World-renowned natural hoof care specialist Pete Ramey is turning the world of horse care upside down. Ramey is saving horses on a regular basis that vets and farriers have said should be put down.
How? By pulling their shoes and trimming their hooves to replicate the way wild horses trim themselves when running free.
What started as a grassroots movement toward natural hoof care for horse owners has exploded to include farriers, hoof care professionals, and veterinarians all over the world. Vets can even earn continuing education credits by attending Ramey's clinics.
At a recent symposium, Ramey was stopped by a vet and told, "After four years of vet school, fifteen years as an equine vet, numerous clinics and two trips to the Bluegrass Laminitis Symposium, I've just learned more about hooves from this clinic in the last two days than in my entire career, combined."
Natural trimmer Jaime Jackson, one of Ramey's mentors, is credited with starting the movement in the United States when he published his study of the hooves of more than 1,000 horses living in the wild. Without regard to geography or climate, all of these horses' feet were hard as rocks and perfectly sound, and they all looked very much the same.
Using these hooves as a guide, Jackson developed The Wild Horse Trim, replicating for the domestic horse what would be happening naturally if the horse were in the wild. Both specialists have said that they have never seen a horse that couldn't be taken barefoot successfully.
"It stands to reason," said Joe Camp, author of the upcoming book The Naked Horse and a resident of Valley Center. "When you stop to realize that the horse has survived on this planet for approximately 54 million years, you have to start wondering why the horseshoe was ever invented.
"The horse is a flight animal, a prey animal, and the most important thing in the world to a flight animal is his feet. Mother nature has provided him with an amazing and complex mechanism for making sure he will survive, and it's not a metal shoe nailed to his hoof. This Wild Horse Model is what Pete Ramey and the rapidly growing army of natural hoof care specialists around the world are using to bring so many ailing horses back to excellent and working health."
Camp, creator of the canine superstar Benji and writer-director of all the Benji movies, is one of the sponsors bringing Ramey to Valley Center in November.
"Pete Ramey is my hero," he said. "He travels all over this country and Europe changing the way people think about horse care, leaving happier, healthier horses in his wake. Horseshoes need to be a thing of the past."
When asked why horseshoes were ever developed in the first place, Camp grins. "It goes back to medieval days," he said. "One of the kings decided that he would be better fortified if he moved his castle up to top of the mountain. But there were no pastures on top of the mountain, so the king's horses had to live in tiny pens or stalls where they stood around all day in their own pee and poop. The ammonia from all that began to destroy the horses' hooves.
"When they were taken out on the cobblestone streets, you can imagine what happened. So to protect the hooves, the king's blacksmith developed horseshoes. There was a better solution, but it apparently escaped the king and his blacksmith. Then, when all the king's men and all the king's horses went down the hill, all the king's peasants saw the these shiny new things on the horses' feet and figured the king knew best. Soon all the healthy, happy horses out in the pasture had shoes on. And so it went for generations."
The hoof is designed to flex with each step a horse takes, Camp added.
"That flexing acts as a circulatory pump, pushing blood throughout the hoof mechanism and helping the heart get the blood back up those long legs," he said. "Without that circulation, the hoof becomes soft and unhealthy. The flexing of the hoof also provides shock absorption for the joints and ligaments. With a metal shoe nailed to the hoof, it cannot flex and thereby cannot pump blood or provide shock absorption. That's why Walt Taylor of the American Farrier Association has reported that 90 percent of the world's domestic horses have some sort of lameness. Less than 5 percent of horses in the wild have any lameness at all."
Ramey will bring his Hoof Rehabilitation Clinic to The Oaks Indian Hill Ranch in Valley Center Nov. 10 and 11, sponsored by the Camps, veterinarian Matt Mathews, and natural hoof care specialist Marci Lambert.
To learn more about the clinic, go to www.hoofrehab.com or www.nakedhorsemanship.com.