Cracked hooves

[cm2581]

My two horses have been barefoot for over a year now and have had great feet up until about a week or two ago when cracks started appearing in my younger mare's feet (both front and one back so far). The feet are not long and she is not lame. The strangest thing is that these cracks are vertical but in the middle of the hoof, not starting from the bottom! What on earth is causing this? They seem to be pretty deep!Has never happened before, shod or unshod and I've had her for 6 years! Any clues?

 

[Tamba]

hmm, I would use Keratex,
but, cant think, but a change in diet, that would cause them to crack all of a sudden,
would ask your farrier, and see if he has any clues,
farriers formaula, might be the thing to improve the hoof quality.

 

[brucea]

Are her feet flared at all?

I would not worry about them if she is not sore and just let them grow out.

 

[Meandtheboys]

sorry can not comment.............but agree with tamba Keratex is brilliant!!

 

[Kallibear]

Toby devloped them.

Has you horse has a change in mangement (feed/workload/foot conditioning) about 6months ago (poss more if the foot growth is slow)

Toby had a huge change in management: starting work for the first time in his life and being exposed to lots of hard surfaces.

His foot growth and quality changed dramaticallly, becoming much tighter, thicker and tougher. The old growth below even looked different.

About 6months later, when the new growth was half way down, the old and new seperated, leaving horizontal cracks at the front and running a couple of inches around towards the back.

He was never sore or sorry and I suspect it's due to the different properties the old rubbish hoof and the new superhoof, in terms of water absorbtion, expanding and contracting, etc.

It's now grow out completely and his hooves are all new 'superhoof'

 

[Cobbysmum]

I have a tb with extremely poor hooves which had cracks from day 1. I now feed Formula4Feet and rub cornucrescine round the coronary band and Effol on the rest of the hooves daily. He is now just about crack free and my farrier finally has some hoof to work with at each shoeing.

 

[lucy1984]

[ QUOTE ]
The strangest thing is that these cracks are vertical but in the middle of the hoof, not starting from the bottom!

[/ QUOTE ]

Izzy has the exact same thing.

Her hooves look healthy, yet she has some surface cracks too. Ive not long noticed them.