Is
Your Horse Well-Shod?
A Pencil Can Help You Find Out
by Richard Klimesh
Photos by Cherry Hill and Richard Klimesh © 2002
Richard Klimesh ©
Copyright Information Your hoof care
program affects your horse's immediate performance as well as his long-term soundness.
You might not think you need to pay much attention to your horse's shoeing as
long as your horse is sound and his shoes don't fall off. The good news is that
horses are very adaptable and they can often tolerate poor hoof care for months
or even years; the bad news is that by the time signs of lameness appear, irreparable
damage might already be done. Shoeing methods used to keep shoes on at all costs
often ignore critical shoeing principles and might end up putting your horse out
of commission for good. Guidelines for judging the quality
of a shoeing job can include such details as how neatly the frog is trimmed, the
size of the clinches and how far the nail heads protrude from the shoe. Details
like these are important to some degree, but usually are not critical to your
horse's soundness. There are a four very important aspects of shoeing, however,
that you can readily evaluate: balance, shape, support, and expansion. All you
need is a pencil and a safe place to tie your horse on level ground. It's best
to evaluate a shoeing job within the first week or two. Balance
Hoof balance includes many aspects of a horses conformation and movement and has
been discussed at length in many books and articles. One type of balance, however,
is relatively easy for anyone to quickly assess: it's called Dorsal-Palmar (DP)
balance. DP balance refers to the alignment of the hoof and
the pastern. DP balance can be measured as the hoof angle at the toe. The hoof
angle is the relationship between the front (Dorsal surface) of the hoof and the
ground (Palmar surface of the hoof). For years, books cited 45 to 50 degrees as
a "normal" front hoof angle and 50 to 55 for hind angle. Today, it is
generally agreed that in reality these angles are far too low. A more representative
range of hoof angles is from 53 to 58 degrees for the fronts and 55 to 60 degrees
for the hinds. Keep in mind, however, that every horse has his own "ideal"
hoof angle. The hoof angle is considered correct when the hoof and pastern are
in alignment, that is, when the front surface of the hoof is parallel to an imaginary
line passing through the center of the pastern. | |
To check the alignment of the hoof and pastern, make sure the
horse is standing square on a firm level surface with his cannons perpendicular
to the ground. Move 8' to 10' from the side of the horse and crouch down to view
the feet. Hold a pencil at arm's length and line it up with the center axis of
the pastern. The front of the hoof should be very close to parallel with the centerline
of the pastern. | |
| If the hoof angle is too low, the center
line, or axis, will be "broken back" where the lines of the hoof and
pastern meet. If the hoof angle is too high, the imaginary line will be "broken
forward". Of the two, a broken-back axix is more common, and more harmful. A
low hoof angle usually indicates a Long Toe/Low Heel hoof configuration.
LT/LH can cause excess tendon stress, heel soreness, cracks, bowed tendons,
contracted heels, navicular syndrome, and under-run heels. (Under-run heels refer
to heels that have an angle lower that the toe of the hoof by 5 degrees or more.
Under-run heels slope under the hoof and in severe cases can appear to approach
the horizontal.) Even when a foot is in perfect balance when shod, the angle almost
always gets lower as the weeks go by because the toe grows faster than the heels
and the shoe prevents the toe from wearing away. This is one reason to have the
feet trimmed and rebalanced on a regular schedule. A barefoot horse actually might
have a better chance of maintaining DP balance, especially if allowed to move
freely over dry ground so the hooves can wear naturally. If
the hoof can't be balanced by trimming, the heels can be built up with a hoof
repair material, or wedge heel shoes or pads can be used to elevate the heels
and align the hoof-pastern axis. Shape
The hoof is a plastic structure, that is, stress can cause it to change shape.
A hoof is strongest when the entire hoof wall from the coronary band to the ground
is straight, without flares. A flare is a concave bend, or dip, in the hoof; a
flare at the toe is called a dish. Flares weaken the hoof wall
and can lead to cracks. A dished toe can affect a horse's movement and long term
soundness by causing the toe of the shoe to be too far forward. This makes it
more difficult for the hoof to break over and can cause forging (hitting of the
front shoes with the hinds) and more serious problems like those caused by Long
Toe/Low Heel. | Flares can result
from hoof imbalance, poor genes, inadequate nutrition, too much moisture, or most
likely, a combination of these factors. Serious flares are easy to see, but early
flares are not as obvious. To check if a hoof is developing a flare or dish, lay
a pencil against the hoof wall. Space under the center of the pencil indicates
a flare or dish. | |
| Most hooves tend to develop flares and dishes
to some degree but they can usually be kept in check if a shoer takes the time
to "dress" the hoof wall straight with a rasp every time the horse is
trimmed. This doesn't mean the entire wall is indiscriminately rasped - only where
a flare or dish is forming. Even neglected feet that have developed wide flares
or deep dishes can be improved dramatically with one trimming and gradually retrained
with regular care. In order to control flares, the bottom
of the hoof where the flare was located is sometimes sculpted out, or "relieved",
with the rasp so that the hoof at that area bears no weight. This removes the
bending forces on that portion of the hoof so new hoof horn grows down straighter.
