Honestly less is better. I think the most my farrier uses is 5 total
4 Likes
Is your horse hot shod or shod cold ?
Cold.
He said there’s supposed to be seven and asking me what the issue is. Well, you said founder, that’s the issue so of course I’m concerned!! I guess I’ll count the nails tomorrow in daylight.
Horses!!! My yearling cut her leg to the point of needing antibiotics, bute, and a vet appointment this weekend. Now this with my mare. My nerves shall be the end of me
2 Likes
Do her hooves like they’ve improved since Jan?
Trying to get high quality photos not cutting off any good from the exact same angle is really really helpful in tracking progress.
I’m not a foot expert but I do think there’s progress. The back lines I just followed what I was seeing. For the dorsal wall I tried to follow what looked to be the projected line if the foot up at the cornet was maintained all the way down. To me it looks like you are on track for a much more upright foot and progress towards a better heel.
A flippant cut back grain and bristling at questions around the number of nails would really tick me off but I also expect farrier to be good communicators and often it feels like you get competent or good communicators and rarely both.
To the point of nails I don’t know anyone who puts that many in a foot. My farrier shoes with 4 total per foot, 5 if we have something a little compromised where he wasn’t super confident about the wall around a nail. 8 is a lot of extra damage to the wall IMHO. If pulling shoes is a concern I’d rather see less nails and 24/7 pull on rubber bell boots.
3 Likes
But also maybe not? From January, yes improvement but I don’t love the direction the front left looks like it is going from March until now. Curious to hear others thoughts.
Why does your farrier rasp so much wall? She needs that strength. The only wall I’d expect to see rasped is where there’s a flare, not top to bottom all the way around.
Back in the day when the Old Man was in work, he was often shod with 3 or 4 nails total. He had good feet and wasn’t a shoe puller, though.
I can’t see heels at all for some reason. It’s like I have goggles on preventing any conception of them lol. But I agree about her front right dorsal wall! It does look like it’s on track to be much more upright and that more correct angle grows out more every trim.
About her left, I see what you mean. The last reset he really deliberately scooted everything back further than he does because she had pulled a shoe literally 30 mins before he got there. Which was the first time she’s ever done that (and was my fault for lunging in not excellent footing - lesson learned), so he “moved the break over point back”.
She was immediately moving different. She’s always had a LOT of knee action for a reining-bred APHA. When he really scooted everything underneath her the last trim and changed her break over, she was moving much more like an APHA and less like a DHH, specifically not bringing her knees so high during the trot. I read that when their break over is too far forward they have to put much more effort into getting their limbs off the ground so the change I saw made sense?
I was going to ask him to do the same and keep her on that track with this reset but alas I wasn’t there. He left her longer than I would have wanted.
She was flared when we started last summer. She has improved a lot with him so maybe that’s the reasoning? And she is not a shoe puller and has good quality feet. I’m not sure why he uses so many nails.
1 Like
In person the farrier is a very good communicator and really engages with me. Over text he’s always been a 1-4 word response type of person. Not abnormal for him to seem flippant over text!
2 Likes
In this picture you can see how much wall more he’s rasping off. He’s to the water line from about 2/3rds, down.
If that’s the case, I’d just call. Some people do not like texting.
I don’t want to feel like I’m annoying him (which is silly, I know) because the anxiety rolling off my texts to him yesterday is palpable 🥲 Me being anxious is nothing new though and he’s always been patient with it. Maybe I should just call him!! I also texted the vet to see if they think it’s something we need to pursue further
2 Likes
I’m honestly not sure why he rasps so much!
1 Like
Is this the only farrier option in your area?
1 Like
Have to agree. The March pix show a foot that was going in the right direction with marked improvement, but it looks like this last round is backsliding a bit. Maybe it was done that way because of the redness in the WL that he saw? Didn’t want to take too much off and potentially cause more issues? Benefit of the doubt would say he probably had a good reason for doing it this way - or he was just not that focused, and this is his standard, default shoeing style.
Not all farriers are open to being questioned, so I’d tiptoe lightly if OP doesn’t have any other options.
1 Like
Alfalfa can be inflammatory which could be impacting that bruising in the white line. If she’s super sensitive, you may need to take her off alfalfa and the Enrich Plus and treat her like she’s metabolic and see if that shifts anything for her feet.
1 Like
More or less — everyone else seems to be random cowboys. Nothing necessarily wrong with that but not what I’m looking for. And trying a new farrier always makes me nervous
I also suspect he was more conservative because of the bruising
1 Like
She’s been on alfalfa pellets the entire time I’ve had her, so coming up on 3 years. Would the metabolic-friendly alternative be a V/M supplement like Omneity or California Trace and Timothy pellets? I like Enrich Plus so much because of the protein, she blossomed once I started her on it
