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Less Is More Horsemanship Forum
Welcome to the Less Is More Forum. This forum is to post questions, comments, suggestions, ideas, principles, concepts and ideas regarding Natural Horsemanship and more importantly, the philosophy of "Less IS More". This is a place where like-minded people can come to throw away all the old traditional ways of training, and riding, and begin to experience a new FREEDOM in their relationship with their equine partners. Whether your goal is to learn more about natural horsemanship, get support for your own personal Less Is More belief, find solutions for problems that are hindering your relationship, begin a journey of discovery or healing, this is your home. Regardless of what the current "fads" are in traditional circles or natural horsemanship circles, I encourage you to think 'outside the box'. Feel free to post a message.
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| Viewing Page 1 of 1 (Total Posts: 6) |
| Author | Comment |
spope
Feb 17, 08 - 3:15 PM |
farrier issues
I have a 7 yr. old paso fino mare, she was shod for the 1st time 3 mths. before I bought her. I had her shod for the 1st time 2 wks. after I brought her home. She had trouble letting the farrier work with her back feet (she constantly wanted to pull away when he was nailing) however we got through that one without mechanical devices. 6 wks. later at her 2nd shoeing with us...she would pull her back legs out of his grip when nailing so intensely he had to use a twitch to keep her still (I hated doing this). As tears rolled down my cheeks...I kept telling her how much i hated doing this. 6 wks. later she did the same thing...he brought out the "TWITCH" again. What can I do to help her get over this anziety with shoeing? She does fine with trimming. Please let me know if you have any suggestions. At this point I'm thinking of having her trimmed only as i can not do this to her anymore.....Thanks S.pope 
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Michael Gonzalez
Feb 18th, 2008 - 4:29 PM |
Re: farrier issues
First thing's first.... Why is she being shod? I have four horses - A 5 year old Paso Fino mare, an 18 year old 7/8 Arabian mare, a 16 year old arabian mare, and a 4 year old BLM wild mustang. None of them have been shod. We trail ride on all kinds of ground but we do not shoe our horses. Our horses have very good feet although I do see some changes in the older ones but not necessarily having to shoe. We take care extremely good care of our horse's feet so we dont have to shoe. Some people shoe because "thats what you do" or "thats what my trainer recommends" etc., etc. Our philosophy is that unless it is for soundness reasons or medical / conformation reasons...or job specific like a mounted police horse that walks on asphalt and concrete all day...except for these, I dont believe that horses need to be shod. I ESPECIALLY dont believe that horses need to be shod so they can acheive gaits. No way! If thats what it takes for my Paso to gait, then she will never gait. Period. That only proves that it isnt a "natural" gait but a forced or coerced one. It isnt that important to me to have my partner gait at the expense of her health and well-being. On to other things...your horse has had a couple of negative experiences so now you must work with your partner to reverse that. First and foremost..NO ONE ...AND I MEAN NO ONE PUTS A TWITCH ON MY HORSE !!!!!! and all you twitch-hugging twitch-loving people dont even bother trying to give me all the hoopla crap about the benefits of twitching. NO WAY WOULD I EVER DESTROY THE TRUST THAT MY HORSE HAS PUT IN ME WITH A TWITCH!!! the reason why MOST people uses artificial devices and have serious problems because they havent put in enough serious time to work through the issues and learn together with their horses on how to overcome the fears. Most people handle feet or practice giving shots or touching the gums the day before the appointment or the very day of...then they wonder why all the struggle. With your paso, it is time to go back to Kindergarten. If I were you, unless there is a medical conformation reason for your paso to be shod, take the shoes off. let the feet heal. Begin working all over again....front feet first and back feet afterwards. Tell your farrier you want to go barefoot...if he wont do or doesnt do barefoot trims, then find someone who will....CAUTION...becareful subscribing to some of the barefoot trimming methods out there...some of them are too extreme. We dont foolow a certain method of trimming. My farrier just takes angle measurements and trims each foot accordingly. We give them a day or so off from riding afterwards in case they are a little tender. CONTINUED ..... |
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Maggie
Feb 18th, 2008 - 4:38 PM |
Re: farrier issues
On the barefoot trimming vein, do you know of anyone in Indy or who's willing to travel to Indy? I'd like to keep the Arab I'm getting soon barefoot. We'll be doing trails and such, but I see no need to shoe - I'll do boots if I have to at first. |
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Michael Gonzalez
Feb 18th, 2008 - 7:37 PM |
Re: farrier issues
Sorry, I dont know of anyone in the Indy area...Farriers are like gold. If people have a good one they are hesitant to tell others for the fear that he will get too busy and wont have time for their horse. Boots are a good thing...just like anything else, you have to do your homework to find the one that is best suited to your horse's feet and your needs. We have considered boots but never had the time to really investigate them thoroughly. As my horses get older, I may start getting boots for them....especially if we are going to ride in hard country. |
