Six Hearts Hoof Care - Katie Arbour

06/05/2025

01/31/2024

I am often asked why I rarely feed bagged, commercially-prepared feeds, grains or name-brand oils or additives, to my horses.

I never feed bagged feed or supplements to my ponies, or to unsound horses here for rehabilitation to a healthier life.

This has long been my method… other than the occasional addition of soaked beet pulp, should a horse be losing ground over our challenging winters. Our horses and ponies are energetic, shiny, healthy, with lovely coats and feet. By far, the majority of ulcers we treat are in horses who have been brought in from elsewhere.

So, we feed homegrown hay, free-choice straw, along with grazing time on pastures containing browse. Our grass and our hay is analyzed and we do offer free-choice mineral, accordingly.

Horses and ponies love spending time chewing on branches and native shrubbery, like willow twigs! If offered these, especially if they must stand around in the corrals for some reason, they’re uninterested in chewing our fences. This constant diet of a variety of bland, or lean, roughage also means that obesity isn’t much of a problem, even in the smaller, aged ponies who live here.

They’re not heedlessly kicked out on acres of lush grass but they ARE acclimated to grazing and foraging for their food.

This is a sticker placed prominently inside our trailer, by the manufacturer. If what we are feeding our animals can erode metal in a short time, why are we so surprised that ulcers are so prominent? It’s something to think about... and yeah, despite our low-stress feeding regime, I DO still clean out the trailer!

12/27/2023

Forage first.
Forage always.
Forage only, wherever possible.

Forage as in grass and hay
Forage as in scavenger hunt to find it.

“Hiding” hay in untraveled corners of the pasture, under logs or spruce boughs, in the crooks of trees, or tossed between poplar saplings is fun for us and fun for them. Spread thinly over large distances to encourage grazing behaviour.

Feeding horses with the quad is my favourite part of the day.

As many horse owners know, colic is an unpredictable, painful, and sometimes fatal condition. Colic refers to abdominal pain in your horse. It is an amorphous condition that can lead to potentially serious health complications. Colic may present as a mild case that is resolved in less than 24 hours

11/13/2023

What makes "barefoot" work?
Dr. Robert Bowker has repeatedly emphasized that the malleable hoof horn responds directly to the trim applied to it, and to any permanent fixtures applied to it, as well as to the ground surface. When we trim, we are actually changing the internal structures of the hoof itself, including the bones. This can be positive or negative.

Historically, all methods of natural barefoot hoofcare have emphasized the importance of healthy living conditions as an active part of the process (originally taught by Dr. Hiltrud Strasser and Jaime Jackson). This crucial part is overlooked and downplayed by nearly all traditionally derived hoofcare methods right up to the current day. Instead, horse care "traditions" continue on unchallenged, even when they have been proven in various European studies to be detrimental to the horse (i.e. full time stabling; isolation stalls; stabling of young horses, etc.).

This is CRUCIAL because the barefoot hoof when in optimal conditions - or even "a little bit better" conditions - will adjust itself. When trimming errors occur, and they do, the horse can then self-trim just a bit to improve things. This "co-trimming" of the horse is so important to the success of barefoot trimming! This does not mean long intervals between trims; this means that the interval between trims, whether 2 weeks or 6 weeks, for a horse in good living conditions will lead to even further hoof improvement (remember that shorter intervals of 3-4 weeks are important when changing a problem hoof; not quite so applicable to stable, healthy hooves in very excellent living conditions).

The BETTER your horse's living conditions, the less important your trimming details become, as long as the hoof form is approximating a natural shape (physiologically, that means short toes and lowish heels so that the frogs kiss the ground and can correctly function and do their proper job). Conversely, with poor living conditions, your trim itself better be smack-down perfect, because there is little room for error (no self-adjustment).

When a fixed device is placed upon the hoof which allows for NO natural wear, such as any form of permanently attached horse shoe, there is zero opportunity for the hoof to adjust itself. Therefore, the farrier/trimmer takes full and total responsibility for the entire foot of the horse, its angles, its function, etc. Seriously, that is a little too much responsibility, being as there is no consensus on what is truly healthy or truly correct. Nature always wins. Happy Hooves! - Yvonne Welz

03/19/2023

Show me the creative ways you get your horses moving, post your pics in the comments!!!

