Proper answer to the barefoot trimming post

criso

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... the fact that farriers are reluctant to charge a decent price for a trim. So it makes more sense to shoe horses,unless you are one of the few who are so passionate about the natural capabilities of the hoof that you don't mind not earning much!!!!!!!

That makes sense.

One of the things I found when I was using a farrier was I was made to feel like a second class citizen because it was 'only a trim', So I had to wait till he was shoeing a horse on the yard to get mine seen.

I would rather have paid a bit extra and get the same importance attached to my horse as the shod ones.
 

tallyho!

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for any hoof anoraks who, like me, need to get a life on a Sat night this has a few points about the divots. Rick Burten is a US farrier.
http://www.chronofhorse.com/forum/showthread.php?t=126474&page=4

Ha ha!! What a ridiculous OP!!! Anyway, thank you for that paddy, it is interesting it is thought that HKH is a development over time. My 10mo has this and has probably had it since birth, only in one foot. The "toe-rocker" hypothesis does not fit neither as she was trimmed for the very first time at 8mo... surprisingly good feet (still, quite long) thanks to a fairly natural upbringing across fairly varied terrain. The notch would have had to have been there in the first place to disturb the otherwise straight pattern of growth around the perimeter of the hoof.
 

tallyho!

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HA! Tell me about it! It may just be this particular area(South West) but there are too many people doing horses on a budget who would rather spend their money on leatherwork,clothing etc, rather than their horse's feet!
You would not go into a motorbike shop and say....'I rescued this bike,I have 2 others to keep on the road. Its only a little bike so can you do me half price tyres,because I really can't afford my hobby.'

Having said that,there are also excellent clients who insist on paying more than the asking price because they value the skill and knowledge they receive. (I have to say this attitude is more prevailant amongst barefoot owners.)
Off to find my body protector and helmet.:rolleyes:

It is, and I think it could be because the majority arrive at barefoot's doorstep desperate to save a friends life, and have already been searching for the answer and have made the jump from "horses need shoes" to "do horses need shoes?"... like me.

Gone are those blissfully ignorant days when I just provided farrier with tea & biscuit and let him get on with it.

One of the things I found when I was using a farrier was I was made to feel like a second class citizen because it was 'only a trim', So I had to wait till he was shoeing a horse on the yard to get mine seen.

I would rather have paid a bit extra and get the same importance attached to my horse as the shod ones.

£10 pasture trim vs £65 a set... no wonder! :D:D

Thank goodness there were some bfs near me, thats all I can say.
 

HuntingPink

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Farriers take years and years to learn their skill.

Barefoot trimmers take months.

But we should all be putting our trust in these people and disgarding our farriers?!

1. Farriers take 4 years to learn how to SHOE a horse and do the metalwork. They do not do 4 years learning how to trim.

2. The barefoot trimming diploma is a 2 year course.

3. Because properly trained barefoot trimmers do a better job than some farriers. My farrier couldn't keep mine sound barefoot because he didn't understand a performance trim, only a pasture trim. My barefoot trimmer has worked wonders and they are now sound enough to ride on roads and on stony paths barefoot, they also jump quite happily on grass, even wet grass.
 

A Guilding

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1. Farriers take 4 years to learn how to SHOE a horse and do the metalwork. They do not do 4 years learning how to trim.

2. The barefoot trimming diploma is a 2 year course.

3. Because properly trained barefoot trimmers do a better job than some farriers.

Im not a good enough typer to get involved in a debate. :D
 

cptrayes

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No, go on then, cptrayes. Explain away the OPs point:

Farriers take years and years to learn their skill.

Barefoot trimmers take months.

But we should all be putting our trust in these people and disgarding our farriers?!

Sorry for the delay Cedars, I missed that you had asked me this early on.

What you need to understand is that most farriers spend no time at all in their apprenticeship with a Master with really hardworking barefoot horses. They never see a hunter like mine or the many others, or eventers or long distance horses. They don't understand how many miles of tarmac an ushod horse can do. They don't realise just how incredibly short hardworking barefoot feet look. Too many of them don't even realise that you should not normally remove sole callous from a barefoot horse's foot during a trim.

