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January Drop-In 2017

Animal Print Shoes

Goal: To link Shoes: Pleasure and Pain exhibition with natural history/ANC.

Process: Visitors will have the chance to create their own sneaker by tracing a template onto colored paper. After cutting out a heel, sole, tongue, and toe, visitors will assemble the pieces to form a finished shoe using tacky glue. Details such as an animal print can be added with markers and colored pencils. A variety of ribbons will be available to serve as shoe laces. Younger visitors can participate by designing their own sneaker on the print-out.

Materials:

Tracing Template: Heel, Sole, Tongue, Toe

Colored Paper

Scissors

Tacky Glue

Tape

Colored Pencils

Permanent markers/ markers

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Hole Puncher

Ribbon

‘Design Your Own Sneaker’ Print-Out

Connections to ANC:

Visitors can investigate what kinds of animals wear shoes. Horses need shoes for the same reason we do. Just like we wear special shoes when we walk, run, and work so do horses. Visitors can also learn more about animals who wear manmade shoes to help their quality of life.

More Information and Resources:

Horse Shoeshttp://wonderopolis.org/wonder/why-do-horses-wear-shoes

Do you like to play games outdoors during picnics? In addition to games such as cornhole and tag, you might have also played a game that challenges you to toss a curved piece of metal a long distance toward a metal spike. What are we talking about? Horseshoes, of course!

That curved piece of metal you throw, known as a horseshoe, might also hang on a wall of your house, since the horseshoe has been considered a symbol

of good luck for ages. What we often forget in the midst of thinking of horseshoes as lucky charms and game pieces is that these curved pieces of metal are actually important and practical tools.

What kind of tools are they? Just ask a horse. They're shoes! Obviously, they look quite different than the shoes humans wear, but that's to be expected. After all, wouldn't a horse look funny wearing tennis shoes? Horses don't even play tennis!

But have you ever wondered why horses even wear shoes? After all, it's not a common occurrence on the farm. Here on the Wonderopolis farm, we have pigs, geese, cows, sheep, and goats, in addition to horses, and guess what? None of the other animals wear shoes!

So what's so special about horses? To answer that question, we have to start with the hoof. Horses are large, strong animals that are able to run quickly and do lots of work on the farm. To

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help protect their legs and provide shock absorbency when their heavy bodies move, horses have thick, tough hooves.

Horse hooves are made of a tough protein called keratin. It's the same tough protein that your hair and fingernails are made of. In horse hooves, though, keratin exists in multiple, thick layers to make hooves exceptionally strong.

Like your hair and fingernails, horse hooves keep growing all the time. In fact, horses grow the equivalent of a new hoof about once each year. The first people to ride and farm with horses realized over 2,000 years ago that hard work wore down horse hooves faster than they could grow.

To alleviate problems from worn hooves, horseshoes were invented. Thin, metal horseshoes attached to hooves help to slow down the rate at which the hooves wear down. They also provide additional shock absorbency, as well as added traction to help horses to walk, run, and work with more confidence.

Today, a professional known as a farrier puts horseshoes on. Horseshoes can be made of many materials, including steel, aluminum, and even titanium. A farrier customizes the fit of each horseshoe to fit each hoof as perfectly as possible.

Most horseshoes are attached with small nails that go through the horseshoe into the outer part of the hoof. Since there are no nerve endings in the outer section of the hoof, a horse doesn't feel any pain when horseshoes are nailed on. Since their hooves continue to grow even with horseshoes on, a farrier will need to trim, adjust, and reset a horse's shoes on a regular basis.

A New Kind of Horseshoe

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1118252837/megasus-horserunners-for-horses-and-horse-lovers

MEGASUS HORSERUNNERS: The world’s first clippable runners for horses, using our patent pending Mega Lock Fastener Technology.

Megasus Horserunners are the result of long-standing research and study of horse hooves for twenty years. We found the common understanding of the

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functioning of the hoof to be wrong. As early as 1998, we proved the existence of vertical hoof movements and published our first study in the renowned science magazine GEO.

When fixing the hoof with rigid material such as iron, tendons and ligaments will become immobilized - a feeling comparable to wearing a cast. Megasus Horserunners are flexible and allow all 3-dimensional natural hoof movements on any type of terrain. Flexible doesn´t mean soft, as the hoof itself isn´t soft. It means that the hoof protection should only move under the weight of the horse.

Manmade Animal Shoes

http://voices.nationalgeographic.com/2013/09/17/if-the-shoe-fits-animals-that-wear-boots/

Chhouk: The Elephant With a Prosthetic Foot o In 2007, orphaned baby

elephant Chhouk was found wandering alone in the forests of Mondulkiri Province, Cambodia. Badly emaciated and separated from his mother, this endangered Asian elephant had lost his left front foot due to injuries sustained from a poacher's snare. Now his lifestyle has improved with the help of a prosthetic foot. Today, Chhouk is a healthy bull elephant, able to take long walks in the forest, frolic in the pool, and play with his adopted big sister Lucky.

https://www.thedodo.com/meet-chhouk-the-elephant-with-a-prosthetic-foot-1234833339.html

Dung Beetles with Bootso An international team of

scientists recently outfitted dung beetles with silicone boots as part of an experiment to find out how the African insects handle the savannah heat, which can reach 140 degrees Fahrenheit (60 degrees Celsius).

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Dung beetles typically climb on top of moist balls of poo to stay cool, but those with the modern footgear didn’t need to rely on the ball as much as those who went bootless, their study showed. The research was awarded a 2013 Ignobel Prize.

Akemi the Gentoo Penguino Akemi was outfitted with beer cozies after contracting bumblefoot—a bacterial

infection that’s common in captive birds. When the young bird came down with the condition, zookeepers at the Calgary Zoo in Canada encased her flippers in beer cozies to protect her feet until they healed. Fastened with duct tape and zippers, the booties come with an endorsement by Carlsberg—the brewery that donated the material.

Duckie gets shoes to walk on the beach o Duckie is the most fashion-conscious fowl in Southern California. The pet duck

sports boots made of purple neoprene, the material used to fashion wetsuits. Duckie’s owner used to take him on long walks down San Diego’s beaches, wrapping his feet in duct tape to prevent hot sand burns, the Huffington Post reported. But locals were worried that the duct tape would hurt the bird’s feet, not to mention his street cred. So the folks at Surf ‘N’ Sea Custom Wetsuits fitted Duckie with tiny booties—fancy footwear for webbed feet.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/07/18/duck-gets-fitted-for-surf-booties_n_897647.html

Teacup Pigs wear Bootso Accessorize your porker with

some snazzy shoes, and they’ll be the talk of the farm. Teacup pigs are so small when they’re born—weighing only 9 ounces—that they can fit into baby booties. But if you live in Oklahoma, playing dress-up with swine is off-limits.

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According to state law, it’s “illegal to have the hind legs of farm animals in your boots,” The Examiner reported.

Potential Issues and Challenges to Consider:

This Drop-In activity might be more challenging for younger children, to accommodate visitors of all age we will make a ‘Design Your Own Sneaker’ print-out available.