hehe
what a way to put it ... I cannot wait till I can say that about my boy!
- Although he'd be mortified if I compared him to a goat - he's absolutely petrified of them!!
Well stormybracken you are joined in the Numpty category by me!!! Sophie was my first real intro into barefoot and thanks to Sarah B she has erm fairly normal feet now. Previous to getting her I had shoes removed from 2 horses and Farrier trimmed them and they were comfortable so my research was slow at that time. The arrival of Sophie however sent me on a fast,mind boggling learning experience both about feet and training. 5-6 years on I'm still learning every day. At last though I've achieved a state when I no longer totally panic when there are difficulties...
Just thought I'd resurrect this post because although I have learnt ALOT about barefoot management, recent events have shown me its worth emphasising something that we reguarly discuss on this forum and Nic sometimes refers to on her blog, that you have to look at the whole horse not just his foot/feet. After months of listening to the vet and farrier concentrating on Storm's foot and making recommendations for injections, shoeing and box rest, I finally stopped paying much attention to them (fortunately hadn't paid much to start with) and started concentrating on the whole horse. Friends were commenting on his lucklustre appearance, which after months of pain you would expect, and his previously unknown "calm" demeanour. In fact head honcho vet who came to review the situation also commented on a skin condition I hadn't been concerned about - what a shame he wasn't on the case sooner. Also a salutory lesson that just because someone says a lot you don't agree with doesn't mean they having nothing of value to say.
Now we are peeling the layers of the onion, his feet are becoming stronger, still a long way to go, his coat is the best its ever been to the extent electric fences pose no threat, and he's coping with this disgusting weather rugless so far (I know nothing compared to what poor Bruce & co. are going through), and a big area of concern is now his back/shoulder areas. So chicken and egg, which comes first, poor foot health and balance or possibly tripping and rolling down the hill being a wally, or it that related to foot health.... Whichever, I wouldn't have known that his poor feet were not due to genetics if he hadn't injured his shoulder, which ever way it started.
On hindsight he has been uncomfortable with chemical wormers for years, I knew he was susceptible to sugar and cereal in feeds but didn't connect behaviour change with physical change. It also turns out that his new equine dentist (sorry, another area no vet will now routinely treat my horses) has corrected his up and down chomping to allow a natural grinding which will have a knock on effect on his poll which will have a knock on effect on his spinal processes, which will have a knock on effect on his pelvis and enable him to use his hindquarters more effectively thus taking the pressure off his front end a bit and helping his shoulder etc etc.
Now I hope that anything that shows up I will look at the WHOLE horse, not just the bit that doesn't seem to be working properly.
Another word of warning - I had someone else out to see Storm who was fantastic, very interesting about what is going on and what I could practically do to help, extremely useful visit. This person has a bad reputation in another area of their life which if I had known about I wouldn't have contacted them. Glad I didn't know, another layer of onion skin has been peeled away!
Looking at the whole horse was one of the biggest attractions and convincers of me to barefoot and it tranfers (most of the time) to all aspects of my horsecare. Also I do think sometimes a fresh pair of eyes is useful as we are all guilty of not being able to see the wood for the trees when we're heavily involved every day...
I think this is why barefoot raises such hackles when you go on an open forum. People know that they are damaging their horses but they can't bear to hear it said out loud. I was the same five years ago. I know where they are coming from. Well done you for listening to your conscience!
Stormybracken your open mind does you credit!
C.
ps the Caroline's website is not me, I think it's horsesfirst's? _________________ smartiesdiary.blogspot.com
Oh yes, that's Nic's but it was developed originally by my husband (bless him!) and featured my horses very heavily because they were competitive trailblazers at affiliated eventing. It's a great website, I think, very welcoming ("accessible" would be government-speak ) I'm glad that you liked it.
No, its at least half Caroline's, probably more, since dear Allan (aka Superhubby) guided my first faltering attempts at setting up a website back in 2004
Although some of the horses on there are no longer with us, they were all trailblazers, so its good that the website is still useful for people
dorisday wrote:
I struggled for 2 years with my conscience
It took me a while to convert too, and I was quite religious about shoeing!
But honestly it has taken me even longer to "grow up" in a barefoot sense from seeing the feet as an end in themselves - of course I wanted excellent feet that "looked nice" - to seeing the feet as just a small part of a great big picture of which the success or otherwise of the feet are simply an end result of a lot of other things going right or wrong. Bare feet seem to act like an amplifier at times!.
That's why it has taken me so long to get Link right. I was focussing on the feet themselves, and doing lots of activity around them, and wasn't really hearing all the things that Anni was telling me about the rest of the horse. Things like supporting the liver to handle the environmental challenges, dealing with the tension in the mouth and through the poll and how that affected the stance, supporting his tetchy guts rather than just eliminating irritants such as grains, lots of other things that all add up and show in a failure to achieve great feet.
And the last big thing was accepting that where I am, with the obvious issues in the grass and soil and other pressures, it isn't going to really get better and a different environment is needed. That's the hardest one because it involves huge disruption to me, and that's what I'm addressing now by moving to the next valley - barefoot horses that were on this current yard have all thrived and done better after they have moved.
Sorry - maybe shouldn't be so candid. But I'm in a reflective mood.
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At last though I've achieved a state when I no longer totally panic when there are difficulties... 
being a wally, or it that related to foot health.... Whichever, I wouldn't have known that his poor feet were not due to genetics if he hadn't injured his shoulder, which ever way it started.
