Farriers at Events

MegaBeast said:
Absolutely not!!! Not only would it lead to people taking the mick but I've only once used an on site farrier in the last 4 years of eventing which cost me £20 (that was smack on 4 years back come to think of it), would have spent a small fortune if I was paying an extra £3 per time to cover the farrier for a service I was ony using very rarely.
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This, entirely. Interesting re farrier fee - we don't pay the farrier anything to be there, we make sure he is generously fed and watered but any money he makes is his only income for the day. He does it partly to lend his support, I'm sure he doesn't make much.

When I have used a farrier to refit a shoe (have always had either the original or a spare) it has ranged from FOC to £15 I think.
 
SpottedCat said:
£15 to refit. Looked like the farrier had stood on one side of the lorry park and thrown the shoe and the nails in the general direction of the horse on the other side though - absolutely lousy job, but I was in no position to complain!
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That made me chuckle!

Went to Blenheim - for eventer trial - and having got there early, asked on site farrier if he had time to remove shoes and add stud holes as my farrier had forgotten (or maybe I had forgotten to ask :)).

Luckily no-one more important had lost a shoe so he set to, did a fab job, took him 45 mins as he had to find new nail holes as well as make holes, and think I paid around £40. Ground was churned up that year so studs were essential.

Daughter's team were placed so it was worth it, and we saw farrier walking round with his family after so showed him the frilly and thanked him again :)
 
The one time one of mine yanked a shoe off (which I had) is cost me £25 at a BE event, took him 5 mins to put back on. I actually ended up changing to him after that, and he's actually one of the cheaper farriers in my area!
 
I was intending once to get my horse shod at an event as I didn't think the yard farrier would have got them done in time before the event, and they desperately needed doing. As it was yard farrier did squeeze my horse in, so event farrier missed out on the cash
 
Our mare decided that whilst Mini TX was screwing the tap into her stud holes that it would be great fun to slam her foot on the floor and break the tap, leaving the thread inside the stud hold. As it was a wet day and she was jumping at Novice we hot footted it to the farrier on site. He took the shoe off and the tap screw out. Told us no charge, so I gave him a tenner for his trouble as Mini TX was hyperventilating at this point.

Plus, he was hot, and I thoughougly enjoyed standing there while he shod the horse ........
 
FfionWinnie said:
I have had a lecture from each farrier so far (pleasure rides, horse completely sound:mad:). I am too lazy to put her boots on as she doesn't wear them for the ride but maybe I should lol
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:eek: What have they said? I'm tempted to quote Tevis Rock statistics of the last few years at the perpetual doubters, but then one just gets told how the UK is different from the US...I just deleted what amounted to a minor rant, which would have been both impolitic, and de-railing to the conversation...

Queenbee, I hope you manage to continue BF! I take your point about the turns on grass, though seeing the way my lot were carrying on today at feeding time (on wet grass), I wonder if we don't worry too much! :D
 
spookypony said:
:eek: What have they said? I'm tempted to quote Tevis Rock statistics of the last few years at the perpetual doubters, but then one just gets told how the UK is different from the US...I just deleted what amounted to a minor rant, which would have been both impolitic, and de-railing to the conversation...

Queenbee, I hope you manage to continue BF! I take your point about the turns on grass, though seeing the way my lot were carrying on today at feeding time (on wet grass), I wonder if we don't worry too much! :D
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One said she is walking on her frog and sole and I will be in for problems and be lucky to make it round the 20km ride(muttered darkly and no more info than that), as far as I understand it they are meant to walk on the frog/sole and the bars aren't they not really the wall on its own. We made it round at the fastest allowed time and she was still sound and striding out at the end and every day since.

Next one said I will just run the rasp round or her feet are really going to crack up. I said er no please don't!!! He didn't and they didn't.

I'm pretty pleased with her feet, she is an APH (coloured QH) and QHs are prone to navicular so I'd rather not shoe her, her feet have gone through two angle changes in 9 months and are looking better and tighter all the time.

I do share QBs worries about jumping on grass but I will report back in Saturday as we are doing it then for the first time, inc a derby bank :eek:!

I don't know enough about it to defend myself so don't bother but I am happy with my choice (she is not my only BF one, well they all are). (You could have pm'd me the rant :p)
 
FfionWinnie said:
One said she is walking on her frog and sole and I will be in for problems and be lucky to make it round the 20km ride(muttered darkly and no more info than that) [...]
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*headdesk* And this person has a professional qualification to work on hooves? ...Unless he was implying that the walls were so worn down that only the frog and sole were in contact with the ground?

No farrier has expressed any worries to me on that front, so far. Not sure what I would do if one did. One needs their signature on the form to compete, so one has to hope that they know what they're doing.
 
some of these farriers seem to be charging a lot, especially seeing as they are paid to be there for the day, they dont volunteer and take away the cash they earn that day. We pay about £150 for the day for a farrier to be at our events (Eland! which may be why some of you had shoes back on for free!)
 
I got charged £50 last week to put a prepared shoe onto a prepared hoof!

Horse had been shod 4 days earlier on other 3 but recovering from abscess on this one so needed a few more days. My farrier prepared foot and made shoe and said to check there would be farrier on site and have it put back on there. It was simply nailed on, 2 minutes - £50.
I dont believe he was getting any payment from the competition and was on call not on duty all day but had only travelled 10 miles to me. Having read above costs I am feeling pretty miffed to say the least but a few people I spoke to agreed I had more than overcharged.
 
I have been charged up to £20 for a refit. I did have a horse barefoot for a while, and never had any problems with the farriers at endurance rides, in fact most of them are quite interested!
 
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