New Farrier

We have been here almost a year. Last month our farrier group decided they were no longer servicing the area, that their farriers were too spread out and they had to cut back on travel to keep their services reasonably priced. Certainly no hard feelings there, but searching for a qualified farrier who does a good job and treats the horses with respect (and patience for my old guys…and Macchi) is always stressful.

Joe brought out a few cadaver hooves, while his focus was on the point of rotation in comparison to landmarks on the sole, it always amazes me how little holds the coffin bone in place and how thin the protection from the ground to the bone.

Our new farrier was found as a mention from some random person on some random northern Colorado horse Facebook page. Yes, dangerous sounding I know. But I was delighted to see on Joe’s website that his background is in mechanical engineering. Being from a science person myself I thought this might work. http://ironhorsehoofcare.com/

When I asked our vet if Joe was a farrier that they liked, they said they were happy with him. Dr. Leclair did go on to say that Joe goes into the math and science and a lot of people get turned off because of that but that I would like what he did. He was right.

Joe diagramed out center of balance, how changing it changes the stability of the hoof (simplified to a box) and the strain that gets translated to the tendons when the center of rotation is not balanced correctly. Summer and Sage both came over during the lecture to see what was going on- they approved.

While we made some bigger changes then I would like made at once, the horses are already walking better, showing that there was some strain on their legs due to hooves being a bit out of balance. Thank you Joe!