Part 8

While this condition is hereditary in gregarious families, it is essentially a psychosis in those animals that have been often scared until they are continually on the watch for objects of fear.

Treatment. In the case of horses, the best course is to make the animal familiar with the object of dread; let him look at it, approach it slowly, smell it, feel it with his lips. Never turn away his eyes from it and drive him off, as that confirms the impression of dread, and the object retains ever after its dreaded appearance. In this way timid colts become gradually fearless of umbrellas, city sights, street cars, large vans, flags, music, locomotives and the like,—they become, in the expressive language of the horseman, road-wise. A paddock or yard beside a railroad will soon accustom a timid horse to the cars, and so with other things, experience will remove apprehension.

A more speedy removal of the habit of dread may often be secured by the principle of substitution. The mind of the animal does not readily attend to more than one matter at a time; if, therefore, we can distract the attention in another direction, the object of fear may be virtually ignored until the eye has become habituated to it, and it will be recognized as harmless. Thus it is that a twitch on the upper or lower lip, a binding of the chin in upon the breast by a Yankee bridle may make the horse temporarily heedless of the object of terror. So also in the bolting horse, the obstruction of the breath by a cord with a running noose around the neck, or the sending of an electric current through wire reins and bit will promptly check him in his wild career.

The result is still better when the animal is made to feel his utter helplessness in the hands of man and the futility of any attempt to escape. On this are based the method of Rarey and of his various successors. With fore limbs strapped up, the animal soon exhausts himself in his efforts to disengage them and escape, and lies down completely reconciled to his fate. He may now be accustomed to his objects of terror—the opening and closing of an umbrella, or the waving of a flag over his head, the discharge of a gun close to his ear, the passing of car or locomotive, or any other object of his dread. When allowed to get up he will usually pay no further attention to these things, especially if patted and spoken to encouragingly, and perhaps fed apple or sugar, or something of which he is fond. As far as is consistent with the thoroughness of the subjection, the animal should be treated throughout with the greatest kindness, so as to retain and even increase his trust in man and sense of dependence, while at the same time he is strongly impressed with the futility of resistance to his will. After the animal has been thus taught to bear with equanimity his former objects of terror, he should not be at once allowed to forget them, but by daily experience he should be confirmed in the conviction that they are harmless, and may be met with safety. This should be carried out, if possible, in the hands of the bold and kind operator who has trained him, as, if returned to a timid driver or rider, he may be easily led back into his former habits of blind terror. A similar and even easier resort is the process of turning as given under balking.

Constant hard work, for a time, is an excellent form of accessory treatment, as the plethora developed by overfeeding and temporary idleness begets an irritability and impatience of control which is quite likely to beguile him into his old habits.

In case of runaway, beside the electric and asphyxiating treatment already referred to, the animal may be blinded and quickly brought to a standstill. Movable blinds may be used which habitually stand well out from the eyes, but which may be instantly drawn closely over them by the simple pulling of a cord. The sudden darkness and the impossibility of directing his course, brings an instant realization of the existence of other dangers beside the original bugbear.

BALKING. RESTIVENESS.

Definition. Common in ass and mule. Causes: low condition; overloading; nervousness; sluggish nature; irritable driver; shoulder sores; poor collar; hard bit; sharp or sore maxilla; sores in angle of mouth; mares; racial tendency; going from stable; a psychosis. Symptoms: stands stock still; plunges, but won’t draw; will stamp, bite, kick, rear, buck, crowd on wall; lie down. Breach of warranty: sound price; willfulness; balking of raw horse; diagnosis from nervous disorders; sores, etc. Time in which returnable. Treatment: preventive; curative; distract attention; cord on ear; whiff of ammonia or capsicum; closing nostrils; blindfolding; tying up the fore leg; stroking nose, eyes or ears; tapping flexors of metacarpus; move in circle with head tied to tail; coax to go.

In general terms this has been defined as a refusal to obey. Usually in solipeds it is a refusal to move as directed with a load, under the saddle, or in hand. Though essentially a vice, it may become such a fixed habit that it appears to dominate the will of the animal and may thus be called a psychosis—a mental infirmity.

It is much more common in asses and mules than in horses, in keeping with their more obstinate disposition and too often harsher treatment.

