thought on the whole shoes/barefoot thing

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the watcher

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I've been here (on this forum) a very long time. That doesn't make me special, or my opinion especially valuable, but it does mean that I have seen some trends and changes over the years.

The one that is currently troubling me a little is the whole barefoot thing; hardly a day passes without some poor owner seeking reassurance about the right diet, whether their 'transitioning' is going correctly, where to source the right hoof boots, how to locate the right trimmer. I say 'poor owner', the reality of course is poor horse, those horses that had been perfectly happy for years working in shoes whose owners have decided that being unshod is somehow preferable.

I'm not against unshod horses, if a horse can work happily without shoes I'm all for it, I have unshod horses myself, and one with just fronts and just one with a full set of shoes (believe me, he wouldn't cope at all without them)

However, if your horse being unshod (or barefoot if that is what you want to call it) means that you have to be mail ordering special minerals to keep them comfortable, ordering in hoof boots, agonising over their diet and lfestyle.....you have to ask yourself whether you are actually doing the right thing and whether it wouldn't be kinder to just nail a set of shoes on...

wouldn't you?
 
I completely 100% agree!!!

Unfortunately, due to repeated shoe self- removal me and Peej have been forced into the world of barefoot-ness... it is heavy going!!! Every article seems to end with a different product you should buy or a different (often very labour intensive or completely impractical) routine you should be doing!

I have lost count of how many times in the last 18 days I have ended up in tears out of pure frustration.

We are currently on a feed/routine/work load/hoof boot regime that I hope will work....

I wish we could have our shoes back :(, we were happy not being trendy!
 
You said " I say 'poor owner', the reality of course is poor horse, those horses that had been perfectly happy for years working in shoes whose owners have decided that being unshod is somehow preferable."

This is SO not true! Most horses (mine included) have gone barefoot BECAUSE of problems caused by shoes! Barefoot was a last resort for many. Remedial farriery was causing my mare masses of problems. If i can get her sound this way, i couldn't care less how much it costs. Many wouldn't be here at all the rate they were going. :-/
 
:DTo be honest my thoughts on the matter is at the end of the day they pay for their horse so they can do what they like as long as they horses is taken care of.

If mine needed a bf for any reason then I would do it but they are fine shod.
I have had a bf pony in the past and I say bf in the lightist sense of the word, he didnt have any special diet just a slice of hay at night, grass in the day and was worked well and had very hard hooves.

But some horses lack certain things in their diet so it needs to be supplemented to help with healthy hooves no matter weather they are shod or not........

That is my opinion only, I have asked questions before because I was curious about the Transistion period as was thinking about it for the WB, it had nothing to do with any lamness or anything I was thinking on the saving money side of things:o, but she is doing so well in her rebacking that I didnt want to take a step back waiting to ge rock crunchers.

The few BF people I will actively listen to on here are Oberon and Cpraytes (sorry if spelt that wrong the heat is muddling my brain:rolleyes:) as they have so much information and advice and don't mollie coddle you.


By the way agree with the above poster.......most of the time people are goingBF as a last resort to save their horse considerible pain and lamness. so you really can't judge until you knw the whole story.

right now I'm going to sit back with some ice cream and bulmers mixed berry and lime to watch the show
 
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I come at this barefoot/unshod debate from a different angle as my happily shod for years mare was almost crippled by a bad farrier who shod her for a short time. She's had her shoes off for well over a year now and I'm starting to bring her back into work. Considering that she was almost PTS, I'm thrilled that she is doing so well.

She has not suffered because her shoes came off, it has saved her (sounds dramatic but completely true and not an overstatement). Yes, I do think more carefully about her diet but I think that that is a good thing anyway.
 
itsonlyme said:
You said " I say 'poor owner', the reality of course is poor horse, those horses that had been perfectly happy for years working in shoes whose owners have decided that being unshod is somehow preferable."

