Collapsing when picking out feet

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kirstyhoneyb

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When my friend is picking out her mares feet she sometimes almost colapses. Its when doing her front feet, she kind of leans forward and the front leg that she is still stood on bends slightly, if my friend lets her put the lifted leg down and the horse moves and stands again she seems ok.
Its not all the time so could it just be a balance thing?
 
It is the mare evading having her feet picked out.. most horses do it at some point.. they lean onto the leg you are holding until you feel they will fall and then you drop the leg.. it is rude.

Lou x
 
Presumably she is used to having them picked out?

I only ask because my mare used to do this when i first got her, i dont think she had been handled much, she didnt understand picking feet up and used to collapse a bit sometimes when having her feet picked out. Once she got the hang of having to stand with one foot up she was ok, but it took a bit of time!
 
UnaB said:
Presumably she is used to having them picked out?QUOTE]

Yes she's used to having them picked out.
Thinking about it, I think she only does it when my friend brings her in from the field for her tea. So she could just be being impatient wanting her tea!?
Click to expand...
 
thanks everyone who has replied.

Today we had the farrier out to the yard. I stood with my friends mare as my friend was at work. When he was trimming her fronts she starting leaning backwards at quite an angle. She was fine when he had her feet on the stand thing.
Do you still think its her being impatient (it was near her tea time again) or could it be something more?
 
Nailed said:
It is the mare evading having her feet picked out.. most horses do it at some point.. they lean onto the leg you are holding until you feel they will fall and then you drop the leg.. it is rude.

Lou x
Click to expand...

Actually not always - "rude" is the easy interpretation I'm afraid

I spoke with Prof R Bowker who did some studies on blood perfusion on the loaded hoof and found that in a hoof on concrete - loaded by lifting the oposite leg, the perfusion dropped to nothing - resulting in a level of ischaemic pain and discomfort for the horse.

When he put a washcloth under the loaded hoof the perfsion was almost normal - it just needed the yielding surface.

So armed with this information, I puat a pad of camping mat material under the loaded hoof of a horse I was having trouble - same kind of thing - and it helped greatly - no folding and no snatching.

So now if I have a horse like this I do them on the grass - like you would a shiverer.
 
My youngster used to do it i thought wrongly he was being rude, but i got his back checked and he had a few issues, once put right he never did it again.
 
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