When Martha Olivo was 13 years old she trimmed her first equine, a foundered Shetland pony. This was the beginning of Martha’s lifelong vocation of caring for horses and their hooves. The pony was the first of many Martha would encounter that had hoof disease.

 A mixed herd of 80 horses and ponies of assorted sizes and breeds came into her life when Martha was only 14. Martha took on the task of trimming their hooves and trained some of the horses for riding and driving. 
 Soon after she began to trim hooves and train horses for the public. Martha took a short farrier course at a local junior college when she was 19 years old, in order to learn to shoe her own horse. Encouraged by other horseowners, it was not long before Martha added horseshoeing to her list of services.

In the mid 80’s, Martha was introduced to the concept of communicative horsemanship. She learned how to understand the horses’ body language, and how to influence their behavior by “speaking” their language. This was part of her ascension into the natural horse/hoof care movement.  Martha’s intuition was sparked to awareness as she developed her feel and timing for the horses. She successfully integrated communicative horse handling into her farrier work. 

In 1994, Martha attended a Gene Ovnicek presentation, where she saw her first hoof dissection. This is when she learned about the frog to overall length proportions of the sole. This was a major turning point in Martha’s perception of the hoof. 

In order to qualify for a job with the Vision Quest juvenile rehabilitation program, Martha was certified as a farrier in 1995 through the North Texas Farrier School. She traveled and worked on one their wagon trains for 7 months. Martha was responsible for the care of 40 working horses and mules as they made their way from Ohio to the Texas/Mexico border in fall of ’95 until spring of ’96. Martha honed her horse handling skills going down the road as she maintained the traveling herd’s hooves.

After moving back to East Texas in 1997, Martha met Frank Orza and Mary Winn, creators and producers of the Horsesneaker™ hoof boots.  Through them she become aware of the inherent but generally disregarded pitfalls of horseshoeing and other traditional horse care practices that cause hooves to deteriorate.  Upon learning this, Martha decided to quit shoeing all together and took up “barefoot” hoof care. Soon, she was busy trimming 300+ horses a month for her East Texas clientele. 

In 1999, Martha committed to expanding her knowledge of the hoof and sharing it with others on a global basis. It was then that she also adopted a “gypsy” lifestyle. This allowed her to move about quickly and freely as she gained and dispensed knowledge of the horse’s inherent nature and of their incredible hooves.

Martha was dissecting cadaver hooves by this time in order to better understand their inner workings. To date, Martha has performed and attended over 3,000 dissections.

Martha met Dr. Hiltrud Strasser in May of 2000 and enrolled in the controversial German veterinarian’s Hoof Care Specialist Course. Martha was certified in May of 2001 as a Strasser Hoof Care Specialist.  

From her accumulated knowledge and experience, Martha gleaned the best information from all of her sources. She refined the information and condensed it into what is now known as MO Standard Hoof Care™. 

Martha has traveled to over 36 states and 4 foreign countries in the last six years to learn more about hoof care and to share hoof care information with others. She has taught hundreds of "Hoof Grooms™" from all over the world to care for their own horses’ hooves. 

Many of Martha’s Hoof Grooms™ serve as Hoof Care Mentors, as they help others understand and care for hooves. 

Many of Martha’s students have become successful independent hoof care providers and/or hoof care instructors.