Aiken, SC and shoes

[Dapple Field]

We are hauling two of our horses down to Aiken from VT for 3 weeks in March! We are so excited to be able to actually ride. At the moment the horses are barefoot and I'm trying to decide if I should have them shod before we go, or if we'll be able to keep them barefoot. Normally during the riding season here, we shoe them because of the abundance of rocks. Obviously to me maybe not DH , we won't be able to work them hard because we haven't ridden since before Christmas up here. What do you all think? We will be doing a lot of slow trail riding and DH will probably be jumping. Horses both have nice solid feet.

[fergusnc]

There are pages on Facebook specific to equestrian communities...charlottes, sandhills, triangle areas of NC. Maybe there isn't one for Aiken? Or I bet if you joined the one for the Sandhills, you would find people that haul to Aiken and may have personal experience...

[piedmontfields]

I'm not sure what the typical soil is like in Aiken. In Southern Pines, it is easy to go without shoes (although if you ride a lot on the sandy soil vs. an arena, your horses feet will wear down from the abrasion!).

I bet the people on Sandhills Equestrian on FB could answer your questions.

[kande50]

If it was me I'd either bring boots or shoe them, because unless the trails are pretty soft they could easily run out of hoof in 3 weeks. If I was going to leave them barefoot I wouldn't trim any hoof off before I went either, because I know someone who had his mule trimmed before a multi day wilderness ride, and she ended up so footsore he had to lead her back out.

[angela9823]

Aiken is very well known for its sandy ground. You should not have issue without shoes. Their hunt country is pretty sandy without rocks. SOME areas could have a really hard base if we haven't had wet weather but we've had nice rains lately so you should be good. I think Aiken does have quite a few railroad crossings you may have to encounter out in some of the trail areas but that should be your only issue. You can find pictures of Hitchcock here showing the sandy soil: http://www.hitchcockwoods.org/