Feet Feud

My horse has always been awesome about lifting his feet, but now he’s getting crabby about it. Some days he just won’t let me pick up his front feet at all. Any ideas on how to break this bad habit before it spreads to the back feet?
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Q: My horse Lucky has started a behavior problem when we handle his feet. He's always been awesome about lifting his feet, but now he's getting crabby about it. It started when he went lame on one front leg because of a foot abscess. Once it burst open, he got much better, but it still bothered him. The vet said it would just take time to heal. So we cleaned his foot every day, soaked it in a tub, and packed and wrapped it. Lucky would let us lift that foot up and work on it okay for a couple of minutes. Then he would get agitated and pull away.

Lucky has been behaving a little better when we work on his bad foot. But now he has started being uncooperative on the other front foot. He's even worse than on the sore foot. He walks on it fine, so we don't think there is anything wrong with that one. Some days he just won't let me pick it up at all. Any ideas on how to break him of this before the habit spreads to the back too?

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A: One explanation for Lucky's behavior change with both of his front feet, but not the hind feet, could stem from the discomfort in the front abscess foot. That would certainly explain why he was and still is reluctant to lift the opposite front foot. Lifting an opposite foot makes him bear additional weight on the sore foot. I would guess that his sore foot, even though it's getting better, might still be uncomfortable for the extra weight-bearing when the opposite front foot is lifted

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Written by:

Sue M. McDonnell, PhD, is a certified applied animal behaviorist and the founding head of the equine behavior program at the University of Pennsylvania’s School of Veterinary Medicine. She is also the author of numerous books and articles about horse behavior and management.

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