Barefoot help needed

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Pinkpeeper

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I have recently bourght a 5yr old welsh d who has never had shoes on before. She has pretty much just lived in a field all her life, and her feet were long with low heels when i got her 2 months ago. She has had them trimed 6 weeks ago by our farrier who is brill with our other barefoot pony.

She then developed a bit of thrush, which has now cleared up. At this point she was foot sore on stones and concrete. Vet advised leave her in for a bit (fields are like a bog) which we did. She is fine on a soft surface and on concrete, but is still footy on stoney ground. Her feet look as though they have worn down to quickly, they are short and look like they really need to grow.

She is fed haylage at night and is out during the day (no real grass at the moment), the only other feed she gets is a tiny handfull of alpha a oil and tiny bit of speedybeat morning and night.

Now part of me is thinking, get some shoes on her, however i do love having our other one barefoot and she has the best feet ever. And i am wondering if anyone can advise anything i can try before we go for shoes.

Analysing haylage is not going to work as i can not be certain she will get the same haylage each week. Also i know that road work would help her but unfortunatly i can only do this at weekends until it gets light in the evenings again.

Im not really looking at getting some boots for her, the reason being that she still has to walk down a stoney path to the field and if i have to put boots on and take them off just to turn out/bring in, then im afraid she will be getting shoes on.

All help welcome and thanks for reading.
 
A barefoot horse's feet will look short, but it doesn't necessarily mean they're too short ;). I would start by cutting out the alfalpha - some don't do well on it - and adding a mineral supplement such as pro-hoof http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/PRO-HOOF-1-8KG-HIGH-CONCENTRATED-EQUINE-SUPPLEMENT-/280763394528?_trksid=p4340.m185&_trkparms=algo%3DDLSL%252BSIC.NPJS%26its%3DI%26itu%3DUCI%252BUA%26otn%3D10%26pmod%3D280723407424%252B280723407424%26po%3D%26ps%3D63%26clkid%3D5418257368349665165 or equimins meta balance (you have to phone them as it's not on their website). If she's lived in a field her whole life until now she may not have had a chance to build sufficient sole to cope with the stones - this will take time, but is perfectly achievable :).
 
Thanks for the advise.

No more alpha a from today then, she only really has a feed so she feels loved like the others.

I know its like asking how longs a piece of string, but any idea on how long it might take before she isnt foot sore on stones?
 
When her toes grew too long her heels will have still been growing at the appropriate rate but they will have been growing forward with the long toe. My point is that the pony will have been doing everything right - but her circumstances (LOF disease) will have been causing the wrong angles of growth.

As you have a BF pony already I am sure you will appreciate her hooves should be short (2.5 -3 inches long) and the if you look at the sole view - her wall should be a few mm above the live sole plane and no more. They cannot be any shorter than the internal structures dictate without severe lameness.

A healthy BF horse on an appropriate diet, with an appropriate trim will NEVER wear their hooves too short as they will lay down tissue in response to stimulation.

If she has thrush then she will be footy and sore.

The inability to resist thrush and the footiness are also dietry signs. As mentioned in the previous post - the mineral supplements recommended will make all the difference to a BF horse.

I echo that alfalfa is not well used by some horses and is best avoided unless the horse is in very heavy work (it's a legume, not a grass like hay or haylage).

If you are not comfortable in changing the diet, then shoe.
 
Thats very helpfull, thank you.

Whats confusing me a bit now is that she hardly has any hard feed at all, i will cut out the alpha a, but will it make much of a difference as she only has a tiny amount at the moment?

Will give the pro hoof a try to, is it this that will make the most different?

My vet said that as she has only been in a field all her life just walking from the field to stable twice a day is putting her feet under more pressure than she has ever had before and it will take time for her feet to adjust. Is this something you would agree with?

By the way, the pony is in work, being ridden in the school most days, and up until recently was hacking out but i have stopped that as she is now foot sore.
 
Removing the alpha a may or may not make a difference - some horses are more sensitive than others, but imho it's worth removing it in case your horse is one of the sensitive ones. Sufficient minerals in the correct quantities can make a huge difference, too. I feed pro hoof, as it's one of the few available to provide the right minerals in good quantities.

It sounds like your vet thinks that it is a case of thin soles, which I would think is fairly likely. Building up your pony's work on surfaces she's comfortable on will also be key in toughening up the soles. It's hard to say how long it will take, I'm afraid - all horses are different. My 8yo TB had shoes taken off 3 months ago (he'd previously been shod for at least 4-5 years). He's just now starting to become comfortable over stones.

Good luck with your pony, it isn't always easy not shoeing, but the benefits are massive :)
 
Pinkpeeper said:
Thats very helpfull, thank you.

Whats confusing me a bit now is that she hardly has any hard feed at all, i will cut out the alpha a, but will it make much of a difference as she only has a tiny amount at the moment?

Will give the pro hoof a try to, is it this that will make the most different?

My vet said that as she has only been in a field all her life just walking from the field to stable twice a day is putting her feet under more pressure than she has ever had before and it will take time for her feet to adjust. Is this something you would agree with?

By the way, the pony is in work, being ridden in the school most days, and up until recently was hacking out but i have stopped that as she is now foot sore.
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You're vet's thought is fair. The hooves adapt to their workload and terrain. If she's done very little, the hooves will get used to that. But they WILL adjust to the new workload and terrain (providing we can get the diet that makes her feel comfortable enough to work).

I did very little with my Tank for a while and then started hacking on the roads again. He was sound and happy but the day after a longer hack he developed a 'shoe' on each wall.
It was because his hooves felt they weren't fully ready for that amount of work and put a protection of the sole in place.
A week later and the 'shoes' had disappeared. His hooves were ready for whatever I could throw at them.

They are THAT dynamic and changes happen THAT quickly!

So when things grumble on for a while - it means something isn't right.

If the pony has (like all the domestic horses out there) been on the same fields and eating the same grass - then she is taking in the same mineral imbalances in those fields.

Although every field is different in it's quirks - high iron and low copper and zinc tends to be common in the UK. Copper and zinc have plenty to do with metabolism, skin, hooves etc and high iron blocks what little copper and zinc there may be.
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Unfortunately most mineral supplements have too much iron to be much help:(

Pro Hoof and Equimins Meta Balance are both new products, formulated for this problem.

I can't feed anything with alfalfa as my forage's calcium is already too high and it pushes everything out of whack!
 
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