The Summer of Thrown Shoes

It's been a rather dismal summer for Cash and I in terms of getting to ride.  We hit a few high points when I was able to actually ride him for more than 2 weeks at a time and got a few jumping rides in which were amazing.  However, the majority of the summer went something alone these lines:

Farrier comes and shoes horse
Horse keeps shoes for a few weeks, a month maybe
Horse throws shoe
Call Farrier, Farrier comes a week later, by this time Horse is lame
New shoe on, wait a week (or more) for Horse to be not-lame
Horse is sound, ride horse for a week or two
Horse throws shoe
Rinse, repeat....

I've honestly lost track of how many shoes we've gone through this summer. We finally got him to let us hot shoe him (courtesy of a lip chain) so that we could put quarter clips on.... that still didn't work.

He tore up his bell boots like nothing else...

So got shinny new ones... and still pulled a shoe the very next day

I'm frustrated, my farrier is frustrated, we're both puzzled as we can't figure out why (or HOW) he's pulling these shoes so frequently.  Interesting thing is I realized yesterday that the rate at which he's pulling these shoes has increased significantly since getting his hocks injected earlier this summer. So it very could be that he's feeling better and stepping up more under himself, OR he's just the klutz with his feet I know he is and continually stepping on himself as I see him do on a nearly daily basis. Sigh.

SO.... as of this last missing pulling a few days ago I'm just going to throw in the towel and pull his shoes for the winter and let his feet grow out.  They are getting so riddled with nail holes at this point that it's just going to be a continual downward spiral.  Sucks because I was hoping to get to ride him in his first show next month.  Oh well, such is the life of horse ownership.  I'll probably still take him just to hang out and experience the atmosphere, but I doubt he'll be sound enough to ride.

Welp Cash, enjoy your winter break! Guess that gives me more time to study, play with the kiddos, hang out with the boyfriend, and play a sweet little GPS-based mobile game I got dragged into called Ingress.

Cheers,
Emily

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In which Cash pulls his shoe off

Yep, third time this summer.  I dunno what the gig is, this farrier is just as nice and tight and tidy with his shoes (if not more so) than the farrier I was using last summer, yet Cash has pulled a shoe off out of all but one set.  Maybe it's the shoe itself?  The shoes this farrier uses are heavier than those used by my last farrier.  Weird.

This video is taken probably about two laps after he pulled it (the man was being a klutz over those poles!!)... it's pretty self explanatory!

Just waiting to hear back from the farrier now as far as when we can find time to slap the thing back on.

Update: About 20 minutes after I posted this the farrier called and said he just so happened to be down the road and could swing by and put the shoe on. Hopefully he keeps it on.  The farrier said that if he fits it any tighter he'll be short shod.  So, we'll see.

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The Shoes are Off!

Cash got his shoes off today! I got a call this morning from my farrier saying that he was in town and able to come by and take them off.  The timing worked out perfect and I was able to zip off to the barn to meet him after work. He was originally going to come last week but he came down with the flu and wasn't able to work for a couple weeks, yikes!

Since I'm running rather short on funds until my next paycheck, I said that I'd trim Cash myself, which is something I actually enjoy.  I'm no expert, but I know enough about the balance and function of a foot to be dangerous.

After the past two months waiting (im)paitently for Cash's feet to grow, I've definitely decided that we need to try keeping his feet (namely his toes) a bit longer than we had.  He just wasn't comfortable with them that short.  He tends to have very short toes, which means a tendency to be sore in the toes.  All I did was round the toes (took off length from the top essentially), trim off some shedding frog, and called it good.  He really didn't have any length that needed to be taken off.

His front left grows a bit clubby, so finding the right angle is tricky.  You want to go by the textbook and match the pastern angle, but, a club foot is often that way because of how the horse naturally is or at one point there could have been an injury that caused a lack of weight bearing for a prolonged period.  I don't know what the reason is with Cash, but I do know that one can only alter a club foot so much--you can't force a body to conform to a shape it's not built to be.  Anywho, this is what the left front looked like after I did the toe, I rasped the heels a fraction, but they were level with the frog so didn't go further.  It'll be interesting to see if the frog starts shedding now that it'll be more load bearing.  Looking at this picture you see that it would appear he needs some toe taken off. 

 But putting the foot down you see that, really, he's not that long in the toe after all.  I may try to take a smidge more heel off.  But again, I want to try leaving his feet a touch longer as I think he needs extra padding to stay sound.

  The right front is much rounder with a lot of width to it.  It's not what I would call a flat foot, but it's borderline.  Again, same deal with the toe.  Looks long underneath...

... but perfectly fine when set on the ground.  I have no want or desire to make his toes any less.

 Overall, for a thoroughbred he's got pretty decent feet.  Nice shape, open heels, healthy frog.  I'm going to be avidly using the Keratex Hoof Hardener this week and see how it helps.

Aside from that? My day was rather crappy :(  One of our chickens died, she was one of the older hens we had (prob about 3-4 years, old for a chicken), and I think the subzero temps did her in.  I found her very lethargic in the run, brought her inside to warm up hoping that might help, but after about 2 hours she convulsed and died. By the way she was acting, I wouldn't be surprised if she had a stroke.

