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 Nothing Comes Easy
Posts: 2353
  
Location: Texas | I have a mare that requires a modified natural balance type shoeing. She has a bone spur on her navicular bone and ringbone on her short pastern. In order to keep her comfortable for the last 12 years, we use regular shoes, square the shoe slightly, bring it back, and rasp the toe to meet the shoe. From what I've been told this allows the foot to breakover faster, reducing the concussion on the heel. With the right shoer, I find this is very effective for my mare.
http://www.thehorse.com/articles/14185/the-basics-of-breakover
This is one of the only pictures I can find of my horse's feet. This was after having some trouble finding a farrier when I first moved to Texas. The farrier I was using wasn't listening to me so this was the first time this one farrier touched her, and was fixing the other's mistakes. You can judge if you want, but this was from 2010 (?). She was wearing natural balance shoes in this picture, but was switched over to St. Croix after a few months. My mare is 16.2 hands and is very hard on her front end.
Edited by Stride 2017-01-06 7:41 PM
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Expert
Posts: 2122
Location: The Great Northwest | classicpotatochip - 2017-01-06 12:03 PM Natural Balance shoes (PLRs etc ), require a certified farrier that understands X-rays and anatomy. They've saved my mares front feet and kept her working, and I'm grateful. They work to add breakover at the horses preferred (conformationally ) points. Breakover points can be as personal as a fingerprint. Cheating a horse by cutting his toes off in a square ruins the mechanics of the legs and feet. It also disallows correct breakover to the side, and ruins leverage points for take off. Ruins ruins ruins so much. Working from the heel forward, cutting off the proper amount of foot (again, X-rays required to truly be accurate how much can be taken ), then filing back with a rasp is what sets a foot up, whether barefoot or shod. Working with Jo Schmoe that went to some four week farriers class is crazy and dangerous. Working with an honest to goodness farrier, with years of training, apprenticeships, journeyman training, veterinarian conferences, and farrier competitions is the best thing you can do for a horse. You can find a list of good ones by stateon https://americanfarriers.org/find-a-farrier/ For those that won't travel to a farrier, I have been in situations where a 6 hour one way trip is what I have done. You want a sound horse, you go to the ones that are trained and will do their best. Just like vets. Just like Doctors for us.
I feel that when the foots toe is squared it is like walking in square toed boot. I can feel the difference from a square toe boot and long toed boot. Squaring the toes on these horse has to interfere with the way some horses may need to break over which can cause soreness especially for 6 months and older. | |
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 Scooters Savior
 
Location: "Si Fi" Ville | The vet is a well known track vet and farrier is one of the top ones in the state, there are X-rays and she feels comfortable with it.
When I checked further into it, there were a number of the same opinions I saw on this thread. I had a lot of questions.
I feel terrible for her that due to a number of factors, that she has this problem.
Myself, I have a good farrier that specializes in a good trim. So far, I have had no need for shoes. | |
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  Sock eating dog owner
Posts: 4557
Location: Where the pavement ends and the West begins Utah | With long toe and no heel it is necessary to bring the toe back.Go to you tube and watch the different steps to bring the hoof back to axel point and you will understand the squaring off of the toe. A long toe is equivalent to wearing high heeled shoes on backward if you could. If you could see the hoof on a wild mustang, they wear their hooves down to a square at the toe. If the farrier is a hot shoer and makes his own then he knows how to balance that shoe. | |
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The Advice Guru
Posts: 6419
| treasurehunter - 2017-01-06 9:42 PM
The vet is a well known track vet and farrier is one of the top ones in the state, there are X-rays and she feels comfortable with it.
When I checked further into it, there were a number of the same opinions I saw on this thread. I had a lot of questions.
I feel terrible for her that due to a number of factors, that she has this problem.
Myself, I have a good farrier that specializes in a good trim. So far, I have had no need for shoes.
Make sure she resets every 4 weeks. With underslung heels you need to pull them back more frequently cause if the toe gets too long it will pull the heel forward. Even with squared shoes this can occur.
With what you described this horse could have been left too long between resets to cause the problems you described.
Personally I trust my vet over my farrier, but my vet also graduated/passed the farrier course from Oklahoma. | |
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 Elite Veteran
Posts: 1100
Location: Southeastern Idaho | cheryl makofka - 2017-01-07 12:51 AM
treasurehunter - 2017-01-06 9:42 PM
The vet is a well known track vet and farrier is one of the top ones in the state, there are X-rays and she feels comfortable with it.
When I checked further into it, there were a number of the same opinions I saw on this thread. I had a lot of questions.
I feel terrible for her that due to a number of factors, that she has this problem.
Myself, I have a good farrier that specializes in a good trim. So far, I have had no need for shoes.
Make sure she resets every 4 weeks. With underslung heels you need to pull them back more frequently cause if the toe gets too long it will pull the heel forward. Even with squared shoes this can occur.
With what you described this horse could have been left too long between resets to cause the problems you described.
Personally I trust my vet over my farrier, but my vet also graduated/passed the farrier course from Oklahoma.
Totally agree. When you use these type of shoes (Natural Balance) or similar brands you do have to reset more often. I can get 5 weeks comfortably with my club foot mare. | |
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 I Prefer to Live in Fantasy Land
Posts: 64864
Location: In the Hills of Texas | skye - 2017-01-06 7:35 PM classicpotatochip - 2017-01-06 12:03 PM Natural Balance shoes (PLRs etc ), require a certified farrier that understands X-rays and anatomy. They've saved my mares front feet and kept her working, and I'm grateful. They work to add breakover at the horses preferred (conformationally ) points. Breakover points can be as personal as a fingerprint. Cheating a horse by cutting his toes off in a square ruins the mechanics of the legs and feet. It also disallows correct breakover to the side, and ruins leverage points for take off. Ruins ruins ruins so much. Working from the heel forward, cutting off the proper amount of foot (again, X-rays required to truly be accurate how much can be taken ), then filing back with a rasp is what sets a foot up, whether barefoot or shod. Working with Jo Schmoe that went to some four week farriers class is crazy and dangerous. Working with an honest to goodness farrier, with years of training, apprenticeships, journeyman training, veterinarian conferences, and farrier competitions is the best thing you can do for a horse. You can find a list of good ones by stateon https://americanfarriers.org/find-a-farrier/ For those that won't travel to a farrier, I have been in situations where a 6 hour one way trip is what I have done. You want a sound horse, you go to the ones that are trained and will do their best. Just like vets. Just like Doctors for us.
I do hope you know that the NB shoes are a round shoe just like any other shoe but because of the plate that goes across the toe just gives it an appearance of being square. | |
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