Rafter C Ranch, LLC

08/10/2022

Over thinned and flattened foot causing instability in the hoof capsule leading to digital pulse and inflammation.

Easycare Versa Glue ons helped remedy this.

07/09/2022

Both ranches have sold!

Getting rid of miscellaneous items. If you are interested please PM. Needs to go before Friday the 15th! 

05/23/2022

ABSOLUTELY…..

People call me all the time saying that they can’t find a farrier or they only show up once and they never come back. Usually there is a reason for this.

In person consultations are not free. Gas is not free and time is valuable. If you just want an assessment, there is a fee.

Just because your horse stands well for you to brush him and feed him treats does not necessarily mean he’s well behaved. If you have not trained him to have his feet handled it’s not the farriers job to do it. If he’s going to pull my back out and put me out of work and behind schedule for two weeks then I’m not going to wrestle with him, I’m going to dope him. Dope is $20 extra.

If you are not going to keep your horse on a schedule and are going to only call a farrier once they go lame or after they’ve gotten so long you are worried your neighbors are going to turn you in, it will cost extra if I can find a place in my schedule to work you in. I will not drop everything and shuffle regularly scheduled customers just because someone neglected their horses and now “need a farrier right now today “.

If I get your foundered horse on its feet again and then you proceed to neglect to have him regularly maintained or put him right back on grass to re-founder, I’m not going to waste my time.

Lots of people seem to think that farriers should be available at the spur of the moment, that our prices are negotiable. This is not true. It’s a highly skilled job. If you want to treat your farrier like a lawn boy, maybe you should see if your lawn boy wants to trim your horse.

04/25/2022

For all my gluing clients….these will be game changers! I will no longer be there 4 hours a horse prepping 🤪

Innovation by Easycare Inc.

Happy Monday!

04/11/2022

This is why having good clients and good steeds is of the utmost importance.

You can and WILL burn out a great Farrier by your misbehaved horses or the way YOU treat them. Most Farriers I know are skilled enough to do something different…..don’t burn them out.

Have you ever wondered what it’s like to be a farrier? Or maybe just how many times your farrier was p**ped on that morning before shaking your hand? Maybe you have thought to yourself “what’s that smell?” or “what is that green thing stuck to his ear?” or even “The dogs sure love them, I wonder what hoof trimmings taste like?” If 12 years of standing at the anvil have taught me anything it’s that the answer to such mysteries (at least the ones that can be answered in a few words) are: a lot of p**p; also p**p; and salted p**p…

As for what it’s like to be a farrier, let me try to explain. This job is not for the faint of heart or the mentally stable. You can’t be sane (or hope to stay that way long) if you wish to work with equestrians. You have to be insane to participate or work in a full-contact sport that lays under the line where rugby meets motor-cross and your only bit of protection is a hat made of the same material as a disposable coffee cup. Seriously, aside from crash test dummy, what other sport or job exists where someone can suffer massive blunt force trauma and is expected to get right back up and repeat whatever activity just about killed them a moment ago? “Horse or hospital!” is an expression I have heard more than once both as a horse rider and as a farrier (moving target) apprentice.

The ability to withstand impact aside, this is a job that requires the same attention to detail as an artist, the skill and steady hand of a surgeon, the patience of a saint, and the endurance/pain tolerance of a Navy Seal. For those who have never seen a farrier practice their trade and wants to walk in their shoes, try to imagine you are working in a stiflingly hot building, bent over and holding a 2×4 between your knees. On one end of the 2×4 is a small platform you are attempting to perform incredibly detailed work on. This table is incredibly valuable and the slightest mistake could cause it to explode; most of the tools you are given to work with are crude, bulky, and (like the table) also incredibly expensive considering they were invented sometime in the 14th century. While you are standing in this pizza oven from hell you will have to light a fire, which you will use to heat up your art work. Sometimes this art work will set you on fire.

Meanwhile the Hulk is tugging on the other end of that 2×4, occasionally ripping it away from you and dragging small knife blades that are sticking out of this table through your hands and legs. Side note: Friction tape will become your new best friend as it makes holding on to the rusty and poo crusted tools (which are now covered in your own blood) much easier! From time to time the Hulk might let you have the 2×4, but he is going to sit on you while you toil away on your art project. Now, as you fuss over details and panic every few moments that the speck of blood you just saw might not be yours (and are incredibly relieved when it is,) imagine there is a bucket of excrement sitting above your head, which at any moment may tip over on you without warning. Depending on the time of year, that bucket of poo may be switched for a bucket of spit. (Ah, clover…) And I mean more spit than you might think any earthly critter would have the capacity to produce. You will also sweat so much you will drink two gallons of water by the end of the day and not need to p*e once. For this reason you will never leave the house with no less than nine extra shirts and just as many towels.

To make your task even more impossible imagine that there is this invisible crazy man wildly running around your work area swinging Gallagher’s hammer. At any moment he might run up and smash you like one of Gallagher’s ill-fated watermelons. If you are unlucky enough to find yourself on his pedestal of doom that day, you are going to be faced with one of those moments when where most rational people might question your sanity. Since you can’t give up and call it a day with only three of the four 2x4s now complete (there is this very terrifying 5’4” 120lbs women who just body slammed a 1,300 pound Hanoverian into submission who would be very displeased if you did) you must trudge on despite the pain of what you are pretty sure is a broken leg and maybe a few pulverized ribs. It takes a special kind of stupid to keep working after the might of Thor’s hammer (a draft horse) knocks you through a barn wall. Fortunately you’re a farrier and you are just the kind of stupid needed to get back up and finish the job!

Now that you’re done with the first horse there are 12 more waiting…

04/05/2022

Overdue for this little guy.

03/23/2022

Understanding leverage and how it effects the soft tissue, tendons and ligaments is of utmost importance.

Happy Wednesday!

03/15/2022

Ok, Alaska! I’m back March 29th to April 2nd.
I am booking now so FCFS! Sorry for the delay fighting to get affordable tickets in this day and age is not easy!

Talk to you soon!

02/19/2022

All of this!

Are we missing an important piece of the puzzle in re-occurring issues in our horse…us!?

An absolutely mind blowing webinar with Tuulia Luomala details our affect on our horses physiology. From how we breath and psychological connections, to how myofascial restrictions in our own body creates mirroring dysfunctions in our horses.

The anatomical slides are incredible and add another depth to the understanding of the subject.

In my opinion this webinar should be watched by absolutely everyone.
For owners to realise their own physiology is vital in maintaining a healthy horse. For body workers to appreciate other pieces to re-occurring puzzles and even farriers to appreciate abstract influences on what they see In the feet!!

Get your recording access now at this link…

https://equineeducationhub.thinkific.com/courses/horseriderconnection

01/20/2022

Yes yes And yes! Great reminder.

01/06/2022

I am so thankful that this information is getting out. Every day I see Farrier’s pair out soles, mutilate frogs and Over rasp walls, all in the name of tradition! A fantastic read.

“It's all about soul…Yes, it is.” The title and line from Billy Joel's 1993 hit refers to unmeasured essence of our being, and the same may be said also about another kind of sole, the hoof's sole, which is an often-overlooked, under-studied insensitive structure of the hoof that fails to get ...