Steph~ Using the term Farrier, All people that I know would think that a person calling themselves a farrier, Shod horses, used shoes, I do not know why anyone who would use the term for a barefoot trimmer.
Sally shoes horses....if they can go barefoot she will let the owner know, and take in account the pasture, climate, hoof and sole quality, and many other factors that I even are not aware of. She would prefer a horse to go barefoot, and has studied barefoot trimming..... Now a Stausser Trimmer is NOT a FARRIER. They take an oath never to harm a horse, put Shoes of any kind on a horse...it is kind of Cult like. I do know this first hand as Sally has spent 3 days with Sabine Kells, Straussers right hand person, learning the technique, only to really disagree with it. The list of forge work you listed just proves my point, that it is extensive. There is nothing wrong with forge work. What my point is ...Is that Farrier schools generally put a lot of emphasis on Forge work and MFG shoes...rockers, eggbars, clips etc etc....I wish they would put a little less emphasis on that and some more on other things, why does that upset you? The Off the shelf KEG shoes have evolved very nicely in the past 20 years...I just think Farrier schools should take that into account and catch up. And yes if you can say there are 10-15 good farriers in your area, consider yourself Lucky. We did not even have that in washington state in our area. Had we had a list of good farrier here, we would be doing something else for money at this point, but right now we are having fun. Storme ____________________________________________________________________________________ Be a PS3 game guru. Get your game face on with the latest PS3 news and previews at Yahoo! Games. http://videogames.yahoo.com/platform?platform=120121
