Tuesday 24 November 2009

Hoof changes...

Sole in November 09
Sole in June 09
Hoof in November 09
Hoof in June 09

Here are some fun photos, taken of a lovely young horse who came out of shoes in June. The June photos show of her hoof that day, and by contrast the others show the same horse in November.

Photos like these are interesting because they show how even good hooves on sound horses can sometimes improve, both in biomechanics and in hoof quality. This horse had been well shod, but even so you can see how long her toe was becoming in shoes, and that her heels would probably have under-run if she had stayed shod.

As a bonus, both her owner and I also think her movement is straighter and stronger than it used to be :-)

1 comment:

perils said...

One other thing that I have noticed after looking at previous photos of my horse's hooves with shoes on as compaired to now barefoot are that her feet are a lot smaller than before. It's like she has slippers on the bottom of her legs now as opposed to hob-nailed boots when she was shod! Although she is a large-ish girl her feet seem much more in proportion to her body!