If your farrier did get that kind of training, great. If he has learnt it since, great. But until the Worshipful Company of Farriers pull their fingers out and teach their apprentices, all of them, how hardworking barefoot feet look, how to alter the feed of a horse that is not coping, and that taking the shoes off a navicular horse is usually much more effective than putting eggbars on it, then anyone trusting in their farrier is putting their faith in pure chance that they had a Master with hardworking barefooters (which are rare), or have put themselves out to learn later.

If the Worshipful company of Farriers brought their training up to date the trimming organisations would disappear and everyone would know where they stood.
 
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ester

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IMO although we can bandy about that farriers do 4 years training (in comparison to what bf trimmers do) a lot of that is shoeing horses in practice, sometimes with the boss and later on sometimes not.

I was curious to find out what the breakdown of that was (and a nosey at the syllabus!) how much theory training farriers did, ie in the classroom learning stuff about feet rather than as an apprentice out shoeing horses with their boss (who obviously is training them as well but amongst the day to day shoeing of horses).

It's 23 weeks apparently http://www.wcf.org.uk/files/WCF Examination Manual.pdf.
Including doing IT and business studies ;) and Application of number and communication :)D at the last one) as well as learning how to make lots of different sorts of shoes. So I wonder if that starts making the actual 'learning' hours more comparable.

Just a musing!
 

moorman

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I so did not want to get into this thread but…..
1) I realised when I finished my apprenticeship !!!!! Years ago I had not been well prepared for what was to come.
2) Since being asked to help apprentices get through the existing exam I realise we have come on very little from those days, other than the improved quality of the ’readymade’ shoe
3) Until we have a system similar to the vets, ( as we to come under the animal welfare act) whereby the student attends collage for 3 years ( under good tutorage) and then is assigned to a master for a years practical going on to take finals ( which should include shoeing a horse all round and explaining your actions) then a probation period with at least 2 assessments, we will carry on taking ‘pot luck’ as to the consistency of skill within my profession
4) When I decided after 38 years of shoeing that barefoot was for me a better way forward, I took myself back to school and found that if I wanted to offer a barefoot service that included knowledge on Nutrition, condition and trimming I had to be a lot better informed than when I became a farrier.
5)There will always be good and bad in all professions but I have been fighting within farriery
( including in my book which was not loved by the powers that be) for a better teaching system that will produce at least a minimum standard.
6) Barefoot is not about trimming, the better the horse the less trimming you have to do
 

sbloom

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IMO although we can bandy about that farriers do 4 years training (in comparison to what bf trimmers do) a lot of that is shoeing horses in practice, sometimes with the boss and later on sometimes not.

I was curious to find out what the breakdown of that was (and a nosey at the syllabus!) how much theory training farriers did, ie in the classroom learning stuff about feet rather than as an apprentice out shoeing horses with their boss (who obviously is training them as well but amongst the day to day shoeing of horses).

It's 23 weeks apparently http://www.wcf.org.uk/files/WCF Examination Manual.pdf.
Including doing IT and business studies ;) and Application of number and communication :)D at the last one) as well as learning how to make lots of different sorts of shoes. So I wonder if that starts making the actual 'learning' hours more comparable.

Just a musing!

I so did not want to get into this thread but…..
3) Until we have a system similar to the vets, ( as we to come under the animal welfare act) whereby the student attends collage for 3 years ( under good tutorage) and then is assigned to a master for a years practical going on to take finals ( which should include shoeing a horse all round and explaining your actions) then a probation period with at least 2 assessments, we will carry on taking ‘pot luck’ as to the consistency of skill within my profession

Exactly. Farriery has a four year apprenticeship which is not actually at all the same as four years' training.

In my trade the SMS training is seen as the be all and end all, but we all know there are bad SMS fitters and great non-SMS fitters. For now I'm staying with the non-SMS for many reasons.
 

A Guilding

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AG please!

It's

"I'm not a good enough typist to get involved in a debate"

:D

You're one of the good ones, please don't stop helping us!

Yep confirms my point, I have only been rwriting for four years.
I see my role as to Improve things not knock them.
Where expanded Knowledge can be helpful I will share it.
I do not care for anyone who feels that there is only negative in one aspect and positive in another.
I spend a lot of time involved in the improvement of myself and others.
The system is the system.
And it is all about trimming, if you can read a foot, if you can read a leg and if you can read a horse then you know what to do with the rasp in your hand or the knife or cutters, and yes sometimes that will be nothing.
 

