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[RC] Ground Control - Dream Weaver

At 08:59 AM 8/24/2006, you wrote: 
Karen, do you still use Ground Control shoes on Chief?  (he was the one, =
right?)  My youngest is just starting and he is beating his front =
fetlocks into bloody pulp.  We haven't been able to see him do it and I =
think I feel it only or mostly at a walk (how weird is that?).  Anyway, =
I tried the GC's on my older geldings and they didn't seem to work, but =
I was thinking maybe this would be a fix for the youngest.

Hi Dyane -- I have not been using them, but if I did decide to put shoes back on for whatever reason they would be my first choice. They need to be applied correctly in order for them to work, most of the time when I saw them on other horses they were not. The horse needs to have a good thick hoofwall that is not prone to flares.

If you do use them, ask the farrier to file the sharp edge off of the bottom edge. I had horses hit themselves with the shoes just in the trailer and draw blood. Rounding the bottom edge helped with that a lot.

I never had any of the problems reported by others with the shoes. They held up well even on 5 day multiday rides. I wouldn't suggest trying to do much more than and some conditioning rides on a set, but then you probably shouldn't expect most shoes to last longer than that.

The GC's only come in certain sizes, if there isn't a size that works for your horse there are other brands of plastic shoes that come in a lot more sizes and shapes.

With young horses that hit themselves -- that may be because their feet aren't really balanced but it could also be simply that they just have not learned how to carry themselves well yet. We used to joke about Chief being "helicopter legs" because they were all over the place. That is where doing lessons and arena work can really help, as it takes a long time to get a horse in shape and develop the muscles and mental focus to be able to move the most efficiently for extended periods.

Karen


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