farriers

Every so often a horse needs a new pair of shoes. This might seem like a pretty simple thing for a horse. However, every horse has different hooves. And every shoe has to be custom fit to that hoof. All four of them. This is the job of a farrier. Or a horseshoer. I have horses on my property and every so often a farrier shows up here to trim the hooves of the horses and fit them with new shoes. This time I decided to make some images of the process. I was attracted to just how the farrier would stand with the leg of the horse between his own legs to give him some stability. Sometimes the hoof was set on a very skinny prop that had a rubber top on it so the horse would not move it’s leg. The trimming and filing was just like you might see in a nail salon but in a much bigger way. The hoof has to be flat to begin to fit the shoe. And just like in the movies, the shoe is heated up with flames and pounded into shape with a hammer to widen or narrow areas of the shoe to fit this exact horse’s hoof. And it has to happen four times for each horse. Ken showed us some construction parts, nuts. Those nuts could be attached to a bolt to hold something together. A farrier actually uses nails to attach the shoe to the hoof of the horse. He uses a hammer to pound those nails in and files them flat. I found the process fascinating.