This is SO not true! Most horses (mine included) have gone barefoot BECAUSE of problems caused by shoes! Barefoot was a last resort for many. Remedial farriery was causing my mare masses of problems. If i can get her sound this way, i couldn't care less how much it costs. Many wouldn't be here at all the rate they were going. :-/
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I have noticed a trend for people claiming this over the last 18 months or so. I've no doubt that for a very small number of horses that may well be true, although probably has more to do with inappropriate farriery in individual cases than shoes being a problem.

The minority who have had success are very vociferous and quite evangelical about the improvement, and this is the part that concerns me because it may persuade others that barefoot is the way forward for every horse. It isn't.

Funnily enough you rarely hear posts from people commenting on how their horse was footsore and not coping, but became far more comfortable with a well fitted set of shoes...which is probably the far more common scenario
 
Faracat said:
I come at this barefoot/unshod debate from a different angle as my happily shod for years mare was almost crippled by a bad farrier who shod her for a short time. She's had her shoes off for well over a year now and I'm starting to bring her back into work. Considering that she was almost PTS, I'm thrilled that she is doing so well.

She has not suffered because her shoes came off, it has saved her (sounds dramatic but completely true and not an overstatement). Yes, I do think more carefully about her diet but I think that that is a good thing anyway.
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If you found that she wasn't coping with work unshod would you put shoes back on then?
 
the watcher said:
those horses that had been perfectly happy for years working in shoes whose owners have decided that being unshod is somehow preferable.
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I guess the question is whether they really were perfectly happy in the shoes, because (and I might be wrong) I think most people have a reason for going barefoot rather than just because its trendy at the moment. I have been hearing this whole "wouldn't it be kinder to just nail a set of shoes on" argument quite a bit as we struggled a couple of months ago with the good grass. Problem is I went barefoot for a reason - because my horse kept tripping over, which completely went as soon as the shoes came off.

Also, I just find him so much nicer to ride unshod, in part because we have a lot of road riding on steep slopes where I am and I don't enjoy skidding about. So I am prepared to put in the time and effort to get the diet sorted so that we can stay barefoot, and find some well-fitting boots for when there are problems. I don't really see mail-ordering special minerals or agonising over lifestyle / grass intake as enough of an issue to make me stop, but then I was already mail-ordering vet prescribed COPD supplement and agonising over lifestyle for weight-loss (very good doer!).
 
This is a great thread. If the horse can work "shoeless" then thats brilliant. However if his hooves wear down too much they need protection by either a shoe or a boot. Simples! People agonise and worry and spend a lot of money unnecessarily. Either shoe or boot if needed Which is up to you.
Personally my horses are shoeless Nov to April and then have shoes on April til end October.
 
the watcher said:
The one that is currently troubling me a little is the whole barefoot thing; hardly a day passes without some poor owner seeking reassurance about the right diet, whether their 'transitioning' is going correctly, where to source the right hoof boots, how to locate the right trimmer. I say 'poor owner', the reality of course is poor horse, those horses that had been perfectly happy for years working in shoes whose owners have decided that being unshod is somehow preferable.

I'm not against unshod horses, if a horse can work happily without shoes I'm all for it, I have unshod horses myself, and one with just fronts and just one with a full set of shoes (believe me, he wouldn't cope at all without them)

However, if your horse being unshod (or barefoot if that is what you want to call it) means that you have to be mail ordering special minerals to keep them comfortable, ordering in hoof boots, agonising over their diet and lfestyle.....you have to ask yourself whether you are actually doing the right thing and whether it wouldn't be kinder to just nail a set of shoes on...

wouldn't you?
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No.
At least when owners are 'agonising' over diet and lifestyle, they are thinking hard about their horse's health. How many owners just hand responsibility for their horse's feet over completely to the farrier and then have no idea whether said farrier is doing a good job or not.
I went bare years before I read anything about anyone else doing it, and now (as a biologist) it seems insane to me that anyone would nail a solid metal object to their animal. It just defies common sense that this can be a healthy thing to do, and certainly in the case of a horse that is lame when it doesn't have shoes on - there is obviously some sort of problem that should be addressed, not masked. Many hoof issues are things that take a long time to develop, so a horse seeming 'happy' in shoes isn't necessarily the best measure of hoof health. I can see the attraction of shoeing for certain activities, or perhaps at certain times of year for those with difficult metabolic issues, but shoeing really should be the exception rather than the norm, and all horses should regularly have time out of shoes.
 
