Namaste Barefoot Trimming

02/21/2025

Just over a year of work on Brownie pony! She has 3 almost normal feet now and her "weird foot" is finally making some good progress decontracting with some trim adjustments. It also appears to be growing in straighter. I do think there are some bony changes affecting it but things have really been coming along with this new trim, and time will tell!

02/18/2025

This is one I really wish I had done intake photos on but the owner and I are both very pleased with her progress! 20 year old mare with rotational limb deformities who has also foundered in the past. She had been crippled previously by farriers who tried to chop her toes or use other drastic means of "correcting" her feet. Owner had been maintaining her feet and she was sound with her "pancakes".

She's now gaining some heel height and while her feet are still pretty flat we have gotten rid of a lot of compacted bar material which is allowing for better function and growth. Because of her rotational deformities she needs her breakover eased on the lateral toe pillar. We can address this without chopping toes or invading the white line.

02/17/2025

Missy mule's first trim and most recent trim. She was quite feral and I learned a lot in the process of gaining her trust. She's been trimmed at liberty for a while now.

02/14/2025

I am currently at my capacity for horses on a maintenance schedule. I will maintain limited availability for consults and short term rehab cases. If you would like to be added to the wait-list for future openings, please message me.

02/08/2025

This is the most comprehensive explanation I have found on the bars and what happens if they aren't addressed properly. It's incredibly common for excess bar material to accumulate over time and the more compacted it becomes, the harder it is to differentiate from the live sole. This has a serious impact on both the function of the foot and the hoof care provider's ability to balance the hoof correctly.

Welcome to the 3rd 🚀 lesson of 2025! 🐴 This episode dives into your horse's bars: What are they? Why are they there? And how should yo...

02/07/2025

Sharing for a client who is taking a break from horses and offering some nice prospects at very reasonable prices. Good homes are a must. Both are registered AQHA.

Larkin (bay) is super smart and learning great manners. He is already a little tank with a great Quarter Horse b***y. It appears he may end up being bay roan.

Dilly (cremello) has been slow to mature but over the past year I have watched her grow up a lot. She can be a bit quirky but has a great mind, power tools don't phase her. She has a beautiful build and movement. She unfortunately was kicked by a pasture mate and ended up with a gash on her knee, it's healed well and hasn't bothered her but there's a chance she might need more maintenance down to road due to the injury. She would make a fantastic liberty horse or English prospect. I really like this mare and I would love to see her go to a client.

Feel free to share if you know of anyone looking, or message me for the owner's contact

02/05/2025

Glueing in winter can be more challenging, but we can still get it done, even on the really cold days

01/21/2025

Why We Don't Settle For "Good Enough"

This young horse has been on my schedule for 2 years officially as of today. She initially had very unbalanced feet with very high heels. Her posture wasn't great and she had trouble standing for trims. The last issue was partly mental but being so unbalanced definitely contributed. It took some trial and error from both myself and her owner but she improved and we were happy with her progress.

However, this past fall she was experiencing some tenderness on harder ground. This coincided with me filling in some knowledge gaps in understanding balance and correct biomechanics of the natural foot.

Despite being conscious of her heels needing to come down, I was still leaving them too high and it was causing some contraction at the back of the foot as well as putting P3 in a hyper positive angle.

Small adjustments to her trim have allowed the feet to relax into their natural balance, her heels to decontract, and the toe to recover. Her feet are maintaining a better balance even over a longer cycle. And now that we are a few trims into these adjustments it is evident that the new growth is coming in tighter and better aligned. The small amount of white line separation she had previously is now gone. There have been no changes in diet, this is a direct result of balanced trims.

01/03/2025

Why is Surface Area Important to the Barefoot Horse?

Despite how we talk about heels and toes, a hoof is a singular digit which makes surface area and dorsal-palmar (front-to-back) balance extremely important.

While hoof-pastern axis or HPA is also something to be considered, a hyper focus on achieving a specific HPA or "aligning the bony column" can lead to imbalanced trimming. I am equally guilty of having made this error in judgment so it's important to note that I'm not shaming anyone. Let's normalize talking about and learning from each other's mistakes.

This horse was 6 weeks out from a trim and his heels, quarters and bars were much longer than his toes. This brings the heel further forward and drastically shortens the area that the horse is walking on.

The goal of a barefoot trim is to allow the horse to wear and grow relatively in balance. Of course that will vary case by case dependent on many factors including lifestyle, conformation and any lameness or restrictions higher up in the body. But if the growth rates are significantly imbalanced from the heel to the toe it is a good indicator that the trim hasn't been balanced.

Reduced surface area also interferes with the natural exfoliation of dead sole and can lead to retained and compacted material, further throwing off the trimmer's eye. I removed the excessive bar material which was causing debris entrapment and thrush problems, and was able to exfoliate some retained sole. More will be ready to let go by the next trim. He doesn't have a "low heel" despite removing the excess height and his HPA actually improved.

12/29/2024

Edward the little auction mule has been with his family and on my schedule for almost a year and is doing fantastic

12/23/2024

This guy has been making progress since May on healthier hooves. Now that those heels aren't so crushed we are working on getting them back where they belong and he is also letting go of layers of retained sole that caused further distortion and pain.

12/18/2024

12/16/2024

Beautiful Mustang hinds from today. If you zoom in, you can see how the tubules grow in at slightly different angles at the heel, quarter and toe. This has been studied in wild horses that maintain their own hooves and a barefoot trim should simulate the natural wear patterns in healthy wild hooves.

12/02/2024

Happy December! I will be working on scheduling for January in the coming days so keep an eye out for those messages.

As an additional heads up, I have become aware that I am occasionally not receiving texts/not getting voicemail notifications. I will be the first to admit that remembering to check voicemails is not my strong suit and it doesn't help when the notifications don't show up or disappear. It seems to be completely random and only occasionally an issue. All that being said, if you do text or call and don't hear back, please call again or send another message! I promise I am not ignoring you, it is either ADHD or technology working against me if I don't answer.

11/27/2024

A look back at Woody's hooves a little over a year ago compared to now. Woody is on a 4-5 week trim cycle. It's very helpful for older or limited mobility horses to be maintained on a shorter cycle so their hooves never get a chance to develop distortion. They stay more comfortable and it also makes the trimming process faster and easier on them.

11/25/2024

Trims today during the first snow of the winter and Poncho thought this hoofprint was for him 😆

11/23/2024

Levi wore composites up front for the entire riding season and this past cycle we added hinds. He gets lots of trail miles and enjoys going in the water, so he really tested his shoes and they worked very well for him. I thought I would show the set of shoes at the start and end of the cycle as well as his hooves post-trim.