You know what it’s like when your back is sore and you’ve got to clean the paddock with a wheelbarrow and shovel. It takes forever and now your back is really sore.

Strathcona Ventures has done it again with another great product under their umbrella of equine brands: DryGuy Waterproofing. Having spent most of my life living on the “wet coast” here on Vancouver Island, I appreciate a product that helps keep me and my horses dry. It’s also environmentally friendly and safe for humans and animals, so I was keen to test it.

Proper hoof trimming is vital to preventing lameness and injury in horses. Keeping the hoof bars aligned and healthy is also dependent upon trimming. Bars appear as white lines along the frog and are made up of laminae. Think of the bars like plastic straws – if you push on the straw from the end, it stays strong and holds its form. If a straw gets too long, it will likely bend when pressure is applied and become weaker. In order to keep bars aligned and healthy, hooves need to be trimmed and collected on a regular basis. Without healthy bars, a horse can develop a “stacked sole,” or worse, a bruised sole or abscess.