Talk:Horseshoe

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[edit] older entries

The term "sole" for the skin of a horse's foot that touches the ground is wrong. It is actually the fingertip or tiptoe; the true sole is high off the ground, as horses are ungulates. But I don't think horsemen call it the fingertip. What do they call it? -phma

phma, You are basically right, horses walk on their fingertips. But still horsemen call the part of the horse's hoof which touches the ground the "sole". - Ahab
In veterinary terms (and in general with farriers as well), the sole is the concave bottom of the hoof, composed of horn tubules which curve at the ends and are then shed. A cleaned sole is generally an off-white color. The frog is the triangular region of less-keratinized epidermis which subdivides the sole in the caudal third of the foot, between the bars. The frog is much darker and softer than the sole (the frog feels a bit like rubber in a well-hydrated hoof). The outside of the hoof is the hoof wall, and it comes in contact with the ground. There is much debate in current equine research regarding the weight-bearing properties of the hoof. Traditionally, the balance of opinion is that most of the weight is borne by the hoof wall, and transferred to the distal phalangeal bone via the laminar junction. However, this belief came from observations of horses on hard surfaces and often with hooves that were modified by farriery. On softer surfaces, it is clear that the frog, sole and heels do make substantial contact with the ground, although the amount of weight borne by these structures has not been determined conclusively. - Jonathan Merritt 1 September 2003.

One fairly good Ref: Kainer, R.A. (1989) Clinical anatomy of the equine foot. Veterinary Clinics of North America: Equine Practice -- Vol 5, No. 1, April 1989, pp. 1-27. - Jonathan Merritt

[edit] Rewrite

Hi Everyone,

I don't want to tread on anyone's toes here... I recognize that the art of farriery is a well established one, with many traditions that hold merit despite lack of scientific evidence. My comments here are those of somebody who is involved purely with the scientific research in this area, and with very little practical farriery experience.

I think this article could be dramatically improved, and parts of it are a little mis-leading. I can re-write those parts of the article that I see as most deficient, providing references to referreed journal articles to support my comments.

Is there anyone actively working on this article who might be upset if I go ahead and do that? I'm asking because my changes will be quite substantial...

- Jonathan Merritt 1 September 2003.

I'm planning to improve the historical aspects as I get time. I already put a photo of a hipposandal up on wiki commons.
What aspects of the article are misleading?
--Nantonos 11:40, 1 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Missing information

I read this article looking for one piece of information which appears to be absent.

I would like to know which way a horseshoe is supposed to be oriented. Does the open part of the shoe face toward the front or rear of the hoof?


It faces towards the rear - a horse shoe is the same shape as the end of the hoof.

[edit] Shoe orientation

Horsehoes normally are set with the opening at the heels. Sometimes, in therapeutic cases, the shoe is applied backwards (open at the front) to ease breakover and provide posterior support. This is known as an "open-toed eggbar", and requires extra nail holes be punched into the shoe so that the attachment can be made forward of the widest part of the hoof.

There is even a name for this type of shoeing, "banker shoe," derived from the idea that bank robbers might purposely nail the shoes backwards on their horses to throw off any would-be followers.

Note also that not all horseshoes are open-ended or "horseshoe shaped." Some go full circle (bar shoes), while others may be differently shaped depending upon the needs of the horse.

[edit] The barefoot horse movement

There is much to do to edit this article - it covers only one point of view, the "traditional" one. I think, there is sufficient evidence to say that horseshoes - just like lots of other horse-related traditional knowledge - have to be critically reconsidered. Horseshoes probably damage the hooves much more than they protect them! Take a look to Barefoot horse webring, where you'll find lots of really scientific - and new - knowledge about.--Alex brollo 22:01, 4 November 2005 (UTC)


