Shoeing Woes - Advice Appreciated

[snowrider]

Spend a lot of time messing with her feet. bring a little hammer and tap on them every time you pick them. If she’s scared of the smoke, watching a calm horse get shod is very helpful, just let her stand there and watch as often as possible while you chat with the farrier and other owners.

Finally I had a farrier who would put a big leather muzzle on horses who were bad to shoe. They would spend so much time licking and futzing with it that thye would forget to misbehave. It sounds bizarre but it worked! He also used blinkers on occasion. He was a good dude who was unusually willing to work on tough horses and saw it as an interesting challenge though, not all farriers want to do that. He was also young and shoed a lot of rough stock

[peedin]

Nothing better than finding the right professional for the job. You are entitled to the happy dance.

[Cheltenham]

[QUOTE=Rnichols;8865353]
I’m having some issues with getting my horse shod and it’s starting to turn into a problem, as the behavioral issues are not getting resolved. I’m very close to my witts end so turning here for advice and to see what has worked for others. I’ll try to keep our back story as short as possible

My mare is a 4y/o OTTB that I got in April. I do not know what her shoeing experiences were like prior to me getting her. Had my farrier out for the first time about 3-4 weeks after I got her. He pulled her shoes, trimmed, and hot shod her. She was initially fine for all of it, but started getting antsy. Farrier held onto her leg a little too long and she lost her cool, started throwing her self around like a lunatic and ended up knocking his box of tools over. After that she was a terror - he couldn’t even get the back shoes off of. Told me to get some dorm, and came out the next day to do her. Horse is 3 legged lame - turns out she had stepped on a nail. We rehabbed from that yadda yadda yadda and she’s fine and recovered.

I switched farriers after that, not because I really blamed him but because I moved barns and he wasn’t going to come all the way out to where I boarded for one horse. I explained to the new farrier what had happened and asked if he would take us as a client - he said yes. I was very up front with her behavioral issues. I asked if he wanted me to give her dorm the first time he came out and he said no. So he comes to do her and everything is going just swell (she’s standing still, not pulling away from me or the farrier) until he puts the hot shoe on and she looses her mind. Pulls back (we are in an open area, BTW he didn’t want to do her in an enclosed space), leaps into the air, rears straight up…just being a total brat. Farrier grabs the lead rope from me and makes her run in circles (this is his method - if she isn’t going to stand still she can get to work…basically the idea is that listening to him is her best option and makes her life easier). We go through this several times, but he finally gets all 4 feet done (took ~ 2 hours). The next time he came out we had a similar issue when he goes to put the hot shoes on, but not as terrible.

Third time (2 weeks ago) he cancels our appt 15 minutes before he is supposed to be there :mad:. Okay, whatever. Rescheduled for the following week (last week) but I had to pay the girl who works at the barn to hold my horse (who also happens to be a good friend of mine) since I couldn’t make it out. Also the mare sliced her leg open and was on stall rest for 4 weeks and then limited turn out for the 5th week. So when he came out to do her she hadn’t been worked for a while due to an injury (which I did let him know). I get a message from the girl after saying the farrier was in a bad mood (he was an hour late for the apt, BTW). Apparently he got into it with her (running her in circles) and things did not go well - but I wasn’t there so I can’t say if it’s any worse than what he’s made her do before or not. He asks my friend if he’s the only one who trains this horse and do I even do anything with the horse (we’re in a training program and was getting worked 5-6 days/week prior to the injury. Pardon me for not having a furnace to practice hot shoeing while you’re not there …)

THEN the mare pulls a shoe on Sunday and he came out today to tack it back on. Not only was he not on time today again, but he also charged me $50 to put the shoe on (which was news to me, every other farrier I know does it free of charge). He also told me how horrible my horse was last time and saying 4+ weeks of stall rest wasn’t an excuse. He says she is a brat and dominant and has no manners. The thing is though, the ONLY time she acts like this is with the farrier. She is super sweet and willing under saddle and on the ground. I don’t have any problems when I pick her feet out or do stretches with her.

If you’ve managed to read this far, THANK YOU!!! Now, I can finally get to the questions!

1. Has anybody else encountered problems with their horse being this awful for the farrier before? She doesn’t try to kick, but just pulls back and rears and doesn’t want to have her hoof messed with for long periods of time.
2. Would you consider switching farriers to see if the mare does better with another one, or stick it out with the current farrier to see if things get better?[/QUOTE]

My gelding is exactly like this. He has been barefoot fine a long time. He’s always been a dick to farriers—he isn’t that way to me. It took 10 years same guy for him to stop refusing to pick up feet , slamming foot down, and forget about putting it on a stand…just No, you aren’t my human, F U.

This summer ground very hard/draught. I had a couple stone bruises abscess so I decided, lets put shoes on. His feet have healthy horn. He is not tender footed, it should be fine…

holy jaaaaaysus. It was a disaster. Like you, starts off fine, fronts go on fine…hinds all hell breaks loose. We do get him done though.

Next morning dead lame behind all the nails feel hot to touch. Pull shoes off within hours—horse is fine…untill the next morning when the fronts were dead lame and hot over nails…take them off, horse is fine. He was a little tender footed a few days but no question the shoes hurt him.

I then seriously wondered if the drama we had putting them on was a sign of tenderness. getting “close”.

Farrier was shocked/ stunned/apologetic that clearly the shoes and nails hurt. despite not being abviously placed badly / nail position etc.

I discussed with my vet----she said some horses can’t handle the nails, they just cant. My guy is TB cross —he has good quality horn and not tenderfooted but he probably has thinner walls and soles. And he is super sensitive----with everything ( except tranquilizers…give him enough to drop a bull elephant and he’s still like NOOOOOO You may not float my teeth ARRRRAGGGHHH! Kinda like a intoxicated godzilla)

My vet said-- think about glue ons or boots next time. I agree—I mean, it was so bad I just don’t even want to try again.

[Cheltenham]

BTW-- in this age of rope swinging NH yahoos w dvd’s that get a horse to say uncle and bark like a dog in 30 min----a lot of farriers and people around the horse scene assume all horses are like a colder blood that you can run around in a circle, boot in the a$$ and convince it’s way more trouble than standing obligingly to have things stuck in their feet, their nose their, their mouth…rear end whatever. But a blooded horse is not deterred by running in a circle 90mph for 90 min—that’s what their muscle, metabolism, and CNS is all keyed up for. Game on Mofo’s!

It’s very irritating to have 30+ years experience wrangling all manner of horses and breeds…and have some howdy doody blow hard with a 6 DVD set to horse mastership diploma – yank your horses leg around and complain that aren’t well trained or behaved because they object to said howdy doody blow hard hammering away at their hoof without pausing to consider if it’s actually quite uncomfortable and the horse is saying "I’m uncomfortable! What are you deaf? You GD Horse whispering booby! Am I whispering loud enough for you now! "

Yeah—good farriers are hard to find. Back in the old days they seemed to say little, smell like a brewery, kinda just roll and sway right with a horse till they got them done.