Today Daisy and I tackled the Minions the hooves.  I gave myself a break from rasping them down all winter as my back and I couldn’t face the endless mud and weather. I had decided to save up and get the farrier in when it was Spring to give the Shetlands one professional trim a year, and I would keep them tidy for the rest of the year.

Well, that was the plan until this – no farrier visiting until maybe next month.  It keeps being put off.

So armed with Daisy, some hoof clippers, a rasp and the axle stand, we went to work on Tiddles.  The photos don’t show how badly he needed trimming.

We went by the theory that we both know what we want a hoof to look like, so between us we would achieve it.  Daisy was on clippers while I did the rasping afterwards.  Then we would stand back, look at our handywork and decide if we needed to do any more.

Of course there was an audience.

We did backs and fronts.

Here are Tiddles’ fronts after our work.

And here is the boy himself appreciating our work.

Feeling we could do another, I went and chased after Silver and eventually caught him.  He was not in a helpful frame of mind.

One front done and you can see the difference.

Both fronts done.

The backs untrimmed.  Far too long and toey.

Backs afterwards.  We were pleased with our work.

Hair up!

Hair down!

Just another 17 horses/ponies to go…… then.