03/03/2023

Disobedience is a sign of intelligence.

Read that again.

An animal who will blindly obey you, no matter the circumstance, and never choose to advocate for themselves, is not an animal displaying intelligence.

They are displaying their ability to learn and follow instructions but if that always comes above their own innate needs, bodily discomfort and overall welfare, they are not making the more intelligent decision.

The act of saying no, while being aware of risk of punishment for it, is an act of self advocacy and is a sign of intelligence.

Having a mind of their own rather than becoming a vessel for their trainer to control is your animal showing you intelligence.

As trainers, we put way too much emphasis on obedience at any cost and this has resulted in a lot of normalized shutdown in horses.

It’s resulted in us applauding trainers for having robotically obedient horses who do their every bidding without question. Never having an opinion of their own.

If we want blind obedience without any regard for emotional, physical or mental well-being, I think what we are looking for is a bicycle, not a horse.

02/15/2023

The bison ate all the tasty bits out of the green feed, now they are spoiled and refusing our canary hay lol. Meanwhile, the horses are grateful for the leftovers. Low nutrient high fiber forage spread out on the snow is blissful. Mixed with some canary grass hay.

02/14/2023

Horses going back to quadruple check they didn’t miss any of the hay I spread yesterday morning.

They came running from the straw hoping I had more hay to give. When it didn’t materialize they returned to the place I spread it yesterday in the forest.

You can train them to leave the bale. You don’t have to starve them. You just have to get creative. Straw helps.

The snow is so deep in there the quad got stuck so I had to walk back.

There was tons of tracks in the fresh snow up to hill to the waterer and back. Maybe I’ll put a tracking collar on them and see how much they are moving !

The grey is 8 months pregnant. She doesn’t get any special “mare feed”. She’s already a pretty easy keeper. She has access to mineral and salt.

are we pre-programming our foals to be insulin resistant with “mare feeds” ? I think that’s a thing that’s happening.

02/14/2023

It took me a long time to get to the point where I felt like I could share some of those brazen posts about overfeeding concentrates to those obese horses. Know that every day every horse I see like that I question “why am I even doing this?” and I’m on the verge of quitting. I promise you I am frustrated, tired and just over it. I’m tired of tiptoeing around you. Go ahead and trim your own horse. Hopefully you can do it better than me.

It’s so sad because half of the commenters missed the point of the post. I feel like they didn’t even read it and they are the ones who need to. Or they are from a different continent??! (Still making excuses.) you missed the point. You picked the one thing that triggered you and went to war with me.

You don’t agree with me? Fine. Scroll on. Call a different farrier. I turned off the comments. I’m turning them off on this one too. I’m tired of arguing. Want to keep over feeding junk to horses who can’t walk over gravel? You go ahead. You are the problem.

✌️

02/13/2023

Foundered horse rehab starter pack:

Stemmy hay & a garage-sale bought quad.

Spreading and sprinkling hay through the trees, up the hills, over the pasture… I picked deep snow where there aren’t many horse tracks. I’ll even sprinkle some in little trees or hide it under fallen logs. Bonus points if it’s snowing and covering it (you don’t think they can’t smell it?).

Why all this work? Isn’t a netted bale easier? Of course it is. That’s why it needs to change. Horses will stand at the bale all day, or stand waiting for you in the same place you feed them. Spreading your hay and hiding it simulates grazing foraging behaviour. Head down, searching for morsels… saliva being produced to naturally buffer stomach acid, trickle feeding low nutrient high fiber forage. At the same time, they’re also sipping on water in the form of snow. Hopefully, while they’re out there they’ll discover some little morsels under the snow they forgot about.

I can gaurantee you those horses will retrace their steps all day today trying to figure out if they missed any of my cleverly stashed piles. This is enriching for horses who spend up to 16 hours a day grazing.

Do you have to go out before dawn in a snowstorm to do this? No not at all. Do you have to do it everyday? No, but you can. The more you feed horses like this, the healthier they will be.

Good exercise for me too 🥰