Rx; Shoes Forever?

Can't live with em', can't live without em'.

Especially if you are a thoroughbred named Yankee Wonder. Forever a battle with my problem child.

From day one we had issues keeping shoes on his pretty shitty horse toes. Thrown shoe after thrown shoes after thrown shoe. Sometimes I imagined him as a dainty gay unicorn running through the pastures going "FUCK YOU SHOES BAI" and flicking his toes around, trying to make me hate him. The situation steadily improved as he got older and with the move to MO (change in farriers/change in turnout??) I was able to keep shoes on for the majority of his existence.

Then we moved back to OH.

I haven't been able to keep a shoe on him for more than 2 weeks at a time. His RF is absolutely shitwrecked at this point, having tossed the shoe 6 times in 3 months. Half the time I would find them in his stall sheared clean off with the nails still in his foot. HOW. His LH and RH also magically, mysteriously and spectacularly threw shoes 3 times. Making the grand total in the 13 weeks we've been back NINE FUCKING TIMES. Keep in mind its $20 to nail a shoe back on. Every. Damn. Time.

Once, he tossed his RF twice in one week.

I was beginning to wonder whose fault it was....Yankee's, Ohio pasture or my farrier. lord knows he was making half his profit from me.

I still don't know, but after the last time Yankee jacked his RF up beyond salvation and we ended up yanking his shoes for the next 6 weeks.

I almost had a mini panic attack with the farrier about this decision.

The one time we pulled his shoes was when we first brought him home- his feet crumbled like sugar in water and he was lame for 3 months. That  shitshow took almost 2 years to recover from. We tried again 2 years ago and after 11 days he was lame as a one footed duck. Rx; SHOES FOREVER.

....Unless you can't keep them on and now you're back to square one, 8 years later. We weighed the pros and cons and decided that besides acrylic (aka $$$) the best option was to go barefoot, hope the softer fall ground pads his feet and see if he can regrow some hoof wall. Huge huge huge huge did I say HUGE, risk, considering his past success barefoot.

In addition, if he does well, we will keep him bare all winter and hope we can get his SEVERELY contracted feet to spread out a bit. His heels are...just the worst. In general his feet are just the worst in every way possible besides the fact they aren't rotting from the inside out.

This looks 10x better than before the trim too...

Deep clefts, soft walls, cracks, long/sloping and contracted heels should make my horse dead lame all the time but he's done well with shoes up until this point. Minus his horrible bouts with thrush every spring that wreak havoc on our lives, I am always mildly impressed that my typical horsebeast's OTTB feet don't create more problems than they do. Started him on a new hoof supplement 6 months ago, & you can see the newest  growth from the coronet down to the red arrows.. I'm not 100% sure if thats good growth or bad, but it looks thicker than the lower part of his hoof.

To say I'm anxious about this decision is a massive understatement. I might lay awake at night fretting about the soundness of my baby and if he will be gucci enough to be ridden in the next 6 weeks with no shoes on his toes. The other half of me is like,

Show season isn't happening for us, so I am chalking 2014 up to a loss along with 2011-13. Womp womp.

Luckily, my farrier is on call for me and the first instance we think this is a bad idea, he will come put the acrylic shoes on and Yankee will have all winter to recoup.

ALL THE WORRIES.

Both the meese getting their pedicures

 In addition to THAT horse, Bacardi has been increasingly getting more footsore in the front. Of course. When it initially started 3 weeks ago I thought it was from our trail ride, but he only got worse riding in the back field. The biggest change I noticed was in his trot...went from lofty and massive to short and choppy. I guess tufts of grass and hard ground make my delicate OTTB fall apart.

Luckily, his feet are dimes. Cuppy, big, and hard as rocks. He's been barefoot since he came off the track and I really wanted to keep him that way, but alas. As with Yankee, farrier and I debated and think that shoes are the best right now in order to keep in training with the facilities we have available to me right now. If he gets better, then that was the problem and thats the solution. If not, back to the drawing board.

It was HILARIOUS to watch B getting his shoes. He kept staring at his feet while farrier nailed the shoes on with a very quizzical and concerend look. Afterwards, he stood spread eagle and picked each foot up and just held it there, holding them up like,

I didn't even know horses had that kind of thought process, but I swear, that's what his brain was doing.

Trying to put all my worry aside on this particular incident and compartmentalize my anxiety about starting my adult job/commute tomorrow & all the issues that go along with that. I can't even explain the level of worry about not being able to ride everyday. Its like, I need a job to ride, but can't ride with a job. WHAT IS HAPPENING.

A separate issue will be keeping the baby hydrated while I'm slaving away at work. I will be gone from 7 am to 6 pm ALWAYS and they will no longer get lunch hay or water checks. Bacardi not only drinks an epic amount per day (3-4 buckets easily), he is also is a hay vacuum. I've never seen a horse his size slam down 3 flakes faster than he can. To remedy the situation at first I was goign to hang three buckets, but that was too much work. I opted for a muck tub full of water.

 Bacardi gets ALL THE WATER. I also put his hay in a slow feed net. Might slow him from mach5 to about 40 miles an hour, but its better than giving him it on the floor and him being hungry for 8 hours out of the day in stead of 11.

I might end up hiring the neighbor girl to give them lunch hay because I hate think about empty horse tummies.

So I solved that tiny problem, for now, hopefully.

I shall now retreat to my bed to curl up in fear about the future and all the drastic life changes.