Barefoot Horses At Work
A
common misconception is that if a horse is in regular, hard work or
ridden on hard or rough terrain that they need shoes. This has been
proven wrong again and again. I do agree that if your horse lives the
"conventional" lifestyle - in a deeply bedded stall for 20+ hours,
ridden in a soft arena for an hour, maybe turned out on grass for a
couple hours, etc, that they probably will not do well barefoot.
Management plays an important role in keeping a barefoot performance
horse at the top of their game. You have to take the amount of
turnout, footing, and conditioning into the picture. But again, there
are many other websites with in depth information on this topic and so
I won't be repetitive. I just want to share our barefoot horses with
you here. They all work hard in various ways and our sights are set
high in years to come. My goal is to have barefoot
horses showing at the upper levels of their discipline in years to come.
All of our lesson horses here at Flying Hearts Farm
are barefoot. They teach up to two lessons a day in the arena, they
regularly go out back on the trails, they are sound ridden across all
terrain including gravel. Their lessons can be anything from an easy
lunge lesson with a beginner, to going out jumping cross country and everything in between.
Examples of Healthy Hooves