Cob Feet

I live in a rural town (McKinleyville, Ca...the town's motto still reads "Where horses still have the right of way", though many folks now tend to ignore that, and don't slow down when they see riders...the downside of growth and city imports...sighhh) and towards the even more rural end of it. There are a ton of horses out here and several boarding places, with access to trails and the beach not far away. I don't have enough room to keep horses (though I will occasionally bring one of mine over for a few days of backyard mowing), so they are spread all over the local tri-city area. My rising 2yo KMSH filly, Ari, lives just down the road from me at a nice little place called Mini Whinni (owner runs a daycare and pet sitting business). Though at one time it also was home to some real Minis, now it is home to Welsh Cobs and Welsh Mtn Ponies. In exchange for keeping the herd trimmed, I get to keep my filly in a wonderful pasture, with a stall when needed, and lots of horses for company. It works out great and I love bartering where possible with clients, when we both have something the other needs anyway. No point in me giving someone money for hay, then they give me the same amount of money for trims, and so on. Just cut out the money and trade straight across :)
Yesterday I went out and trimmed several of the larger Welsh Cobs (section C I think?), as well as my filly.
The first was Auryn (Welsh for gold), a recently gelded palomino. He is a wonderfully kind and sensitive boy and his owner started him under saddle last year and has been riding him out on trails with me. In the pictures you can see what I am now calling "Welsh feet" (not sure if all Welshes are all like this, but all the ones she has, have these feet...). They may look like ponies to some, but they also kept a lot of draft blood in their genetic makeup and the feet tell this. The feet tend to have a shallower and flatter sole, they like to flare out and get "bell shaped" (lots wider at the bottom of the feet, than the top), and they often have a heart shape to them (wide in the quarters, pointer in the toe, heels wide) to them as well. And they like to run towards low heels and longer toes. Some horses more so than others, but they all have these characteristics to one degree or other.













Here is Auryn. Not the best pictures since he isn't standing level or square, but they will have to do. You can kind of get an idea here of how his feet are shaped. This is about 6wks into a winter trim (slower growth and limited riding). In the warmer and drier times of the year and when he gets ridden a good bit, he'll go down to a 5 or even 4 week trim, or his feet tend to chip up quite a bit and flare more as well.




This is his right front foot. Btw, these horses live about a mile from the beach, as the crow flies. The pasture they live on is not as acidic as most the other areas here as there are very few Redwoods right here (though even one or two miles more inland will make a HUGE difference, or further north/south) and even though the soil has some organics in it, it is also very sandy. Not the difference in the frogs and soles to the horses in my previous posts. The same amount of rainfall, these horses also have mud (though the sand does drain a little better at times). But no pitting in the sole or frogs! It HAS to be the acidity...Very curious! Anyway, his front feet are less heart shaped than his backs, but still very wide at the quarters and heels (if he is not kept up on often trims, his Easyboot Gloves don't go on very well, as his quarters will block the application of them). You can see how there is not a lot of sole depth either. In the winter, he and one of the other cobs also like to peel the very outer layer of the wall, instead of chipping, this coincides with areas of flare, so I figure it is a way for the hoof to self trim..

The start of the trim...take of basic excess hoofwall, trim any tatters off the frog (some trimmers leave it to fall off on its own, but in our climate, ANY flaps/holes/etc are places for thrush to settle in...), take down excess bar. You can see I don't "cut pretty" like some more experienced farriers/trimmers, but I clean that all up with the rasp later :) And some days when I feel "fancy", I do try and make a nice, even cut all around. But most days I just nip away as you see it.



Here I have rasped down the hoof, cleaned it up, taken out most the flare, and brought back the toe (he tends to stumble more if I don't).







Here is his foot up on the toestand, before I take flares down from the top and give wall a finishing roll. you can kind of see the left over flare here. You shouldn't see "daylight" when you put a straight edge on a hoof like this...



And after flare removal and a roll applied to the bottom of the wall. Now you can no longer see daylight when setting a straight edge on the hoof. This is a great test you can do at home too! As seen in the above left "before" photo, the hoof "looks" fairly normal. But then I set my rasp on the hoof (from coronet down), and flare that was not very obvious to the eye before, is now much more visible. If you have flaring (on a shod OR barefoot horse) after a trim/shoeing, then you might want to ask you hoofcare professional about why it is there (some SEVERE flaring, like after major foundering, has to be taken away bit by bit or there is basically no hoofwall left. But in general, there should be NO flare on your horse's feet after a fresh trim/shoeing) and if they can't give you a sound reason for it, look around for a new one.


The left front went pretty much the same way, and here they are, after both feet were done. Again, not the best positioning for a good picture, but you get the idea :)











His right hind foot. Here you an see more of what I mean by a heart shaped foot. pointier toe, wider as it goes towards the heels. The side shot also shows how he peels that first layer of wall away...




Here it is again. It was short enough I didn't bother nippering, just rasped it down, and cleaned up the bars and frog. This frog was pretty good, I only had to trim a little of the "corners" that cover the lateral grooves. Again, some trimmers leave that alone, but here, if you let the frog overhang the grooves too much, it traps a lot of dirt and manure, leading to issues.









Flares cleaned up and toe rounded up a little. I still have a little of the wall hanging on the left photo. In the side view on the right, I have cleaned that up too. Again, you can see the relatively shallow sole on these horses...








And the finished rear foot. He really does not toe out this much. It is just my horrible photo skills and how he is standing again. :)








Next entry: Arwen, the Cob mare....