2016 Best of HN #7: 14 Ways To Make Your Farrier Hate You

Plus one sign he might already.

Flickr/Ian Matchett/CC

Gathered from real live farrier feedback, here are fourteen sure-fire ways to make this important figure in your horse life hate you:

1. Every time your horse misbehaves, you shove treats in his mouth to calm him down … in the middle of your “trust me, I’m a trainer” speech.
2. You insist on holding your horse while the farrier works. You say things like “how cute, my horse must love you, awww,” and “be nice!” as your horse is biting the farrier on his or her butt.
3. You tell the farrier he needs to change your horse’s hoof angles to 45 degrees, because you read it somewhere on a message forum.
4. You get upset when your brand-new farrier can’t make your 25 year old, permanently lame in all four feet, arthritic, foundered, ringboned and navicular horse sound enough to go do a cross-country course. In one shoeing cycle.
5. Your farrier suggests you change your horse’s feed because he’s on the verge of foundering. You don’t listen, your horse founders, and you blame it on the shoeing job.
6. An hour before your scheduled farrier visit, you call and cancel because you forgot you had a hair appointment scheduled for the same time.
7. You clean your horse off for every farrier visit: make sure his mane and tail are braided, stars and hearts are clipped into his rump, his throat latch and ears are tidied up, but you always run out of time before you get to his muddy feet and legs. If you do have time, you make sure to polish all four feet with hoof black right before the farrier arrives.
8. In the summertime, you tell your farrier you’re going all natural. That means no fly sprays or repellents are allowed on the property.
9. You have that one monster stallion that no farrier in a 100-mile radius wants to shoe. You call the only farrier you haven’t used yet, and tell him once he arrives that you had to fire your last 5 farriers because they weren’t gentle and calm enough around your prized stud.
10. You think your farrier is your therapist and you’re paying him to listen to all your life’s problems.
11. You make your farrier walk across your 10-acre swamp to get your hard-to-catch horse.
12. Your farrier is trying to explain something to you and you get frustrated because he’s interrupting your Facebook status update.
13. When it’s time to pay your bill,  you realize you’re 20 dollars short. Again. Oops.
14. You call your farrier in the middle of the night, in a panic, and demand he comes out first thing in the morning because your horse threw a shoe. It’s ONLY been 13 weeks since his last shoeing.

The number-one sign you might have ticked off the poor guy or gal one time too many? You try and call your farrier and realize he’s changed his number and moved to another state.

Go riding!