Goldenstar

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Gone are those blissfully ignorant days when I just provided farrier with tea & biscuit and let him get on with it..

I remember this lovely innocent relaxing time as well when all you did was make a phone call and write a cheque every five weeks !
 

CBFan

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, I get tired of some of the propaganda spoken about barefoot. Stop making it a new industry in holistic care. Some of us have been managing our horses with plenty of exercise and an appropriate diet for years. Its not rocket science, its old fashioned horse care.


I can understand what you're saying - my horse is barefoot but I don't talk about it unless anyone asks... I may sugest it as a solution if someone has a hoofcare issue but I leave it up to the individual HOWEVER I have to say that I think you're in quite a minority when it comes to feeding as sadly the majority don't seem to have a clue about 'apropriate diets' and feed either what they have always fed or what is fashionable at the time with little or no understanding on what the food contains or what it does. I'm not suggesting that everyone needs to have bespoke diets for their animals butI know if I asked all the people on my yard of 30+ horses,the majority would basically recite the sales line on the feed bag label ' great for good doers' 'puts on condition in the blink of an eye'... if asked why or HOW they really wouldn' know...
 

cptrayes

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I get tired of some of the propaganda spoken about barefoot. Stop making it a new industry in holistic care. Some of us have been managing our horses with plenty of exercise and an appropriate diet for years. Its not rocket science, its old fashioned horse care.

- has it occurred to you that you may be incredibly lucky in having well balanced grazing? Few horses are rock-crunching on my grazing barefoot without a holistic approach, because it is high in manganese and iron. In the old fashioned horse care days, my horses would simply have been "just horses that need shoes", when what they actually need is copper.

- agreed that most of it is old fashioned, but it is ways that have been forgotten - removing shoes for the off season, be that winter for showjumpers or summer for hunters; feeding concentrates only to horses working hard; feeding unmolassed straights - you can't even buy them at a fair number of horse food vendors; feeding magnesium (sulphate in the old days, oxide now) to laminitis prone horses. None of it is new, no, but it is certainly new to most modern horse owners who weren't in horses 30 years ago as you and I probably were.

- it is a new industry. Paid trimmers who do not shoe are, as far as I am aware, a phenomenon only of the last ten years or less. And please don't diss it, it is this new industry that has discovered that horses with caudal hoof lameness have a far better prognosis without shoes than with remedial shoeing and medication. So not only is it new, but it is making progress too.


Now, if only the Worshipful Company of Farriers would join the party, all would be well in the world of horse foot care :)
 
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Oberon

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Oberon, is that what is called hyperkeratinised horn?? My new filly has it but only in one hoof. She is 10mo and it could still show up in other one but so far, managing well with it.

OOOhhh - I've never heard of hyperkeratinised horn before.

Do you have some pics and info?

The Tank's dimple appears to be an absence of sole , which I believe mimics an area of bone loss to the coffin bone (such as a dimple to the tip).

It's a fault that can collect dirt and needs to be kept clean, but he is perfectly sound and healthy. It's just cosmetic.

Certainly no cause for a farrier to go digging
notallthere.gif
 

dressagelove

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- has it occurred to you that you may be incredibly lucky in having well balanced grazing? Few horses are rock-crunching on my grazing barefoot without a holistic approach, because it is high in manganese and iron. In the old fashioned horse care days, my horses would simply have been "just horses that need shoes", when what they actually need is copper.

- agreed that most of it is old fashioned, but it is ways that have been forgotten - removing shoes for the off season, be that winter for showjumpers or summer for hunters; feeding concentrates only to horses working hard; feeding unmolassed straights - you can't even buy them at a fair number of horse food vendors; feeding magnesium (sulphate in the old days, oxide now) to laminitis prone horses. None of it is new, no, but it is certainly new to most modern horse owners who weren't in horses 30 years ago as you and I probably were.

- it is a new industry. Paid trimmers who do not shoe are, as far as I am aware, a phenomenon only of the last ten years or less. And please don't diss it, it is this new industry that has discovered that horses with caudal hoof lameness have a far better prognosis without shoes than with remedial shoeing and medication. So not only is it new, but it is making progress too.


