I am finally coming to an uneducated guess as to why my horses and ponies lose their shoes all the time. Been using a farrier who came onboard when my 65 yr old master retired a year or two ago. This guy does a beautiful job. Does glue-ons on one problem horse but the other five are all straight up front shoes and a trim on the rear. But the problem is that no one hardly ever makes the five or six weeks without losing a front shoe. It’s getting ridiculously expensive to have him come back and put a shoe on at $50 a pop. One horse was away for training for four months and has been back here for a month and hasn’t lost a show. What’s the difference? It’s that she had her feet done by a different farrier three times and now I see difference. He’s using three nails on each side. Current farrier uses two on each side. I walked around a horse show recently and didn’t see any horses with only the two nails to a side. So have I hit on something with my speculation that three nails per side is better than two. Or could it be something else. How do I tactfully request three nails per side?
I’d be curious to see photos of these feet.
2 or 3 nails wouldn’t be a deal breaker for me, its more about the fit of the shoe. Is the shoe a quarter clip or toe clip, as those act as nails as well?
I am also quite uneducated, but it also depends on the shoe and fit.
My farrier uses six nails but on one horse for a while he had to use all eight to keep the shoe on. Maybe the farrier is doing it to generate more income.
Does he use clips in the front? I have a chronic shoe puller as well so I’m curious about this thread too.
We need good hoof pics. I will say from my own experience that with a former farrier mine were almost never making it the entire 5 weeks. With new farrier, have had for 3 years now, I can count on one hand the number of lost shoes. Key differences are the trim, and this farrier hot shoes and he makes darn sure that shoe fits the hoof.
I would bet it is just the trim and not the number of nails.
I also would be p$ssed if multiple horses were frequently pulling shoes and I had to pay to tack them back on every cycle. It happens sometimes but this sounds like a big red flag.
My experience, barring genuine freak accidents like a clip before a big effort or slogging through the mud at a hunt, is that horses who are routinely pulling shoes are doing so because they are trimmed incorrectly with way too long toes. Seems to me that is a recipe for shoes being tossed, especially if the toes get equally unbalanced behind. Routine shoe tossing in my book is a farrier issue.
Also… this thread makes me realize I am lucky my farrier puts a shoe back on at no extra charge on the odd event a horse does pull a shoe. I usually give him a 6 pack an $20 to make it worth his time, but still.
This. Nails and clips can make a difference on the margin, or for a single horse whose conformation sets him up for failure - but I’d look at the trim and the fit of the shoe first.
Coming in to pile on the “can we see pics?”, especially if you have pics before and after he went to the trainers, preferably around the same time in the cycle (ie not fair to compare a fresh trim to a 6 week length)
4 nails total just makes it easier for a stepped on shoe to come off, but the question is WHY are they being stepped on Usually that’s a trim issue and usually that’s long toes which keep the foot on the ground too long
But, something else to consider - was the horse at the trainer’s being asked to move in a more correct way, so was developing better balance and muscling?
The farrier is coming tomorrow. I’ll take a picture or two tomorrow of before and after on two horses. Then I’ll figure out how to post them. Lol. I’ve had horses for close to 50 years I’ve been boarding horses for 38 yrs. I’ve seen the good and the bad in boarders feet, always thinking how lucky I was to have the farrier I had. This farrier is very good. Truly knows what he’s doing as far as trimming. He’s hot shoeing two and in aluminum on another ( and one has glue-on. ). The metal makes no difference, they all come off. This last time it was two days after being shod and it was another $50. The horse who returned from trainer was not there for extensive training, so no change in her balance and way of going. More like convenience during horse show season and she’s been here for a month being ridden and turned out as usual and keeping her shoes on I’ll post pictures after tomorrow’s visit
If I had a dollar for every time I heard “this farrier is very good / been shoeing for over 40 years / I trust my farrier’s judgment” and still saw a pathologically unhealthy hoof due to trim, well… I’d be able to buy me that Prelim packer I’ve always wanted. 
But who was riding her? The trainer? I would hope that 4 months with a trainer would make improvements in the horse’s level of training
Was the last shoeing while at the trainer’s, just before she came home? I’m assuming so, since your normal farrier is coming tomorrow. So was that 3 times the trainer’s farrier worked on her?
I have never once been charged to tack a shoe back on a horse by a farrier. That’s a big red flag to me.
If a horse looses a shoe more than one time, it’s the farriers fault. I know some people will make excuses, but if you have a horse who pulls a shoe, you change the way you shoe them the next time to stop that problem.
One shoe a year lost and i might chalk it up to bad luck. Multiple in a year and id be farrier shopping.
Once I had the opposite problem where the farrier would make the shoes narrow in the heel so they didn’t pull shoes. You don’t want that either necessarily.
I had a farrier a while back that was the nicest guy in the world, would come out on a Saturday, got along with the horses… but just wasn’t a great farrier. He was terrified of quicking a horse so he nailed very low. So he comes out, removes the shoes, does very little hoof prep and nails the shoes back on. I turn my horse out and she runs around the barn. As I see him driving away I see one of her shoes flying through the air. Now it didn’t tear up her foot when it came off but the shoes didn’t stay on very well either. This was a sign I needed a new farrier.
FWIW, my endurance horses have done many, many rides - including 100 milers - over varied terrain with only 4 nails in each shoe.
Opps. I had a typo there. Should have said “shoe”. Not “show” for the mare coming home. I didn’t say she was being trained. I simply said she was at trainers. ( It was for convenience of having a bigger ring with “dressed” jumps for DD. She rode her horse herself). Anyways, I appreciate the imput I’ve received but I’m not questioning the quality of my farriers skill, he is highly qualified. Still just wondering how to ask for two more nails in a shoe.
There are good reasons the horse is the cause of the pulled shoes, nothing to do with how the feet are trimmed or the shoes nailed on.
There are times when it has to be a conversation between the farrier, the owner and, ideally, the trainer if there is one. A horse who is moving on his forehand, in turnout and being ridden, using the wrong muscles and just pulling himself along, is a lot more likely to pull a shoe than one who is using himself properly and moving uphill.
If a farrier doesn’t ask those questions, he may think he’s doing all the right things with the shoe, the feet may be really well trimmed, and it’s not his fault (other than not looking past the foot)
If an owner automatically blames the farrier for everything wrong with feet/shoes, he’s going to blow through every farrier around, and still have an unhappy horse
The real question is - why do you so strongly think 1 more nail on each side will keep the shoes on?
I don’t think the number of nails is necessarily your entire problem. And it might not be the farrier’s fault either–at home are your horses out in the wet a lot compared to the trainer’s barn? But you can just straight up ask for 3 nails a side.
Ok, but if a horse is doing that then there’s probably a medical issue going on.
If a horse has horribly shelly feet, or has some sort of limb defect that causes irregular movement, the farrier can’t fix that. But that’s nitpicking here. Assuming these are 6 regular, healthy horses, there is no excuse for loosing shoes all the time.
