Rolling Dog Farm Blog

Our farrier, Rich Boyle of Simms, Montana, was out here last week trimming the horses’ hooves.  That meant lots of hoof trimmings lying about in the pastures and corrals.  There’s something about these hoof trimmings that dogs just love as chew toys.  Now, most of the dogs stay in our fenced dog yards and don’t have access to the pastures and corrals, but one of them does get out and about, and that’s Dolly. 

She can’t get enough of these things … and that sets up a contest of wills.  We don’t let her chew on them because they aren’t sanitary and we worry about sharp pieces breaking off and getting swallowed.  So Dolly knows — we’ve been through this a lot in seven years at the ranch — that hoof trimmings are a no-no.  Which makes them all the more desirable, if you know what I mean.

Dolly can’t help herself, though.  You’d think, having found one of these forbidden hoof trimmings, she’d slink off behind the barn to quietly chew on it.  But no, she is compelled to walk around with it in her mouth, as if she’s flaunting it.  She’ll walk right up to me with the dang thing in her mouth … and yet she knows I am going to make her drop it.  Thus the look on her face in the photo above.  Judging from the gravel dust and grit on her nose, it appears she had been rooting around for this particular treasure, like a pig hunting for truffles.  And just like the pigs who aren’t allowed to eat the truffles they find, Dolly had to surrender the hoof trimming, too.