Eye sight tests for horses??

[jayvee]

Does such a thing exsist??? Can a vet tell if your horse is long or short sighted? Can horses be long or short sighted like us anyway?????

I only wonder cos does anyone ever consider their horses eye sight if it was a jumper for eg and had trouble with jumping, or a very spooky horse? when the reason is because of it's eye sight?? ..How do vets find this out?

We emphasize on all the usual problems we encounter, like "it won't jump because the bit or saddle may be the cause" but does anyone consider eye sight ever being the problem??

I do vaguely remember a showjumping horse on the TV wearing a contact lense in one of it's eyes!!!

Can anyone shed any more light on this subject, I am curious

 

[Enfys]

I remember hearing about the horse with the contact lens, if I am right I think it was more to do with correcting the balance of light and dark in his case.

I don't know about eye tests for long or short sightedness, but having lost a horse (who got very spooky, wouldn't jump etc, etc) because of cataracts I would strongly advise anyone who automatically has backs, teeth, tack blah, blah,blah, checked to get eyes done too. It wouldn't have saved my horse either way, but once I found out about his eyesight, or lack of it, the reasons for a lot of his behavioural problems became obvious.