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As you can see she is not standing with her cannon
bones vertical to the ground and is therefore not
weighing her heels. So the question arises: "Why is she
not weighing her heels?" |
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The red line is where she is now, indicating a 25
degree hairline, which is not congruent with a ground
parallel coffin bone. She would need to grow more
vertical toe height (green line) which you will get over
time if you back up the toe a little more and trim the
underside differently so that she will load her heels
more. |
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Now you can see that the heel is too high and how
the pastern angle changes (after rotating the picture)
when you take the heel down. This is true in real life
as well. Next you will have to take the toe back a good
bit (vertical) as to ease break over. But one thing at a
time, so the hoof capsule does not become too
destabilized, which would cause inflammation |
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You may not be trimming a scoop into the hoof, but I
think I am seeing one that is too far forward. If you
want the horse to get better toe height, you need to
keep the scoop shorter as indicated in the blue lines. |
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Here I have marked how high the lateral cartilage is
pushed up. This is not a healthy situation. The lateral
cartilage becomes pushed up through contraction, high
bars and/or a tilted coffin bone (where the palmar
processes push the lateral cartilage up. |
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Blue lines: Where your bars should be. Red lines,
this all should be trimmed into a flat surface, having
the lowest part in the collateral groove or at the bar
and the highest point at the wall. Forward of the green
line: Do not trim at all. When you back up the toe, back
it up often, but do for now not rasp through the white
line. Once you have trimmed this correctly, she will
weigh her heels and her pastern angle will change from
its upright position to a more sloped position. |
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Much improvement. Bars need to come still
straighter. A straight bar does not curve under
pressure, but keeps the heel more upright by providing a
resistance against the under-slinging heel. |
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This is the Left Hind, but it was the easiest to
illustrate. I would start with taking half of that heel
down, with other words the area that is marked as a red
triangle. Then you have to lower the bars again to keep
them in proportion to the heel height.
Side remark: make sure your knife is razor sharp. It
makes trimming easier and you get smoother lines. In the
picture below you can see how the bar stands upright,
meaning it would meet the ground parallel. In your trim
it is still stuck to the sole. |
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This is a picture I just found from a recent student
trim. You can see where the bars end. I rotated the
picture to match yours above. |
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I hope you can see here how the heel is angled to be
lower towards the frog and higher towards the outside
wall, which helps with de-contraction |
