Hey Tara & everyone helping,

I totally get the barefoot philosophy and utilize it successfully with my mare who events & hunter paces barefoot (yes, agreed, WAAY better traction barefoot than any shoe or studding could ever give, esp wet grass!) My concern w Tofurky is his crooked front legs that predipose him to travelling heavily onto his medial walls -- he has two enormous matching splints to show for it. Im very willing to pull shoes and handle the frequent & necessary trimming myself to get the hooves to a healthy form (under supervision) -- that Im not opposed to at all. I have Renegades that fit him & Im comfortable using them for riding. What Im concerned abt is the other 23 hrs a day he's not in boots, that he will excessively load the medial walls and revert to the deformities of before which lead to the horrendous splints. So Im thinking i need a band-aid "support" structure of some kind to get him through the immed transition when shoes are first pulled -- as in glue-ons of some kind that can be removed frequently, hooves trimmed, and reapplied. I dont think i can keep him booted, which, yes, would be ideal. Perhaps im just a boot novice and dont know enough of what could stay on 24/7 for the initial transition -- ive used Easyboots w gaiters and the Renegades. Both of these have given rubs within 24 hrs when ive used them on Tofurky for a thrown shoe. Thats what has led me to thinking of some kind of glue-on strategy. I need advice on this matter.

If necessary please move this convo to the Hoof forum, although I still definitely need help with Tofurky's diet plan.

And of course, now my IR/PPID mare's BG this morning was 135mg/dL (AlphaTrak2 vet glucometer) when I drew blood to send with Tofurky's for KSU's iron panel. I was waiting til 6/21 (the equinox, just an arbitrarily chosen date that I could easily remember) to start increasing her pergolide but looks like her calendar is ahead of mine. Guess its time to update her CH!

Thanks everybody,
Kerry in NY