Faking lameness

ester said:
She was suggesting that a horse withou shoes with an optimal diet should have sufficient hoof protection to prevent bruising whatever the terrain. So if it is bruising then his feet aren't as good as they could/should be and the main way to better feet is diet.

Also, because of their tougher soles remember that abscesses often come out of unshod horses at the coronary band - which can take longer/be more intermittent/not findable with a knife very easily.
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It depends very much on the terrain - horses that live and work on a sharp sand environment as is found in many arena surfaces have the sole sandpapered away by the surface.

Our racehorses all developed thin soles after the warmup track was re sanded.
 
Tnavas said:
That would tell me straight away that the neck vertebrae were out of alignment as the muscles from the neck and under the girth area are the ones prone to being tender. Hence the reaction to being girthed up and the reason many horses fuss and fret when being tacked up.
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Nope. He was thoroughly checked - absolutely nothing wrong. And if he wasn't going in the school, it stopped straight away. He may have had some sort of remembered pain, but there was absolutely nothing wrong with him at the point that he was doing this with his previous owner, and after long and expensive investigation by vet, then physio, chiro, osteo, she even had a flaming horse whisperer out to him, there was nothing.

Behaviour stopped with continual hacking out, then would reappear occasionally when we took him around to the school, then eventually stopped completely once he chilled out.
 
Tnavas said:
It depends very much on the terrain - horses that live and work on a sharp sand environment as is found in many arena surfaces have the sole sandpapered away by the surface.

Our racehorses all developed thin soles after the warmup track was re sanded.
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growth should be proportional to wear regardless of the terrain - unless a change in workload/terrain is made too quickly.
 
Sukistokes2 said:
I would still be concerned, if he was "hopping" lame.

However , sorry to say this but my pony Star used fake lameness. He was a bright clever chap, would open and shut bolts no problems. When you used toget him in he would be fine, once saddled he would limp. You'd get off an turn him out and he would trot off as sound as a pound , ears picked, tail flagged!!!! In the end we used to keep going and he eould just heave a big sign and walk normally.

If your horse is limping in the field I would be more inclined to think he had a brewing abscess or a stone bruise.
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Sounds more like his saddle was causing the lameness. Saddles can easily do that.
 
khalswitz said:
Just wanted to add that I knew a horse who would fake being lame as well. He was sound as a pound except when his girth was done up - then he's go hopping lame. And he would change which front leg he was lame on, sometimes within a few minutes. He would continue this in the school for the first few minutes, then settle, or if going for a hack in company would stop as soon as he realised we were going up the drive.

He had THOUSANDS of pounds spent on trying to find a problem, X-rays, MRI, scintigraphy, thermal imaging, nerve blocking, stomach scoped, blood tested, but the sod would only ever go 'lame' when his girth was done up.

He was given to me by his owner as she absolutely despaired when the vets said there was nothing wrong with him, and within four months of us hacking him out all the time so that he strengthened up and enjoyed being ridden, he completely stopped the behaviour. He went on to do some showing and low level dressage with me, then my sister took him on and evented him, absolutely fine.

I have never met another horse like him, and no idea what may have taught him this, but it was very weird.
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Obviously made sore by the girth/saddle.
 
Wagtail said:
Obviously made sore by the girth/saddle.
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But he wasn't. Or certainly wasn't at the time he was showing these behaviours. And I'm afraid if the saddle was what was causing pain, then this wouldn't have stopped after he got going.

Actual pain was totally ruled out after a LONG stay at the referral hospital. The specialist vet suggested that, if the seat of the 'lameness' wasn't continually changing, then he might have suggested a mechanical problem, but he believed (and so did all of the othe professionals who looked at him) that it was a mental thing.
 
Often with saddle/girth soreness, it is most severe on tacking up and first riding. Then the pain wears off and becomes bearable. My horse that had kissing spines showed absolutely no pain response from any palpation. Infact, the condition was missed by two vets, a physio and a chiro. All pronounced his back as being strong and pain free. Yet he would intermittently freak out after girthing. His pain was caused by trapped nerves. The pain was sudden and shooting and completely undetectable on examination.

It could be that with the horse you describe, he was quite comfortable going in straight lines when hacking, but being asked to go in circles was uncomfortable for him under saddle.
 
Wagtail said:
Often with saddle/girth soreness, it is most severe on tacking up and first riding. Then the pain wears off and becomes bearable. My horse that had kissing spines showed absolutely no pain response from any palpation. Infact, the condition was missed by two vets, a physio and a chiro. All pronounced his back as being strong and pain free. Yet he would intermittently freak out after girthing. His pain was caused by trapped nerves. The pain was sudden and shooting and completely undetectable on examination.

