Summary Conclusions & Personal Thoughts
The wild horses have shown researchers that the foot of the horse is much more self-maintaining than one might believe. I have experienced the same phenomenon with wild horses which I have owned, which to this day have never been shod.
If when the horse is trimmed, he is trimmed naturally and the point of breakover is correct, his feet will try to maintain themselves, respond to the environment, become more durable and be less prone to hoof disease.
The horse is not intended to bear weight on the hoof wall, and in fact it can be damaging to the coronary band and other structures when he does so.
Chips and cracks along the hoof wall are usually natural exfoliation processes which do not affect the ability of the foot to support the horse, but rather reveals that the hoof is trying to maintain itself. This is not to say that flares, chips and cracks shouldn't be dressed up when they occur, but they are not true indicators that the horse is in dire need of a trim. In many instances, properly balanced horses can go weeks longer between trimming on correct trims.
Mud is good. It provides sole support which protects the coffin bone and sensitive laminae. The Natural Balance Shoe is designed to maximize retention of mud in the sole. In response to a direct question that I posed regarding the end user's maintenance of feet before riding, Ovnicek responded that the debris in the hoof should be leveled off to the shoe line or hoof wall, but the contents around the frog should remain. (Don't leave a ball of mud which extends below the ground striking plane.)
Ridges and formations along the sole of the hoof are there for a reason and should not be removed, but rather be made level. Only the exfoliating materials should be pared out and the trim should not extend beyond the "waxy" layers of the sole.
The lips of the sensitive frog should not be pared out. The buttress of the frog should be left as intact as possible. Only flaky exfoliation should be removed.
Thrush is a symptom of necrotic frog tissues which are present and decomposing as a result of insufficient stimulation. Leave the mud, stimulate the tissues and the thrush will have nothing to grow on. Problem solved. In addition, the mud is an important component in the exercising of the ungual cartilage and arterio-venus capillary complexes.
A proper trim should have the buttress of the frog extending 1/4"below the plane of the heels. The frog should touch down first as the horse walks. The frog has a high concentration of proprioceptors. In horse training we sometimes spend a great deal of time trying to get the horse to better perceive his limbs. Preserving the buttress of the frog will increase neurological activity and therefore the horse should be naturally more aware of this feet and be able to more easily "read" the ground.
No two feet examined were alike. This statistic includes pairs of feet on the same horse. Each foot should be trimmed to its specific needs, which may result at first in some visual disparity. However, if the natural corrective forces available within the foot are allowed to occur, a pair of feet over time will tend to grow more alike.
There is a significant amount of excess material in the toes of most horses as was demonstrated by the driving of nails up through the soles of the feet and out the dorsal (top) wall with no discomfort being felt by the horse. This excess growth does negatively impact flight and breakover of the hoof. Breakover is so important that even the difference between a fresh and worn shoe can make a difference. Studies of performance horses indicate that they consistently performed better when in reset shoes where the toes were already worn down. (Reset those shoes as long as they are viable.)
The breakover point of the toe on a typical foot should be within 1 1/8 to 1 1/4" in front of the apex (point) of the frog. A ratio of 1/3:2/3 should be maintained using the apex of the frog as a reference; 1/3 of the foot (to breakover) being forward of the apex and the remaining 2/3 of the foot being to the anterior of the apex. From our personal observations this ratio seems to increase to 1/4:3/4 with respect to draft horses. It is possible that my notes are in error and the reference point should be Duckett's Dot (see the anatomical view in Part 1), and I am in the process of gaining clarification on this point.
A Matter of Confidence
On shod horses the appropriate breakover point may have to be maintained through use of a rocker toe or blunt shoe such as the Natural Balance Shoe. As the properly shod hoof grows, it should become more into natural alignment so that eventually the shoe won't appear as "set back" as it would likely seem at the first shoeing.
Foals need to be able to develop good feet through exercise and wear of the developing hoof walls so that the sole structures can make contact with the ground and properly develop the elements within the foot.
Wild horse feet which developed naturally oftentimes do not need to be shod in the human environment provided proper foot balance is maintained. The feet of domestic horses will respond to the environment and when managed properly, can tend to become somewhat like wild horse feet and become more self-sustaining.
Most wild horses, even specimens with poor conformation, don't tend to stumble or trip. Part of this surefootedness is attributable to the balance of the foot. We can promote some of this surefootedness in domestic horses by emulating as many of the characteristics of the wild horse's feet as is practical during our hoof maintenance efforts.