Now, if only the Worshipful Company of Farriers would join the party, all would be well in the world of horse foot care :)

CPtrayes, I just love everything you say. You write so well about it.
 

tallyho!

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OOOhhh - I've never heard of hyperkeratinised horn before.

Do you have some pics and info?

The Tank's dimple appears to be an absence of sole , which I believe mimics an area of bone loss to the coffin bone (such as a dimple to the tip).

It's a fault that can collect dirt and needs to be kept clean, but he is perfectly sound and healthy. It's just cosmetic.

Certainly no cause for a farrier to go digging
notallthere.gif

Neither had i until very recently. I will take photo of filly's foot in the morning.

This might be of interest though...

http://www.appliedequinepodiatry.org/Text_Files/HK_Horn_article.pdf

:)

As you will see, the report is 7 years old. My Hcp (hoof care professional... I dont want to be controversial :rolleyes:) seems to know more about it and says it is commonly mistaken for seedy toe and she has seen a few injuries from digs and even burns from peroxide to the laminae. Glad I know what it is now though...
 

Cedars

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What I have learnt is that I love my farrier.

He won't shoe unless necessary.
He'll come out whenever I want just to have a look, no charge if no work done.
He does a beautiful shoe job and a lovely trim.
And it's £15 for the trim and £55 for the shoe!
Oh and my horses love him.

Nope, I'd still rather be with someone who CAN shoe if necessary, than someone who can't but now thinks they're the dogs *******s because it's the new fashionable thing to be.
 

tallyho!

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Oberon, here is the filly's HKH notch. We have had to do a little bit of excavating, not for gold though, to make sure it was not full of infection. Sorry it's blurry, trying to get her to stand still in the field was a mission!

photo0232.jpg
 

cptrayes

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TH the HKH stuff is REALLY interesting and I suspect that nearly all toe-notches are as a result of this. Why has it taken a barefooter to dissect feet that have it and find it out??

Good on KC la Pierre! The man has an ego the size of a planet but he does do some good stuff.
 

Goldenstar

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What I have learnt is that I love my farrier.

He won't shoe unless necessary.
He'll come out whenever I want just to have a look, no charge if no work done.
He does a beautiful shoe job and a lovely trim.
And it's £15 for the trim and £55 for the shoe!
Oh and my horses love him.

Nope, I'd still rather be with someone who CAN shoe if necessary, than someone who can't but now thinks they're the dogs *******s because it's the new fashionable thing to be.

Theres no requirement for a trimmer to be arrogant I don't work with any arrogant people in any field with my horses my trimmer is a very quiet thought ful young man who listens twice as much as he talks.
if I wanted one of my unshod horses to go back into shoes I would just call the
farrier and get him to do it.
 

tallyho!

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There is a marked difference between HKH and seedy toe but I guess they have been grouped together for a very long time resulting in cases such as Oberons'.
 

forestfantasy

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Sorry for the delay Cedars, I missed that you had asked me this early on.

What you need to understand is that most farriers spend no time at all in their apprenticeship with a Master with really hardworking barefoot horses. They never see a hunter like mine or the many others, or eventers or long distance horses. They don't understand how many miles of tarmac an ushod horse can do. They don't realise just how incredibly short hardworking barefoot feet look. Too many of them don't even realise that you should not normally remove sole callous from a barefoot horse's foot during a trim.

If your farrier did get that kind of training, great. If he has learnt it since, great. But until the Worshipful Company of Farriers pull their fingers out and teach their apprentices, all of them, how hardworking barefoot feet look, how to alter the feed of a horse that is not coping, and that taking the shoes off a navicular horse is usually much more effective than putting eggbars on it, then anyone trusting in their farrier is putting their faith in pure chance that they had a Master with hardworking barefooters (which are rare), or have put themselves out to learn later.

If the Worshipful company of Farriers brought their training up to date the trimming organisations would disappear and everyone would know where they stood.

Fab post :D
My farrier trims my barefoot horses but everytime i have to tell him what i want doing :rolleyes: No sole off and leave their frogs please!
He always does as i ask but it also means i can't leave him too it while i get on with something else or he gets itchy for his paring knife!
He is quite happy to just trim them but has no interest in BF (I'm working on him!)
 
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