Snow -Is anyone not putting vaseline, lard, socks ..

Today I tried rubbing a handful of salt over the underneath of my cob's feet & it seems to have worked really well! He was out all day & there was no build up of snow in them at all, every other day it's balled up really badly, sometimes to the extent that he struggles to walk properly. I think I'm going to try mixing some salt in a little oil & painting it on in the future.
 
I had front shoes put on my mare who only recently recovered from cushings induced laminitis. The idea was to protect her paper thin soles from hard frozen ground. BIG mistake as she's walking around on 4 inch stilts :(

Tried WD40, vaseline and baby oil, all useless. I'm tempted to take the shoes off again but they have only been on a couple of weeks so not sure if her feet will stand it.

She's 3/4 TB, 1/4 exmoor and is unclipped. She hasn't needed a rug yet. :)
 
Nope, I never bother doing anything with my horse and ponies hooves. I pick them out, as usual regularily but thats it. Never have any problems. Saying that, they are all unshod at the moment (well 2 are permanently barefoot) so the snow doesnt ball up anything like they do when shod.

I think your friends horses would probably like to be rugged (if they are fine) but with rugs which dont freeze. I've got several turnout rugs for one of my horses, 2 of them I know will freeze in places whereas the others don't. Dont know why, none of them leak or anything.
 
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