personally I dont know what happened to the term 'unshod'

I guess if being unshod is helping the horse then there is no harm done and of course what works well for one horse wouldnt work for another but I do think some people are evangelical to the point of fever pitch about it
 
As the saying goes, all horses can become barefoot but not all owners can. Its certainly not for the quick fix, its a long term thing, depends if want/can fit it into your lifestyle.

For me, having had my 20 year old pony kicked twice in the stomach by a farrier wearing steel toecaps because he couldn't be bothered to wait while Ben stood squarely was the deciding factor,( he used to be sedated before I had him :( ) not because I was against shoes.

But then he has been brilliant ( now have a good trimmer and he goes to sleep ) Its no hassle to me bringing in during the day in the spring/summer and fed on soaked hay, neither is it any bother that I have to spend a few minutes putting on front boots, and its certainly no bother for my pocket which has more money in it!

If your horse can't walk unshod on tarmac without being "footy" then surely there's something wrong, and if there's something wrong wouldn't you want to find out what it was rather than just shoeing and thinking, well he's sound now so thats ok?
 
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the watcher said:
I have noticed a trend for people claiming this over the last 18 months or so. I've no doubt that for a very small number of horses that may well be true, although probably has more to do with inappropriate farriery in individual cases than shoes being a problem.

The minority who have had success are very vociferous and quite evangelical about the improvement, and this is the part that concerns me because it may persuade others that barefoot is the way forward for every horse. It isn't.

Funnily enough you rarely hear posts from people commenting on how their horse was footsore and not coping, but became far more comfortable with a well fitted set of shoes...which is probably the far more common scenario
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Im not evangelical, but i do have to say my big WB ended up with a very severe injury inside his hoof. He managed to damage the Impar ligament which then adhered itself to the DDFT. He was in a very bad way, I was told by the Vets i would be lucky if he made it to being field sound.
I did the whole remidial shoeing & unfortunately that made him worse, he was seen by one of the top farriers.

I decided to take him barefoot, from the off he was much happier & slowly with careful management. He's now fully sound & is back competing BD at Medium level & doing it with ease. He moves better & feels better than he ever did before.

I like to keep open minded, all my 5 horses are barefoot. No special diets, yes hoof boots occasionally for hacking if needed & a fab trimmer. No smoke or mirrors just good horse management.
 
OP - I can understand your point of view if you have never had a horse with a PTS sentence then restored to full competitive health by the type of management changes made for healthy unshod/barefoot hooves.

Hqwever the diet changes invoked are often just simple healthy food choices - healthy for most horses, not just the unshod. But an unshod hoof leaves the owner with nowhere to hide. They get it right or the hooves will tell the tale.

And I've never, not once, deshod a hoof that hasn't in some way been compromised by the shoes - even when beautifully shod. And some farriers do superb work, but regardless of how good they are, the shoes still cause some damage. It's not the fault of the good farriers, its the nature of applying a solid metal object to a flexible, adaptable, biological one.
 
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Its what works for the horse surely?
I have had several over the years that have been quite happy shoeless (sorry cant bring myself to say barefoot!), but on the flip side I have had a few that will not cope without shoes regardless, and as such wear them.
Would rather have a happy comfortable horse TBH.
 
I personally don't think some horses can cope with being barefoot. I'm not anti barefoot. Our old dressage horse was barefoot and had been all his life. He had good feet and was never footy even with road work so we kept him that way - no special diet. I asked his old owner if he was on supplements etc and he'd never been on anything extra to contribute to his hooth health. I think it makes a big difference if a horse has always been barefoot as i think they're adapted to cope with that lifestyle. However as he was a bundle of nerves anywhere other than the school, we didn't hack loads and when he did a lot was on verges, but he was fine on the roads when we did go on them.

