March 10 lecture with shoer Steve Wiberg and Associates

On Monday March 10, the SFP chapter hosted a talk with farrier Steve Wiberg and
his associates, Mike Hayward, Solomon, and Mike's wife, Jennifer. Steve is
the sole shoer for the Ringling Brothers Circus and flies to each of the three
"units" to take care of all their farrier needs.

We had a great time hearing Steve's backstage view into life at the Circus.
Steve and Company provided fascinating stories of orchestrating the hoof care for
more than just horses. Every six weeks, Steve and Mike hop on a plane to provide
shoeing and foot care for sixteen mini horses, a string of Cossack horses, draft
horses, zebras, llamas and a porcupine. We also learned a lot about how the
circuses work - How do they help the animals to stay healthy and happy? What does
it take to develop a liberty act of 16 horses or a dozen lions? How do they move
from location to location, and how close are the 'close calls'.

Steve and Mike were only getting warmed up with the discussion of horses as Mike
was formerly the main elephant trainer for the circus.  With the elephants, a
trainer's work includes foot care - elephants don't wear shoes but they need
regular nail trims to keep their feet healthy. Mike became interested in the
biomechanics of foot care and now works shoeing horses as well. And I thought
shoeing draft horses was a tough job ...

We'd like to thank Steve, Mike, Solomon for sharing their expertise with us.
The display of posters, personal photos and shoeing materials was wonderful and
they're obviously passionate about what they do.  As Steve says .... "We get a
kick out of our work..."!