Crazy coincidence to find this within a couple of days of taking a deep dive about the neurological details of this very thing. A horses legs have an interesting story that parallels what we know about our own physiology. Most of us have the experience of a physician tapping us on the patellar ligament to illicit a subtle reflex kick. That kick response isn't a process generated at the knee or brain, but comes from a reflex arc that occurs in the lumbar spine. Likewise, if we touch something hot and jerk our hand away, that action happens at a neural pathway in the upper thoracic spine. We become conscious of it and process what just happened much later. When we're handling horses' feet/legs, we're overcoming some very strong mechanisms of self protection, some of which can never be completely trained away because of this hard wired reflex arc. People are occasionally injured by a kick from gentle, well trained horses by accidentally surprising a leg before the horse has a chance to think about it. In general, horses don't think about their legs any more than we're thinking about our feet right now. Are your shoes comfortable? Socks? Too hot, too cold? None of this is in your conscious space until I pose these questions. This is why your process here is so important. Being able to build a connection between the horse's conscious mind with the external stimulus of handling legs and feet is actually quite amazing and an underappreciated accomplishment. A horse has to overcome a lot of instincts and hard wiring to cooperate.
Crazy coincidence to find this within a couple of days of taking a deep dive about the neurological details of this very thing. A horses legs have an interesting story that parallels what we know about our own physiology. Most of us have the experience of a physician tapping us on the patellar ligament to illicit a subtle reflex kick. That kick response isn't a process generated at the knee or brain, but comes from a reflex arc that occurs in the lumbar spine. Likewise, if we touch something hot and jerk our hand away, that action happens at a neural pathway in the upper thoracic spine. We become conscious of it and process what just happened much later. When we're handling horses' feet/legs, we're overcoming some very strong mechanisms of self protection, some of which can never be completely trained away because of this hard wired reflex arc. People are occasionally injured by a kick from gentle, well trained horses by accidentally surprising a leg before the horse has a chance to think about it. In general, horses don't think about their legs any more than we're thinking about our feet right now. Are your shoes comfortable? Socks? Too hot, too cold? None of this is in your conscious space until I pose these questions. This is why your process here is so important. Being able to build a connection between the horse's conscious mind with the external stimulus of handling legs and feet is actually quite amazing and an underappreciated accomplishment. A horse has to overcome a lot of instincts and hard wiring to cooperate.
Good info. Thanks.
I am currently doing this on my mare. I do the head and proceed to each leg. Great job
Thanks