I wouldn't keep a horse barefoot if it needed hoofboots to do things though. To me if they need them and are footsore without then i don't think they're really coping barefoot and i would have them shod. Just my opinion though! Sure there's probably a million who will tell me i'm wrong! But then i'm sure there was a reason they started nailing metal on horses hooves other than to drain our purses of £70 every 6 weeks!
 
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My 4yo is unshod and has been all her life - she's on grass livery, has no supplements and has great feet. Should she ever require shoes then she'll have them...if they're in her best interests. My new 13yo came to me shod all round and with crumbling backs (whether that's bad grazing, the wet weather, bad farriery, just her or something else I've yet to determine). My plan is to go unshod long term if it suits her but if she needs shoes then she'll have them. All horses are different, though I'm inclined to think more can go unshod successfully than many people think. Ultimately, while I prefer unshod, I'll do whatever's best for my horses :)
 
Fanatical, evangelical barefootiness etc etc. its such a turn off.

Working unshod horses is not new, but the money making spin is.

Obsessing doesn't make a good owner, neither does blaming a farrier for ruining your horse. Learning to recognise a well balanced and well shod horse is pretty essential for a horse owner.

Horse care is the same for shod and unshod horses. Appropriate diet, fresh air and exercise. No money in that approach though.
 
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joeanne said:
Its what works for the horse surely?
I have had several over the years that have been quite happy shoeless (sorry cant bring myself to say barefoot!), but on the flip side I have had a few that will not cope without shoes regardless, and as such wear them.
Would rather have a happy comfortable horse TBH.
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This ^^^ entirely. Keeping an open mind, and not harping on like crazed evangelists at poor, confused novices would also help to keep eveything a bit more civilised, I'd say. I have several of my horses without shoes, because they are perfectly happy without them. I have one who has just got her shoes put back on because she is most definately not happy without when her workload is heavier.
 
I like unshod for mine as currently youngsters and when in work will be happy hackers with no roadwork.

The farriers I'd use are all very good and aren't heavily biased as to shod or unshod, so will give you an honest view on what would suit the individual horse rather than what he or the owner would prefer. If they say that a horse isn't going to cope without shoes then I'll take his advice.

Pan
 
the watcher said:
If you found that she wasn't coping with work unshod would you put shoes back on then?
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LucyPriory said:
OP - I can understand your point of view if you have never had a horse with a PTS sentence then restored to full competitive health by the type of management changes made for healthy unshod/barefoot hooves.

Hqwever the diet changes invoked are often just simple healthy food choices - healthy for most horses, not just the unshod. But an unshod hoof leaves the owner with nowhere to hide. They get it right or the hooves will tell the tale.

And I've never, not once, deshod a hoof that hasn't in some way been compromised by the shoes - even when beautifully shod. And some farriers do superb work, but regardless of how good they are, the shoes still cause some damage.

As for the not so good farriers.
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I'm going to be quite honest - I am actually slightly frightened of shoeing her again, so I really hope that she continues to cope unshod with no trouble.

If she is sound and happy going for a potter around the lanes (so far so good and she's totally sound in the school anyway), then I'll stick to the things that she can cope with.

You have to remember that I nearly lost her, then field sound was the best that I could hope for... now ridden work is looking seriously possible.

No, I don't want to shoe her again and I don't want to shoe any of my horses.
 
But would you, if they were footsore? I completely understand that some problems are caused by shoeing, but there are also horses which can't cope with being unshod. And, FWIW, I absolutely believe that probably the majority of leisure horses do NOT need shoes.
 
Learning to recognise a well balanced and well shod horse is pretty essential for a horse owner.
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I agree completely. Now that I have learnt what a well balanced hoof should look like shod/unshod, I am horrified by the amount of badly shod horses with flare, under-run heels and long toes. The problem is that this is so common that it begins to look normal.
 
