How long has your horse been barefoot?

I do really believe with any professional (farrier/vet/barefoot practitioner of any kind) you should go by word of mouth and recommendation. Go and see their work if you possibly can. My partner was recommended to me as the best horse vet in the area (and he is!!) and now he's a fantastic EP too!! Lucky me!!!

As to being cheaper, I wouldn't actually say that because Alun attends so much CPD all over the place. I think the farrier was way cheaper (even with shoes) and was so much easier because we knew very little and left it up to him (more or less). But once you start on the road to finding out more, it's compulsive! Our ex-farrier is a great guy and is still a friend (and neighbour), he's even been on a few days of the courses (we used to run most of the KC La Pierre courses here in Wales) and really enjoyed them, particularly the dissection. He even brought a couple of friends along and they are very complementary about what we do!
 
Just over a year. Is he sound? No, not really. Is he in work? No. Is that anything to do with the lack of shoes? No! :D

Trimmed by a fabulous EP.
 
My welsh D has been shoeless since birth, my anglo for about 4 months. I trim my anglo myself, and the welsh is trimmed by a farrier. Anglo we are going to try and get the farrier to trim, though he's so frightened of him its just been too dangerous. No probs for me to do it though. We reckon someones given him a thrashing at some point
 
Robbies been barefoot for 6 weeks and is improving over rough ground/stones all the time. He was only shod at the front before but as he doesn't really do much in the way of work - we've gone down the barefoot road - farrier trims him every 8 weeks - we have a great farrier too.
 
Most of the RS horses since we bought them. Daughters old WHP since last farrier ended up in hospital 10 years ago.

Not as jokey as it sounds as WHP was given to us as an insurance write off at the age of 4 with arthritic hocks and has had a very successful career as a PC horse including XC and Intermediate WH/SJ all except the first year totally unshod as she was unshoeable without vets sedation. Still going strong at 16 and probably going to wow in veteran classes.

We only shoe horses when they require it, either as a temporary corrective measure for poor foot conformation or for the odd one out competing / working more than natural horn growth could cope with. Total decision rests with our fab farrier who will use everything from corrective trimming, though normal shoeing, natural balance etc to produce a good cost effective solution for us.
 
I brought Hollie not until she was 14 and she was never shoed, about 6 months later she had fronts put on due to bad cracking, she was superb with that, and just 3 weeks ago (4 years later also) she has had backsies put on due to more off-road hacking.

Roz had shoes on for a longggg time but since being retired for 4 years she had them removed.
 
My horse had shoes put on for a year after I bought him (from a wild herd) and then I had an EP recomended to me & hevnt looked back! his feet are in much better condition than with shoes & he's comfier now he's got his natural shock absorbers working as they should! I'm more knolwagable about his feet & now I couldnt go back to shoes, or live without my fab EP!
 
I have four horses:
Angel, 28 was shod once by a previous owner.
Skip, 23 Never shod
Trip, 10 never shod
Jack, 3 never shod.
I do my own trims and all of my horses except the 28 year old are worked year round on all kinds of surfaces and none of them have been lame..
 
4 months. Trimmed by an EP.

(Frayne was barefoot for the first 7.5 years of her life - I then had her shod because she was footy on our stony roads - but she hated being shod and after 6 months of literally trying to hold her down the farrier couldn't cope, so shoes came off in August and she is now working on all surfaces - mainly without boots - and her feet are fantastic :))

Ali xx

ps EP also managed to start sorting out the feet on my 33 year old loan pony. His feet have been neglected for years and he is very nervous about being handled. She trimmed off some of the horrible flare on his front feet - and showed me how to improve his confidence when having his feet lifted. I can now lift all 4 feet - with some patience - without being kicked :D
 
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