Hope 4 Hooves

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04/01/2025

As much as I’d love everything to be in my control… it’s not.

There are so many factors that go into a healthy hoof—things we can influence and things as a hoof care practitioner I simply can’t. I often find myself in conversations with colleagues about the horses that challenge us the most. More often than not, the struggles aren’t just about trimming or shoeing technique; they stem from compensation patterns, or long-standing imbalances that are beyond what we can change with a rasp or a shoe.

And hooves don’t exist in isolation. The entire body is connected.

Proprioception—the horse’s ability to know where it is in space. When one part is compromised, the rest must adapt.

🔹 Hoofcare: The feet are the foundation that everything else is stacked on. A compromised foundation affects the entire structure above it.

🔹 Bodywork: We need to give the body as many opportunities as possible to compensate. Restrictions in one area lead to compensations elsewhere, impacting movement and balance.

🔹 Dentistry: The brain sits on the shelf that is produced by the teeth. A horse’s dental alignment affects jaw mobility, posture, and neural input.

As Dr. Audrey DeClue puts it, “The foot only grows dependent on how the body controls the limb to land. The hoof only grows evenly if there is even pressure.” Hoof growth is a reflection of how the entire limb moves and bears weight, and the health of the body and limb attached to the hoof.

And as Tami Elkayam says, “Feet are an expression of the motion possibilities of the limb above. At some point, the foot shape will lock the motion possibilities of the limb above.” Over time, compensatory movement patterns can restrict what we are able to achieve in the feet if we aren’t being proactive.

At the end of the day, we only have an influence over the horse in front of us for a short period of time each cycle—often just 30 to 60 minutes. In a perfect world, we’d spend longer assessing a horse (statically and dynamically) and documenting progress than actually working on them. But that requires access to facilities where we could slow-motion video, analyze movement in real time, and (dare I say it) actually be paid for that time.

But we work with what we have, doing the best we can with the small window of opportunity we get. Because while we can’t control everything, we can make the most of what we have.

And then we add stress and inflammation into the mix. Whenever we have inflammation present it limits the ability of the body to function and heal. Instead of working with the body’s natural mechanics, we create further restrictions, pain, and imbalance.

A truly holistic approach means looking at the bigger picture, recognising these connections, and working to support the horse as a whole.

Some great thrush info 👀
04/01/2025

Some great thrush info 👀

Often overlooked, central and collateral groove infections cause severe lameness in the back of the foot, which can then cause chronic toe-first impact, which in turn can cause distal descent of P3, thin soles at the toe, subsolar abscesses, hoof capsule rotation, wall flare, wall cracks, navicular....

03/29/2025

Psst.

8+ weeks is too long.

I said what I said. 🤷‍♀️

Hooves grow an average of a 1/4" per month.

What's traditional is not always harmless.

Just because it "didn't kill them" doesn't mean it is optimal.

It isn't about "looking long" or not.

It's about the entire animal above the hoof. It's time to get curious about it.

It's the difference between damage control, good enough, and the best we can give them.

💃
03/21/2025

💃

Congratulations to the following PHCP students who passed their Intermediate Studies presentations and are now Advanced Student Practitioners. Thank you to the Scholarship Committee and donors to the Scholarship Fund who made it possible for scholarship recipients to pursue certification.

03/04/2025
🗣️Train your eye🗣️What do your horses’ hoof prints look like?
10/27/2024

🗣️Train your eye🗣️

What do your horses’ hoof prints look like?

10/22/2024
10/17/2024
10/15/2024
Read me 📖 👀
10/08/2024

Read me 📖 👀

✈️PHCP's hoof care conference was quite transformative for me✈️I have deeply considered the horses body for my own horse...
10/07/2024

✈️PHCP's hoof care conference was quite transformative for me✈️

I have deeply considered the horses body for my own horses in relation to the growth of their feet. I however, have often narrowed my focus just to the feet and gait in my hoof care practice. Of course, mentioning glaring issues but not the more subtle observations. I tend to overwhelm people with information anyways, as you can see in this post here 😂.

