Guess what!

No, really, guess!

I'm waiting...





Nope, that's not it.  Try again!





Give up?




Oh, alright....

*Someone* is out of aluminum bar shoes and into regular ol' steel shoes!

My checkbook is very very appreciative.  River doesn't seem to care one way or the other, which I guess is good because he feels fine either way.  Bell boots are staying on, just in case.  (Don't worry that the shoe looks crooked.  It's not, but River wasn't cooperating for me to get a better picture.)

Also, we had rain!!!!  First time in probably a month we've had any appreciable amount of rain... thank goodness.


Not about River, but I have to brag.  Seriously, I do, I'm so excited.

I like feet.  Not in a foot fetish way, in a hoof trimming way.  I've been playing around with trimming and learning for something like three years now.  Every time my super-awesome farrier comes out I watch and ask lots of questions.  I've been trimming my older gelding for the past year and a half, ever since he went barefoot.  He's stayed sound, so I figure I'm doing something right.

Last week, my BO asked if I could do one of her horse's feet.  Her farrier isn't due for another month and the mare's feet were getting pretty gross.  I had planned on just running a rasp around the fronts to neaten them up, but they were in sufficient need that I ended doing a full trim all around.  I was happy with the work I did and my BO was thrilled.

So when my farrier came a few days ago (yes, this post has been waiting for me to get a picture of Riv's new shoes), she asked him to take a look at the mare I did, not telling him who did her feet.  He was complimentary and BO explained that I did the feet.  Super-awesome farrier was very pleased with my work and only had two very minor corrections.  Super-awesome farrier is proud of my trimming and asked when I'm going to start doing feet for money.  !!!!!!!  Which, honestly, I would actually really like to do.  I mentioned this to the BO at my old guy's barn and she's interested in having me do at least some of the barefoot horses.  Not to brag, but I can say with absolute certainty that I'm better than their farrier.  The barn farrier is... well.... he's terrible.  He somehow manages to keep horses going, but the quality of the work is appalling.  Ugh, I need to stop, I'm going to freak myself out.

I will say, the problem with having a super-awesome farrier and learning about feet is that I pretty much have to force myself to not look at other people's horses' feet.  It's just too upsetting to see horses standing on trainwrecks when I can't do anything about it.  I did suggest to one person that she ask the farrier why the shoes weren't on straight and why one heel was so much longer than the other....

So yeah.  I'm apparently a halfway decent trimmer!  And on Thursday I'm going to a clinic/lecture thingy at super-awesome farrier's house.  We'll be radiographing and dissecting cadaver hooves!  Yes, I am a little too excited about dead horse feet.  It'll be so educational and I think it will help a lot with my confidence...  Old guy had a crapload of retained sole for months because I was too afraid to go after it.  I finally did and his feet look so much better, but I think the cadaver hooves will help with understanding the anatomy so I don't feel like I'm cutting into the unknown.