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Re: [RC] [RC] shoes impeding circulation-not! - heidi

What I see, with my guys feet, is weather dictates everything, and, this
 August, with over 15 inches of rain, I've been dealing with a lot of
wet.

From dry to wet seems to be the worst transition and when you go back
to

dry, parts of the hoof wall can disentegrate and turn to dust.

The biggest thing I am noticing, with regards to blood flow, is the
frog.  I  seem to have a much better frog on a horse that has been
barefoot, with no  shoes, for awhile.  Sometimes, with a horse that is
shod, a large part of  the frog kind of dissolves away, and doesn't look
nearly as healthy as on a  barefoot horse.


That's more a function of the weather than the shoeing, though.  If the
horse is constantly in wet, the frogs often disintegrate, even on barefoot
horses.  One has to be careful to pare away dead material to keep the live
material underneath healthy.  Out here in the dry, that material pares
away on its own, regardless of whether the horses are shod.  The
difference between barefoot and shod is apt to be in intermediate
conditions, where the shoe can hold moist material in the cup of the foot
much more readily than the bare foot will do, causing the sole and frog to
stay moist and airless and causing deterioration.  Cleaning feet regularly
will help to deter that.  It is also more of an issue in horses that are
confined, as horses with a lot of "run room" are more apt to kick up their
heels and fling out the material that is stuck in there.  Again, in our
desert, NUTHIN' sticks in there--and the frogs on the shod horses look
just as good as the frogs on the barefoot ones.  (The farrier cusses the
dry feet this time of year, though, as his nippers and rasp bounce off of
them... <g>)

Heidi



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Replies
Re: [RC] [RC] shoes impeding circulation-not!, Howard Bramhall