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Michael Gonzalez
Feb 19th, 2008 - 9:29 AM |
Re: farrier issues
sorry for the delay is completing my previous post... Okay...going back to kindergarten with your Paso.... Start with touching her all over with your hands..this means her legs...then touch her with the flag stick...yes, we are going back down the line to the very beginning to see if there are any "holes" in her foundation....if there are, GREAT, let's address them now...if not, then you should get through that fairly well. Then begin asking her to pick up her front feet...pick it up and YOU gently put it down. We dont want her ddictating when it should be put down...if we find that she will only allow it to be held for 5 seconds before she yanks it away, then we want to ask her to pick up the foot and we will hold it for 3 seconds before WE put it down gently...we want it to be OUR idea before it becomes HER idea. We will then slowly increase the time we hold it always setting the foot down adn rewarding her. When we finally are able to hold her foot up for an indefinite period of time, then wrap it between your knees like a farrier does and begin massaging her hoof, pastern, etc and then YOU put the foot down gently. Once this is accomplished, then begin cleaning her feet out with a pick...remember this...always clean the hoof out scraping AWAY from the frog instead of toward it. This will allow better trust. If you are scraping and cleaning toward the frog and you slip, you might cut the frog or nick her and she will be less liekly to trust you in the future. If you slip while cleaning AWAY form the frog, you cant hurt anything and you havent compromised the trust. Once we are good with that, then comes using the pick to tap on the hoof...just a few light taps all the way around the hoof and then set the foot down gently...reward her and move on...you dont even need to do all the feet in one sesison...just get her positively responding to one foot being handled, cleaned and tapped on.... Here is another hint....always do the same order when handling the feet...lets say you handled the right front first...then the right rear...then the left rear and eventually the left front...always always always use that same order of rotation. Eventually, some months down the road, you will be able to handle the feet in any order, but it is always good to use the same pattern. Heck, to this day, I use the same pattern with my "Desi" although I know I can walk up and grab any foot at any time. get the idea....we are going to present this to her in a logical progressive manner so she will always accept it and also will know what and how you are going to do things next. This makes them comfortable and trusting. Again, please strongly think about going barefoot, but I would advise leaning towards any of the extreme methods out there....just google some sites and read all that you can. Hope this helps.... Michael |
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Felicia
Mar 3rd, 2008 - 10:49 PM |
Re: farrier issues
Hi, I am a barefoot trimmer in Northern IN. There is a guy near Indy, he's an AANHCP cert. John something. Check the AANHCP website, I'm sure he is listed. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/IndBFH/ is the link of the barefoot horses on Indiana group on yahoo. Me and Michael Murray are the two moderators. He is a trimmer from southern IN. You can ask any kind of barefoot or natural horse care questions or yack with other barefooter's, or whatever. I wouldn't shoe either, not for any reasons. IMO, a horse only sound in shoes isn't sound at all and needs fixed, and if he's sound out of shoes, why shoe him? I use boots, which I really like and have great luck with, and hooves improve dramatically in health in them. That's the beauty of them, shoes damage a hoof they are on, while boots (fitted with pads) improve the feet in them. Anyways, farrier issues. I don't twitch. Ever. Or use lip chains, or stud chains, or ear twitching... you get the idea. It's much more dangerous IMO, to have a hrose twitched then to work with him through it. A twitched horse will kick just as much as anybody else. But a horse you trust and have worked yourself, they are much quicker to just pull away. I always prefer a to try and pull away rather then try to kill the farrier. ;) So if the horse is pulling away, I work more on rubbing his legs. Lots of breaks, maybe only one snip with the nippers and give the hoof back. Always look up. Rub hips, check movement, check balance, check cmfort, check the other feet. Most horses, and especially old, sore, or young horses, I trim off my boot. Stand on one leg, with your other heel on the ground and toes up. Put the horse's hoof, on your ankle and trim. You have to bend over more, but most horses adore this, especially older or sore horses who are having trouble hiking their leg in the air. Work with Michael's ideas, and check up, make sure she's not having a physical issue. BTW, Michael, what's differant in your older horse's feet? Most the time, the older the horse, the better the feet, unless there is a hoof issue. Hooves mature in miles, and by the time you got 20+ years of miles on a hoof, they are started to look pretty darn good.  Felicia |
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