When Paula Morch and her husband moved to Prince Albert, Sask., eight months ago, she made a surprising discovery.
They had just doubled the number of farriers from Saskatchewan who belong to the 250-member Western Canadian Farriers Association (WCFA).
And that, she said, despite the fact that Saskatchewan has the third largest horse herd in the country.
Morch, who is a graduate of the farrier training program at Kwantlen University College in Langley, B.C., said the problem is that many people don’t appreciate the importance of belonging to a professional organization that provides education through clinics, seminars and communication with others in the profession.
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“Saskatchewan has to get out of the mode of thinking that just anyone can do this,” she said.
To promote this effort, Morch helped organize a recent farriers demonstration in Gruenthal, Sask., which she hopes will be the first of many and encourage more of the province’s farriers to join the WCFA.
There are no laws in North America that prohibit horse owners from shoeing their own horses or hiring an unregistered farrier. In the United Kingdom, it is illegal for unregistered farriers to shoe horses.
“(The American Farrier’s Association) has been fighting for the last couple years over that particular issue because it’s almost impossible to make that happen,” Morch said.
She acknowledged that it would be hard to bring in educational requirements now.
“I believe in education … but making everyone certified would be very difficult.”
Olds College in Olds, Alta., offers a one-year course in advanced farrier science that costs $8,200, including tools and supplies.
Program co-ordinator Dean Sinclair said the college supports legislation that would require North American farriers to be registered.
A licence is needed to cut hair but not to shoe a horse, he added, even though a bad shoeing can be far more painful for a horse than a bad haircut can be for a person.
Attempts at farrier legislation in North America have so far been unsuccessful.
Nathalie Tokateloff, a clinical associate at the University of Saskatchewan’s large animal clinical sciences department, said she agreed that mandatory registration would be good for consistency but was concerned about what would happen to farriers who don’t have formal education but do a good job.
“We do need more good farriers, and we need a way to insure they are good farriers, but that doesn’t mean that someone who isn’t certified doesn’t necessarily know what they’re doing,” Tokateloff said.
“There should be some kind of exam so they can skip the training if they’ve been doing it well for years.”
The WCFA has five levels of certification: intern; certified; certified tradesmen; journeyman and specialty endorsement, which allows a farrier to treat a horse that has specific foot ailments.
Experienced farriers with no formal education can take the WCFA’s internship exam, which Sinclair said shouldn’t pose a problem for experienced farriers, even if they have no formal education.
Morch hopes the events she is planning in Saskatchewan will encourage more provincial farriers to register.
“If Saskatchewan wants to become buoyant in the future of the horse industry, (farriers) need to upgrade their education, and everyone seems to think that’s a bad thing, and it’s not, it’s a very good thing, for the health of the equine.”
