[touchofdandy]

When Dandy walks, his back feet come up under him pretty far (my farrier is the one that noticed it before I did.) He sometimes clips his front feet, today he definately was hitting his front feet alot, I could hear it. Is there any way to correct that??

Thanks in advance.

[BornToRide]

do his feet need to be trimmed ? i had this problem with one of my geldings and his feet needed to be trimmed and it corrected the problem.. otherwise.. i am stumped lol

[Nevada_Silk]

Your farrier should be able to fix it. My gelding clipped badly when I first got him (under a different farrier). 2 trims by my personal farrier and he wasn't clipping at all.

[touchofdandy]

Dandy still clips his front feet. Just not as bad. My farrier has filed down the front of the back hoof to keep it from clipping so much. It has helped but hasnt eliminated the problem.

[griffin]

First you need to figure out where abouts on the front foot he is hitting as there are 2 types.

Over-reaching - this is where the back toe is catching the heel of the front foot. For this I use over-reach boots, aka bell boots. This wont stop him from doing it however it will protect the heel and stop him potentially pulling his shoe off.

Forging - this is where the back toe is catching the toe of the front foot. There is nothing (as far as i know) that you can use to protect the foot.

My boy forges when he gets excited and does camel impressions and also when he gets tired at the end of a long workout. It is because he is not picking his front feet up quick enough for the back ones to land - normally in trot but sometimes in canter also.

I have spoken to my farrier about it and he has started to roll his toes which i understand to give him a quicker break away which seems to have helped alot.

When you ride try to figure out when he is doing it. It is during a particular exercise, at the beginning of a work out or at the end. This kind of info will help your farrier decide what to do.

I hope i have made sense for you

[asha1]

You can also use Bell boots when his in work, His over reaching theres really nothing you can really do just keep his hoofs up to date and use the Bell boots when you ride him.

[touchofdandy]

ok thanks guys.

I only notice him hitting his front feet at a walk.

[JBandRio]

There are several causes of overreaching and forging. Does Dandy do this only when you ride, or out in the pasture too?

A common cause while being ridden is the horse just being lazy. He's not really pushing with his back end, not lifting his front end, so his front feet don't get out of the way. The solution is simple, ask him to actually do a little work

The next common causes have to do with hoof balance. Either the hind toes are too long, causing them to have the length to grab/hit the front feet, or the front toes are too long, causing their breakover to be delayed, keeping them on the ground too long while the back feet catch up. The solution here is likely to find another farrier/trimmer, as likely the current one just doesn't recognize this issue has been occuring, and that's his job - keep feet balanced. You can tell him (if you understand the issue, not just repeating words) that the toes are too long and it's causing the forging, and if he gets it, he can fix it, but you may have to keep on top of him to keep the issue from coming back.

[Appylvr]

My mare was doing this until my new farrier started to square her toes in the back... she hasn't done it since. Before she did it so bad a couple of times that she opened up the back of her heel.

[Sharpspal]

It means yer Horse is too short horizontally. Hehehehh... Sorry, couldnt resist...