ycbm
Overwhelmed
I got the following message from someone who is concerned that the forum is still a bit Wild West about barefoot and that people might criticise. Please help me prove them wrong. I don't know everything and I don't like giving one to one advice to people without seeing the horse. I hope they will forgive me posting this for them, I have anonymised it.
I was wondering if I could possibly pick your brains with regards to one of my horses.
Since early this year he has been off on one of his hinds and one of his fronts.
We seem to have the hind end issues sorted, but as a result he is more lame on his fronts, picked up by Vet in September as a shoeing issue.
Different Vet has sorted the hind end, but now wants him shod with bars, pads and wedges. I want to take him barefoot, he is absolutely against me doing this, as is my partner.
The initial problem I will have with going against the Vet is that I will be seeing him monthly for follow ups. I'm a stubborn git, so not worried at all about him being cross, more that I don't want to upset him as I still want him to continue with the hind end issues. I have recently changed farriers, new farrier is great, probably couldn't give two hoots, as in whatever I decide to do he will be fine with.
At the moment he is in at night and turned out in a sand arena in the daytime. He has oat chaff and high fibre haylage to eat. He is a native x tb and a very good doer.
My questions are, do I need to change the diet before taking barefoot. He is lame so I don't think I could do anything with regards to exercise/conditioning his feet just yet. I am in a place that's pretty much frozen all winter, should I wait till Spring to take the shoes off? Would you get the feet trimmed or leave well alone for a bit? Do I keep him in until he is comfortable enough to go in the arena?
Sorry for this very long message and loads of questions. I feel so strongly that unless I do this I will be looking at pts within a year. Because I am going to get zero support I need as much information as I can before doing it.
There is probably loads more stuff that I can't think of at the moment.
I was wondering if I could possibly pick your brains with regards to one of my horses.
Since early this year he has been off on one of his hinds and one of his fronts.
We seem to have the hind end issues sorted, but as a result he is more lame on his fronts, picked up by Vet in September as a shoeing issue.
Different Vet has sorted the hind end, but now wants him shod with bars, pads and wedges. I want to take him barefoot, he is absolutely against me doing this, as is my partner.
The initial problem I will have with going against the Vet is that I will be seeing him monthly for follow ups. I'm a stubborn git, so not worried at all about him being cross, more that I don't want to upset him as I still want him to continue with the hind end issues. I have recently changed farriers, new farrier is great, probably couldn't give two hoots, as in whatever I decide to do he will be fine with.
At the moment he is in at night and turned out in a sand arena in the daytime. He has oat chaff and high fibre haylage to eat. He is a native x tb and a very good doer.
My questions are, do I need to change the diet before taking barefoot. He is lame so I don't think I could do anything with regards to exercise/conditioning his feet just yet. I am in a place that's pretty much frozen all winter, should I wait till Spring to take the shoes off? Would you get the feet trimmed or leave well alone for a bit? Do I keep him in until he is comfortable enough to go in the arena?
Sorry for this very long message and loads of questions. I feel so strongly that unless I do this I will be looking at pts within a year. Because I am going to get zero support I need as much information as I can before doing it.
There is probably loads more stuff that I can't think of at the moment.
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