The barefoot section right now is all interjection, so i put a NPOV tag on it. It doesn't cite any evidence, and seems to be interjecting a lot of opinion. Please add something of substance.D-rew 23:41, 20 September 2006 (UTC)
And please don't make out all traditional shoers to be "backward". Not ALL horses do well barefoot, even if it is done correctly. Just like not all horses do well in one type of bit, or in one training program. There's nothing wrong with promoting the barefoot horse, but the whole "holier than thou" attitude of some of the barefooters really turns me off the concept. Eventer
I agree with Eventer except I'm not really offended because I do think that there is something of interest to be said of Barefeet vs. Shoes. The article however does make it sound as though barefeet are always the best option with every horse, and this is obviously and demonstratably false, such as in cases of Laminitis, plain old thin sole, or one of a dozen other podiatry issues a horse can have. Also, the website shown above has obvious NPOV issues, so everything associated with it should be taken with a grain of salt.D-rew 00:12, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Types of horse shoe and shoeing methods

I think it would be good to have a bit about various types of shoe - say racing places, hunter, remedial shoes such as the egg bar. Also something about how the shoe is put on, the traditional method, hot and cold shoeing. Maybe something about 'natural balance' shoes. Comments?Ashfan83 22:37, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Gait

Is the section on walking horses too positive when talking of horse shoes? Some abuse has occurred in this are and continues to occur. Perhaps some mention of the abuse potential is in order? The article says "Special shoeing can help enhance their natural movement."Ggb667 11:05, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] NPOV issue...

It's hyronical that retained ideas no deserve any proof or quote... new ideas need lots of them. I added a brief, very polite mention to barefoot horse into a clearly not neutral article at all; respecting a wide, but probably wrong, point of view. Anybody can find into the web lots of evidence (both testimonial and scientific so far) against the practice of shoeing; it's really difficult to find some evidence in the web - some good, scientific evidence - in favour of shoeing practice. Please read "The Unfettered Hoof" by dr Tomas Teskey: http://www.equinextion.com/id48.html and its large bibliography. --Alex_brollo Talk|Contrib 15:26, 27 November 2006 (UTC)


[edit] General cleanup...

Calkins/Calks was changed, as these are still in common use, and used on the toe as well as at the heels.

The line about nailing to the "rim of the sole" was changed, as one does NOT nail into the sole.

A bit about the genetic difference between domestic and feral horses was inserted.

The line about "tapping down clips" was removed, as this is a poor practice which can damage the perimeter of the coffin bone. Clips should be angled correctly BEFORE the shoe is nailed-on.

The bit about the "clinch cutter" being used to cut off the nails was removed. The clinch cutter is used to shear off clinches before the old shoe is pulled-off. When new shoes are nailed-on, the excess nail (points) are usually wrung off with the claw of the driving hammer or nipped off with the shoe pullers or a small pair of nail nippers.

The paragraph about consequences of incompetent "farriers" causing problems was reworded with "horseshoers" replacing "farriers"... By definition, farriers are supposed to be competent professionals. Therefor, persons engaged in the practices described should not be called farriers. (The term "horseshoer" is neutral, and can describe anyone who shoes horses without regard to skill level.)

Dave Millwater, RMF 17:47, 25 January 2007 (UTC) Dave Millwater, RMF

Overall a set of good edits Dave, and welcome! All I ask is that both here and at the barefooters article we ALL (Hi Alex, that means you too) hold rigorously to Wikipedia's NPOV approach...we can discuss differences of opinions and controversies, I just am begging in advance that no one starts an edit war. Given that I rarely put shoes on my own horses, but have them trimmed by a farrier and am not a "barefooter" per se, I consider myself the guru of neurtality and NPOV here (as well as a wordsmith at your service) if someone wants to negotiate a compromise between warring factions...<smile> Montanabw 19:28, 25 January 2007 (UTC)


I tried to keep it pretty much to technical clean-up. The barefoot zealots have their own entry under "Barefoot_horse", and I resisted temptation to do more over there than insert a link to a rebuttal, fairly labeled as such, in the external links section.

Funny thing is, in my practice, I've probably spent twenty times as much time and effort trying to convince people to let horses go barefoot than I have trying to get them to use shoes over the years. Not because shoes are bad. Just because a lot of horses are shod needlessly.