It could be that with the horse you describe, he was quite comfortable going in straight lines when hacking, but being asked to go in circles was uncomfortable for him under saddle.
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He x-rayed clear, and showed nothing on the thermal scans or scintigraphy for his back - his back was where they looked into most detail as he was showing problems on either front leg. I'm afraid I believe the three regular vets and team of specialists at the vet school, not to mention physios, chiros and osteo.

Also, saddle pain and kissing spines are two very different things. I can understand nerve firing from kissing spines being hard to pinpoint, but saddle pain not so much - especially when two different saddlers were happy with the saddle, and vets were happy there was no problem.

You don't have to believe me if you are adamant not to, but it was proof to me that yes, horses can 'fake' lameness, especially as he settled down perfectly fine and was schooling well after four months, including jumping etc, with no problem ever having been found.
 
ester said:
growth should be proportional to wear regardless of the terrain - unless a change in workload/terrain is made too quickly.
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Unfortunately that is not so! These horses, often 100 of them in training all had problems with thin soles. Sharp sand is very abrasive and when worked on this surface daily their soles wore away faster than they could grow.

Another case, the other riding school in the area had to shoe all their horses behind as they had surfaced their arena with sharp sand. The school horses knocked out the toes of their hind feet whereas my school had bark as a surface and none of mine needed hind shoes.
 
khalswitz said:
He x-rayed clear, and showed nothing on the thermal scans or scintigraphy for his back - his back was where they looked into most detail as he was showing problems on either front leg. I'm afraid I believe the three regular vets and team of specialists at the vet school, not to mention physios, chiros and osteo.

Also, saddle pain and kissing spines are two very different things. I can understand nerve firing from kissing spines being hard to pinpoint, but saddle pain not so much - especially when two different saddlers were happy with the saddle, and vets were happy there was no problem.

You don't have to believe me if you are adamant not to, but it was proof to me that yes, horses can 'fake' lameness, especially as he settled down perfectly fine and was schooling well after four months, including jumping etc, with no problem ever having been found.
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No, I absolutely believe you about everything you say. The thing I struggle with is that a horse can have the reasoning to think that if he pretends to be lame he won't have to go in the school. I just don't think horses have the fore thought to do that. I think there would be a reason for this lameness. As my vet once told me, 'just because we do every test under the sun and find nothing wrong, does not mean that there is absolutely nothing wrong. It may just be that we haven't been able to find it.'
 
I can't pin down one specific one atm, but there are many anecdotes on record of horses during WW1 faking lameness. They had veterinary quarters for ailing horses behind the front lines. Many a sound horse would come 'limping' out - they knew where they were being led out too....
 
Wagtail said:
No, I absolutely believe you about everything you say. The thing I struggle with is that a horse can have the reasoning to think that if he pretends to be lame he won't have to go in the school. I just don't think horses have the fore thought to do that. I think there would be a reason for this lameness. As my vet once told me, 'just because we do every test under the sun and find nothing wrong, does not mean that there is absolutely nothing wrong. It may just be that we haven't been able to find it.'
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I don't for a minute think he reasoned that he could pretend to be lame and not have to work - I agree there. I think the points made above about remembered pain could be very applicable - I don't know his history prior to when he came onto our yard, other than that he had been barefoot, used for endurance. He could well have previously had problems in the school and associated it with pain - who knows. But I do know that he was sound, with no pain, and yet he would present as if he was when he was saddled up to be schooled.

Continuing to hack him out was decided on only because we found nothing else - I wasn't convinced he wasn't unrideable - but when it cleared up itself over time and as he settled in, it confirmed what we'd thought - that it was a mental thing rather than a physical thing.

However, I've never met another case like that at all, and before him I'd have agreed that any horse that was lame had to be in pain. Even after him I'd still go through all that investigation before deciding he wasn't. But I would say it is 'very rare' rather than 'impossible' for a horse to 'fake' lameness, and even then I wouldn't use 'fake' to mean the same as a human would fake something.
 
I'm not sure TBs in training ( can be compared to the OPs situation. plenty of horses do work on sand daily without sole thinning and I was just expanding on Nugget's post for the OP so that she could understand it.
 
A horse's gait will only alter because of discomfort or inability to move as before. The pain or limitation isn't necessarily in the limbs, it could originate anywhere (mouth/ back/ pelvis/ guts/ etc), but it will be genuine. A horse won't decide to limp if there's not a problem because it is easier for it to move in its natural gait, that's how their minds work.

