Hoof question

[Wizpop]

Appreciate this would probably be better with photos but, till I get some, here goes.
I’ve had my horse a good few months now and when I bought him I would say that he was well shod, in that I didn’t notice anything untoward about his feet - obviously I’m not a farrier/ vet but have always looked at feet quite closely.

It was soon clear that he has deep clefts and central sulcus which can make him prone to thrush, and once my farrier had shod him, I was more aware of the shape of his feet, as in not being round and a bit pigeon toed on one foot. Recently he has had his shoes off ( temporarily) and his feet don’t really look a good shape to my eye.

My question is; can anything be done to improve this shape of foot? Given that he is now rising 8. My gut feeling is that his feet looked better when I first bought him- but was that a “cosmetic fix”? My current farrier ( who was horses previous farrier but before shoeing in sales livery), has not said anything other that that he is prone to thrush for reasons already mentioned. His approach is to put side clips on the front feet to make the toe in less noticeable- he didn’t have side clips when I first got him.

 

[ester]

I'd suspect it was just dressing the outside to make it look straighter perhaps.
Generally you don't mess with pigeon toes once a horse is in adulthood as it just upsets the system.

 

[sbloom]

He's prone to thrush because his heels and frogs are contracted, too many farriers treat low grade thrush as normal and "fine", it's not. Read all you can, on here and Google, on hoof function, hoof balance, heel function. Look at good barefoot articles, look at The Equine Documentalist and Progressive Equine Services on FB...you are entering a rabbit hole, but it's SUCH an important one. Once you feel you know a bit more you can start to decide if it's worth talking to and working with this farrier, which can work well, but sometimes because it's them that essentially allowed the problem to build up, they're not the person to fix it. If you go barefoot there are trimmers as well as farriers, which you will discover.

 

[Wizpop]

Thank you sbloom. That is exactly what I was wondering re the contracted heels and thrush. He is shod in front in an attempt by the farrier to keep the foot that is pigeon toed in better balance. This was his advice to horses previous owner. Yes and do need to, and will, research more into this as his feet just don’t look right- thank you.

 

[Wizpop]

I'd suspect it was just dressing the outside to make it look straighter perhaps.
Generally you don't mess with pigeon toes once a horse is in adulthood as it just upsets the system.

Hello Ester, thanks for your reply ( missed it somehow yesterday!)
Just to clarify, I’m really more concerned about the contracting heels and deep clefts / sulcus than 5he pigeon toe as That, as you say, is now “set” at his age.