Then, the really cruddy part of the day was that my husband said enough's enough with the little 6 month old kitten we have, well had.  She's been peeing on a lot of things lately, I'm 110% positive it was hormones as when we got her spayed last week she was in heat.... Today she popped a squat and peed on a backpack right in front of him.  He took her over to a friend's house this evening to be their cat....  Yeah, I'm rather upset....... she was my little buddy, even if she was kitty terror.  To say my husband is impulsive is an understatement.  It's epically frustrating since I am anything but.

Gonna miss that little face :(

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Shoe pulling fail

Being able to pull a shoe is, in my opinion, a skill that any able bodied horse person should know how to do because inevitably there will be that time when you've got a shoe half on, half off that needs to come off now and could potentially cause damage if left until the farrier can get there.  Really, it's easy, well in theory at least. What I do is first rasp the clinches off, then I pull the shoe off a little to loosen the nails, give it a pound which frees the nails from the shoe allowing me to pull the nails out individually.  Once only two, maybe three nails remain I can simply pull the shoe off the rest of the way.  It takes me about 15 minutes per foot as the strength (and thus efficiency) of a farrier I have not.

Never before have I NOT been able to get a shoe off, until Cash.  Granted, in the past the horses I've worked on have always been good about their feet, or were at a point where they had become good with their feet and would happily stand patiently still while I did my business.  Cash, however, does not dig the farrier or anything to do with farrier work.  The first time my farrier ever trimmed his feet he danced around like a jumping jack on puppet strings, screaming his head off because he was not with his buddies.  This elicited the muttered comment from the farrier of "I bet you had a margarita to get your feet done on the track".  Over the past 10 months or so he's gotten worlds better, but still requires a firm hand and he will still squirm and jump from time to time.

I got as far as getting the clinches rasped off (and to my farrier's credit, his to date have been the toughest clinches to get off of any shoe I've pulled!  They were in there good), but as soon as I got his leg in between my knees and started working on that shoe it didn't take long for Cash to figure out what was going on.  I quickly gave up on my endeavor when A) he started leaning incessantly on me to the point of almost loosing his balance and B) when that didn't work he started fidgeting and jumping around, attempting to yank his foot away.... UGH.  He got a good reprimand for that, and then, since Baby K was starting to fuss (she hangs out in the heated tack room office and I carry a baby monitor to listen to her), I decided to give my farrier a call instead.  He'll swing by on the 8th when he's in this part of town and pull the shoes for me. 

Beautiful Colorado snow - a main reason for getting rid of the shoes! I hate ice balls...

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That Coveted Yellow Watch

I think that there needs to be an official term for the hangover like syndrome that happens after Christmas... All that hype and anticipation, planning and gift wrapping, baking, entertaining of family members (both wanted and not), which climaxes in a dramatic tearing open of presents which lasts maybe half an hour. And then, it's all done... or is it?  My house has been in a post-Christmas state of chaos ever since, with mounds of new clothes, toys, gadgets, and should I mention the now empty wrapping supplies??? Two days out post-dewrapping and I've only managed to half tame the beast.

The view Christmas evening after it was all said and done

This year things were a tad tight for us, so we focused on getting gifts for the kiddos above all.  And, I would say, they came out pretty good... lucky kids, I never got stuff like that as a kid... Anyway, of the two (or was it three?) gifts I got, the prize jewel was something I've been coveting for years, that iconic eventing symbol: the big, yellow faced, Optimum Time Event Watch!!

Thank you Mom! She had asked me for some things I wanted for Christmas, I poked around, came up with a list... and then, on eBay I spied an auction for a barely used Optimum Time Watch at half the price they sell for new.  I promptly emailed her the link and said, "This! Want!"  And, well, I was very very happy to open up that lovely watch on Christmas morning! 

Previously I've been using a cheap, $10 digital watch from Wallyworld, not very stylish but it worked fine--although it would only count up, not down.  So, I certainly can NOT wait to get out there and use this bad boy!

But first, Cash is getting his shoes pulled.  We had a beautiful white Christmas, and more snow is on the way, so that means the ground will be soft-ish and I feel comfortable taking those shoes off to let his feet get a rest.  Plus, I can't ride in the snow with shoes on, but I can with them off (read: ice balls).  I will be taking them off myself this afternoon, so we will see how he does soundness wise. I fully expect him to be a bit off for awhile, but who knows, maybe he'll surprise me.  I discussed it with my farrier a few weeks ago, and we are going to try and keep his feet just a smidge longer than we were--he just wasn't comfortable, especially in the toes. Maybe even go to 9 or 10 weeks inbetween trims/shoes, especially in the winter. 

In the mean time, I've having a little too much fun working with one of the ponies at the barn, I'm getting him back in harness so that he can pull this adorable little farm wagon they have.  A post about him will be forthcoming.

I'll leave you today with a Christmas Baby picture, because I think she's too adorable not to share :)

My little snuggle bug

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