About Me
I discovered horses in my late twenties when my partner Clare encouraged me to join her for riding lessons (she had ridden as a child). I was instantly hooked and we bought our first two horses as soon as we could afford a property with a little land.
Owning horses has been a massive but extremely rewarding learning curve for me, not least when Clare's horse Esme developed hoof problems soon after we bought her. After a year of remedial farriery, we reached the point where our vet hinted that there was no point carrying on, her feet were so poor. Neither of us were prepared to give up on such a beautiful young horse, so as a last resort we decided to explore going barefoot. I learnt to trim and we began a long and hard fight to bring Esme back into work. Along the way, I gained a qualification in Equine Podiatry and the rest is history.
I originally studied physics and then electronics at Manchester University. I worked as an electronic engineer for 14 years but finally realised that I was more interested in horses' feet! I've been trimming hooves since 2002 and am currently one of the most experienced equine podiatrists working in the UK.
I have retained a thirst for knowledge from my academic past and am now actively involved in research to try to understand more about how equine feet work and why they sometimes go wrong. I have a particular interest in laminitis and low grade laminitis. I am also one of the main tutors on the new UK Diploma in Equine Podiatry run by Equine Podiatry Training Ltd. If you're interested in training to be an EP, details of the course can be found here.
My practice includes a mixture of remedial cases recovering from major hoof problems and horses whose owners just prefer to work them without shoes.
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| Clare and I share five horses: |
Jazz
Jazz is my main riding horse. It's taken me a long time to discover that, underneath his bullish exterior, he's actually a very sensitive horse. Having sorted his feet out, he now has extremely good gaits for an IDx, but it's taken me a lot of time and a lot of clicker training work to reschool him to light classical aids. He's now working somwhere around novice/elementary levels. I don't often compete with him, just enjoy schooling and hacking him at home. |
Esme
Esme, Clare's main riding horse, is the one who started it all with her bad feet. She's an Irish Draft x Thoroughbred x Appaloosa (the spots only show on the soles of her feet). Sadly, she inherited the TB feet and her hoof walls tend to crack easily.
Her original hoof problems started with bad underrun heels which led to massive quarter cracks, especially on her hind feet. The cracks became infected and she started with the first of many abscesses. It took three years of fighting with her feet (and learning a massive amount about hoof pathologies along the way), but she is now sound and back in work. I owe Esme a lot for both getting me into hoofcare in the first place but also for teaching me much of what I now use to help my clients' horses. |
Olly
Olly 'acquired' us when he came on loan to help graze down an excess of grass we happened to have at the time. He'd been rescued from a dealers where he was going for meat. Apart from having a deformed front leg (his left fore turned outwards by about 30 degrees), he had very poor feet, wouldn't keep weight on, and had become extremely aggressive (towards humans - he tends to get bullied by other horses). He didn't really fit in on the riding yard that had ended up owning him and we just hadn't the heart to send him back there.
He now has good feet (as far as his conformation will allow). His 'deformed' leg turned out to be partly due to how the hooves had ended up. After a year or so of trimming, it became more obvious that his actual conformation defect is to be moderately toe out on both front feet (around 15 degrees each). He's also a reasonable weight, and is gradually learning that not everyone is out to kill him (vets excepted). He's firm buddies with Zafirah and with her he has re-learnt how to play. Treating his stomach ulcers with ant-acids has helped his digestion a lot, and providing magnesium supplementation has helped him to be much calmer. He will probably always need careful handling, but at least he's remembered how to be a horse.
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Zafirah
Zafirah is a purebred Lusitana filly who we imported from Portugal as a yearling. Here she is just after she arrived, looking cool as a cucumber despite the long journey. She's now four (must get another photo of her) and we're just starting the process of backing her. |
Fred
Fred is a five-year old Hannovarian who we acquired recently. He's had severe laminitis and we're hoping to rehabilitate his feet. You can read more about Fred here. |
We also have two cats, Yoda and Teasel, who aren't really relevant to this web site, but would have been upset if I'd missed them off:
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 Yoda
Yoda has excellent feet and completely self-trims... which is probably something to do with the mileage she covers catching mice around the yard. |
 Teasel
Teasel arrived in June '07 as a small (and rather sharp, hence the name) kitten. She's growing up fast, but doesn't seem to have realised this yet. She does a particularly good line in being cute.
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