Why Going Barefoot Cuts Costs and Why Vets Can’t Go on Holiday.
This blog post is a follow up of Why Go Barefoot…?
To write this post I first have to quote this:-
“Of the 122 million equines found around the world, no more than 10 percent are clinically sound. Some 10 percent (12.2 million) are clinically, completely and unusably lame. The remaining 80 percent (97.6 million) of these equines are somewhat lame… and could not pass a soundness evaluation or test.”
Walt Taylor - Co-founder of the American Farriers Association, and member of the World Farriers Association and Working Together for Equines program. [American Farriers Journal, Nov. /2000, v.26, #6, p.5]
I have read this many times and continue to re-read it, these figures are quite incredible…..
Once horses are shod, we are dealing with pathology. The definition of pathology is:-
“the science and study of the cause and effect of disease.”
So, in my own words; once we have shod our horses we have created diseased, malfunctioning hooves. We then go about administering them and treating them with all manner of pots and potions, but we continue to create the disease by shoeing them. I sometimes wonder how we can be so stupid…….. for a long time I shod our horses and it is only now, after studying, that I realize how stupid and appalling it was – not to mention how much money went down the drain on farrier and vet bills.
How do Vets benefit from this?
We have created pathology and from doing this, our vets will have to administer to us and our horses. Our Vets will help us to superficially treat our hoof problems and then all the problems that can occur further up their bodies including leg, tendon and joint problems etc. If we manage this superficial treatment well, we might get our horses to live, ride, compete etc up to 20yrs; but after this a vast majority of horses will have peaked and be on their way down, yet we know that horses can survive and go on for very much longer.
How Will Our Vets Manage?
If we were to become a world of barefoot horse owners, there would be a huge reduction in work for our vets and so, no holidays…….
I know for sure that our Vet is not raking in a large income from our collection of horses; he was here once last year and that was to geld our colt.
Why Going Barefoot Cuts Costs.
Going barefoot cuts costs. There is no argument there. The Vet and Farrier bills just stop.
OK – if you don’t want to learn to trim your horses hooves, you still have the cost of a barefoot trimmer, but this is vastly cheaper than the cost of shoeing a horse.
OK – Great for Me… What about the Vets?
Maybe we could enable our vets to still to go on holiday….. they should not be doing superficial treatment on horses with pathology that we have created. They should instead be using their skills when unseen accidents happen and complications occur. Far more challenging and rewarding work.
Our Vets and Medics… Their Real Skills
I have to now mention a recent personal experience…
Our youngest daughter, while doing a gymnastic move, a “Flick” (full twisting back handspring) fell and broke her arm – she was being trained beyond her 80% ability, (if you don’t know what this means, don’t worry I will be writing about this in a future post) the up shot was, we needed medical care fast.
This is just one example of when our medics and vets come into their own and give us all the most fantastic medical help and support, I cannot commend them enough for all they do and I cannot thank the surgeon involved who looked after Sasha so brilliantly – no pinning and no scaring, in fact no-one would know she has had such a serious injury. (I will also post how we helped her in addition to the medics.)
My Point…
My point for mentioning this however, is that, our Vets don’t need to be “fixing” pathology which we have created. Their immense skill and training should, instead be used for problems out of our hands.
As horse owners, are we not better to support our Vets by not loading them up with unnecessary pathology, but instead, for us to study and learn, how best to maintain the health of our horses using natural horsecare methods.
Surely this is what we should be striving to achieve. Yes, we still need our Vets – their work and dedication to looking after our animals is outstanding – but lets shed them of the pathologies we are creating and instead let them use their skills in areas which are outside our abilities, just as I needed the medics for my daughters fractured arm.
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