Heel Wedges Do They Crush The Heels

I use just about every kind of wedge that is available on the market and do not produce crushed heels with them. My own team roping horses as well as my wife's barrel horses compete in aluminum PLR wedges, and have for years. Some even receive an additional lift of some design when necessary to elevate PA. I believe the problem of crushed heels might be breed sensitive. I work primarily on quarter or appendix horses. They may arrive crushed, even when barefoot, but they don't leave, nor do they remain crushed after wedge application and subsequent reset. I bring the heels "back, back, back" to solid horn each time and do not rely on the "6 week cycle myth" as some need to be addressed earlier, while some can go longer. In most cases I work with radiographs, pre-shoeing and post-shoeing. Some are even in "Roller Motion Shoes" with a wedge of some design. I have no hesitancy in using wedges, front or rear, as I do not experience negative results with them.

I wont use plastic wedge pads these days. I have no issue with using graduated shoes and graduated bar shoes, knowing when to take them into flat shoes is essential. I have visually seen using radiographs pre and post shoeing the PA increase. I do believe that less than 5% of horses need wedging/graduating where good and regular shoeing hasnt been sufficent.

I am pretty much in agreement with what Donnie said above. I have used all different kinds of wedge pads and shoes in all different kinds of modalities with regular success. Saying " wedge pads crush heels" is about as inaccurate as saying "guns kill people". I could duct tape a loaded .45 to the side of my head and walk around the rest of my life without danger UNTIL some human applies an incorrect influence to the pistol,(like pulling the trigger). The same with wedge pads/shoes........ it isn't the wedge itself that's the culprit, it's the misapplication of them. In most cases,if you're crushing heels down after wedging them, it's dollars to donuts that your trim and/or shoe placement is wrong. As Donnie mentioned, if your not bringing those heels back to good, straight horn and then positioning your elevated shoe correctly on a proper trim, your heels will continue to fail and the wedge is going to get the blame when the real guilty party is the craftsman, (or lack thereof), himself.

The other necessary piece of the puzzle along with wedging, is that you need to provide solar support back to the ground surface with the modality of your choice in order to make up the added distance that you raised the frog/sole from the ground surface. Without it, the weak heels with still have to carry the brunt of the load and that will retard improvement at best if not lead to further failure.

This has been my experience.

Dave

AMEN!!!

Do wedge pads crush heels? Not always. There are a lot of variables you need to account for until you can suggest they do or don't crush heels.

As a generic statement, if the horse grows heel you can probably add a wedge and not have issues.

If there was a horrible shoeing job and the heels are crushed. If you correct the shoeing job and add a wedge the foot will probably come back around. (depending on the conformation)

If it was a good shoeing job with a negative angle and somebody added a wedge, I'd like to see pics on improvement.

David,
My first weapon of choice in these instances is a wedged shoe with the solar surface of the foot left exposed. I think that you have to have a healthy frog that is going to stay engaged with the ground to keep everything happy this way, but in general, I find it easier to keep all things on the solar surface healthy if I can leave them open as opposed to padding them with either leather or a synthetic material.
Now, if the frog is already atrophied, I think you have very little choice but to pad and pack the foot to get everything jump started again. Since I started using a lot of Magic Cushion under may pads,(don't I wish they picked a less "gimmicky" name), I have seen a vast improvement of the condition of the foot under my plastic pads.I think, in many instances, my atrophied frogs improve at an accelerated rate. Now, most of my horses don't live in a swamp and I would wager that if I was working in a much wetter environment that my results might not be as positive. I think that the environmental factors have to figure into all our work.
So, to your question, I personally see no difference in desired results between using a wedged shoe by itself or elevating a flat shoe with wedge pads. I also have few problems associated with using plastic pads. I do, however have issues with leather wedge pads crushing down on me and not holding the desired elevation for the duration of the shoeing cycle. Any insight to help this and I'm all ears.

I have to add that I have started using Ray's leather/plastic combo pads and the more that I use them the more I like them.

Dave

I've got a jumper whose back hooves were broken back very bad - there were no heels. The farrier before had alway put the horse on plastic wedges and he horse did good, but for me it was wrong. When I took over the horse I put on a set of Jim Blurton heartbars. After the first shoeing I had heals. I now keep the horse on heartbars as it is very flatfooted and I feel the extra support from the heartbar helps.

I have also had another horse whom I took the plastic wedges off, supported the frog and got heel growth.

With these two horses plastic wedges did harm and not good.

I must admit I prefer to go with this philosophy than wedging, unless by vet Rx.

Rightly or wrongly, in my corner of the sand pile there is a perception that wedging does crush heels. Anytime I've thought it appropriate (which is quite rare really), it is greeted with this perception. Even many vets avoid wedging unless there is no other way.

And in these days of social media, one must manage perceptions carefully IMO.

wedges do not crush heels , the downward descending bodyweight on contact causes the crushing effect , the use of wedges and their height needs to be experimented with until you find the happy medium

Funny thing, since these threads came up in the last few days, a client got a new horse with alum wedges without pads on front. Haven't seen or used them for a few years 'till we started talking about them here. Power of the internet I guess.
I hate using pads. Thing is though, when you need them, not much else works.
I hate wedged shoes more. The group of guys I run with out here had Gene O. out a few years back for a clinic. I had him set up a WP QH I had just started working on. He had me put the rail shoes with the tallest rails and a three degree frog pad. The horse trotted off noticeably better across the asphalt parking lot. Back at home in the soft arena, not so much. The rails sank into the sand, the pad stopped the foot and although we had about a three quarter inch of rail, the practical lift was three degrees from the pad. I ended up putting a stack of wedge pads thick enough to fling his ass over his ears if he stopped too fast. Went best with that set up.
Seems to me wedged shoes only on a foot will not lift the foot in soft ground as a frog pad will.
Where I do use a wedge shoe is on a couple of WBs. Full brother and sister, both have the off hind foot pointing south west when it should be pointing south. I build a wide, long, wedged, lateral branch for that foot and they are doing well. The width of the branch gives adequate float apparently, the stifle is better in the older sister and the gelding hasn't had any problems, they both are moving well and the big sister is placing and winning in that jumping stuff. I set the gelding up with that shoe on his off hind for a year before he started training or wearing shoes on the other feet.
Another thing to consider is how the toe is set. A rolled toe, set back, will effectively give several extra degrees to any kind of wedge, or eliminate the need for any type of wedge.
As mentioned above, the main thing isn't a particular shoe or pad, but how it's put on.

AMEN Bill