Are Natural Hooves Adequate?
As more and more people realize the long term dangers of shoeing, there is increasing interest in natural hooves. But the question arises, "Are natural hooves adequate for my horse?" Rather than answer that question with a simple "yes" or "no," let's take a circular route and think about some things.
Sometimes we lose sight of the fact that horses are not man-made things; they are naturally occurring animals that existed for ages before they were domesticated. The horse's body is designed by Nature for the movements required in its everyday life; horses are not designed to be ridden or to carry loads. Horses are flight animals and are designed for quick movements. Their bodies are not designed to carry a rider on long trail rides and are not designed to carry a rider over repeated jumps. Riding a horse puts loads and stresses on the entire body that the body is not designed to bear.
And yet so often we don't really think about that when we decide to ride a horse...except in terms of the hooves. People hear and read things about self-maintaining horses with natural hooves and think, "Yes, natural hooves are fine for those horses, but...they are not ridden." That of course is true, but why stop at the hooves? It's as though every part of the horse is seen as adequate to bear the unnatural stresses and strains of riding, jumping, eventing, barrel racing, steeple chase, and so on.....except the hooves. And so really, when you think about it, the only thing seen necessary to transform this flight animal designed for quick movements into a load-carrying animal is a shoe or a certain kind of trim.
But let's stop and think for a minute. It's true that most horses will not have hooves adequate to withstand a two-day trail ride on hard, rough terrain after standing in a soft grass pasture for a month. And the horse's hooves are certainly not designed to withstand the stresses and strains of landing from repeated jumps, and despite what many believe, no type of shoe or trim will redesign it to make it able in the long term to withstand those stresses and strains. But let's go beyond the hooves. Are the legs of the horse designed for that...the bone structure, muscles, tendons, and ligaments? No. Is the spine of the horse designed for that? No. Is any part of the horse designed for that? No.
But yet in the horse world, it's assumed that horses should be able to do all that. It's assumed that they should be able to be ridden for hours carrying a heavy load; it's assumed that they should be able to withstand repeated jumps; it's assumed that they should be able to be started on the racetrack before age 2; it's assumed that they should be able to be used for years for barrel racing...and do all that and their bodies suffer no ill effects. Why?
You know, just because horses are commonly used for things like that doesn't mean that they're not harmful in the long run.
Not long ago I had a conversation with someone who owned a 14-year old horse who had been used all its life for eventing. It was lame, and the owner couldn't understand why. She was sort of shocked when I said, "Well, what do you expect? Do you think it's reasonable to expect the horse's body to take all that abuse for years and suffer no damage?"
We don't usually think of the everyday uses we put our horses to as causing damage to the horse's body, but to a certain extent they do. Now this is not to say that we shouldn't ride horses, or that it's inhumane to ride horses, but it should point out to us that we need to respect the limitations of our horses when we do ride.
Of course I know that there are magic trims out there advertised to redesign your horse and make it into a load-bearing performance machine, but your common sense will tell you that you can't make a few swipes with a rasp and hoof knife (no matter whose initials are engraved in the handle) and magically redesign the whole horse. And I know that farriers and horse owners alike talk about how shoes provide "support" on landing from jumps and how shoes "support the bony column"...they're just unable to explain exactly how that works. And I also know how people talk about how a horse that stands in the pasture for a month should magically become a load-bearing athlete able to carry someone who weighs 235 pounds up and down hills on a 7-hour trail ride. But the fact is that all those uses put stresses and strains on the horse's body which it was not designed to bear, and no shoe or trim is going to change that.
In fact most all things that horses are commonly used for put unnatural stresses and strains on their bodies. Horses subjected to heavy use over a period of years run a real risk of developing non-reversible problems as a result. Little by little the wear and tear takes its toll, and by middle age, the horses show the effects. Some of these problems could be lessesned if the horses were better conditioned, but the fact is that very few people are willing to take the time to properly condition their horses. Somehow or another we've gotten the idea that horses lounging around in the pasture, or worse, imprisioned in a stall, magically build up tremendous reserves of strength and endurance which is just waiting to be released when we want to ride. You can advise conditioning a horse until you're blue in the face, but many people still just can't believe it's necessary, or rather believe that a few minutes of longing or few hours of paddock turnout is all that is necessary. After all, no one else does the conditioning....
It's not unusual, in fact it's the norm, for horses heavily used in many riding activities to develop problems in middle age. Those horses are found everywhere, there are many more of them than most people realize, and their old age ends up being pitiful. In my video, "Understanding the Horse--From the Horse's Perspective," I use the example of a former champion roping horse, and how pitiful he ended up in old age. By and large, people don't connect the problems the horses develop with the unnatural stresses and strains they have born over the years. Instead, they think the horses shouldn't have developed the problems, and so they search for solutions...after the fact. But they're searching for something that's not to be found, because in the final analysis, they're simply asking for too much from the horse.
Yes, you can use a horse for whatever you want, for all the things that horses are commonly used for, and if you choose to do that, that's fine, that's your decision. But you need to realize that you can't do that without a price...for the horse. That price is risking problems as the horse reaches middle age. If you're comfortable with that, then that's your business. And when it happens, then there's no use running around trying to negate what happened, trying to reverse what happened, trying to make the problem go away, because it'll be too late. Although a whole industry in the horse and hoof care world has grown up around trying to make it not too late, trying to make these things reversible, you'll find that, despite the promises, the solutions they offer probably aren't going to work. At best they offer temporary patch-ups that will make the horse usable a little longer. Despite all the advanced-sounding farrier, trimming, and veterinary techniques that you read about in the magazines, they have not discovered a way to reengineer the horse and make into something it's not, and they have not discovered a way to recreate the horse in middle age and negate the accumulation of ill-effects built up little by little over the years. So the thing to do, instead of wasting your time and money chasing rainbows of magic cures, magic shoes, and magic trims, is just to accept what has happened and go on to the next horse.
But what if you look at the horse as something more than just a throw-away, as more than a car that you just trade in for a new one when it wears out? Well, then, the best thing to do is adjust what you do with your horse so that you will minimize the unnatural stresses and strains you put on the horse's body, and thus lessen the chance that your horse will develop problems in middle age. If you don't want to cause long-term damage to your horse, there's no other way. It requires a rethinking of the way we keep and use our horses...IF the well being of the horse as a living being is what we're concerned about.
So that brings us back around the circle to the question posed at the beginning, "Are natural hooves adequate for my horse?" The answer is undoubtedly a big YES. That's looking at it from the horse's perspective, the way we like to look at things. But let's ask another question, "Are natural hooves adequate for what I want to do with my horse?" The answer to that question is MAYBE. You see, that question looks at it not from the horse's perspective, but from your perspective, and so the answer will depend not on the horse or its hooves, but on you. Please keep in mind that when you make your decision, you are affecting the horse's future.
