Hoof trauma and barefoot

[JaneSteventon]

Hello I have a gelding who has had no shoes on for about seven months now. Hooves hardened up great and working on all surfaces with no problems. But he recently injured his heel, practically sliced it off. The injury has healed great but it looks like his coranet (sp) band has been injured as well and the hoof is not growing down as it should from there. It is his front hoof about midway from the toe and heel. My vet doesn't think it has been injured enough to cause a problem, but i am concerned that the hoof wall will now be permently weak in that area and he will have to be shod. This would be a nightmare due to lack of farriers in the area. Has anyone any experience of this ? Thank you

 

[Tia]

One of my horse's ended up with coronitis after suffering a kick from another horse. I thought his hoof may need paring back however the hoof wall "glued" back to the foot and he was left with a large horizontal line running down his hoof wall. This caused no trouble until it was near the bottom of the hoof and then it was decided to shoe him to help prevent it from snapping off. This worked well and he was only shod the once and then the hoof was long enough to be trimmed level and he went back to being barefoot.

It took just short of a year for the damage to grow out. He is absolutely fine now.

 

[Bri]

My gelding had an old injury to his coronet when we bought him. It's caused his foot to grow in a slightly different way, his hoof is no longer symmetrical. It caused a large sandcrack down his hoof which grew out but he has been left with a permanent ridge. He was happily unshod for around 6 months when I first had him and would have continued that way if I hadn't needed to use studs.
Farrier told me that putting shoes on would actually weaken the area as the nails being driven in would damage it more.
Hope thats helpful, sorry think I just ended up rambling!

 

[JaneSteventon]

Thank you for the replies feel much better now. Fingers crossed mine will be ok.