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  Discussion on Hoof Pads Necessary?
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Member:
Jrisch

Posted on Tuesday, Apr 13, 2004 - 2:42 pm:

Dr. O. I recently purchased a mare that has pads on her front feet. The owner told me that she gets bruises and abscesses easily, so she always keeps pads on her front feet. I read your articles about shoeing, abscesses and gravels. It seems that pads contribute to softening the sole. I am meeting with my farrier in two days and he has already indicated that the pads should come off. What are your thoughts on the continued use of pads? Thanks for your time.
Member:
Gafarm

Posted on Tuesday, Apr 13, 2004 - 3:57 pm:

Every horse with pads on that I've ever known (their owners gave me a similar story) had some kind of foot problem that the owner never had diagnosed properly. I would strongly suggest that you have this horse's feet X-rayed before you make the decision to remove the pads or ask the previous owner if they have X-rays on file with their vet.
Moderator:
DrO

Posted on Tuesday, Apr 13, 2004 - 6:34 pm:

I too think conferring with the past owner is sensible. Pads do weaken the bottom of the foot but I have known 2 horses that no matter how hard we tried, diagnostically or therapeutically, we could not get off pads, with the pads sound off the pads lame.
Member:
Aewheele

Posted on Wednesday, Apr 14, 2004 - 7:48 am:

Dr. O. I have read that pads can actually improve the health of hooves because they come in contact with both the frog and the ground increasing blood circulation to the frog. When a horse is shod and the bottom of the hoof no longer makes contact with the ground, blood circulation is diminished and the hoof can weaken. Can you please comment on this?
Thanks.
Member:
Christos

Posted on Wednesday, Apr 14, 2004 - 11:15 am:

Andrea,
If you need extra pressure on the frog, the way to go is with heart bar shoes, not a pad.
A pad protects the hoof from getting worse, it does not improve it in any sense I can think of.

Member:
Erika

Posted on Wednesday, Apr 14, 2004 - 11:31 am:

The only time I use pads is if I am doing lots of riding in the snow. My shoer uses a kind that has a convex bubble that pops out the snow balls!
Member:
Aewheele

Posted on Wednesday, Apr 14, 2004 - 2:43 pm:

Thank you both for your responses. Christos, my farrier discourages me from using bar shoes because he says they can constrict the heel. When I first got my horse, he came with both pads and bars. He's a 16.2h TB/cross who had very small feet. We took him out of bars to help his heel spread. We also took him off pads, but I found that he goes better with them. I too had snow pads this winter and noticed the difference. There is so much conflicting information out there. I am very interested in hearing from people, like yourself, who are obviously knowledgable (I've read a lot of your posts).
Hopefully Dr. O will weigh in on this topic as well.

Thanks again.

Andrea
Member:
Parfait

Posted on Wednesday, Apr 14, 2004 - 6:09 pm:

Jennifer,

I agree with Donald in that I would x-ray before I would start messing around with the feet. You need to know about sole depth and such.

I have a horse presently that is short legged diagonally BTW and NEEDS pads on the RF and LH. I cannot tell you what I have been through to figure this out. Many shoers and vets who just looked at one leg at a time. Finally found a podiatrist that saw the whole horse!

I use the pads that have the frog built into them. Much healthier for the foot. Her heel bulbs on the RF are finally starting to get in the same zip code, and she doesn't stand on them anymore. It's important to keep an open mind re: any technique. Never say never with individuals, just use what works!
Kerry
Member:
Christos

Posted on Wednesday, Apr 14, 2004 - 7:45 pm:

Andrea,
The abundance of information about farriery does sound conflicting because it is very difficult to describe some hoof adjustments in words.
But let's give it a try.
I do not believe that bar shoes constrict heel expansion. I've been "taught" that too, but, somehow, it does not make sense to me.
Except racing plates, which is very thin shoes, I do not think a normal shoe expands that much at all, so that we could consider a bar shoe's rigidity a disadvantage.
The hoof expands anyway much more than the shoe, normal or bar, and this is exactly the reason we must allow this little extra width behind the quarters.
If hoof expansion is a real problem, I have tried, and it worked beautifully, fitting shoes beveled to the outside at the heel, so to somehow force the heels to expand. This is a very gentle bevel that is needed, don't go wild!
I've been thinking of putting some leather pads on our horses as extra protection, as we now frequent a rocky trail with some very sharp gravel, but I backed off fearing that leather may give friction between hoof and shoe and constrict heel expansion.
So, I believe that pads may (I know I'm being paranoid) interfere with heel expansion, but not bars.
I would also enormously appreciate DrO's comments on this.

Christos
Moderator:
DrO

Posted on Wednesday, Apr 14, 2004 - 9:48 pm:

Aileen, I have seen no proof of this, either scientific or personal experience. But I seen those thin pliable soles that come from pads in wet environments.

Christos, I suspect both the type pad and the type ground might effect the answer to such a question. Pressure on the frog is a key component of hoof circulation and a hard pad on soft ground is likely to decrease the pressure on the frog. I too think that egg bars do not greatly decrease expansion compared with a normal shoe but a bar across the frog will greatly effect frog pressure on some types of ground.

Heel expansion is more likely to be effected by the way the shoe is applied with nails or clips applied behind the widest part of the foot limiting expansion and the farther back the more expanision is limited.
DrO
Member:
Mrose

Posted on Wednesday, Apr 14, 2004 - 11:30 pm:

Christos-I've used leather pads, but lived in a very dry climate. I switched to just rim pads for extra cushioning becasue it worried me not being able to clean the foot(this was on a driving horse used sometimes on blacktop roads.) I've ridden in some pretty rough places and never had cutting or bruising of the sole as long as the horse was shod. Maybe just lucky, but never felt the need for pads. I do know people that use Easy Boots, however, for that purpose.
Member:
Christos

Posted on Thursday, Apr 15, 2004 - 4:02 pm:

Thanks for pointing the soft ground difference out, Doctor. I am, indeed, only thinking of hard ground, as, unfortunately, that is all we've got here.
Sara, I've never had sole issues either, and I've been crushing some rock too. But I have to deal now with a couple of horses that are non of my taste or choice, some heavy animals with hoofs made of soap, on rock packed terrain. We've managed three-four rides out without an ouch, but I think that's pushing it enough.
It seems that pads are unavoidable for these two, I am just in the progress of deciding what exactly to do. It'll probably be synthetic packing and leather.
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