Hurrah, barefoot haflinger girlie does first endurance ride!

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lachlanandmarcus

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Just so proud of my girl, who is 6 and who I got at 3 unbroken and backed with my RI, having bought her from breeders still in field with mum.

Today we did our first endurance 20km 'pleasure' ride, and apart from a distinct lack of brakes for the first mile or so :-OO, she was a star!

She vetted fine before and after (heart rate 40 before, 46 after) and we came in exactly between the min and max times.

All this with no shoes, and just a £10 farrier trim. 90% of the route was trot and canter, up some steep braes and rocky tracks as well as tarmac and grass.

I'm just a really chuffed haffiemum! I know Haffies sometimes have reputation of being stubborn etc so just wanted to put the other side of the coin, she is the most loving, talkative, funny and loveable pony Ive ever met....

here she is stuffing her face straight out of the Healthy Hooves sack afterwards :-)))))
Liesel3corrachreeendurance2May10.jpg
 
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Well done, great mane, wish my girl's was as thick, my lovely Haffy did a fab ride today too, and have dressage tomorrow although I think she is in season so it could be interesting!
 
Well done you! Friend has a Haffie and does lots of endurance - as well as dressage and driving! He's a real allrounder.
 
Well done to both of you - now that's an advert and a half for 'Healthy Hooves' :)

Could I ask you how you do keep your horse's hooves so strong and healthy? My girl is barefoot and I've started hacking her out more, I've only had her 5 months (1st horse too) I want to know how to keep her barefoot and how much work I'll be able to do - I really don't want to put shoes on her, her last owners kept her unshod too, although I don't know how much work she did.
 
HandTS said:
Well done, great mane, wish my girl's was as thick, my lovely Haffy did a fab ride today too, and have dressage tomorrow although I think she is in season so it could be interesting!
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Her manes great, but she does like to rub and itch that lovely tail and wees down it too so it lets the side down a bit.....

Maybe the mares season will allow her to simply show more extravagant elevated paces to the boys? The only dressage test I did with Liesel was when she was just backed, a walk and trot one indoors and she spent the entire test poking her nose in the air braying at the other horses and then trying to eat all the cakes they had unwisely arranged on a table at 'A' :-OOOO.....
 
HollyB66 said:
Well done to both of you - now that's an advert and a half for 'Healthy Hooves' :)

Could I ask you how you do keep your horse's hooves so strong and healthy? My girl is barefoot and I've started hacking her out more, I've only had her 5 months (1st horse too) I want to know how to keep her barefoot and how much work I'll be able to do - I really don't want to put shoes on her, her last owners kept her unshod too, although I don't know how much work she did.
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Shes never been shod which helps, but she does have very flat round feet which grow very slowly, so she does, or did, feel the rough going. We used Boa hoof boots which seem to fit round shallow hooves well, and they were really good (and have an easy dial twist tightening mechanism, no spanners!). I used them for about a year, and then started going without them in spring and autumn, and then stopped altogether.

She will always take the softer ground route if its available (mainly so she can bomb along and sweep me off under tree branches :-)) but by building up with hoof boots and only increasing the work gradually, her hooves have definitely got much thicker soles and she doesnt have that 'feely ouchy' moment that gravelly roads would give in her first summer of ridden work.

We are lucky here tho, we live on an unsurfaced track and most of our hacking is on forest tracks, moors and some roads.

I did feed farriers formula and all sorts to start with but it was so expensive and such a faff I decided to dump it all and try her on Dengie Healthy Hooves and its been just as good if not better. She loved it and the big shod (im very much horses for courses on shoeing and he does well with shoes) hunter boy also then demanded it as his feed, they both adore it! It also makes their hooves grow more and mane and tail as well. Cant praise it highly enough.

hope this is some help. if she ever had problems I would def use a good barefoot trimmer but there hasnt been the need yet.
 
Good news! I was meant to do the Beachy Head EGB ride this morning but decided against it with all that rain we had!
 
Congratulations to you and Liesel from a fellow hafi owner. My girl is also very talkative, loves her food (and everybody else's) and likes to scratch her tail. Breed traits do you think? She's doing well barefoot too. Love the photo!
 
fireflymac said:
Congratulations to you and Liesel from a fellow hafi owner. My girl is also very talkative, loves her food (and everybody else's) and likes to scratch her tail. Breed traits do you think? She's doing well barefoot too. Love the photo!
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I think its quite common but some do and some dont, there were 2 other haffies at the ride, one has done loads of endurance (hes also quite a bit trimmer than fatty Liesel so gives her something to emulate!).Both had lovely manes AND tails.
 
hurrah I bought the photo and theyve just sent it through!
(this was in oops no brakes part at the start, I dont always try to remove horses teeth in this way nor do my feet look as though I am hoping to collect baskets on them!). Exciting tho, you know you're a passenger when ponios prick their ears that much.....!

FOX_7754_dg12.jpg
 
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