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gossip28 · Joined: 13 Feb 2009 Posts: 46

Was just musing & wondered how everybody on the forum got into barefoot?

Personally, my farrier had a hernia & I couldn't find another so I gave barefoot some thought, rang Nic who super-kindly came all the way from Exmoor to trim for me. She recommended Pete Ramey's book, I read it & it made sense so decided to try barefoot 'as an experiment' at the livery yard I was on at the time. I saw some very different sides to people I thought I knew after I had taken my horse's shoes off - seems to bring out the worst in some people - which was interesting in itself. But although a couple of times when she was a bit footy I thought I would just get her sound & put shoes back on, of course when she was sound she didn't need the shoes .. d'oh!

Would love to hear other people's stories... Very Happy

Jo.

cptrayes · Joined: 05 Feb 2007 Posts: 449

I had two horses. One of them had fabulous feet but was increasingly unsound walking over stony surfaces. Since he was an eventer it was a decision between going for pads and trying something drastic. The other was a lot worse. His front feet were huge and desperately flat. He couldn't stand on concrete to be shod and had to be done one foot at a time. In his worst foot, his frog was 3 inches from one side of his foot and 4 from the other and he clearly stood with his entire weight going down the inside wall and not spread across the whole foot. On top of that, he pointed that foot constantly and I was certain he was in pain. I tried and tried to get my farrier to sort it out, but he was completely unable to see why I was not happy and actually seemed puzzled by me making a fuss about the severe imbalance. I had already tried two other farriers, who were even worse - one leaving his toes too long and the other fitting shoes so small he made his feet bleed cutting them to fit the shoe.

So for me, it was desperation. I never in a month of Sundays expected it to work!

My farrier, a man with over 30 years experience, and his son, newly qualified just out of college told me that the second horse would never manage without shoes. He evented at affiliated novice (jumps to 4ft 1inch) in the July after going barefoot the previous September.
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horsesfirst · Joined: 08 Nov 2008 Posts: 405 Location: kent

My farrier at the time (who trains all the apprentices in the area) was dreadful. Wanted to put shoes and pads on a two year old (now I know that the only problem we faced at the time was a b awful trim job and rather wet ground.)

I didn't know anything about feet, but I knew good quality bullsh*t when I heard it.

This was before the internet existed - or even word processing let alone email - in fact computers still wrote in green and you had to know how to code to use one. (that's how old I am!) Embarassed

Horse remained shoe free. Lots of things happened - nothing to do with feet - and then I found another farrier who couldn't see the point in putting shoes on a healthy horse (let alone pads).

Lots more stuff happened - all of it adding to the weight of evidence that for my horse barefoot was best. Including several successful rehabs who were all converted to barefoot with my pro barefoot farrier.

So never really made the choice to go 'barefoot' and I wasn't really driven to it by incurable lameness. If the original farrier wasn't such a **** the issue may never have arisen.

But lots of stuff has happened since which could have easily swung me towards shoes if I hadn't had a happy barefoot horse for years.

It is tough when you have responsibility for a metabolic, poorly raised, compromised horse being looked after by a novice at a livery yard which treats horses like Barbie dolls.

And then there is Grace. Who is a whole new ball game. But its going to be a barefoot one. Cool

Chris Thompson · Posted: Fri Nov 06, 2009 1:59 pm Post subject:

Ok this has been told before but here goes again.

I was in Houston on a business assignment in 2003, and at that time "knew" that horses had to be shod if they were in work. I was having difficulty finding suitable horsers to ride and read ina book about Darolyn Butler's Adventure trail rides www.horseridingfun.com, so booked myself on one.

Most of the horses there were Arabs but they brought me a paint horse called Choctaw, and told me he was a Spanish Mustang

and we went for a ride along the sand trails through the woods. Choctaw and I got on well and I requested him the next few times I rode. I also noticed he was not shod, in fact I noticed that none of her hroses were shod Shocked

I soon met Darolyn and asked her why she did not shoe her horses, assuming it was because the sand trails were soft. I got GBH of the ears and was lent and told to read Strasser's book "A lifetime of soundness" before my next ride.

What I found out was that Darolyn had 50 barefoot endurance horses. This is her barefoot story http://www.manesandtails.com/darolyn.html or http://www.horseridingfun.com/barefootin.html

To cut a long story short, I took Choctaw on loan and he and I did a lot of barefoot miles together, including a 50 mile endurance ride, over terrain that varied from smooth to rough and in some cases that would give a mountain goat pause for thought.

Darolyn also got me trimming (you ride him, you trim him was the edict).

Anyway, at the end of the assignment I returned to the UK and out of necesity started riding shod horses again. They just did not feel right - too noisy, too much concussion, not enough grip, etc. Then I came across a yard near to Didcot that had barefoot horses. The rest as they say is history, including Brego's story.

brucea · Joined: 15 Feb 2008 Posts: 1134 Location: Aberdeen

My wife told me to.
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Sez · Joined: 06 May 2007 Posts: 244 Location: Blackpool

QAR · Joined: 19 Feb 2007 Posts: 101 Location: Cheshire

Bruce that is brilliant Laughing

Our first horse was shoeless, big piebald cob, never even thought about putting him in shoes. With him we didn't 'do barefoot' (hadn't even herad of it!) we just had him regularly trimmed by a farrier and didn't think about anything else. As it was he was a good doer so lived on a token amount of feed with relatively poor grass and hay.

