Opinions on these feet please?

Casey76

Casey76

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These feet belong to my new mare, who I bought at the beginning of May. On Thursday this week she had her first "barefoot" trim, which came 6 weeks after the last trim by my farrier (and first trim she had with me)

And sorry in advance I think these photos are going to come out huge!


Right fore
Pre/post trim







Right hind:








Left fore
Post/pre trim








Left hind:







Any my beautiful girlie :)
 
Front ones look nice and laterally balanced but a little broken back, but I'm sure this will correct itself in time :)

Looks like she takes a little more weight on the insides of her hinds, but if it's not too bad, then it shouldn't be a worry :)

Very beautiful girlie :D
 
They are too long. Far too much height in the hoof wall and frog not properly ground bearing. You might also consider asking your farrier to stop slicing lumps off her frogs.
 
Trim was by a (albeit fairly recently qualified) DAEP.

I can only presume he didn't take so much off, as there is already a significant change in her angles, by lowering her heels a lot. Although she us perfectly sound at the moment, I'd be reluctant to take any more off, at least for a few days, to let her adjust to where she us now.
 
Heaven help horse owners who have to use a trimmer if a DAEP sculpted those frogs :(

If you think the trim us right, can I ask why you posted asking for opinions?
 
I'm loathe to comment really as I know zero about barefoot trimming, but the angle of the hoof looks all wrong, far too sloping and with all the weight on the heels.
Here the retired horses get rare trims as their feet wear down on the granite soil naturally into the shape that best keeps them sound and they don't look like your horse's feet at all.
I get retired horses arrive with soft feet which have been problematic their whole lives, within 6 months they have rock hard natural shaped feet that cope with stones/rocks undulating ground. Many that arrive lame with soft soles never go lame again.
My first thought on looking at your photos (sorry) was without shoes that horse is going to go lame...
Remember I know nothing about barefoot, but I do have an awful lot of horses who are unshod.
 
I'm not saying I think the trim us correct. There are lots of things about thi trim which I was surprised at (eg, leaving the quarters so long)

She is exfoliating like mad at the moment, so I'll probably run a rasp over the walls in a couple if days, I'm just not confident to do much more than that :/

@hh, the mare had been with me for less than 2 months. Prior to her coming to me her feet had been very infrequently trimmed and were extremely long. We don't have granite soil here, we have nice soft clay soil, you can see that the angle if growth is quite different at the top of the hoof, so she is trying to grow a better shaped hoof.
 
My first opinion was that the hoof walls were too long and would be acting as a 'shoe'. However, IMO, if the heel height was brought down the toe would be too high and the not yet strong enough palmar aspect of the foot would be forced to load.

What sort of work is your horse doing? I'd be tempted to walk the horse and let him/her wear and balance his own feet; possibly booting if required.

Change takes time.

FWIW I didn't have great experiences the two times I used a DAEP. She wasn't, IMO, very effective and couldn't confidently answer any of my questions or concerns. I know that you get good and bad within every organisation but UKNHCP was the only trimmer that I felt confident with. It's all trial & error on the very steep learning curve of this barefoot thing, or so I've discovered.

Have a read of the Rockley blog and the "celery trim" ;)

Very pretty pony too!
 
Hi just to hi jack slightly - TPO was very interested to hear your daep experience, i moved to a new yard 8mths ago and it turned out to be very pro barefoot (unbeknown to me at the time) so when I took my ned's shoes off, which I have to say was influenced by the info I was picking up there, the chap used was a highly experienced and well recommended daep who seems to have done a great job with my ned. Hence that being my only experience of a trim that works well for the horse, I would love to know what you feel the difference is with a UKNHCP trimmer as there seem to be very few listed as qualified on their website and absolutely none in the south east especially kent area where I am based. My DAEP is absolutely snowed under with work and I would be loath to have a farrier do a barefoot trim and don't like the sound of mustang trims etc so would really appreciate any info in case of future need, there seem to be so many methods of trimming turning up it gets quite confusing for newbie's like me and having made some bad decisions on which farrier to use, I would love to know that I am not making the same mistake with the type of trim my horse is having!
 
Sorry just seen this Beth.

IMO there will be good and bad in every field. In my experience the EP when I first used them in 2008 lamed my horse with the trim and gave bad/ wrong advice. However I knew nothing about BF at that time and only tried it as a clutching at straws thing. Years later after finding out about bf properly I got her back to my already bf horse. She couldn't answer my diet questions and IMO the trim wasn't up to much. She seemed really nervous and unsure so generally didn't inspire confidence; especially by talking about how all of her's were always lame!

I could notice a positive difference in the feet after the UKNHCP had been and they were able to answer all my questions,
 
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