There may be simple refusal to pull. This often comes from overloading, and especially when the animal has been sick or idle, and comes back to work with soft flabby muscles unequal to any violent exertion. After one or two ineffective efforts he sets himself back in the harness refusing to try again and the vice is started. Ordinary loads on bad roads full of holes from which it is impossible to drag the wheels have a similar effect. The danger is greater if the animal is naturally of a nervous or impatient disposition, and if he makes a desperate plunge forward and fails at once to move the load. Such a horse hitched with a slow steady mate is liable to have expended his effort before the latter has had time to join him in the pull, and it becomes impossible to move the load because the two cannot be started simultaneously. The conditions are aggravated if the driver is irritable and by voice and acts further excites the already too excitable animal.

Lesions of various kinds, such as shoulder bruises, abscesses, abrasions and callouses, saddle bruises, callouses, abscesses or fistulæ cause acute pain whenever the effort is made, and render the animal more impatient and indisposed to try again.

Too small a collar or one that fits badly (too narrow, uneven) has often a similar effect.

Among other causes may be named a hard bit harshly used, a sharp edge of the lower jaw bone where the bit rests in the interdental space, sores of the buccal mucous membrane in this situation, and caries or necrosis of the superficial layer of the bone. Also chaps, ulcers, or cancroid of the angle of the mouth.

Young horses, that are as yet imperfectly trained, are more readily driven to balk than old trained animals.

Mares are more subject to the vice than geldings, by reason apparently of a more nervous disposition, but much more because of the excitement to which they are subjected, under the periodic returns of heat.

Pench speaks of rare hereditary cases in which the habit is uncontrollable and the animal incurable.

Friedberger and Fröhner accuse chestnut and sorrel horses as being especially liable to balk.

However started the continued exercise of the act fixes it as an incurable habit a virtual psychosis. Yet the inclination of the animal, his likes and dislikes to a certain extent control its manifestations, thus a horse rarely balks in going home, and shows it mostly in going in the opposite direction, and above all on a new or unknown road.

The Symptoms vary greatly in different cases. One animal stands stock still propping his legs outward and absolutely refusing to budge. This may occur even in the stall when it is attempted to take the animal out. When on the road he is usually willing to turn and go back, but no persuasion by voice or whip can force him forward.

Other horses make ineffective plunges forward but never throw weight enough into the collar to overcome any resistance.

Still others stamp, bite, throw themselves to one side rather than forward, rear up, strike with the fore feet, and if whipped kick with the hind. Some will throw themselves down and struggle in this condition.

Under the saddle the animal may crowd against a wall, rear, kick, buck or even throw himself down in his efforts to dislodge the rider. These violent manifestations however rather belong to vice than mere balking. Trembling, perspiration, frequent rejection of urine, and general acceleration of pulse and breathing may manifest a severe nervous disorder.

Diagnosis. It is often important to pronounce upon the exact nature of this trouble so as to determine whether the seller is responsible for a breach of warranty given or implied. As regards implied warranty a sound price for an animal sold to do a given kind of work implies a mutual understanding that the animal is not physically or psychically incapacitated for such work.

The balking horse is one that obstinately refuses to perform a piece of work for which his physical condition seems to be well adapted. The willfulness of the refusal is the important feature. In case of such a serious drawback to the value of a horse, the presumption of fraud on the part of the seller is unavoidable, in case he failed to mention the habit to the purchaser, but of course this is even more emphatically certified if he has warranted the animal as a good worker, or kind, or true in work.

On the other hand he cannot be held responsible for the failure to perform an act in case the horse has been overloaded when fat or out of condition, or if he has sores on back, withers or shoulders, a badly fitting collar, a severe or large clumsy bit, or sores on the lower jaw, or indeed any temporary physical infirmity, to which the balking can be fairly attributed.

Balking is not to be confounded with nervous affections (paretic, spasmodic, congestion) in which the failure to obey is not due to lack of will, but to lack of power. Nor must it be confounded with the inability of the paralysis of lead poisoning. It is perhaps most likely to be confounded with that lack of both sensory and motor power which attends on ventricular dropsy and other chronic affections of the brain. In such cases (immobility, coma) the habitual dullness, drowsiness, general hebetude, and lack of energy contrasts strongly, with the strength, vigor and general life of the animal which suddenly, willfully and incorrigibly balks.

The balky horse which has no such nervous disorder as an excuse, no badly fitting harness, no lesion on shoulder, back, limbs nor mouth, no unsuitable bit, no special softness nor poverty of condition, no slow, ill-adjusted mate, no impatient driver, and no excessive load, nor impassable road, but which jibs without excuse, as a willful disobedience, may well be cause for annulling a sale. In most European countries such a horse can be returned to the seller and the sale set aside within 3 days (Austria), 4 days (Prussia), 5 days (Saxony), 9 days (Hesse).