Triple H Equine & Hoof Trimming Services

06/04/2026

Thank you! We appreciate you! Your horses appreciate you! 💕

THE OWNERS WHO DO THE WORK

A quiet acknowledgment for the owners who do the work.

The owners who ask questions.

The owners who read beyond the headlines and social media soundbites.

The owners who take the time to understand the condition in front of them, rather than the version of it they wish existed.

The owners who seek information from credible sources.

The owners who trust qualified professionals, while still engaging with the process and learning as much as they can.

The owners who stay vigilant.

The owners who notice small changes before they become large ones.

The owners who pick up the phone, book the appointment, arrange the blood tests, organise the radiographs, review the management plan and make the necessary changes, even when those changes are inconvenient.

Laminitis can be a devastating disease, but not every success story looks dramatic.

Sometimes success looks like damage that never occurred.

Sometimes it looks like pathology that never had the opportunity to progress.

Sometimes it looks like a horse remaining comfortable because concerns were recognised early and acted upon promptly.

Good outcomes are rarely the result of luck alone.

More often, they are built from knowledge, observation, evidence-based decision making and timely intervention.

They are built by owners who are willing to learn, willing to listen and willing to act.

Those owners don't always receive much recognition because the crisis they prevented never happened.

But prevention matters.

Education matters.

Good science matters.

And so does having the confidence to trust the right people when the evidence points in a direction you may not have expected.

To the owners who choose curiosity over assumptions, evidence over anecdotes, vigilance over wishful thinking and action over delay, thank you.

Your decisions matter more than you may ever realise ♥️

06/04/2026

When we think about hoof problems or lameness, we often focus on trimming, shoeing, terrain/environment, or movement. But sometimes the missing piece is something else entirely - and something that the owner needs to address, not the hoofcare provider.

Last week, I chatted with hoofcare provider and equine nutrition consultant Becky Bawn about her mustang Dakota and his struggle with selenium deficiency, and how it showed up in ways that many horse owners might not immediately connect to nutrition. Becky walks through the process of uncovering the root cause of his movement issues and hoof concerns, the challenges of recovery, and the important role nutrition can play in hoof quality, tissue strength, and overall movement.

While we so often hear about the risks of selenium toxicity, we rarely hear about deficiency- which is why bloodwork and investigation in confounding cases can be so important.

You can hear the entire conversation on any podcast app under "The Humble Hoof," or directly at this link: https://thehumblehoof.com/2026/05/22/selenium-deficiency-in-horses-with-becky-bawn/

06/04/2026

Diabetes is defined as persistently elevated blood glucose. It is more likely to occur in horses with both EMS (Equine Metabolic Syndrome) and PPID (Equine Cushing's Disease). Learn more in the proceedings from Dr. Kellon's presentations at the 2021 NO Laminitis! Conference Comparative Human and Equine Metabolic Syndrome. Downloads are free: https://www.e-junkie.com/i/11jjb.

06/04/2026

Just a day in the life of a barefoot hoof trimmer!

05/30/2026

05/26/2026

"HE'S NEVER HAD LAMINITIS IN HIS LIFE"

He's twenty-three.
Been in the same field for ten years.
Same grass. Same routine.
Never had a lame day in his life.

Then suddenly — laminitis.

So what changed?

Usually, not the field.
The horse.

One of the most persistent misunderstandings around laminitis is the idea that it behaves like an acute toxin exposure. Horse eats rich grass, feet immediately fail, catastrophe follows.

Sometimes there is a clear dietary trigger. But most endocrinopathic laminitis — the form most commonly associated with insulin dysregulation — develops as metabolic resilience erodes over time. And that erosion is often almost invisible while it's happening.

A horse that coped perfectly well with a management system for years may not cope with it indefinitely. Not because the grass suddenly became poisonous overnight, but because the horse standing on it is physiologically different now.

Hormones change things.
Body composition changes things.
Underlying endocrine disease changes things.

The horse who once burned through spring grass without issue may now process carbohydrates differently. Muscle mass may slowly reduce while fat deposition increases. Insulin responses may become exaggerated. Metabolic flexibility may narrow.

And none of that necessarily looks dramatic at first.

A horse can still appear bright, happy, and outwardly healthy while important physiological changes are developing underneath. Still ridden. Still turned out. Still charging to the gate at feed time. Still living exactly as he always has.

Maybe he's just slightly rounder every spring than he used to be. Maybe the neck has become subtly crestier over time. Maybe the fat pads behind the shoulders linger longer than they once did. Maybe he takes a little longer to tighten back up after winter.

Owners often miss these shifts because they happen gradually. When you see a horse every day, slow change becomes normal.

Then one year the threshold changes.

The pasture may not even be objectively richer than previous years. Weather patterns may be similar. Turnout may be unchanged. What has changed is the horse's ability to physiologically tolerate the same environment.

That distinction matters enormously.

Because people naturally compare the horse to his own history.

"He's always eaten this."
"He's never reacted before."
"He's lived out here for years."
"He's always been a good doer."

Yes. And at one point his metabolic system was compensating adequately. Now it may not be.

Conditions strongly associated with laminitis risk — especially insulin dysregulation and Pituitary Pars Intermedia Dysfunction (PPID, a hormonal condition affecting the brain's pituitary gland, common in older horses) — can exist quietly for a long time before the classic signs become obvious.

Not every PPID horse has a massive curly coat.
Not every insulin dysregulated horse looks obese.
Some still look relatively normal right up until the feet become involved.

And the feet are often the first place the compensation failure becomes impossible to ignore.

That's why laminitis can feel "sudden" to owners while, physiologically, it often has a long lead-up. The horse does not wake up one morning and randomly decide to develop laminitis. Usually the metabolic and endocrine landscape has been shifting underneath for months or years before the feet finally reveal it.

And this is the difficult part:

Past survival does not prove current safety.

A horse tolerating a management system for ten years does not guarantee he can tolerate it in year eleven. The fact he "always got away with it before" is not evidence that the risk was never there. Sometimes it simply means the body compensated successfully — until it no longer could.

History matters.

But physiology decides.

05/26/2026

Join Philip Himanka for the Anatomy, Trimming and Hoof Protection Clinic in Erie, Colorado next weekend. This clinic is open to horse owners and professionals and you do not have to be a PHCP member to attend. The next offering of this clinic is located in CA in June. Sign up here: https://progressivehoofcare.org/2025/10/anatomy-trimming-and-hoof-protection-colorado.