Natural Horsekeeping

[guest@endurance.net]

K S SWIGART   katswig@earthlink.net


Jasmine Cave said:

> In order to have a strasser type trim there are several other things
that
> must be done. The first thing is to have a natural living area for you
> horse. This includes:
> 1. enviornmental temperature- outside living. Strasser feels it is
unhealthy
> for a horse to be in a warm barn then pulled outside in the cold. She
feels
> the horse is better off living outside year round.

My horses live outside 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

> 2.movement- she feels the horse has developed a continuous motion
lifestyle
> and keeping a horse stabled would be unhealthy.She feels the horse would
be
> better off living outside in a pasture or paddock so it could move
around
> freely.

They live in a 100 acre pasture.

> 3.herdlife- the horse has developed as a herd animal and it is better
for
> the horse mentally to have others of its own kind to groom each other
and
> socialize with.

Herd size varies from 3-5 (although what a horse’s mentality and mutual
grooming practices have to do with the condition of its feet and how those
feet ought to be cared for is beyond me, but if it does, my horses
qualify, unless she requires that they have entire males practicing and
fighting for breeding rights to also be essential to the socialization of
horses because that is what is done in nature).

> 4.nutrition- the horse developed as a grazing animal and should be out
to
> graze pasture grass or given free-choice hay. She feels feeding only
2-3X
> day is unhealthy for the horse.

I supplement their graze (predominantly oat grass, but also a bunch of
other grasses: orchard, rye, barley, mustard, a small quantity of alfalfa
and some red clover in addition to whatever weeds grow out there--varies
from year to year depending on the weather) with 5-6 lbs per horse per day
of alfalfa hay during the late summer, fall, and early winter when the
quality of the grass declines to the point that they are eating mostly
dead grass and sticks.

> 5.body posture- In the wild the horse has a lower head position. When
> stabled the horse must eat and drink in an unaturally high position.

Since they are grazing off the ground or I throw the hay on the ground I
am okay there; the water level is about 2 feet off the ground (when the
trough is full).

> 6.exposure of the hooves to water- The hooves must be soaked 15 minutes
per
> day. In the wild this is done when the horse goes to a water hole to
drink.
> It can also be done by riding the horse in water for 15 minutes or by
useing
> soaking boots.

Just how wet the horses’ hooves get and how much time they spend standing
in mud depends on the time of year (more during the rainy seasons than the
dry season, but since one of their favorite activities during the hot
months is to throw water on themselves from the water trough, it gets a
bit muddy around the watering hole).  However, none of them ever spends 15
minutes standing in the mud by the water trough.  They go up, get a drink
and leave (or throw water around and then leave to go roll in the dirt).
Neither of these activities takes 15 minutes, so I question the assertion
that 15 minutes of soaking is mimicking the activity of wild horse
behaviour around a water hole.

> 7.resting spaces- in the wild the horse is in open space, when stabled
the
> horse is kept in a small space where amonia from urine can cause
problems
> with the hooves.

No small spaces or enclosed spaces (except for the hay barn) at my place.
Everything is open air…even the “shelter.”

> 8.oils- strasser feels that hoof oils cause more problems than they help
and
> should not be used. She does recomend the use of a water based
conditoner
> after the hooves have been soaked to help hold in moisture for hooves
that
> are prone to drying out. This conditioner is sold on Jaime Jacksons
site.

I have never bothered with any hoof conditioners (I am not convinced that
they perform any function).

> 9.direct ground contact- stabled horses do not get this. Bedding
prevents
> the expansion of the hoof capsule and changes the angle the horse stands
at
> because the hooves sink into bedding. strasser uses rubber mats in her
run
> in. If the horse likes to lay done she says to have a pile of shavings
or
> sand for the horse to lay abd roll in, but only in one spot, NOT the
whole
> floor of the run in.

I use straw in the foaling pen for the broodmares, and I will occasionally
use straw to fill in any nasty mud holes, but I don’t provide any bedding
for the horses…which isn’t to say that they don’t have their favorite dust
bowls for rolling in or lying down in.

> This is all talked about in detail in the book " A Lifetime of
> Soundness".She also talks about several hoof diseases and prevention. So
> what Strasser recomends is a paddock or pasture with a run in shed and
> keeping the horses in a social group. If you are going to be riding on
lots
> of rocks you should add stones to the area the horses stand most like
around
> the water tank.