Tension in the muscles, a lack of structural development, an imbalanced rider, a poor fitting saddle, nerve compression and vascular compression, riding a horse without structural development, and the horses metabolic state deeply affects the whole horse and their feet.

❤️The health and happiness of the horse at risk if we ignore the sometimes subtle and sometimes not so subtle signs.

💡 In my practice, I will be implementing more focus on metabolic health, and I will be paying attention to compensatory postures and patterns and making bodywork recommendations.

✍️ I cannot fit them all here, but are some other key take aways from the conference taken from speakers Dr. Jenny Hagan, Celeste Lazaris, Wendy Murdoch, Dr. Rendle, and Ida Hammer:

👉It is really fun to talk to strangers when they are fellow horse nerds.

👉There are toads in Chicago 🐸

❤️Horses are not motorcycles, you cannot just jump on and expect good results.

❤️Physical development is paramount, especially for the spine, thoracic outlet, and lumbosacral regions of the horse.

💡Laminitis is a collective failure of owner, veterinarian and podiatrist. It is preventable.

✍️Studys have shown that obese mares have profound differences in placental metabolism that are passed on to the foal. Fat mares produce foals with reduced metabolic function.

✍️Obese pregnant mares are at a heightened risk for developing laminitis.

💡A physically well developed horse has more confidence.

‼️In a published study- If insulin levels were less than 21.6, 6% of ponies developed laminitis, if insulin was 21.6-45.2, 22% percent developed laminitis, if insulin was > 45, 69% of them developed laminitis- a 2 in 3 risk. The ponies were fed a pasture diet and were studied over a 4-year period.

❤️‍🩹Aggressive horses are always in pain.

✏️High insulin levels induce laminitis. 90 % of laminitis has an endocrine cause.

✏️Thin horses can have elevated insulin levels, it is not just a condition of obese horses.

✏️50% of domestic horses are obese.

💚Take more pictures!

✏️Small increases in NSC have been shown to markedly increase insulin levels.

✏️Exercise has a 72 hour effect on reducing insulin resistance.

✏️Peroglide does not suppress progression of disease (PPID), but aims at managing clinical signs.

✏️Turning out late at night to early morning is the best way to restrict sugar pasture sugar intake.

✏️Horses show less aggressive behavior on a track system versus a strip grazing system.

✏️Obese pregnant mares have foals with higher incidents of OCD.

💡Compression at the cervicothoracic junction causes nerve impingement and blood flow impingement leading to unwanted behaviors and poor hoof quality.

✏️Fascia is composed of 90% nerve endings dictating proprioception and can stretch up to 200%

💡All myofascial nerve lines in the body feed into the poll and feet except one.

❤️‍🩹Gelding scars can be a cause of behavioral issues in the horse.

💡💡💡Don't just look at the foot, foot issues are not always foot issues ➡ look at the body.

💡The first year of a horse's life they have a 100% remodeling of tissues in the hoof. In comparison, an adult has as little as 10% per year. Foals must be trimmed and maintained early. Once the conformation fully develops, it can no longer be corrected.

✏️Hoof capsule shape mimics the shape of the coffin bone. So, if it was allowed to become conformationally misshaped as a foal, you are stuck with it. Body conformation cannot be influenced, just posture.

💚💚💚If you made it this far, you are a hoof nerd- let's be friends 😉

Equine Complex Vertebral Malformation
10/06/2024

Equine Complex Vertebral Malformation

Sharon’s passion for horses was first noticed when she was caught riding a bush horse at 4 years of age. She would climb up the front leg and haul herself up...

Steel shoes were pulled off May of this year 💐 Now sporting a better hairline angle, the heel bulbs are no longer on the...
10/01/2024

Steel shoes were pulled off May of this year 💐 Now sporting a better hairline angle, the heel bulbs are no longer on the ground, and there is an improved hoof pastern axis. Feet on the mend 💕

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Vacaville, CA
95687

Opening Hours

Friday 9am - 5pm
Saturday 9am - 5pm

Telephone

+15303654158

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