Hi, I'm Danvers.
I'm the Hoof Health Consultant for SmartPak, and today we're going to talk briefly about
safely picking up a horse's feet and how to do that in a way that makes them more comfortable
and more willing to be cooperative.
As a general rule, horses will give you their hind feet more willingly.
They don't feel as threatened by losing a base of support.
Again, they're used to supporting more on the forehand.
So, they're a rear-wheel drive vehicle, so you're taking away a little bit of their ability
to run.
But, we'll go ahead and pick this up.
I have a different way of approaching this.
All of the textbooks, all of the materials that I am familiar with tell you to start
here and run this hand down the leg.
Or to start here and run this hand down the leg.
With a horse like this that is kind and considerate and cooperative, that's fine and I'll do that
all day long.
If I don't trust a horse, I don't want to do that.
It exposes everything that is near and dear to me to danger.
It puts my face right in his line of fire.
Puts my chest and heart there.
Puts my wonderful, fat belly there.
Puts my groin and crotch there.
And my knees don't bend the proper direction.
So what I do when I'm not...I'm not sure that everyone is comfortable with this, but it
certainly makes me more comfortable...is I turn my back to the barrel of the horse.
If he were to cow-kick now, my knee would bend the way that God intended for it to,
he would catch me in my fat butt, and I would go away from him in a much more natural manner
than I would if I were being thrown backwards.
In effect, if he kicked me now, I would be thrown into my travel not away from it.
It does expose my kidney a little bit, but not anywhere near all of the opportunities
that I have going the other direction.
It does require me to make one extra turn.
So, when I come down and...I think it's very important that you start here and you never
just grab down here and startle that horse, but you let him know it's coming.
You work all the way down, you pick this up, and then, I'm going to have to make an additional
turn where I step under.
And at that point, I get the toe.
This is critically important to get the toe.
Then, I put my other arm here, bring it up, and I've got it in my lap.
Notice that I have my arm over the hock and my hand at the toe, so I can actually push
down here, pull up here and gain some element of control if this horse wants to kick or
fight.
And again, I've created a bench to work from and I can go to work on this horse in a fairly
comfortable position.