You sure can't treat abnormal growth patterns by only looking at the
wear patterns. In general there should be some sort of equilibrium
reached where the horse left bearfoot will reach a reasonable foot
configuration and it will with most horses. And most likely the horse
below would be a good meal for a cougar or bear in the wild.
I have one we have to intervene a little on - not as bad as what you
describe. He gets trimmed every 5 weeks and eggbars squared off a
little at the toe. Going barefoot would do him no good at all but we
know that and have spent several years with a good farrier to get him
where he needs to be.
How the horse wears his feet barefoot is how he should have been shod.
Truman and all, generally I support comments like the above, since it is
founded on common sense; but one of our mares has the strangest-growing feet
I have ever seen, as we have tried to have her barefoot over the winter. I
cannot think this horse could survive in the wiild long! Barefoot, she
entirely loses all heel, but the toes just keep growing and growing. If
nothing was done, she would have an extra 2-3 inches of toe out there....so
the shoeing does the exact opposite of how she wears...that is to really
whack back the toes and also get shoe back under the heel....
Other mare of mine likes to grow heel faster than toe, so we have to watch
she doesn't get too upright!
Karen
