"Deborah has been a great help since she first came to take Frank’s shoes off in March 2012 with excellent advice on all aspects of barefoot delivered in a way everyone can understand. In November 2011 Frank was 3-4/10 lame on his left fore and diagnosed with reverse rotated pedal bones in both front feet and with DJD in the coffin joint of his left fore. The heels on both front feet were also identified as being low and under run. Having read a lot on barefoot in the preceding couple of years I had said that if he had a foot problem I would take the shoes off, however I was swayed by the potential of getting him sounder quicker with conventional treatments and the positivity of my vet so he was shod with bar shoes and had steroid and hyaluronic acid injected into his coffin joint. Although his heels had started to look much better when I brought him back into work it was clear that the improvement in soundness we saw was mostly due to him having a holiday in the field as once trotting he went lame again.

So in March 2012, with Deborah’s assistance and the ok from my vet we started our barefoot journey, which we did take very slowly because I was worried about breaking him again! Deborah has been able to provide advice on feeding (which we also use for my Mum’s shod horse), creating a track system (which was absolutely brilliant for an out of work, round, Welshie!), suitable boots and what we could expect generally. If we have had any problems or queries she has always got back to us quickly with reassurance and tracking Frank’s progress using her photos and slow motion videos has been especially interesting. Frank is still sound, back in medium work- hacking, schooling and trips to the beach. He did his first post lameness dressage last weekend with a respectable 64.5% in Novice 28 so it certainly seems to be working and I’m very pleased I brought Deborah in to be his trimmer and so much more."         Laura, Somerset