Never really gave feet much of a thought. Sold the cob because he was a fab hack but hated the RC stuff we really wanted to do. Second horse came fully shod, which somewhat perturbed me in that I didn't feel it was 'right' but its what you do with a 'proper' horse right? Long story of lameness, remedial shoeing, box rest etc etc during which time I was more and more convinced he shouldn't be wearing shoes. MRI scans showed tendon damage, ligament damage, navicular changes etc. Took his shoes off and his feet improved enormously but he remained unsound and was not entirley happy and some days downright miserable. Took the decision to have him PTS on 05 Dec 2007. I'll always wonder that if we'd known at the start with Ace what we know now whether he'd still be with us.

Decided barefoot was teh way to be and went out looking for a horse that was happily living barefoot and found Mr P Very Happy

Chris Thompson · Posted: Fri Nov 06, 2009 4:15 pm Post subject:

Forgot to add just about the time Darolyn went barefoot her yard was flooded and she lost her grass, so her barefoot horses were in sand surfaced fields with ad lib access to round bale hay that was put in a feeder.

There was some coarse grass around the yard that they would eat if they got the chance, and they were occasionally turned out into the surrounding woods to forage. They were partial to bamboo strangely and water melon skins.

Knowing what I know now about diet, I cannot help wondering how much the loss of grazing helped in her barefoot sucess.

cptrayes · Joined: 05 Feb 2007 Posts: 449

Gossip what a wonderful thread this is! Thanks for asking the question.

C

Bruce - good man! Did she give you a titbit when you did what you were told, or is it verbal reward only in your yard?
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lazeearabians · Joined: 21 Sep 2009 Posts: 32

I had my first brush with barefoot about four years ago when I bought a saddle off a woman who was a trimmer in Cumbria (totally forgotten her name - Rhona or Rhonda?). It wasn't something I'd ever thought about before, though of course I knew people who rode without shoes but doing it myself wasn't even on my radar.

I went away from her house thinking how much sense it made but no idea how to take it any further - besides my horse had been shod for most of his life without problem. So I left it at that.

A couple of years later whilst competing endurance I met Sarah (Sez) and later on Helen Newton - both of whom were competing barefoot with their horses. I was convinced by the theory of barefoot - logically it had to be healthier for the horse BUT I wasn't convinced it was something I could do successfully. I'm not one for faffing around soaking feet or not riding because of a six month transitioning period, or messing around with fiddley hard to put on boots. Besides my two horses (herd was growing!) had both been shod most of their lives without problems.

I got to know Helen better, rode with her more frequently, and became more and more impressed with how her horses went. I was getting closer to jumping over the edge but TBH was put off by the sometimes evangelical nature of barefoot posts on various forums plus the idea of not being able to compete for a period of time.

Fast forward to May this year. I'd changed farrier - new farrier came highly recommended - and two things happened. One - I noticed my horse's off fore hoof starting to flare on the inside. This had never been noticable before, though when I looked at his vetting cert from when his old owner bought him as a three year old, it did comment on poor foot balance particularly on his OF. When I bought him he was in Natural Balance shoes. Second - we did a 40k CR at Cannock and at the post ride vetting the vet noticed swelling on the inside of his OF cannon bone, just under the knee. She clearly wasn't expecting him to trot up sound but he did, however clearly something was making his leg fill. I had him scanned a week later convinced ligament or tendon damage and luckily he was clear but things don't happen without a reason IMO and it seemed too much of a coincidence with the OF flare.

I still wasn't quite ready to make the leap though (the season had only just started and I wanted to keep on competing, so I'd said to myself I'd try barefoot at the end of the season when it didn't matter if I couldn't ride much) and got my farrier to try Epona plastic shoes. What a disaster. He failed to follow the fitting instructions properly and after doing a 50K at Dukeries the OF shoe fell off! I had to quickly get it reattached to pass the vet but plastic shoes clearly weren't going to be a viable option and more importantly neither was my farrier.

So it was either go through the stress of finding a new and competent farrier or just sod it and go barefoot.

I got back from Sherwood Forest and phoned Ross and Mel. A couple of weeks later Ross deshod my horse, fitted me with some Renegades and away I went. We haven't looked back since. We carried on competing doing a 65k successfully in Gloves about six weeks after his shoes came off. I'm lucky in that he started with good feet and has a tough as old boots character. He also doesn't seem to be metabolically challenged (mentally challenged maybe!), so has made things easy for me.

I've since taken the shoes off my old horse and the new horse I bought in August. I am a big fan of boots - don't think I'd have taken the barefoot plunge without having seen how well Helen N does with hers in boots and how easy they are to put on and use - no faffing about at all!

And incidentally the OF flare and associated swelling on the inside of the leg have not reappeared since removing the shoes. I really think if I had ignored it and carried on competing I'd probably have had a lame horse by now.

Sorry about the autobiography Very Happy