Soft soles in barefoot horse

lauracwd2

lauracwd2

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Looking to get a range of opinion please. I took shoes off my 7 year old connemara at the end of December, at that time the farrier didn't do any trimming of his feet and he was walking out well on all surfaces. At the beginning of feb he went lame with a sprained fetlock but in the process of investigating that farrier and vet both used the hoof testers to check for abcess/bruising and both commented that his soles were incredibly soft on the front. He did a period of box rest and turnout with no work and have now been riding him again, the sprain appears to be healed and he is sound on the arena surface and on grass. However he is noticably more sensitive on the harder tracks and is reluctant to walk out.

I have a set of hoof boots and he is better in these however I'm not 100% happy with the fit so have only been using them for short rides while I figure out what to try next. Vet's opinion was that he needed to be shod. Farrier is happy to support me barefoot and suggested using a hoof hardener (formaldehyde) to toughen his soles. I have concerns about using formaldehyde but I'm also not convinced that using any other hoof hardener is helpful as it is only masking an issue that is there.

He is turned out 24/7 now and by choice spends a lot of time in the wet, marshy part of the field. He is fed a low calorie balancer and low calorie chaff. Our hacking routes are in the forest but the tracks are crushed stone with some sections of big sharp stones so I expect that to always be tricky for a barefoot horse. However he has good shaped feet and apart from the soft soles good condition on his hooves so I would like to perservere with this.

I try to walk him out in the evening over small gravel and harder tracks even if it's only for a few minutes to try and stimulate his feet. Any suggestions of what else I could be trying to support this?
 
My horse had osteoporosis of the pedal bone last april, whilst on box rest I dressed with sugardine as directed by vet to harden the sole as it had gone thin/soft after weeks of this I then asked about a hoof hardener and was advised by vet and farrier to use one. I picked Keratex hoof hardener which work BRILLIANTLY I would not worry about the formaldehyde not sure what your issue with it is but I didn't worry if it was going to help my horse. It did help and I spoke to keratex about ongoing use and they said to use twice a week.
 
How good is his balancer?
Can you track his field to encourage more movement out there?
I wouldn't worry too much about putting him on more challenging surfaces at this early stage.
I'm not totally against use of hoof hardener
Sounds like better hoof boots would be a big help?

Fwiw when mine was last hoof tested the vet was surprised how flexible the soles were and assume they were thin which I thought unlikely given the the mileage they were functional for. That was until she started digging :p they were flexible and thick! Probably not the case with yours as mine was very well transitioned at that point but worth a mention.
 
Thanks, to answer some of the questions above.

My concerns about formaldehyde are about what a nasty chemical it is (I work in the chemical industry) and I'm not keen to be putting that on my horses feet but I'm open to other hoof hardener suggestions.

He is on the Topspec Lite Balancer, again open to ideas about changing this, Forage Plus has been suggested to me to look into.

We're on livery so not much scope for a track, the fields however are large and varied terrain - hills, rocks, brush, trees, marsh and my observation is that the herd do move around pretty well.

I think better hoof boots would be a good plan, just not sure where to go. Using the Cavallo Simples at the moment, his measurements appear to fit these well on paper but it feels like the move slightly when he is walking although they feel ok when putting them on.

Interesting note ester about the flexible soles, maybe I need to worry a bit less about it? Both farrier and vet slightly recoiled in horror when hoof testing though! He's never had an abcess or a bruise or anything to make me think he has feet issues otherwise.
 
I mentioned it maybe just to not get too hung up on how things appear, if he isn't bruising or overly sore and it sounds like he has coped with varied surfaces he doesn't seem to be doing to bad to me. Frank was booted for all road work from 6 weeks to 6 months bare.

Having worked with formaldehyde I once felt the same as you but I do think sometimes it can have its place with a sore horse etc while things change.

I am not a fan of cavallos so would send measurements (better pics with tape measure in them) and ask the various shops (all helpful!) what they would suggest. I have always used gloves.

I would take him off the topspec. Your best options if you want pelleted equimins Adv complete, if powder fp, prohoof (eBay) and equivita - or equimins again.
 
Thanks, some things to think about there. I'm keen to try and make this work as I already see an improvement in his movement and lightness as he is much more aware of what he is doing with his feet! Have got an email enquiry into Hoof Boutique about boots at the moment but will get some updated pics and email a few more for opinions.
 
My horse had really thin soles and couldn't even walk across the yard comfortably (due in large part to trimming of soles by farriers but we won't go there lol).
The answer to his was threefold - yes, we used formaldehyde because it was important to get the soles strong enough to support the bony column in the short term, and then we made sure he was getting enough minerals etc, with the mineral balancer from Forageplus. And added amino acids as the building blocks for strong hoof tissue, especially methionine. His soles are now like steel, almost 12 months after having had heart bar shoes on because his pedal bones were sinking due to laminitis. Boots and pads helped head that off at the pass, especially for walking across the yard but now he doesn't feel it any more than the ground in his paddock.
We didn't do much in the way of stimulation because I felt the roads here were too dangerous and having had a silver van man frighten him by speeding past I decided it wasn't worth the risk. And a good trimmer helped of course, but the soles are almost the most important part of the foot, supporting the rest with the help of the laminae.
Diet, diet and diet basically over the long term - good luck
 
My friend has been using keratex quite successfully on her (shod) mare with thin soles. The mare is prone to bruises (particularly in summer when the ground is hard), and for a few years ended up with an abscess every summer, unless she was shod with pads. But the pads trap moisture and bacteria, so not exactly helping in the long term. She's managed the last few summers to avoid pads and bruises by using keratex instead. I think it has its use, so long as you realize it doesn't do anything other than harden the outermost layer of horn (and potentially makes it more brittle).
I also tried keratex for a brief while on my barefoot gelding, whom I usually ride booted because he's not entirely comfy on sharp stones/forestry tracks. I can't say it made much of a difference for him, and it was difficult to apply it correctly. You're supposed to put it on a dry hoof, but with him out 24/7, his feet are wet most of the time. When the weather is really dry, so are his hooves and the soles are hard enough anyway. I think it might work better on a horse that is stabled part-time so you can apply it consistently on dry hooves, which might then keep the soles from softening too much in the wet.

