possible sight problem anyone help please

[beaconhorse]

Friend has 3 childrens ponies one is a 12 year old welsh pony who has suddenly started paddling with back legs when tacked up, also started really spooking at shadows of any sort, he did some trotting poles the other day and totally over reacted and leapt one as tho it was a jump (doesn't normally) Vet found a small Cataract but said it was not affecting his sight. She wonders if the paddling is worry about being ridden

Are there any kind of exercises that would help her find out if there is a problem with his sight

or

anyone had similar problem

 

[Box_Of_Frogs]

A very, very basic test for sight (no refinement at all) is the startle test. Hold the pony in a head collar in a safe place and bring your hand FAST up to each eye in turn, as if you were going to punch him hard in the eye but stop short by an inch. The pony should exhibit the startle reflex, ie jump out of his skin, thinking you are gonna sock him one! Try it on both eyes but leave a gap between and I'd defo give a polo afterwards to show you meant no harm! This is VERY VERY crude but may give you an indication of whether there is a loss of vision. If it helps further, after my ned had to have one eye removed, he had some problems on his blind side until he learned to work stuff out. One of the biggest things was if you put his feed bowl so that his blind side was too close to a wall, every time he lifted his head he would bang it on the wall, not knowing it was there coz he couldn't see it. With appropriate care to not injure your pony, you could try to rig something up like this. But TBH if your vet says the cataract shouldn't be a problem, then maybe your friend needs to do some more detective work. I didn't like the sound of the back legs paddling. Could there be some spinal column damage or neurological damage? Any reason why ponio would be starting to worry about being ridden? Has friend tried pony with a different, sympathetic rider? Same result? A worry.