A horse that starts off lame then becomes sounds with exercise has a problem. A horse that is sound in straight lines but lame on a circle has a problem. A horse who is sound on a surface but lame on hard ground has a problem. A horse who's lameness comes and goes with apparently no pattern has a problem. You just haven't found it yet.
 
Flame_ said:
A horse's gait will only alter because of discomfort or inability to move as before. The pain or limitation isn't necessarily in the limbs, it could originate anywhere (mouth/ back/ pelvis/ guts/ etc), but it will be genuine. A horse won't decide to limp if there's not a problem because it is easier for it to move in its natural gait, that's how their minds work.

A horse that starts off lame then becomes sounds with exercise has a problem. A horse that is sound in straight lines but lame on a circle has a problem. A horse who is sound on a surface but lame on hard ground has a problem. A horse who's lameness comes and goes with apparently no pattern has a problem. You just haven't found it yet.
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Completely agree.

And those horses that have now somehow got through it and work fine now, have obviously overcome their problem. Sometimes it is just a mild stiffness or weakness and work improves it. Sometimes they have remembered pain, but generally this is shown as sudden fear reaction rather than lameness or stiffness.
 
Wagtail said:
Completely agree.

And those horses that have now somehow got through it and work fine now, have obviously overcome their problem. Sometimes it is just a mild stiffness or weakness and work improves it. Sometimes they have remembered pain, but generally this is shown as sudden fear reaction rather than lameness or stiffness.
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But don't you think a sudden, extreme, hopping lameness that can then disappear strides later can be just as much of a 'fear reaction' as a rear or kicking out or spooking?
 
khalswitz said:
But don't you think a sudden, extreme, hopping lameness that can then disappear strides later can be just as much of a 'fear reaction' as a rear or kicking out or spooking?
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Yes, I am sure that some horses may take a couple of tentative steps if they expect pain but lots of genuine pain issues work off after a few minutes. I have a stress fracture in my foot, and when it's bad the first few steps I take after first getting to my feet are agony. I can hardly bear any weight. Then it completely goes after less than a minute. Sometimes only three or four strides. I expect it is very similar for a horse with a broken pedal bone in some cases.
 
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Wagtail said:
Yes, it can be expectation of pain, though I would question why it only happened when tacked up. Lots of pain issues work off after a few minutes. I have a stress fracture in my foot, and when it's bad the first few steps I take after first getting to my feet are agony. I can hardly bear any weight. Then it completely goes after less than a minute. Sometimes only three or four strides. I expect it is very similar for a horse with a broken pedal bone in some cases.
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I wouldn't doubt that it could be. But when all else is ruled out, as it was for our lad, then you can reasonably come to the conclusion that it is a mental problem rather than a physical one.

I agree that in the vast majority of cases it is physical, but in this particularly horse's case it was not.
 
Wagtail said:
No, I absolutely believe you about everything you say. The thing I struggle with is that a horse can have the reasoning to think that if he pretends to be lame he won't have to go in the school. I just don't think horses have the fore thought to do that. I think there would be a reason for this lameness. As my vet once told me, 'just because we do every test under the sun and find nothing wrong, does not mean that there is absolutely nothing wrong. It may just be that we haven't been able to find it.'
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Why would this involve reasoning? It is simply learned behaviour. A particular sequence of physical actions results in pain. The instinctive reaction is to modify behaviour to limit that pain. If the pain then goes away, there is absolutely no reason why the behaviour that limited the pain (e.g. limping to avoid putting weight on that foot) should not continue after the cause of the pain has been removed.

Surely that is simple logic. The owner hits his horse with a stick. The next time the owner attempts to do that again, horse anticipates what comes next (i.e. pain) and takes evasive action and avoids the blow. It has learnt a behaviour and will now (probably) flinch at any sudden movement. I suggest that the mechanisms involved are similar. It does not require reasoning.
 
Dry Rot said:
Why would this involve reasoning? It is simply learned behaviour. A particular sequence of physical actions results in pain. The instinctive reaction is to modify behaviour to limit that pain. If the pain then goes away, there is absolutely no reason why the behaviour that limited the pain (e.g. limping to avoid putting weight on that foot) should not continue after the cause of the pain has been removed.