I certainly don’t need to add any rocks to my granite mountain despite the
fact that that is where I do most of my riding.  However, my horses spend
very little time standing around the water tank (probably because there
isn’t any graze around the water tank and they spend most of their time
grazing).  They do have some favorite spots (I am assuming it is because
there is something about the soil in those areas that makes the grass
tastier…because they always graze down their favorite spots first.
However, they also have their 2 o’clock tree (no where near the water
trough) which is an nice big oak that provides nice shade and a pleasant
breeze on hot summer afternoons where they can usually be found dozing on
hot days, and they also have the olive grove for when the wind and the
rain get heavier (also nowhere near the water trough).

And in the wild, it is unlikely that horses will spend much time hanging
out at a water hole.  The water hole is where the predators hang out.
Wild horses will also drink and leave.  So if she says that horses would
“naturally” stand around at a water tank, she is mistaken.

> In order to do the strasser trim the horse must have natural living
> conditions and have a physiologically correct trimming by a qualified
> hoofcare specialist.

And this totally flies in the face of all logic.  If the horse has natural
living conditions it won’t need trimming (who trims the feet of wild
horses???)  Let’s face it, trimming a horse’s feet is as “unnatural” as
shoeing them.  Trimming a horse’s feet is an intervention of man to
alter/adjust the way a horse’s foot wears and/or grows.

So let me tell you about how my horses, that are kept probably more
“naturally” than any horse that Dr. Strasser has ever observed in the
paddocks of Germany, have adapted their feet to their living and working
conditions.

In fact, let me tell you about Marla.

Marla is a 7 year old TB mare that was born at my place (in the foaling
pen which is about 40’ x 80’) and when she was three days old she was
flung out to pasture with her mother and the rest of the herd, which,
while it did not include any entire males, did included one aged gelding
and another adult gelding who in may ways THOUGHT he was a stud (because
he was gelded quite late at the age of 6 AFTER he had bred a couple of
mares).

Marla never saw a shoe or a trim as she grew up on the 100 acres of
granite mountain with the normal southern California rainy season/dry
season.  However, the ground does have an average of about a 13% grade on
it, so there ain’t much by way of standing water, even during the rainy
season (even the dust bowls don’t get all that muddy in the rains,
drainage is just too good).

She was ground driven as a yearling and two year old (barefoot), backed
lightly as a long three year old just to introduce her to the concept of
being ridden (barefoot), ridden more consistently as a four year old but
still mostly to acquaint her with the aids but also to do some light
conditioning of her musculoskeletal system for the work of carrying a
rider while working up to longer distances (all over the same kind of
terrain…her home mountain, but also some of the clay bottoms of the Santa
Ana Canyon and the sandy bars of the Santa Ana River).

It was during this conditioning that she began to show signs that being
ridden was uncomfortable for her feet.  I put shoes on her and the
discomfort went away.

If this doesn’t qualify as keeping the horse naturally, taking the time to
slowly bring the horse along so it can adapt to the work it is being asked
of, and the horse not having to “recover” from the ill-effects of being
shod, I don’t know what does.

So, quite frankly, if Dr. Strasser says that a horse’s feet can adapt to
any workload so long as it is kept naturally, its feet haven’t been
compromised by shoing, and the work is brought along slowly, all I can say
is…she doesn’t know what she is talking about (and this was my polite way
of putting this).

Marla IS a Thoroughbred and she doesn’t have as good of feet as her Anglo
Arab half brother (who is now at the “long four year old” stage of his
training and hasn’t needed shoes yet, but then, he is also a stallion, so
he doesn’t get to run on the 100 acres, he is confined to 1/2 an acre—and
just last month he needed his first trim, since last summer he was moved
into the “stud pen” for while I was out of town at the 2001 XP, and the
stud pen, while it is more secure, doesn’t have quite as abrasive of
footing as “the little boys pen” (which is the 2/3 acre where I keep young
colts).  He does get to run in the pasture when I pen up the girls and can
put him out with the geldings (who are also penned up, the reasons which
have nothing to do with their feet).

I don’t know whether Marla’s brother will ever need any hoof protection.
I don’t have any plans to do endurance with him, he is slated to become a
dressage horse and he will be living in the softer, less abrasive footing
of the stud pen for his entire life (since I also don’t have any plans to
geld him).  But I do plan to do plenty of trail riding on him (since
trails are the only training facilities I have right now), so he might
need some kind of hoof protection, who knows.

But, here is my point, it is horses that are NOT kept in a completely
natural environment that are more capable of doing longer distances
without hoof protection.  These horses don’t wear off too much foot just
walking around grazing.

Windy (little arab/pony mare) could go barefoot through the hills over
rocks etc. quite comfortably when she was kept in a stall.  It wasn’t
until she went out to pasture and started wearing off tons of foot just
living that I had to provide her with hoof protection (and the only
effective hoof protection for her is something that does not increase the
diameter of the foot at all…so all hoof boots are out…because she
interferes badly if you do).

