Stepping Stone Equine Hoof Care - Angie Howard

13/08/2026

13/08/2026

14/07/2026

14/07/2026

Just received my copy, on time for winter holiday reading 📚

I wanted to make a quick post as I recently read this and felt it was worthwhile!

I recently received a copy of Nick Hill’s Hoof Wear Patterns book. It really aligns with a lot of what I think and do when I’m trimming, noticing wear patterns and changes in them, thinking about what it means for their comfort and their upper body - but Nick makes it more quantifiable.

In my hoofcare journey I feel as though I am continually a student of the hoof, learning more and more about what each change in growth, wear, and movement means. This book feels the same! I hope some of you find it helpful ☺️

14/07/2026

Winter feeding. Great advice!

Winter is a normal time for horses to drop a bit of weight. To a degree, that can be healthy. They’re not really meant to stay fat all year, and for easy keepers, ponies and metabolic types, coming out of winter a little lighter can be a good thing.

But some do need extra help.

Horses that have:

dental issues
trouble holding weight
higher energy needs
age-related changes
a heavy workload
recent illness or recovery
poor access to suitable feed
cold, wet living conditions

can struggle once the weather sets in.

Before changing everything, it helps to have a rough idea of how much they’re actually eating.

A common starting point for total intake is around 1.5–2% of body weight per day, but that’s only a guide.

For a 500 kg horse, that’s roughly:

1.5% = 7.5 kg per day
2% = 10 kg per day

For a 100 kg miniature pony, that’s roughly:

1.5% = 1.5 kg per day
2% = 2 kg per day

That number is total intake, not just hard feed. It includes grass, hay, hard feed and anything else they’re eating.

Some easy keepers may be closer to the lower end. Many horses are closer to 2%. Horses needing weight gain may need more, often closer to 2–2.5%, depending on the individual, the weather, their teeth, workload, forage quality and how well they digest what they’re eating.

For a 500 kg horse, that could be around:

2% = 10 kg per day
2.5% = 12.5 kg per day

For a 100 kg miniature pony, that could be around:

2% = 2 kg per day
2.5% = 2.5 kg per day

For weight loss, it’s important not to just stop feeding and hope for the best. For overweight horses use 1.5% of current body weight or 2% of ideal body weight, whichever is larger, as a safe starting point, then adjust from there. The numbers are useful, but they’re not a fixed rule. Use them as a starting point.

For winter weight gain, the first thing I usually want to add is fibre.

Horses are hindgut fermenters. They’re designed to process fibre, and fermenting fibre helps produce heat. That’s why more hay is often the best for the horse.

Good options can include:

grass or pasture hay, ideally tested if possible
Rhodes hay
teff hay
beet pulp
soybean hulls
lupin hulls
low sugar hay-based pellets

With hay, you need to know what you’re actually buying.

“Pasture hay” can mean very different things. Sometimes rye and clover hay gets sold as pasture hay, and that can be far too high in sugar for laminitic, metabolic or very good-doing horses.

Rhodes hay can be a useful lower sugar option. Some batches can be quite stalky, so that’s just something to take note of depending on the horse.

Teff hay can also be useful. Some horses don’t do as well on it if the batch is higher in protein or sugar than expected, so again, it’s just something to take note of.

That doesn’t mean those hays are bad. It just means hay isn’t automatically suitable because of the name. Testing is ideal when you can do it, and if you can’t, it helps to at least ask what’s actually in it.

Winter grass can also be tricky. We can get cold weather, damp ground, sunny days and little bursts of growth. That grass can be high in sugar and protein, and some horses will scour on it, especially if their gut is already unsettled or the grass changes quickly.

For horses needing more condition, I’m looking at fibre first before even thinking about feeds that are high in sugar, starch, oil or very rich ingredients.

That doesn’t mean fat or protein are bad. It means they’re not where I’d usually start if the fibre intake, forage quality, salt, minerals and basic diet haven’t been sorted yet.

Fibre is the base.

If I do want to add healthy fats for more condition, my first choice is an omega-3 source. Omega-3 is the fat I’d add because it has an anti-inflammatory role, rather than just being extra calories.

The cheapest option is usually fresh ground linseed/flaxseed. A lot of people get put off because cold-pressed flax oil can be expensive, but whole linseed is usually much cheaper. Ideally, grind it fresh, or grind a small amount and keep it sealed in the fridge for up to a couple of weeks. Freezing is better if you want to store it longer.

Then we have the other basics that are easy to forget.

Salt is important in winter. They’re often eating more dry feed, like hay, and may not drink as much in cold weather. Salt helps encourage drinking and reduces the risk of dehydration and impaction colic.

Minerals are important, especially if the diet is mostly hay or untested pasture.

Vitamin E is worth thinking about when they’re not getting much fresh green grass.

To summarise. Know roughly how much your horse is eating.
Start with forage.
Add suitable fibre before getting complicated.
Be careful with high sugar hay and grass.
Don’t trust the front of the feed bag more than the ingredients and analysis.
Add salt, minerals, vitamin E and omega-3s where needed.

Winter feeding doesn’t have to be fancy, but it does need to make sense.

Photo of my 30 year-old, unrugged, toothless thoroughbred. Fed Johnson’s fibre safe, salt, best guess minerals, and whatever hay and grass he can pick at.

14/07/2026

LOAD LINES

PART ONE: BREAKOVER

Breakover gets used constantly around horses' feet, and rarely gets properly explained. Most of the advice built around it — shorten the toe, ease the breakover, roll it back — only makes sense once the mechanism underneath it is clear.

Breakover is the final part of the stride before the foot leaves the ground. As the horse's body moves forward over a planted foot, the heel lifts first, and the hoof rolls forward over the toe until it lifts off. Most people use the term to mean the functional pivot point the hoof rolls over at toe-off, though it also describes the whole phase of the stride, not just that single point. The pivot isn't fixed to one spot on the hoof. It shifts depending on hoof shape, trim, and shoeing, and where it sits changes the mechanics of that final phase considerably.

One structure explains why this matters: the deep digital flexor tendon, or DDFT, which runs down the back of the leg and under the navicular bone before attaching to the underside of the coffin bone. As the heel lifts and the hoof rolls forward, tension increases through the DDFT, contributing to flexion of the distal limb and to lift-off. The navicular bone sits directly in the path of that tension, acting as a gliding surface that redirects the tendon's force — sometimes described as a pulley, though that's a simplification.

A longer toe generally increases the distance the hoof rolls before lift-off, which extends the lever the DDFT is working against. A longer lever asks the tendon for more force, for longer, and that translates to more sustained load through the navicular region on every stride. This is the mechanical basis for keeping toes from running long. Toe length isn't the only variable at play — fetlock extension and how the rest of the limb moves through the stride matter too — but it's the one most directly shaped by a trim.

The science gets less tidy from here. Toe length and injury don't sit on a simple straight line where a slightly longer toe on one stride causes damage. What the evidence more consistently points to is cumulative strain — repetitive loading across enormous numbers of strides, with the distal limb's tendons, ligaments and joints sharing load as a coupled system rather than absorbing it independently. A longer lever shifts how that load gets distributed. It doesn't automatically mean catastrophic failure is coming. Much of the current professional disagreement around "toe leverage" comes down to people using the same term for two different things — force on a single stride, versus strain accumulated over months of them.

Breakover isn't a trimming style or a philosophy. It's a definable part of the stride with measurable mechanical consequences, and it's why a trim built around it looks the way it does.