The thing about us barefoot nutters is that at some point in the past pretty much all of us used to shoe our horses. What changed for us? Learning about the evolution of the horse - metabolism, biomechanics and behaviour to name a few. After the many, many hours of research I've done on hooves (probably as many hours as I spent studying my degree), barefoot is just logical to me now.
 
Cortez said:
But would you, if they were footsore? I completely understand that some problems are caused by shoeing, but there are also horses which can't cope with being unshod. And, FWIW, I absolutely believe that probably the majority of leisure horses do NOT need shoes.
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She is not footsore at the moment and if that changed I would think about the reasons why - rather than just slapping shoes on.

If I had everything right (low sugar diet etc...) and she was sore then I would consider shoes although I would consider boots too. If she was sore even when turned out, then shoes become an obvious solution, but as I said, I really hope that this doesn't happen.
 
There was a reason all horses were shod in the dark ages. Most stood in their own excrement for hours on end eating nothing but grain before being hitched to a cart for the rest of the day. Those hooves need shoes. At least until they die of founder and / or azoturia from the diet.

Some things haven't changed but some have. Horses are afforded better living conditions, better food, well a diet more natural anyway and therefore hooves thrive.

I think to dismiss the "fad" is a mistake as there is so much being discovered about hooves that science did not know. It has come a long way over the last 30 years or so, not that unshod is a new thing, but more attention is being paid to form, function, biological links... I think it's marvellous personally. Some horses will need to be shod to perform how it's human wants it to, but the discoveries will shape the way they are shod in the future to avoid navicular, tendon problems and othe lameness related to hooves. Imprint shoes are one of the shoes to come out of these discoveries.

It doesn't matter if you think it's good or bad, the fact you are talking about it highlights the fact that time out of shoes is helping a few horses that needed a break perhaps and a change of nutrients. With so much on the market, one can be fooled into thinking all horses need build-up when pony cubes and hay would suffice.

It's funny that so many people are against barefoot while crying undying love for the farrier. The original barefooters ARE farriers and maybe one or two caring vets!

I was amazed my navicular laminitic completed a 3ft HT and came 3rd when not even a year previous I was sobbing into a pillow at the prospect of losing him. Please forgive me for being evangelical. I am just so happy and wanted to share it. Isn't that what forums are for?
 
Faracat said:
She is not footsore at the moment and if that changed I would think about the reasons why - rather than just slapping shoes on.

If I had everything right (low sugar diet etc...) and she was sore then I would consider shoes although I would consider boots too. If she was sore even when turned out, then shoes become an obvious solution, but as I said, I really hope that this doesn't happen.
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Sorry for the hijack, and not just a question for you Faracat but.....

If the horse is footsore out of shoes, surely the horse is still footsore in shoes it's just the shoes masking it?

And if that is correct in what way are the shoes helping the horse? Is it not just the owner who feels better because the horse appears comfortable?
 
Awwww Tallyho, I feel your happiness!

I see no shame in using hoof boots; we all want our horses to be comfortable; thing is I can take his boots off after our two hour hacks twice a week. He's completely sound on the roads and tanks around the fields, but as we have quite a few tracks, I would rather boot him as he flinches if stepping on sharp stones, as would anyone really!
 
Diddleydoo said:
Sorry for the hijack, and not just a question for you Faracat but.....

If the horse is footsore out of shoes, surely the horse is still footsore in shoes it's just the shoes masking it?

And if that is correct in what way are the shoes helping the horse? Is it not just the owner who feels better because the horse appears comfortable?
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But horse with very flat feet say, could have the heels/bulbs touching the floor when they should be, so shoes would lift and support so the wouldn't be sore or masking the soreness as it should be eradicated with the shoes.
 
Diddleydoo said:
Sorry for the hijack, and not just a question for you Faracat but.....

If the horse is footsore out of shoes, surely the horse is still footsore in shoes it's just the shoes masking it?

And if that is correct in what way are the shoes helping the horse? Is it not just the owner who feels better because the horse appears comfortable?
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Exactly, because the horse is sound in shoes, then all most be fine :)
 
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