I'd probably advise that you look at better boots regardless. You can still experiment with keratex, but I think it is always a pretty hard ask to try and get a horse fully comfortable on challenging riding surfaces (sharp rocks on hard ground) if he spends the other 23 hours in a bog.
 
lauracwd2 said:
He is turned out 24/7 now and by choice spends a lot of time in the wet, marshy part of the field. He is fed a low calorie balancer and low calorie chaff. Our hacking routes are in the forest but the tracks are crushed stone with some sections of big sharp stones so I expect that to always be tricky for a barefoot horse. However he has good shaped feet and apart from the soft soles good condition on his hooves so I would like to perservere with this.

I try to walk him out in the evening over small gravel and harder tracks even if it's only for a few minutes to try and stimulate his feet. Any suggestions of what else I could be trying to support this?
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sorry to say it but he is living in wet marsh for a lot of the time and you want him to ride barefoot over sharp forestry tracks. That is unlikely to work. Kerratex won't solve that problem. I would suggest you either dry up his living conditions considerably or accept that riding on stone is going to need boots. Sharp forestry tracks are a harsh surface for a barefoot horse and he will need a fair amount of conditioning before this is possible,

If he is sensitive over the harder tracks and reluctant to walk out walking him further over them for a few minutes a day will not do much to help. If you do too much on stoney tracks with soft soles and poor feet you will be more likely to end up with a stone bruise or abscess. I would walk out at this stage over smooth tarmac and then get him out riding in boots.
 
Just to confuse the issue even more, sorry.
A friend has a tb and her feet are like steel, always barefoot and rock crunching feet, never had any problems but farrier said there are times when the feet can get too hard as they lose flexibility???????????
I would think the wet ground isn't helping much either but not quite sure what you can do with being on livery etc.
 
LD&S said:
Just to confuse the issue even more, sorry.
A friend has a tb and her feet are like steel, always barefoot and rock crunching feet, never had any problems but farrier said there are times when the feet can get too hard as they lose flexibility???????????.
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Has he got many hard working barefoot horses on his books?

Referring to what you can do, you've been recommended formaldehyde. There is no evidence it causes any harm to feet at all (I've checked) and it does work. Keratex have been week-long it for many years now, with no issues. Sheep foot dip watered down to 8% strength is a lot cheaper!
 
LD&S said:
Just to confuse the issue even more, sorry.
A friend has a tb and her feet are like steel, always barefoot and rock crunching feet, never had any problems but farrier said there are times when the feet can get too hard as they lose flexibility???????????.
Click to expand...
Seriously? If you were going to walk over a stony surface, which would you prefer - stout thick leather brogues or soft flexible moccasins?
 
Thanks everyone, good to get some other opinions on this. I don't have any problem with booting him (just need to find the right ones to suit) and I fully expect that he'll need boots for a lot of our immediate hacking due to the toughness of the tracks but I would like to get him to the stage of being comfortable without boots on some trails. I don't really have any tarmac to walk him on, our hacking is directly into the forest from the farm so only have a little bit of concrete at the stables everything else is grass or stone tracks.
 
lauracwd2 said:
Thanks, some things to think about there. I'm keen to try and make this work as I already see an improvement in his movement and lightness as he is much more aware of what he is doing with his feet! Have got an email enquiry into Hoof Boutique about boots at the moment but will get some updated pics and email a few more for opinions.
Click to expand...

The lady there is very helpful
 
I have a horse with pathetically thin, soft soles. It's almost as if they have stopped growing altogether for the last three months :( I have switched from Keratex to Red Horse's Stronghorn as it is easier to use, less nasty and I didn't feel I was getting anywhere with the Keratex after a while.

So far, so good; haven't got any worse, may well have improved a bit.
 
I would use the hoof hardener and see if it fixes the issue.
I use it from time to time .
It's not like you are bathing the horse in it .
There's no evidence what so ever it's damaging to the horse .
When your not able to control the environment ( in your case the wet ) then sometimes you just have to what you have to do .
On boots I personally would not like to use boots on a horse returning from injury as I remain to be convinced they don't interfere with breakover .
 
Forget the hoof hardener - it will only interfere with he moisture gradient in the hoof (that's important, it's part of the shock absorbing mechanism) - at best it will dry out the surface - do you really want to be handling formaldehyde? I don't

he needs to be on some drier ground - bog is great, they need to get their feet wet, but not all the time

If I were you I'd have a word with Sarah Braithwaite at Forage Plus, get on decent mineral and vitamin supplementation and see if you can grow it better from the inside out

Things like Keratex are simply rearranging the deck chairs, you can only really grow a hoof better.
 
In my own personal experience last year Keratex helped my then 37 year old horse when he was recovering from osteoporosis of the pedal bone, my vet recommended using it, I was careful with it and put it only as instructed
 
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