Ekidemy

In Galop 3 you learnt to name the visible parts of the hoof: wall, sole, frog, the grooves beside the frog, bulbs of the heel, heels. Galop 6 looks inside. The foot means the whole end of the leg: the horny box, or hoof, and everything it protects.

The bones

The lower end of the short pastern bone (the second phalanx), the pedal bone (the third phalanx), shaped like a small hoof, and the navicular bone, tucked in behind, against both phalanges: the deep digital flexor tendon glides over it.

The living tissue

The sensitive laminae lock the wall to the pedal bone with countless interleaved leaves; the velvety sensitive sole produces the sole and the frog; the coronary band produces the wall, which grows down from the top.

The shock absorbers

The digital cushion, an elastic pad above the frog, and the two lateral cartilages, flexible plates that extend the pedal bone back towards the heels.

At every stride, the horse’s weight pushes the pedal bone down inside the hoof. The digital cushion, squeezed between the bone and the frog on the ground, flattens and pushes the cartilages apart: the heels open slightly and the shock is absorbed, while blood is pumped out and drawn back in. A foot whose frog no longer takes weight — heels too high, a frog that is rotten or shrunken — cushions badly and sends the jar up into the joints. Hence the care given to the frog.

The shoe and good shoeing

The shoe is a strip of metal nailed under the wall. Its parts are the toe at the front and the two branches, ending in the heels of the shoe under the horse’s heels, with the nail holes along them. The clip, a small tab drawn up against the wall, stops the shoe sliding back. A front shoe is rounder, a hind shoe more oval. A horse is well shod when:

• the shoe sits straight under the foot, both branches the same length and lying flat;
• the heels of the shoe cover the horse’s heels, the same distance either side of the frog;
• the clenches are in line at the same height, well turned down and smooth under the hand;
• the foot stays in line with the pastern, from the side as from the front, with no horn overhanging the shoe.

Call the farrier back when the shoe looks too short or too narrow, the horn overgrows it and breaks away, the clenches have risen, or the shoe is worn or loose and clinking. On average a horse is shod every 6 to 8 weeks; if the shoes are not worn, the farrier does a reset, or removes: he takes the shoes off, trims the feet and nails the same shoes back on. An unshod foot needs regular trimming too.

The stages of the farrier’s work

1. 1ObserveWith the horse held or tied up on flat, non-slip ground, the farrier looks at it standing, then walked and trotted up in a straight line: how the legs are set, how the shoes have worn, how the foot lands. You will learn to name faults of limb conformation in Galop 7.
2. 2Take off the old shoesHe knocks up the clenches with the buffer and the driving hammer, then levers the old shoe off with the pull-offs, without tearing the horn.
3. 3TrimHe takes off the horn grown since the last shoeing (the new growth) with a toeing knife struck with a mallet, cleans up sole and frog with the hoof knife, then levels the bearing surface with the rasp so that the foot is balanced.
4. 4Fit the shoeHe shapes a shoe of the right size on the anvil, hot or cold, until it follows the outline of the foot. When hot-shoeing, the shoe briefly scorches the horn: it smokes, but the wall has no feeling.
5. 5Nail onHe drives the nails through the nail holes with the driving hammer: each nail goes in at the white line and comes out through the wall.
6. 6Cut and clenchHe cuts off the points that stick out, then turns what is left down against the wall to form the clenches, which hold the shoe on.
7. 7Finish and checkA stroke of the rasp smooths the clenches and the edge of the wall. The farrier has the horse walked to check that it moves well.