The saying goes, 'no hoof, no horse' and this is so true. It was only when I began looking after a horse on part loan back in 2010 for three years that I completely believed these words when he was having problem after problem with his feet. 

The hoof of a horse is an amazing structure that is both complex and fragile and looking after them properly is an absolute must. It's incredible to think that something with such a small surface area is strong enough to carry all the weight of such a large animal.

The inside of the hoof is something I've glanced at before in books and online but isn't something I've actually sat and read about in detail. This project is enabling me to take the time to do this and I'm finding it very insightful. I've found some basic information about the anatomy of the hoof here which has been really helpful in understanding how it all works. 

Today's drawing is of a cross-section diagram of the hoof and I haven't even included the vast network of the vascular blood supply 😱 I've used a regular pencil to sketch out the outlines of the hoof which you can see below and then used coloured pencils to show the different areas. I've not worked with coloured pencils for some time and although I only used them in a simple way today (no real colour mixing), I quite enjoyed digging them out. I remember a time when they were the only media, along with graphite pencil, that I used to use. Perhaps I'll dabble with them again soon. 🤔