Central Florida is a great place to live. People relocate to this area at a staggering rate (600 and more per week to the Orlando area alone last time I checked). They move here to be near the water and away from the snow. Many of them either bring with them or purchase horses.

Florida is a long peninsula that extends out into the water. No location in Central Florida is more than 1 1/2 hours from a beach, either on the Atlantic Ocean or the Gulf of Mexico. The interior sections are dotted with lakes of all sizes, rivers and fresh-water springs. Drinking water is pulled from a large aquifer that runs under the state. Most of Florida is close to or a little above sea level. It is, in fact, little more than a large beach with a lot of vegetation and development on it.

The warm climate and extended rainy season make for nice green pastures (see Picture 1 below), which only go dormant for a short period each winter. Because the winters are relatively mild, with no snow and ice, riding is a year-round activity. These are two main reasons the horse industry is strong here. It does get a bit warm and humid in the summer (mid-90s and occasionally into the low 100s in August), but that's what air conditioning is for.

Sound like paradise? For some it is, but not for horses. For starters, the thing that attracts humans in droves to this area -- the warm climate -- is what makes it so uncomfortable for horses. When the temperature finally drops below 60 degrees at some point in the fall, the humans begin grumbling while the horses start playing. During the hot and humid summer months, neither horses nor humans feel like moving, much less riding. The professionals move back north for the summer season, and the locals ride early or late but rarely during the middle part of the day.

The real serpent in this sub-tropical paradise, however, is not the temperature but rather the soft ground. Scratch the surface of those nice green pastures and underneath you will find sugar sand (see Picture 2 below). Since horses everywhere are experts at removing the grass from certain high-traffic areas of their pastures, a certain portion of every pasture in Central Florida is nothing more than deep sand. If there were hard ground somewhere fairly close to the surface, the sand would not be so much of a problem, but there isn't. For the hoofcare professional trying to rehabilitate pathological feet, it presents some very special problems.

The number-one goal of any Strasser trim is to restore hoof mechanism. Since it is much easier to achieve hoof mechanism on hard ground than on sand, the SHP in Central Florida has an uphill job from the first trim. If you add to this scenario the typical long-term clubbed and foundered foot, you have a real challenge on your hands. Such a foot is usually deeply dehydrated and hard as a rock. The joints have adapted to the chronic high heel and just naturally want to tip that foot onto its toe, which obligingly sinks forward into the nice welcoming sugar sand (see Picture 3 below). The sand creates problems for the severely contracted hoof also. When the hoof sinks even a little way into the sand, all forces on the hoof are now inward, leading to contraction. Ideally, you would want your terrain to provide enough resistance to help spread the foot with each step.

The conventional farrier community doesn't find Florida compatible for barefoot horses either. Conventional farrier wisdom is that horses can't go barefoot here because of the moisture. The extended summer rainy season creates wet pastures that often have standing water in them for months at a time. Horse owners are told their horses' hooves are cracking and crumbling and have chronic thrush because they stand in the water that accumulates in the pastures. They are told to limit turnout and to paint their horses soles with such substances as Koppertox (my former farrier's favorite), or a mixture of alcohol and iodine alternated with hydrogen peroxide, or formaldehyde and iodine, or the blue stuff (possibly gentian violet) that is popular with one local trimmer, or any one of a number of drying and hardening agents.

To the uneducated horse owner (that was me), this actually made sense. My grooming box used to contain two small spray bottles -- one with hydrogen peroxide, the other with the alcohol/iodine mix. My mare's soles were so hard my farrier had to ask me to stop using it so he could trim her. But as soon as those feet softened up, the thrush was back.

Horses in natural boarding environments who are getting a physiologically correct trim do not have thrush.  Thrush results when the frog is not getting enough circulation.

The typical conventionally trimmed barefoot horse (never shod) in Florida presents with high heels, long bars, and steep fronts that are squared off and either have well-developed toe cracks or are just starting them. If the horse has been previously shod for a significant period of time (we have a lot of off-the-track TBs), it will present with a long shallow toe and underslung heels, usually with well-developed or just starting quarter or toe cracks. If the horse is a TB, the soles are usually thin and the walls of poor quality, although this situation can be found in other breeds, also. There are, of course, a wide variety of other problems (club foot, founder, navicular, etc.), and contraction of some sort is almost always present.

The good news is that the horses are healing, even on Florida's less-than-ideal terrain, given consistent Strasser hoofcare and some creative attention to their living conditions. Owner education and involvement is, of course, the key ingredient in hoof health. There are substances that can be put down in high-traffic areas to prevent them becoming sandpits, and good pasture management will keep grass loss to a minimum. However, it has been my observation that the horses whose owners either ride them often or hand walk them on firm surfaces heal much more quickly. Just in case you haven't heard it yet, I'll repeat the SHP mantra: movement, movement, movement.

Even during rainy season, I have my horses soaking over the coronet in water twice a day (see picture at top of page). Tonight, as I go out to feed my horses in their "feeding pools," it will very likely be raining and the pastures will be wet. I will laugh as I look at my three horses and their bare feet in various stages of rehab with nary a toe or quarter crack in sight and absolutely no thrush. Thank you, Dr. Strasser.