262 SCIENTIFIC HORSP]SHOEING. 



heel leaves the ground he will hit back of inside heel nail. I 

 have never known a horse that twisted his heels out ever to cut 

 or hit his ankles. A shoe made as per Fig. 168 will turn the ' 

 foot outward from the ankle and thus avoid any interference. 

 The outside heel calk at B should be as high as the case may 

 require, say from f to | inch. The inside branch to be gradually 

 thinned down from last nail hole to end at C, and the shoe to be 

 fitted snug to the foot around that side. 



Use and Abuse of Tips. — Tips should not be used indis- 

 criminately, the build and construction of a horse's legs and 

 pasterns must be duly considered; for instance, tips will be in- 

 jurious if horse has long sloping pasterns whereby the line of 

 weight inclines forward out of the vertical. On the other hand, 

 short upright pasterns where legs are perpendicular or inclined 

 back under the body, have feet at such an angle (say 55°) for 

 the successful use of tips. Such horses wear the toes of shoes 

 more than the heels, and a toe-tip is all that is needed, therefore, 

 to protect the hoof from undue wear. A great majority of 

 horses, however, are adapted to the use of tips, and I think they 

 would be better off from such use on the front feet than other- 

 wise. By wearing tips the front feet would escape corns, bruised 

 heels, quarter-cracks, contraction, thrush, sore tendons, leg 

 weariness, interference or cutting and such like ills to which 

 horseflesh is heir — more from clumsy, misfitting shoes, than 

 from all other causes combined. In some sections of the country 

 too, where, in wet weather, the soil is sticky, heavy clay,, 

 horses are apt to pick up " balls," which pack and wedge up in 

 the foot under full shoes and becoming dry and hard, soon 

 causes lameness, whereas the use of tips would avoid such re- 

 sults. AVhen used, narrow tips are far preferable to wide ones, 

 as it is well known that horses do not wear out from overwork 

 so much as from mismanagement and overweighting of the 



