PLUMPUDDING wrote:They certainly look like your hoof shears, but what a steelworker who lived on a council estate and grew veg in the back garden would be doing with hoof shears is anyone's guess.
Cutting steel with them, probably. Certainly they're up to the job. I don't suppose for a minute they were misappropriated.
Have you tried using them as secateurs? You'll find that that straight blade doesn't make a fist of cutting plant material, unless it is extremely soft, which is why secateurs are curved, or wiggly like the old parrot bills.