Barefoot . . .

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melle

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I have been reading with interest the comments about going barefoot and Rockley farm. Can anyone offer any advice about wanting to take a TB's shoes off - she has very flat wide TB feet, goes hopping lame if she loses a shoe and last winter couldn't even cope without back shoes on as her feet became badly bruised.

Part of me just thinks don't be daft, there is no way she would cope without shoes. But then I keep reading all these amazing recovery stories about how barefoot has helped. Is there anyone on here who has tried barefoot as a rehabilitation effort but it has not been sucessful or alternatively someone whose horse was sucessfully rehabilitated at Rockley Farm (for example) but found it hard to maintain the correct diet/exercise regime when they left and subsequently had to have shoes put back on?

Thanks
 
she has very flat wide TB feet, goes hopping lame if she loses a shoe and last winter couldn't even cope without back shoes on as her feet became badly bruised.
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Why are her feet so sensitive, why is she going hopping lame without shoes? That tells me that the problem isn't just her feet - it's probably dietary issues, conditioning, habituation to shoes, and possibly borderline laminitis and sole sensitivity, and maybe a range of underlying pathologies going on. Are her heels contracted, is her frog atrophied? Does the farrier touch her frog, or scrape/scoop her soles?

Lots of questions.

The real issue melle is not whether your horse can go barefoot, but whether you can do the barefoot thing. A horse like this needs probably needs careful dietary management and will probably need booted for transition.

I've transitioned all mine to barefoot and there is one important thing I've learned - you can't fix hooves, you can only create the right conditions to grow a far better hoof than the horse has now. One of mine was very sensitive when he came out of shoes, but quite quickly adapted - he grew sole.

Rockley farm has no black magic for the horses that get rehabbed there - it's understanding the undelying reasons for the feet being the way they are, addressing the trim, diet, movement, diet, a range of supportive surfaces and did I mention diet? Oh...and diet. :)
 
I can see from all the posts that it is hard work and you have to follow all the steps to ensure a good result.

She is fed high fibre feed - simple systems grass nuts. She is out 6 or 7 hours November to April in the day. She is fed a broad spectrum vit and min and 150g linseed (she needs this for condition). I guess I wouldn't really know where to start with addressing her diet!

As for the farrier, yes he scrapes her sole and her frog when he shoes her.

Is she likely to be borderline laminitic then? Is that common? She has had shoes on since she was broken in at 4 and a half (now 9) We tried to keep her barefoot but very quickly became sore. She would not have been laminitic then and wasnt turned out on grass except an hour a day.
 
brucea said:
The real issue melle is not whether your horse can go barefoot, but whether you can do the barefoot thing.
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I actually think this is probably the biggest issue! I had my boy's back shoes removed earlier this year and it turned me into a nervous wreck - I barely slept for about a month through worrying about it all, and about him. I started off just looking at his feet but by the end I was totally obsessive. During the time he was without back shoes, I changed farriers (obviously he still needed a farrier as was shod in front) to someone more open minded then made the decision to have his shoes put back on.

My horse really needed boots behind to be comfortable but because he shivers, I wouldn't have been able to reliably put them on (struggles to pick up back feet, particularly RH, and there was no point buying boots if I'd only be able to get them on occasionally..by which I mean about once a month!). I was unlucky with the weather as I took the shoes off just before this drought we now have; the ground hardened up very quickly and he was so uncomfortable, even out in the field. He got very miserable, hopped to the field and back, when in the field he changed from a horse who enjoyed interacting with the others and playing to a horse who spent his entire turnout time standing on the softest part of the field. He stopped enjoying his work, became sore all over his back because he was obviously compensating for soreness. I just couldn't cope with the thought of another few months of this so the shoes went back on.

On the flip side, during his time out of shoes his feet improved massively and are totally different. All of the thrush cleared up, the frog and heel became healthier in just a few weeks, sole more concave and the white line tightened right up. I did learn a HUGE amount about my horse - that he is sensitive to sugar in everything, that he really shouldn't be fed haylage (he now only gets soaked hay), that his grass intake MUST be restricted. I also learnt a lot about diet and he now gets a far better diet than he was getting with what I *hope* are the correct supplements to at least help encourage better hoof quality. The whole episode made me re-evaluate everything - I finally took notice of the nagging doubts I'd had about my farrier and changed to someone else, who is amazing. I am now hoping/ planning that my boy will have a holiday in Oct for 3 months, be roughed off and have his shoes off. At the very least I'd like him to have a shoe holiday each year, let the nail holes grow out, let the blood flow improve to his feet, and I'm quietly hoping that when I bring him back into work in Jan, if I boot in front then I may be able to keep him barefoot this time...
 
