About

My horse “Miles” (my nickname for him) is one of the great loves of my life.  To own a horse at all is a childhood dream-come-true.  When Miles walked into my life, so to speak, I was taking dressage lessons at a lovely barn SW of the Twin Cities when he came up for sale.  I had, in fact, been walking past his stall every time I went out to the paddock to catch my lesson horse, who was a big 17 or so-hand-Paint.  I was interested in leasing a horse.  My lesson horse was already leased-out.  I am not a small person (5’7″) and it seemed to me the few horses available for lease there were just too small for me.

But then there was Miles.  His owner told my instructor I could use him for lessons. I went out to catch him in a paddock with mud a foot deep, while the horses rolled their eyes at me as the mud sucked-off my wellies and I scrambled to put them on again.  He looked at me in a somewhat forlorn way.  And it was love-at-first-sight.

When I bought Miles, who is a dark bay 16 hand Appendix, I already knew he had TB feet as he had come up lame with a hoof bruise the day of the pre-purchase exam.  So the exam took place in two parts — three weeks apart, until that had healed.  Other than that, he was in great shape and just gorgeous, with a mostly mellow and nurturing personality.

After I bought him, I moved him to a new barn.  It was, in fact, where he had come from two years earlier — his previous owner had wanted more in-house dressage events and this barn focused more on eventing clinics.  But I knew the minute Miles walked out of the trailer (getting him in is another story) that he had come to the right place.  He looked around and heaved a sigh of relief.  So did I.  Then the barn owner reminded me that he had “tricky feet”.  Hence this blog, to describe and define this ‘horse of a different color’ I have come to live with and work with every day.  And now we are embarking on a new leg of our journey — attempting to transition Miles to barefoot on his front hooves (he has always been so on the hind).  This blog will define that saga in hopes that others whose horses also have “tricky feet” will learn from my experiences and my mistakes…:-)