Redtail Equine Services

10/13/2026

10/08/2026

Check out this blog EasyCare Inc. Protective Hoofwear shared!

10/08/2026

I had the amazing experience of getting to work with and trim some donkeys the other day. Their owner called me asking if I’d be willing to help her out with her donkeys’ hoof care. I said absolutely yes.

These are such cool creatures! I’ve been around donkeys plenty, but never worked with them in this fashion. Every year I have the honor of attending Brent Graef’s young horse handling class. As soon as I got into the pen with the donkeys, I realized I was running through Brent’s class in my head.

It’s human nature to be in a hurry and have our brains scanning a time period anywhere from 20 years ago to 72 hours in the future. We have goals and plans and any and all of our various problems (and successes) can come waltzing in unbidden. I’ve been fortunate to have worked in so many aspects of the horse world, and I’m seeing that hoof care isn’t exempt. I purposely don’t have a ton of clients. I like to take my time with the horses and the process, and frankly my body wouldn’t hold up to doing tens of horses every day. This is definitely a self-afforded luxury and I recognize that and was intentional about it, because I also know that it allows me time.

Time is the key word because there will be equines that come along who simply can’t do something for whatever reason(s). These are the ones you can’t rush. (The caveats here are the horses who will be in a world of trouble - physical, mental, emergency cases, etc - with whom time is of the essence and you’ll do more damage than good if you wait). However, foot care isn’t about just the feet. It’s everything. Horses, all animals, and people are remarkable because of how interconnected our whole systems are; everything affects everything.

The more I thought about it, the more I realized these animals’ self awareness and self preservation instincts are right there on the surface; they have a huge sense of justice. I think this is what’s behind the assumption that donkeys are stubborn, mean, uncooperative, dangerous, etc. It wouldn’t take long at all to get a donkey quite indignant and then the behavior (of both humans and animals) would immediately deteriorate. I try my best to be present for all the animals I’m working with, but it really struck home how donkeys absolutely REQUIRE that from the human.

Two of them, Coco and Puff, had been BLM burros. Coco was rounded up as a weanling but Puff had already experienced a few years of life being feral. The other two, George and Jazzy, were mini donkeys and had lived their entire lives around humans. Each animal had an entirely different personality and way of being.

George has a history of suspected laminitis, so I said we’d get to his feet first. He came in quite footsore in both fronts. He’d had an abscess come out the coronet band on his left front. After his trim, he marched away so happy and comfortable.

Jazzy said no way would I be trimming his feet, but we did some really good work on letting him see that I wasn’t going to take his feet away and that I’d help him think through things and help him feel more balanced in his body. See, it’s about the thought process there; if I’d become upset that he wasn’t keen on my handling his feet, I’d have just been another human along the way who got impatient and egotistical. So instead I told Jazzy and his owner that the work I was doing was setting him up for success for next time.

Coco initially said oh hell no, but after we’d worked together for a bit, she decided it wasn’t such a bad deal after all. She went from thinking that kicking me in the face might be necessary, to letting me handle all four feet and move them around and place them in different spots.

Their owner had said Puff might be the hardest to do since she doesn’t care much for people, having never really warmed up in the couple of years since she’d been brought off the BLM - interestingly, Puff was the only one not adopted out of her group. That jenny was amazing! While she was fully prepared to defend herself, she came around the fastest of the four. It made me see for the millionth time that working slowly will get the fastest results.

I’ve already informed myself that I will not become a crazy donkey lady, but that might be tough 🤣😂

09/29/2026

09/24/2026

09/23/2026

While a lot of the work I do involves horses with some pretty serious stuff going on in their feet and bodies, it’s not all therapeutic.

I love doing a straightforward trim on adorable ponies (and any other horse).

The pony in question here is Joy, who’s half Shetland and half mini.

09/22/2026

A set of 3D HoofCare Derek Poupard Jim Blurton Farrier Products EasyCare Inc. Protective Hoofwear Garrett Ford Rollers all around for my daughter’s horse.

This mare’s feet have been a mind bender for years. I’ve been working on developing her heels and improving the back half of her foot.

This latest shoeing, I was pretty pleased to see the heel tubules growing in straighter and the frogs widening (which is a visible sign in her case that her heels are becoming less contracted).

Since we’ve had a ton of rain and mud after a year long extreme drought, I’m seeing all the horses slouching off soles and frogs. I want to make sure to keep thrush at bay so every foot got a healthy coating of Strahlfoili hoof clay. On the fronts she’s got 2° half mesh wedge inserts by 3D HoofCare, soft DIM by EasyCare, and on the hinds she’s got 4° half mesh wedge inserts and soft DIM. All four feet were glued with HoofLox acrylic in natural and sealed with a small amount of superglue.