Step 5

They rode their barefoot, un-booted horses all through the Rocky Mountains for ten days.

Ruth and I feel that dealing with flares is a very, very important aspect of trimming. Reducing flares is the first step in decreasing or stopping further damage to the hoof. We cannot fix a foot by trimming, but we can encourage it to heal. One of the simplest ways to encourage healing is to decrease leverage on hoof horn. This is similar to a doctor not being able to fix a broken bone. When a doctor sets a bone that has been broken, he is not actually healing the bone, he is protecting it from further damage. The body actually does the healing. We want to protect the hoof from further damage and encourage healing.

When a hoof is properly finished off, leveraging forces on the walls are minimized. The results are quickly felt by the horse.

His heels were not particularly high and the sides were not flared, but the toe was extremely long.

We want to point out that flares can occur anywhere on the hoof. It is very common to have flares pointed out in the toe region, but bars, heels and quarters of the foot can also be misplaced by flares.

We take liberty in referring to any misplaced hoof horn as flares. Along with the typical flaring that you see in the outer hoof wall, we feel that under run heels are a type of flaring and that laid over bars are also a version of flaring.

There are two ways to identify flares, from the top and from the bottom of the foot.

From the top, we look for any deviations in the wall. We want to see a smooth downward slope without any dips or waves. From the bottom, we look for the wall to be an even width all around the sole, including the heels and bars.


un-flared	flared

Notice the difference in the hoof walls of these two feet, even the sides of the hoof are flared.


un-flared	flared

Look at the dip in the toe. Once this is under control, the hoof will begin to heal.

From the bottom, there are many ways to identify flaring. Remember, we refer to "flaring" as any hoof horn that is misplaced with bent tubules. When the tubules are not correctly oriented to the ground, they will not wear properly.

Notice the pictures below. The picture on the left shows hoof walls that are an even width all around the sole, the bars are short and straight, and the tubules in the heel area are perpendicular to the ground. The picture on the right is almost the opposite. The hoof walls are pulling away from the sole area, the bar tubules are laid over, and the hoof horn in the heels are so far under run that this gelding is walking on the sides of the tubules.


un-flared	flared


under- run heel	same heel months later

This is a side view of an under-run heel. The "flaring" was taken off by rasping the heels down to a clean heel triangle. The rasping essentially cut off the tubules that were folded under the foot and put them more perpendicular with the ground. Now they could wear more evenly and not continue to fold under the foot.


folded over tubules	clean heel triangle	heel finished

This is as far as I would go with the first trim. Fixing a long standing problem like this is a process. Taking these heels down more aggressively will only make this horse sore.


edge of sole	walls trimmed to even width

I have marked the edge of the sole so that it is clear that the walls are an uneven width. Unless they are trimmed, they will create leverage on the hoof walls and cause further separation.

When we see cracks or stretched areas in the walls, we know this is a sign of leveraging forces. Put simply, stretched walls translate to a flare. We address flares by rasping the walls from the top and the bottom. From the bottom, we use the rasp or nippers to take off excess wall and make it an even thickness around the edge of the sole. From the top, we rasp down the wall to take out all the dishing and waves.

We may or may not remove the whole flare in one trim. Extreme flares are removed in many trims. We always round the wall right into the lighter pigmented portion of the wall in the toe area. When the hoof is on the stand, we can determine a stopping point by looking for the un-pigmented portion of the hoof wall. If we see the “hairy” white line, we know we have gone too far, but no real damage has been done. Rounding the toe discourages dishing of the wall or stretching of the white line and facilitates break over wherever the horse needs. Leveraging forces are kept to a minimum when the wall is rolled all around the foot. Imagine short fingernails verses long fingernails, which is easier to bend backwards?


before trim	after nipping	after rasping

Notice that most of the flaring was removed by nipping? It only took a small amount of rasping to get rid of the last bit of flaring and roll the edge. On a foot like this, all the flaring can be removed in one trim. If the flaring is really pronounced, it may take a few trims to completely get it under control. We never invade the live sole or go into the white line to remove all the flares. Time is on our side. We let the horse heal and don't force it.

Here, we are working on the flares from the top of the foot. Notice that the rasp is used in a side to side motion. If you go straight down the foot, you will scrape the coronary band.

Here is a picture of a beautiful mustang roll. Notice that the hoof wall falls away from the rasp and goes into the un-pigmented portion of the wall.

I start the roll from the bottom, rasp the flares down the wall, and then finish the roll by running the rasp under the edge of the hoof. I run my hand underneath the wall to confirm that it is smooth and rounded.


rolling sides from the bottom	rolling down	finishing underneath