I have a client who kept her barefoot Arab mare in a box stall with
shavings and a run for 20 years and rode her all over the same Santa Ana
mountains (and had to have her trimmed about once every 12 weeks), but if
that horse had been living outside at my place she’d have needed hoof
protection for the kind of riding that Ginny like to do (even though it
wasn’t endurance).

And Marla, when I took her to the other side of the hill last May to give
her some “town bronze” before I took her to the XP this summer, lived in a
stall…and what do you know, she grew enough foot so that I could ride her
through the hills barefoot without her getting all ouchy.  And the reason
that she grew some foot was because she WASN’T living “out to pasture.”

Saber, when he lived in a stall could do 50 mile rides barefoot fairly
easily (assuming they were not back to back; he couldn’t do a 100 miler
and I never tried a multi-day), but when he moved to the granite
mountain…25 miles was about his max before he would start to get foot
sore.

Presumably, there is some happy medium for bare hoof management.  Enough
hard terrain to building a tough foot, but not living on it all the time
so that it wears off all the foot just living.

So, as far as I am concerned, the intelligent horse owner/manager keeps
their horses barefoot for as long as the horse is comfortable doing so and
then provides some kind of hoof protection that is appropriately suited to
the horse and its specific needs, with respect to shape of hoof,
conformation, quality of hoof, terrain, living conditions, work load,
budget (it is important not to forget this), and availability of people
who know how to properly apply the type of protection chosen (e.g. if you
are going to use steel shoes, you have to have access to a competent
farrier; if you are going to use Equithotics, you have to have a farrier
who knows how to work with them, if you are going to use EasyBoots
SOMEBODY has to know how to put them on properly, etc.)

Dr. Strasser may have what sounds like a nice theory (although I can point
out to you some really substantial problems with her underlying concepts),
and, for all I know, she may not be claiming that horses can do thousands
of miles of endurance competition in a year just so long as they have
“adapted” to it (I haven’t heard from her, only from people who claim to
be quoting her), but in practice her theory just doesn’t hold water.

Darolyn stated that she thought that if her horses were kept and
conditioned in rocks that they then would be able to compete in rocks as
well.  And I am telling you (and her if she is listening), that my horses
ARE kept and conditioned in rocks, and not only can they not compete in
rocks, they can’t even be heavily conditioned in rocks or competed in
anything.  They wear off too much foot just walking around grazing.

And if you listen to the people who DO actually keep their horses
naturally (as in running around in the mountains barefoot until they are
old enough to do something with), you will hear them say “no, the
underlying theory is wrong, and all of the reasons that you give for
believing it are also wrong.”

It IS perfectly natural for hoof wear and hoof growth to match perfectly
when the horse is doing what it was designed to do…walk around and graze
on unirrigated terrain with occasional burst of speed to avoid
predators…or just for the hell of it (they sometimes do that).  But the
instant you ask the horse to do anything different than this, you are
going beyond the design of the mechanism.  The bare hoof mechanism is not
designed for anything more than walking around and grazing on unirrigated
terrain with occasional bursts of speed.

The extent to which man can adapt the mechanism to accommodate work for
which it was never designed has nothing to do with what is “natural.”  Man
has made all kinds of conformational and other adaptations through
selective breeding to attempt to accommodate the way that he keeps and
uses horses, some with more success than others, but make no mistake, no
“wild horse” was ever designed to do any of the things that endurance
riders (and almost everybody else who has one) ask their horses to do.

A wise horseman (no matter what his discipline) either figures out a way
to make those adaptations without breaking the mechanism (and uses every
tool at his disposal to do so), or he just uses the horse beyond it
capabilities and throws it away when he is done; hoping that it will have
served its purpose before it becomes useless.

Endurance riders, because one of the major goals is life time mileage
(and, is what attracted me to endurance in the first place) generally don’
t fall into the latter category.

Much of what I am hearing from many of the barefoot enthusiasts who have
posted here is that they are unwilling to accept that there really are
limitations to the mechanism of a bare hoof.  To which, the engineer in me
can only answer, “there are limitations to EVERY mechanism.”


kat
Orange County, Calif.


p.s. For any of you who are under the mistaken assumption that a bare hoof
can be conditioned to the point where it is as resistant to wear from
abrasion as steel, I suggest you perform a small experiment.  Pick up a
hoof rasp and your horse's bare foot and rasp off and eigth of an inch of
hoof.

Then using the same rasp and the same amount of pressure, pick up the foot
of a horse shod with steel shoes and rasp off an eigth of an inch of
steel.

See which takes longer.