Spring grass makes my barefoot tb sensitive (she is rock crunching in the winter). Mag ox helps a lot and I use hoofboots if ecessary. Yes tbs can go barefoot :)
 
The reasons that barefoot doesn't work tend to be

1) Incorrect diet (incorrect for the individual horse).

2) Too much trimming.

3) Too little work.

If your horse is sore without shoes, it will likely be due to thin soles.

If you intended to go barefoot it would be necessary to look at the horse's diet beforehand and be prepared to make changes if needed.

Engage a trimmer/farrier who knows how to trim a barefoot horse - too much trimming and intefering is much, much worse than too little!

Horse will likely need some boots for comfort during the transition.

As Brucea says - Rockley Farm doesn't do anything magical - they allow the body and feet to do their own thing and stop interfering!

There is a book - Feet First, which you may find helpful.

There are many people who have tried barefoot and had to put shoes back on.

The horses that come from Rockley don't tend to have that option anymore.
 
when you say incorrect diet though what do you mean - I think I have her on a good diet - one that suits her cribbing tendancies and ulcer type symptoms, one that I have researched and after trying many other things have settled on as being the most sucessful. How do I know whether it is a 'good' diet for her feet? What do I need to look for?
 
There's a great book called Feet First - it's Nic Barker's book, worth a read - it will tell you lots.

She is fed high fibre feed - simple systems grass nuts. She is out 6 or 7 hours November to April in the day. She is fed a broad spectrum vit and min and 150g linseed (she needs this for condition). I guess I wouldn't really know where to start with addressing her diet!
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Linseed meal - brilliant stuff - 150gr seems low.

Why the grass nuts? Switch to unmolassed, rinsed beet? I'd add in mag ox, a good broad spectrum mineral supplement, brewer's yeast, a yeast like yea-sac (yes feed both becuase BY is dead) consider overnight turnout if you can or see if you can switch her to somewhere with really rough grass, under trees etc. The flat feet are a real giveaway.
 
Frankie on Rockley's blog is a tb failed racehorse and was shod from under 2 years old as he was in training in France.
Like yours he was virtually non weight bearing when he lost a shoe and his feet looked awful. He was on box rest and already on a low sugar diet as he gets a little 'enthusiastic' on sugar so it wasn't just grass that was making him footy.
When the shoes first came off he was very sensitive and needed careful work on different surfaces to strengthen and build up his feet.
He's not especially grass sensitive but I am careful anyway and he likes his hard feed and minerals to be just right.

He certainly wasn't/isn't the easier horse to keep barefoot but as Oberon said going back to shoes for a horse like him wasn't an option so I did what was necessary to make it work. If you look at today's blog you can see how it's all been worthwhile.
 
My tb is barefoot and has been for a year, he used to be hopping crippled if he lost a shoe... November 2009 he had an accident, trod on the inside of his coronet band and split the whole hoof, infection, blood, not good. Farrier looked at it and said it would scar and that by about June I wouldn’t get him to hold a shoe... so I took his shoes off.

I’m the same as you, crib biting ulcer prone tb (Ulcers can also effect the hooves, since his ulcers were treated his hooves have got better) I feed a high fibre (no fun!) diet and I add oil if I need extra calories. Adding Mag-Ox has also made a massive difference to him.

Over winter he’s now rock crunching and in spring and summer he wears front hoof boots. If he started to struggle I’d pop shoes back on no problems but as it is he’s doing really well. His whole action has improve and he has quite a flashy trot now rather than before where he was once called “the worst moving horse I’ve ever seen”.
 
melle said:
when you say incorrect diet though what do you mean - I think I have her on a good diet - one that suits her cribbing tendancies and ulcer type symptoms, one that I have researched and after trying many other things have settled on as being the most sucessful. How do I know whether it is a 'good' diet for her feet? What do I need to look for?
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When I say incorrect diet, I mean incorrect for the individual horse.