Dave Millwater, RMF 02:18, 26 January 2007 (UTC)Dave Millwater, RMF

Barefooter article has an POV tag on it, that's all that's really necessary, if your link stays in, fair enough, I certainly saw no reason to toss it...though if a pro-barefooter link shows here, well, turn about and all that... And the barefooter folks have had input over here, I think it's wise to try and be fair to everyone...I think the creator of the barefooter article or one of its major editors is open to help with style and phrasing. I try to stay out of edit wars. Fine line some days. I think the topic can be discussed with neutrality or at least a fair explanation of the issues and viewpoints...I mean, we can always look at the religion articles that make it to Good Article or Featured Article status for ideas on handling hot button topics!
And, speaking of religious fervor, welcome to the world of the horse articles, where we must work doubly hard to follow the wiki guidelines of Assume Good Faith, NPOV and sometimes, to Not Bit the Newcomers! For some reason, there is a lot of taking oneself VERY seriously here...including at times, I suppose, myself.
...I even had a minor edit war with someone over whether or not their favorite brand of "bitless bridle" was the only "real" one or not...and I was basically just trying to write about hackamores...sigh...Add articles to your watchlist with care, you can spend more time being traffic cop than on writing and improving articles...right now, there's a bunch of kids who seem to take great delight in vandalizing the articles about ponies...do not ask me why, but oh well...! Montanabw 04:13, 26 January 2007 (UTC)


They've got at least five anti-horseshoeing links here, so they really ought not to complain about one link over on the barefoot page, especially since it is clearly marked as a rebuttal.

We've got plenty of other places to duke it out over the issue. No need to trash the Wikipedia. I kinda' like this thing. Considering how it's compiled, it's usually a remarkably good source of info on almost everything.

Dave Millwater, RMF 12:53, 26 January 2007 (UTC)Dave Millwater, RMF

I won't complain if you clean up the links and maybe just leave a single one that is the most reasonable in tone. (I spend too much of my life removing links to stud farms from all the breed articles, don't have time to clean up this one) I'm about half-thinking that someone (i.e. should be me but I don't have time), should do a nice NPOV assessment of the barefooter versus traditional debate and paste the identical paragraph into both articles under a "Controversies" header. If you have thoughts or a draft, this is a good place to use as a sandbox for a draft... Montanabw 18:29, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
Oh, and FYI, have you also looked at farrier? Montanabw 21:11, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] More history?

I'd love a little more firm history about when horseshoes came in. Phrases like 'in the earliest days' I find a bit frustrating. I came to the page hoping to find out if the Romans used horseshoes. 82.152.254.146 09:41, 10 March 2007 (UTC)Benedict

Here is the best online article I have found so far on the history of horseshoes, it's well-sourced, from reputable sources (professional horseshoers' web site), and I think its material worth adding to the article. I just don't personally have the time to do it:

http://www.horseshoes.com/advice/invtshoe/winvhrs.htm

Also has some really interesting stuff on iron in general. Also explains why it's so hard to figure out when horseshoes were invented -- people recycled!

Long story short, we probably can credit nailed-on horseshoes to being first widely used in the Middle Ages, even if invented earlier. Looks from this article that the nailed horseshoe was probably NOT in Europe, at least much, as late as 480 AD, but that the Koran (c. 610 AD) mentions horses' hooves striking fire from rocks, and trust me, barefoot horses can't do that, it requires metal shoes.

So basically the answer is that MAYBE the late Roman period had nailed horseshoes, there is pretty good evidence that horseshoes were around in the Carolingian period c 700-800, but the most solid evidence is a specific reference in AD 910. Montanabw 02:05, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Watch out, don't date horse shoes to the late antiquity just because the Koran dates to 610 AD. Archaeological evidence for horse shoe making maybe much stronger than documental evidence for the Koran ever existing in the 610 AD. Anyway, circular arguments are not a good method to use for dating history. Just an advice.

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