hoof-care-clinic in Monteverde Costa Rica

The Rough Guide to Costa Rica 2002: "...who has several healthy, well-cared for horses..."

We held this horse clinic in January 2002 with Michael "Riverstone" Waldorf a professional farrier from Oregon in the U.S.A. He trained our local hoofcare person. My horses had a big smile for him!!!

There is something else than just do a good technical hoof care job. This is respecting the horses feeling and give them a break, when they need it and have the right touch, since every horse has a different character.	Hello all you horse people! This is Michael Waldorf writing you from Oregon in the U.S.A. I will be in Costa Rica from January 8th to February 12, 2002. During my vacation with my wife and son, I will be making a few stops to work with local herreros de caballos and giving one clinic on proper hoof care. If you might be interested in us stopping by, please let me know as soon as possible. I can offer professional hoofcare for your horses, train your local hoofcare person, or give you training on proper hoofcare. I know that it is difficult to get good hoofcare in Costa Rica, and this is why I would like to offer my expertise. Visit www.oregonfarrier.com for background info. on my business. I look forward to hearing from you soon. Pura Vida! -Michael "Riverstone" Waldorf
	Thank you to make this happen, also thank your wife and son for their patience around all the horse lovers, that have been here from Monteverde and took much more of your time than planned.
	The local horse farriers could not get enough input from Michael, so the clinic lastet one extra day. This knowledge stays and spreads from Monteverde. I am very happy.

Michael Riverstone about horse hoof and shoe surface touching the ground: "You want to provide as much HEALTHY ground surface as possible, but..., what is important to recognize is how much of the presented hoof wall is healthy, because you only want to maintain healthy hoof wall, removing any flares or irregularly large sections of hoof wall. This does not mean to back up the horse well into the white line and narrow the hoof wall while applying too small a shoe. Healthy hoof wall should be maintained. When applying a shoe, the heels of the shoe should extent to the widest part of the frog, fully covering the horse's heel hoof wall, and extending in the toe to completely cover the healthy hoof wall of the toe. If there is unhealthy or excessive hoof wall in the toe, then the excessive toe may need to be rasped back to the hoof angle, such as I did on some of your horses that had feet that had migrated too far forward. This is in no way a solution to not providing a large enough shoe to cover the entire length and width of the healthy hoof."