For example, I had my horses on HappyHoof and Allen and Page mixes for a long time.

Although they were sound, their feet lacked concavity and I struggled with infections.

Then moved onto Alfalfa pellets and wheat feed and added my own supplements. Their feet and general health became better, but their feet still lacked concavity.

I have just stopped feeding alfalfa after a foreage analysis and an independant nutritionist indicated too much calcium and too little copper and zinc in the diet.

I now mix my own supplement in accordance with this.

It's only been a month - but (in my older boy especially) the feet have changed shape and look better.

So Happy Hoof and alfalfa may sound great and be approved by the Lami Trust - but they are incorrect for my horses' needs.

And yet my friend's mare can have anything at all and her feet are always perfect!
 
As for the farrier, yes he scrapes her sole and her frog when he shoes her.

Is she likely to be borderline laminitic then? Is that common? She has had shoes on since she was broken in at 4 and a half (now 9) We tried to keep her barefoot but very quickly became sore. She would not have been laminitic then and wasnt turned out on grass except an hour a day.
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Well - there is part of your answer - get a new trimmer - or tell the farrier to leave the soles and frogs alone.

Borderline laminitis - generally the term LGL or Low Grade Laminitis is very common. Where does laminitis start? Many think it is when they are in the classic stance, rocked back, feet burning, pulses pounding....but really it is a spectrum that begins with a slight tenderness, reluctance, or even just grumpiness on the left side of the curve and a complete loss of capsule integrity and founder on the right side of the curve.

On the way home from the yard tonight we stopped and watched a herd of around 15 horses - we could see about a third that were just moving stiffly, slightly stumbling on the turns, looking uncomfortable in very slight ways. A couple were swaying slightly on their fronts whern they were standing. All early warning signs.

If your horse has any sensitivity or laminitic tendency - then cutting the frogs and scraping the sole......he needs all the protection she can get between her and the ground so why remove it?

I'm sure the farrier knows best. :rolleyes:
 
I have been riding mine in boots since the winter and just had a set of shoes on today, as I want to do a bit of showing, plus there are other reasons why keeping him barefoot is not simple during the summer as although I can keep him fit by riding him, I can't do the mileage as my riding is often restricted to the field during the week and out somewhere at the weekends, so there isn't much consistency of work.

He is perfectly sound in the field barefoot and I was cantering circles last week on the long grass, but not 100% on stoney ground without boots.

The farrier was very complimentary about his feet, how they have improved so much since having his shoes off in December, (and they weren't bad anyway), the hoof wall has thickened, his frogs have improved and the concavity has improved a lot, and his back hooves have altered quite a lot for the better.

I am going to do this in future. Boots are wonderful for road work, trotting along, no filled legs! They have also been fine this spring as the ground has been so dry, I had a lovely ride in some woods last week. So shoes off in the winter, much safer in the snow, then road work in boots and back into shoes if necessary.

The great thing about boots is that you can go for miles in them, and the more work you do the better the feet get.
 
I've not had any reason to try them, but you can get a sort of bandage that you wrap around the hoof and then wet it and it goes hard, a bit like a plaster cast (may be called hoof cast or equicast or something similar). Boots aren't designed to be left on for long periods of time, but these things are, so if you have a horse that is very sore coming out of shoes they sound like a good transition tool.
 
Thanks for all your replies. Really helpful. Dizzle - was your boy really sore when you first took the shoes off?

In the past I have always taken horse shoes off for 3 months over the winter to improve their feet then fronts back on if their work warrants them. But farrier not open to barefoot suggestion with mare at all. Says she will struggle.
 
Because they are taught that the line of the horse's pastern and front of the hoof should be unbroken (straight) and they have to drop the height of the toe to make that happen. The fact is that some horses are either not ready for that line to be unbroken because their heels are still too weak (most) or they simply aren't built that way.