Surely that is simple logic. The owner hits his horse with a stick. The next time the owner attempts to do that again, horse anticipates what comes next (i.e. pain) and takes evasive action and avoids the blow. It has learnt a behaviour and will now (probably) flinch at any sudden movement. I suggest that the mechanisms involved are similar. It does not require reasoning.
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I understand what you are saying. A horse could learn to avoid pain by limping. When the pain is gone it may continue to limp as it is anticipating pain, (though I personally have never encountered this, and it goes against all I have been taught about a prey animal trying to avoid looking lame at all costs, I am not doubting that others have). But what we are talking about in this thread (the OP) is a horse 'putting it on', 'faking lameness' in order to avoid work. A horse that ONLY limps when it is being brought in or had a headcollar put on. That would require quite a bit of reasoning on the part of the horse. It would have to think 'oh, my owner is bringing me in to work, better put on a limp because last time I did that she put me back out in the field and I didn't have to work.'

This is what the original post was about. That is the question the OP is asking. 'Could my horse be 'faking lameness'? And I say 'no'.
 
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Wagtail said:
I understand what you are saying. A horse could learn to avoid pain by limping. When the pain is gone it may continue to limp as it is anticipating pain, (though I personally have never encountered this, and it goes against all I have been taught about a prey animal trying to avoid looking lame at all costs, I am not doubting that others have). But what we are talking about in this thread (the OP) is a horse 'putting it on', 'faking lameness' in order to avoid work. A horse that ONLY limps when it is being brought in or had a headcollar put on. That would require quite a bit of reasoning on the part of the horse. It would have to think 'oh, my owner is bringing me in to work, better put on a limp because last time I did that she put me back out in the field and I didn't have to work.'

This is what the original post was about. That is the question the OP is asking. 'Could my horse be 'faking lameness'? And I say 'no'.
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If a horse can reason that it would not like to be caught because it is associating hard work with the person catching them (and this DEFINITELY happens - I used to work backing youngsters and how many times they started being silly to catch for a period with me, and me only, after they started work I can't count), then why can you not think that they COULD make an association regarding 'faking' a lameness?

My old horse learned with his previous owner that if he stopped dead and reared out hacking, then she would take him home and turn him back out. That was NOT a pleasure to correct. So why does every behaviour *but* lameness fit that model?

Now I am playing devil's advocate here a bit with this one, but it is interesting to consider...
 
Who knows, really? Without getting into the mind of a horse, we will never know. I have seen lots of horses refuse to be caught because they don't want to work. They associate being caught with work. It's a simple learnt response. But that is not a difficult thing to sus out. What is different in 'faking lameness' is that it requires 'acting' on the part of the horse. It has to actually 'pretend' to do something. That requires imagination and acting skill. Now it could well be that one day we find out that horses are capable of that kind of thing. I must admit, I am constantly surprised by the level of intelligence of horses and other animals, so I may well be proved wrong here!
 
Wagtail said:
I understand what you are saying. A horse could learn to avoid pain by limping. When the pain is gone it may continue to limp as it is anticipating pain, (though I personally have never encountered this, and it goes against all I have been taught about a prey animal trying to avoid looking lame at all costs, I am not doubting that others have). But what we are talking about in this thread (the OP) is a horse 'putting it on', 'faking lameness' in order to avoid work. A horse that ONLY limps when it is being brought in or had a headcollar put on. That would require quite a bit of reasoning on the part of the horse. It would have to think 'oh, my owner is bringing me in to work, better put on a limp because last time I did that she put me back out in the field and I didn't have to work.'

This is what the original post was about. That is the question the OP is asking. 'Could my horse be 'faking lameness'? And I say 'no'.
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So the horses in the Spanish Riding School behave as they do because they can reason? I don't think so.
 
The horse is lame, poulticing isn't working. I don't agree with poulticing indefinitely - if the abcess hasn't started to shift after 3/4 days soaking & wet pouticing, I would be looking for other causes. Thrush/poor saddle fitting/ muscle/bone damage etc.
 
blazingsaddles said:
The horse is lame, poulticing isn't working. I don't agree with poulticing indefinitely - if the abcess hasn't started to shift after 3/4 days soaking & wet pouticing, I would be looking for other causes. Thrush/poor saddle fitting/ muscle/bone damage etc.
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Abscesses can prat about for weeks, this horse's issue could well still be an abscess. Another one here baffled by the Spanish Riding School relevance.
 
Flame_ said:
Abscesses can prat about for weeks, this horse's issue could well still be an abscess. Another one here baffled by the Spanish Riding School relevance.
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I disagree with the continued use of wet pouticing if an abcess is suspected. Testers have been used, holes have been made & no evidence of pus has appeared. I would be looking for a different cause of lameness.
 
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