Timidity. Panic. Timid driver. Impaired vision. Nervous. Irritability.
Gadding. Gregarious habit. Absence of natural weapons. Treatment.
Habit. Substitution. Absolute constraint. Kindness. Boldness. Work.
Moderate diet.
An animal is naturally nervous, and by habit has become timid until it
is virtually impossible to utilize it. In a body of animals, fear is
quickly transferred from one to the other until all join in a wild panic
or stampede. This is common in range cattle or horses, but is found in
army horses as well, and a whole regiment will sometimes refuse to
longer face the enemy and flee in spite of every effort of the rider. On
a smaller scale, two timid horses in a team, scared by some unusual
sight, add each to the sense of fear of the other, as they try to
escape, until they gallop blindly into any danger. This sense of terror
is often fostered by the timid rider or driver, every feeling of
apprehension conveyed through the trembling or uncertain hand, or the
voice which has lost the element of confidence, tending to undermine the
last vestige of trust on the part of the horse. Imperfect sight is one
cause of panic, as the perception of common objects in distorted form or
unwonted situations strikes terror to the timid animal, causing shying
or bolting. Better absolute blindness than such imperfect vision.
A constitutional timidity tends constantly to increase unless the animal
is judiciously accustomed to the object of terror. The horse once
scared, seems to become more and more watchful for other objects of
dread, and even inclined to bolt from such as are common and of every
day occurrence.
Cattle and sheep attacked by the gadfly (œstrus) flee in great terror,
and this dread is communicated from animal to animal so that the whole
herd or flock is suddenly panic-stricken. The bellow of the ox attacked
and the erection of its tail is the signal for every other within reach
to join the stampede.
These panics are associated with the instinct of these races toward a
gregarious life; they mass together for protection and they learn to
heed the slightest indication of approaching danger. This instinct grows
more powerful by constant exercise, and is most marked in those genera
which have the least natural means of protection. Hence, of all animals
sheep are most easily panic-stricken, and once affected, they move in
mass, one following its fellow, without object, without definite
direction or destination, and without consideration of the other dangers
they are to meet. Hence, if one sheep jumps over the parapet of a bridge
to certain destruction, the whole flock speedily follows. If one leaps
over a fallen tree into a snow bank, all at once follow suit and pile
above each other in one suffocating, perishing mass.
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.