It is very rare that sole callous should be removed and if it lames the horse the first time only an idiot would repeat the same trim and lame the horse again.
 
cptrayes said:
Because they are taught that the line of the horse's pastern and front of the hoof should be unbroken (straight) and they have to drop the height of the toe to make that happen. The fact is that some horses are either not ready for that line to be unbroken because their heels are still too weak (most) or they simply aren't built that way.
Sorry to hijack here, but I'm interested in the last part of this.... I have two with really good bare feet, and lovely hoof-pastern axes, and one with feet that do the job for him but look quite rubbish. He hasn't had shoes on for seven years now, and he still has a broken-back hoof-pastern axis. When you say 'they aren't built that way', have you come across others like this? He did have x-rays of one foot a few years ago, and the bones actually looked more in alignment than I would have thought from his external appearance. I don't understand why that would be though, because the pedal bone should in theory be at exactly the same angle as the hoof wall.....
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Solo I think the problem is that so many of the horses just haven't read the right books :). Whenever I whinge to my resident engineer about asymmetry in my horses he says "YOU aren't symmetric, why on earth do you expect them to be!!". I think this is a bit personal myself, having one ear half an inch higher than the other, among other things!, but I see his point :) :) :)

In my book, if a horse has a broken back or broken forward hoof pastern axis after seven sound years without shoes, then I would say he simply is not built to have the classic straight axis that we look for, and that trying to make him have that would be asking for trouble. Yes, he may not stay sound as long as a horse with a perfect conformation, but in shoes, forced to be "straight" when straight is not what he needs, I'd bet my bottom dollar he'd be unsound earlier than if he is allowed to make the best foot he can for his own particular set of joints.

For the life of me I can't see why, just as some of us are born with one leg longer than the other, or joints out of alignment, or loose ligaments, horses should not be the same. For example, I was born with lax ligaments and I can dislocate my own thumbs and put them back, and when I was a bit younger I could put my leg behind my neck :). If a horse was born with longish pasterns and lax ligaments, then why would they not be broken forward in the hoof/pastern axis? I have had one very severe example of this and she was sound after 2 years racing and I reschooled her over a year to jump and do RC stuff. I sold her sound and as far as I know she is still sound, and still broken forward.

With your horse, broken back, for some reason he also grows thicker toe towards the bottom of his foot than the top? Unless you've had him all his life, you may never know why that is, and even if you had, perhaps it's just "him"? Maybe he just grows the best foot he can for the joints he has available to him. If he's sound, long term, he's sound, and personally I'd be inclined to believe that he knows what he needs better than any human. (Though I would bevel that toe to bring the breakover point as far back as I could get it, provided he stays sound with that trim.)

I have one who is a mild version of yours. He has a terrible scar right over his inside lateral cartilage from when he tried to climb out of the window of the lorry importing him from Holland (it's one of his endearing little traits :) ) He also grows a toe which is thicker towards the bottom and can look broken back, particularly in summer for some reason. But he is sound and has so far been sound 5 years, and I don't intend to try and dictate to him what foot he should grow. I just match his roadwork to his growth and avoid trimming artificially, so he has the optimum foot to cope with the damage he has done himself.
 
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Bailey my horse is a Rockley Farm rehab. And like what has already been said, i have no option, barefoot MUST work for us as he cannot function in shoes. Rockley Farm is for horses that have come to the end of the road lameness wise. My boy had been lame for 2 years, Rockley Farm was our very last option. Getting your head around the barefoot diet and minerals and work is not easy, hours and hours of reading. But for me it has given me my horse back and i wouldn't change a thing. He hacks, hunts, and does everything a shod horse does. Good luck with what you do.x
 
My horse, Solomon, is also a rockley farm rehab
He was diagnoised with navicular and had been lame for 18 months + previous to that. Tried all traditional treatments available, tildren, steriods, navilux, box rest, remedial shoeing and nothing worked.
I was told he would never be able to be ridden again and probably would not make it through the summer. He was assessed, at his worse, as 4/5 10ths lame when he went to Rockley.
He came home at the end of January a different horse who had been hunting and has been in full work since he came home.
We have had a slight relapse in the last couple of weeks but the difference I have seen in him in unbelievable and he would not be here now if I had not sent him to Rockley. And even though we are struggling at the moment, I know we will manage to get through it as he has done once already. It is hard but as Lainey said, there is no other option for my horse either so we have to make it work for him.
 
luciejkk I'm sure you already know that a relapse at this time of year is far more likely to be grass related than the original navicular lameness. Have you been able to identify what has set Solomon off?
 
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