Submitted by Stacey Maloney, Team Easyboot 2015 Member
Recently we had a boot failure caused by a few different factors – but this was the end result…
We were long trotting through a freshly turned but yet to be planted crop field that has just been rained on and was quite slick. My mare who can be a bit unorganized with her legs let out a full body dog-shake while at the trot, got her legs tangled, slipped slightly in the mud and knocked the Glove loose of her hoof in one stride. In the next stride stepped on the shell which was still attached by the gaiter to her ankle and tore it clean off.
On top of the slick footing and my mare interfering, I had also just trimmed her so the boot wasn’t quite as snug of a fit as usual. I could have done a lot of things differently to prevent this from happening. But I didn’t so now to fix it!
I started by removing what was left of the gaiter from the shell – I removed the 3 screws and put them and their washers away neatly so I would know where to find them when I was ready to put it all back together.
Next I drove my pieces needing to be repaired into town to the local cobbler and explained what I needed done and left them in his capable hands to be put back together. If you don’t have someone capable of stitching things back together for you, EasyCare carries all the replacement part you may need and everything is easily ordered off their website.
When I returned, I handed him my payment and he handed me this – good as new!
I got all my screws and washers back out and set to work piecing the whole things back together.
It really couldn’t get much easier than this! Replace the screws and washers as you found them and you’re back in business.
Next collected your trusty steed, mallet those boots on their hooves and re-evaluate fit before you ride off into the sunset.
Now they still don’t look as tight as they could be – especially the hoof on the right hand side of the picture. So make a plan to ensure a tighter fit and better boot retention so we’re not fixing gaiters ever again.
I plan to start using athletic tape on my horse’s hooves underneath the glove shells as is documented in this EasyCare Video – “Applying Athletic Tape to an Easyboot Glove”.
I also ordered some power straps for my gloves for an even tighter fit and I learned about how to properly install them in this other EasyCare Video – “Applying a Power Strap to an Easyboot Glove”.
And now we ride! Happy trails and happy booting!