Another approach is to rasp the flares to about half the thickness of the hoof
wall and apply a shoe with side clips located at the flares. The clips prevent
the hoof from flaring and encourage the hoof wall to grow down straight. Whether
or not flares are kept under control by careful shaping of the hoof often tells
the difference between a "good" shoer and a "fast" shoer. Support
"Short shoeing", using a horseshoe that is too small for the hoof, is
one of the most common and potentially harmful shoeing errors. Assessing support
can be easily done at the same time you check DP balance when you're viewing the
horse from the side. Hold the pencil at arm's length so it lines up with an imaginary
a line through the center of the cannon bone to the ground. Generally, the heels
of the shoe should reach this line or extend behind it. The more the heels are
under-run, the farther the shoe needs to extend behind the hoof in order to provide
necessary support. In many cases, egg-bar shoes or shoes with long extended heels
(sometimes called "open egg-bars" because the shoes are egg-shaped but
the heels of the shoe aren't joined) are used to provide support for under-run
heels. | Shoes that are too short will not
provide adequate support for the limb and can result in under-run heels, fatigue
and permanent damage to the horse's limbs. Unfortunately, one of the most common
ways horses lose front shoes is by stepping on the heels of the shoes and pulling
them off. Consequently, many horseshoers are understandably reluctant to extend
the heels of the shoe (figuring it will save them a return trip to replace a lost
shoe). Speed horses, especially, are likely to be shod with little or no shoe
extending behind the heels of the hoof. Horses with well-formed upright hooves
are better able to tolerate this compromise than are horses with lower angles
or under-run heels. |  |
| Expansion
Expansion" can refer to several aspects of a hoof.
Here it defines the difference in width between the shoe and the hoof as seen
when looking down at the hoof with the foot on the ground. Expansion is the amount
of shoe that extends past the sides of the hoof at the heels. The shoe should
fit flush with the hoof from the toe around to the quarters (the widest part of
the foot) and then be wider than the hoof (when the horse is freshly shod) by
at least the thickness of a dime. | | You
can check for expansion by running the point of the pencil around the edge of
the shoe from the quarters to the heels: if there's no shoe edge for the pencil
to ride on, there's no expansion room. Expansion room gives
the hoof somewhere to go as it changes shape. With each step a horse takes, the
heels of the hoof move outward under the horse's weight. As the foot is lifted,
the heels return to their original position. You can usually see evidence of this
repetitive heel movement in the form of grooves or shiny areas at the heel area
on the hoof surface of a shoe that's been removed. | |
| Also, because the hoof is cone-shaped, the
base of the hoof gets wider as the hoof grows longer. But the steel shoe nailed
to the hoof remains its original width. If the shoe is fit too close, with no
expansion room at the heels, or if a properly fit shoe is left on too long between
shoeings, the hoof wall usually spreads over the edge of the shoe as it grows.
When this happens, the reduced bearing surface area of the hoof at the heel is
often crushed under the weight of the horse. Then when the hoof is prepared for
his next shoeing, the heels have to be trimmed excessively low to get a solid
bearing surface. The best shoeing job in the world is worse than worthless if
let go too long; letting the hoof grow over the shoe is a direct route down the
slippery slope to a Long Toe/Low Heel configuration. Like
extending the heels of the shoe, leaving generous expansion room carries a certain
amount of risk: a horse could step on the exposed shoe and pull it off. Upright
hooves need less expansion room and can be shod fairly close, while more sloping,
spread-out hooves need to be shod "full" with plenty of expansion. Also,
a wide foot can be shod like a flared foot (they are often one and the same),
with side clips to contain the hoof and prevent it from spreading over the shoe.
The average shoeing cycle ranges from 5 to 8 weeks. A farrier must determine by
experience how much expansion room to leave for each hoof. Just the right amount
of expansion will result in the hoof growing to the edge of the shoe but not over
it at the end of the shoeing cycle. In fact, this is one of the best ways to determine
the length of your horse's shoeing cycle: when the hoof grows flush with the edge
of the shoe, it's time for a reset, if the hoof has grown past the shoe you're
horse is overdue. | | The
above tips are general guidelines for assessing your horse's shoeing. Every hoof
must be shod as an individual, taking into consideration the horse's conformation,
movement, habits, management and intended use. If the shoeing on your horse varies
significantly from the guidelines in this article, or if you have questions about
the way your horse is being shod, discuss them with your farrier. A good shoer
will not be offended by straightforward questions and should be able to explain
in terms you can understand why he's shoeing your horse in a particular manner.
The owner is ultimately the person responsible for providing the horse with proper
hoof care. If your shoer is unwilling or unable to provide satisfactory answers
to your questions, that may be reason enough to think about putting your horse's
feet in the hands of another farrier. 
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