Horseshoes VS. Barefoot

There is currently a large debate going on about whether to shoe or go barefoot with your horse. I do not find it to be that simple. The problem is more of a lack of information about the horse’s foot physiology and proper function. Here are my thoughts.

Horseshoes first became necessary when people started keeping horses in cities – tie stalls were very popular, and sanitation was minimal. Horses standing in urine and manure-soaked bedding would get soft feet, prone to cracking and flaking. Shoes helped to protect the foot and keep the horse in service longer.

Over the years, the fact that a horse would often start limping when they lost a shoe was used to prove that shoes are necessary. Obviously, if the horse is sore without a shoe, you must keep them shod, right? I grew up “knowing” that you needed four shoes on a horse in order to ride it. Anything less was barbaric. Most people who were raised with horses learned this same “fact”. Looking at it logically, it is not a case of A, therefore, B.

It is not that the horse is sore because they lack a shoe, it is the fact that their feet were trimmed improperly. For years I stood by, watching while the farrier took the knife to the sole and frog, paring down to the neat and pretty white sole underneath, and trimming the frog to perfectly smooth dimensions, making sure it did not touch the ground . The fact is, the bottom of the horse’s foot creates a thick layer of callous, compressed smaller and smaller, tougher and tougher, as time goes on. Every time the sole and frog are trimmed, this callous is removed. Remember running around in the summer as a child? You couldn’t walk over the gravel driveway at the beginning of summer because your feet lacked callous. By the end of summer, you could barely feel the rocks any more. Same with the horse. Use/friction/stimulation creates callous.

The horse’s foot is a complex structure. The inner bones are surrounded by tendon, ligament and muscle. This is surrounded by the laminae which hold the outer hoof wall to the inner structures. The hoof is designed to take the pressure of the landing on the elastic heel bulbs and frog, dissipating the pressure smoothly throughout the structures of the leg.

The fact is, most shoers pull the structure of the hoof completely out of touch with the ground, allowing the wall to take the entire load. This, in essence, hangs the hoof upside-down, pressure-wise, from what it was designed to do. (This is a very complex mechanical issue, better explained by others. Look it up online – research is your friend!)

Another common issue is long toes. We have not been conditioned to see this. The easiest way to see long toes, is to look at the hoof close-up, from the side. The first ½ inch of growth down from the coronary band will show you the angle that the hoof “wants” to have. If, farther down the hoof wall, you can see a different angle, then you have long toe/hoof wall separation. Once I started looking for this, I realized that most horses have at least some hoof wall separation. Most farriers leave hoof wall separation. Most shod horses have hoof wall separation. Very scary!

Do your horse a favor. Go out, and look at their feet. Chances are, you will see hoof wall separation. Research, research, research. Become educated. Don’t just let others tell you what is okay. You would like to trust your vet and farrier, but sometimes THEY don’t know any better, either!

That being said, there are some great farriers out there who can minimize hoof damage. Hopefully you can find one.

Another option is to take your horse barefoot. This has found great success for thousands of horses and riders. We have NOT “bred the hoof off the horse”. The thing with barefoot is that you must be committed to doing it RIGHT. You must feed correctly, exercise correctly, trim correctly, and condition the foot correctly. You CANNOT just pull the shoes and go. You are doing the horse a huge disservice by rushing it and then saying that your horse cannot go barefoot. Boots are a must for the transition time. Every breed from Mustangs to Thoroughbreds off the track have been successfully transitioned. Again – research and educate yourself.

The best thing about barefoot is that owners generally have a lot more knowledge about the horse's hoof and how it functions. They better understand the hoof mechanics, and can see the difference for themselves. They will not stand idly by while an “expert” butchers the foot.

Whatever you choose, do so with knowledge. So many people think that just because they pay for a farrier every 8 weeks, they have sufficiently cared for their horse’s foot health. Unfortunately, there is a huge range of competence in farriers. I am still ashamed, looking back on the bad shoeing jobs that my horses went through before I knew any better. You owe it to your horse to educate yourself and get it done RIGHT.