Message from SA

We had our National Championship Show this last weekend and a was the National Champ in my grade on Cherry Hall, he is the one with the white face. On the other two boys i got first's in all my events. Unfortunately the weather here is unbareablely hot so we are limited to two day show's. Poor Hawaiian has tendon problems from polo so he only managed jumping the first day, I am thinking about retiring him from the jumping side of life, unfortunately we do not have the technology/machinery here to treat his problem as required so we are stuck with traditional methods, but so long as he is fat and happy I am too.

Well all 3 are all rounders, I use them for hacking and I do dressage, jumping, endurance and cross country.
My oldest Hawaiian is now about 17 he is 16 hands, I bought him as an ex polo pony and he was brought up to Zambia from Zimbabwe where he was bred and he was a race horse who won (according to his passport) several races. His father was Hawaiian Love and his mother was a mare called Espirit de suit. He has been barefoot for four years now, I took off the shoes the min he was mine.
My pony the chestnut, Rafiki (this means "my friend" in Swahili, an African language) he is 14 years old and 14.2 hands, we bred him in Zimbabwe with our own thoroughbred cross welsh mare and a friends pure breed Arab stallion he is an absolute spoiled brat but he is family and we love him. He has NEVER had shoes.
Cherry Hall is my most recent, I bought him straight off the polo field, I took an immediate liking to him and had to have him, he was also bred in Zimbabwe and also won a few races. His father is quite famous for producing show jumpers his name is Hall Gate and his mother was a mare called Cherry Time, he is very sweet but also VERY dumb (eg: he walked into the center part of our horse box today when I was loading him) He has had no shoes since I got him 3 years ago.
All 3 are fed on a pellet produced by a local company which I mix with maize bran, they get fed three times a day and are spoiled with rejects from the near by farmers and have hey ad lib.
Would love the hoofpick but is my location not a problem? lol!
Is great to have some one to bragg about my babies to.
I almost forgot, several of our Zambian riders are off to the Congo to represent Zambia in show jumping this weekend.
If my boy's do make the blog I would love to be sent the link.
Kind regards,
Valerie.

Kestrels Story from Ireland

Kestrel is a 9 year old pure bred Connemara bought as a 4 year old having only ever competed in dressage competitions. He didn't know how to gallop, was extremely spooky (still is!), had never hacked on the roads, hunted, been to the beach - boy was he going to be challenge!


I didn't know then just how much of a challenge he would be when he went lame after completing a second 40 mile ride (to attain Silver Shamrock with the Irish Long Distance Riding Associtation at the age of 7). He was laid off work for 6 months (without shoes), had two sets of x-rays taken which showed up absolutely nothing and generally improved once the shoes were off.

This led me to barefoot websites and some research and my first boots were secondhand Old Macs Originals from ebay. When his feet grew and changed shape I bought a new pair of Old Macs G2s from a supplier in England (we're a bit backward here in Ireland and I have only today for the first time seen an advert for hoof boot fitting - in the south of Ireland - about 150 miles from where I live). These worked well and I now have a barefoot trimmer who comes on a regular basis to trim Kes's feet.

We've progressed to Easyboot Epics which I put onto Kes for a ride on Sunday past which gave them a really good try out as we took part in a pleasure ride around Clandeboye Estate in Bangor, County Down where we were knee deep in sticky mud. I was amazed my boots stayed on despite having looked up the Easyboot site on numerous occasions and read everyone else's reports. Our other horses are also barefoot including a 14 year old TB mare who hacks regularly and we use the Old Macs on her (the boots fit both horses which is very handy) and will never have shoes on them. Their feet are all amazing -despite the fact that as we live in Ireland and the ground is frequently very wet.

It's not called the Emerald Isle for nothing you know! I would recommend barefoot and Easyboots to anyone - just send them my email address and I'll convince them!

Name: Valerie McKie
City: Belfast
Country: Northern Ireland
Favorite Boot: Easyboot Epic

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