Christopher Hole Awcf Farrier Services

10/02/2025

16/10/2024

08/07/2024

🪰Flies - horses & farriers hate them!

It's unfair to ask a horse to stand still for shoeing as it's being eaten alive by flies. You can hardly blame them. The last thing we want is to turn shoeing into a negative & stressful experience.

For farriers, it's incredibly frustrating trying to do your best work on a half-ton moving target.
It can make it hard to pick up on any 'out of the ordinary' behaviours for your horse which are often early warning signs of pain.
A restless horse that snatches & jumps (not to mention the famous tail swish to the eye!) also HURTS.

Do:
✅ Apply fly repellent liberally! Pay extra attention to their legs.
✅ Use a well-fitting fly rug
✅ Acclimatise your horse to a portable fan (midges can't tolerate 7mph+ winds!)
✅ Use a cloth to apply or gels if your horse is afraid of sprays
✅ Manage the environment - set up fly traps and keep your shoeing area away from standing water & muck piles

Don't:
❌ Spray whilst your farrier is underneath the horse
❌ Leave fly masks on - often this can inhibit a horse’s visibility & increase chances of spooking
❌ Book an appointment at a peak pest times
❌ Dress your horse in dark colours or leave them sweaty as this attracts horse flies

Red Horse Products

31/05/2024

Big Thankyou to Henry Tracey, Adam Bradley and the Staffordshire branch team for organising a great farriery pairs competition this week at the Staffordshire county show. Really pleased to come away with a first in every class along side Lydia Dey, Massive thankyou to Lydia for being a top team mate over the two days, doing some great work and dragging us up in the shoemaking💪couldn’t have asked for a better partner. Well done to the wing man turned competitor Toby Pedley for making it a tighter than tight finish for the individual championship this year, it could have gone either way 😅

19/03/2024

Knowledge sharing post No.1.

Digital/Phalangeal Alignment in a wet environment.
Pollitt and Hampson did a study at University of Queensland a couple of years ago.
They concluded the hoof wall has a constant moisture content. The sole however is like a sponge, soaking up all available moisture .
When hydrated to capacity, it loses it's tensile strength and the ability to support the hoof capsule as intended.
The back third of the hoof, which is also the shock absorbing section, drops or prolapses as a result. Counter rotation of the coffin bone occurs.
This is now known as negative palmer/planter angle. That is the angle the bottom of P3 makes in relation to the ground.
As a farrier, the best results to help this are to engage the back third in a load sharing package. Traditionally a heartbar shoe or wide bar was used. More recently dental impression material or pour in material is added to load share with frogs and commisures.
Plastic frog support pads are available most recently, as skills to fit a heartbar correctly are highest level. Protecting the internal structure are paramount whilst load sharing.

Horse's hooves are not designed to be constantly wet. Best results are to remove the cause.
A dry bedding of pine sawdust draws moisture and helps kill bacterial invasion of the whiteline and/frog's.
Overloading of the over hydrated hoof is exacerbated by the weight of the horse. To many horse's are overweight for the tensile strength of the hoof capsule.
If your horse gets to the situation where it needs this specific shoeing package, it's your responsibility as an owner to change the management or husbandry process.
Horse's shod with a load sharing package should be in a confined environment where they can't gallop about with the possibility of overreaching causing premature shoe loss. They should not be in a herd environment where other horse's can stand on the shoe's at play causing premature shoe loss.
Your farrier sees your horse at a cyclic time to reshoe, trimming the hoof to keep in balance perimeters.
The management between visits falls squarely on the owner.
Unfortunately to often expectations of correct digital alignment are overshadowed by owner mismanagement. I'm older and get grumpy when "buck passing " ends up in my lap.
At the end of the day as a professional tradesperson, it's me who decides if I continue to be trying my best for your horse's welfare 🙏

08/02/2024

10/09/2023

05/09/2023

Big thankyou to Martha Cooling, Andrew Cooling and the Derbyshire branch for a fantastically run competition at Chatsworth country fair this weekend. Thanks to Wayne Preece Fwcf for judging and a big shout out to Dylan Evans for Striking. Already looking forward to next year.

27/06/2023

Overly moist, as well as dry and brittle, hooves tend to break and bruise. They can leave horses footsore or make holding shoes difficult. Here, veterinarians and farriers offer advice on hardening your horse’s hooves.

01/06/2023

* LAMINITIS*

As the spring grass shoots through, we are getting lots of cases of laminitis reported.

-What is laminitis?
Laminitis is an inflammation of the sensitive tissues in the feet, triggered by too high a sugar intake, as well as other factors.

-What signs will I see?
Horses will suddenly go quite sore/ lame usually on the front feet (but the back feet can also be involved as well). The feet will feel hot to the touch, and the pulses to the feet will usually be bounding and very easily felt.
Horses will sometimes rock onto the back feet to try and take the pressure off their front feet (as pictured below).
They will usually be slightly quieter than normal, and may be off their food due to being in pain.

-What can I do?
Horses with laminitis need strong pain killers, such as bute or Danilon, and sometimes need extra pain relief in the form of paracetamol. Please contact your vet for a dose of bute and paracetamol before giving them to your horse.
Horses with laminitis need to be box rested and taken off of fresh grass- soaking hay removes a lot of the sugar, and hay should be fed preferentially over haylage to laminitic horses.
A deep bed of shavings will also help support the feet, as well as talking to your vet or farrier about remedial shoeing (usually heartbars) to help support the feet.
Recurrent cases of laminitis can sometimes be linked to hormonal conditions such as equine metabolic syndrome (EMS) and cushings (PPID), both of which can be diagnosed with blood tests, so if you are concerned about recurrent cases, please talk to the office.
Radiographs are sometimes required if the horse is not making as much progress as expected to assess for rotation of the pedal bone (P3).

-How can I prevent laminitis in the future?
The most important factor in preventing laminitis is controlling the sugar intake in the diet. A lot of horses need ‘strip grazing’ where the amount of grass available is increased gradually over time, or need to be turned out with a grazing muzzle to limit the grass intake. Long seeded grass, or grass being left for hay, has less sugars in than the short fresh grass coming through on an eaten down paddock.
It’s always important to remember to add in a balancer to the diet if the horse is eating solely hay, as this lacks a lot of the essential vitamins and minerals required for healthy horses.

If you have any questions or concerns about your horse, please give the office a call on 01745 584516 or email us on [email protected]

13/05/2023

Good start to the year at Nottingham county show.

Thankyou to Zac Watson for organising and
Stephen Hill FWCF for judging.

22/02/2023

17/11/2022

‼ Do clean your horse’s feet and legs prior to your farrier appointment – you wouldn’t go to the dentist after eating a Mars bar having not cleaned your teeth!
Beyond your farrier getting dirty and increasing the risk of accidents through slippy/muddy chaps, farriers use rasps to level, balance and finish the foot – rasps clog particularly easily preventing your farrier from doing the best job they can.

05/09/2022

Thanks to Martha Cooling, Andrew Cooling and the team at the Chatsworth Country Fair for organising a fantastic competition this weekend. Also big Thanks to Toby Pedley for being a top striker all Summer, it’s been a great one to end on 💪