I'm giving you an article from the paper today. It comes from a recently asked question from you guys, so it's only fair to share it here.

I'm working on our next story.....Mouthy Monday will appear later in the week...but I'm still here!



Sensitive Ears

By Janet Huntington

I was recently asked how I deal with a horse with sensitive ears.

I’m a little embarrassed to admit if my horses don’t want their ears touched, then I don’t touch them. Unless I have to, then we wrestle.

I don’t clip my horses ears so it hasn’t been much of an issue for me.

To be honest, I don’t think horses particularly like having their ears touched, although they can really get into having the base scratched. There is so little in their lives we let them control I figure they can keep their ears to themselves.

But I admit horses should tolerate having their ears handled. We need to halter and bridle them, some need to be clipped or trimmed and all of them need to let us doctor their ears if necessary.

In the past I had horses come in for training which refuse to let anything or anyone touch their ears.

“He must have been eared down,” is what I’m usually told.

This means grabbing the horse’s ear and pulling it towards the ground. Sometimes an added twist or even biting the ear is thrown in for extra oomph. This is extremely painful for the horse and from what I’ve seen not particularly successful.

It can also tear the cartilage in the horse’s ear and at the very least will make the horse violently opposed to having his ears handled.

The thing is most horse people know “earing down” is a pretty stupid way to try to handle a horse. Since the invention of the twitch and Ace there hasn’t been much need for this maneuver.

So most ear shy horses have not been abused this way. They are either in pain or have been in pain and being a horse, have decided to never have their ears handled again.

They can get ticks in their ear canal or fly bites from gnats and no see-ums. Aural plaques are scaly lesions that form on the inside of the pinna (outer part of the ear). They are caused by a virus and are typically asymptomatic, meaning that they really cause the horse no problems, so vets generally leave them alone. The virus is transferred by fly bites. Irritating, painful little fly bites.

All this action can make for a very touchy horse and is more likely the cause of ear sensitivity than a history of abuse.

Which is part of why I don’t clip ears, I want my horse to have the protection Nature, God or Evolution gave them.

I would never start working a horse with touchy ears until he had been cleared by the vet. I once had a young horse just about take off my kneecap when I reached up to bridle him. He struck like a snake when he felt my hand touch the back of his ear. Turned out he had an abscess in his ear It was a lesson which stayed with me.

I have two approaches to desensitizing a horse’s ears.

Most often I simply ignore the problem and bridle or halter him anyway. Which means I just dive in and do it.

This method takes a willingness and the ability to hang on no matter how far they drag you and still put the bit in their mouth.

I like to place the bit before I bring the bridle over their eyes. Then I put the bridle on the rest of the way.

I don’t use a one ear bridle on a touchy horse and I’ll take the browband off a browband bridle so there’s only the crown to worry about.

I have always been able to get my horses to accept their fate and the bridle this way, as long as I was tall enough to reach them and I could hang on.

Once I wrestle a horse into his head gear I tend to leave him alone. If he doesn’t want me to touch his ears, I don’t.

Eventually he realizes all I care about is getting his halter or bridle on and he knocks it off. Then I’ll add the browband and when he’s OK with that I’ll go to a one-ear.

But most people would rather train their horse to handle having their ears touched. They would also prefer not having a Saturday Night Smackdown in order to go for a ride.

So method number two comes into play.

First off, if the horse is truly manic about his ears I will use a rope halter to catch him and undo my bridle and buckle it over his head while I’m working on him.

I don’t want him to associate our ear discussions with bridling or being caught.
I start by scratching up his neck toward his ears until he gets nervous. Then I back off and rub where he wants to be rubbed.

Then I head back to where he gets nervous, but stay there scratching awhile. Then I back off.
I go back and forth until eventually I get to the ears.

This can take minutes, hours, days, weeks, whatever. It depends on the horse.

I try to stop each session before the horse is sick of me.

I try to start each session after I have worked with the horse on something else and he is calm, relaxed and a little tired.

Eventually I’ll be able to handle his ears.

This is where many people teach there horses to drop their head. I don’t, but there’s about a hundred kazillion videos on the subject so you should be able to figure it out.

Then I bring in my regular halter and bridle.

The key to desensitizing is always the same. Patience, patience, patience zzzzzzzzzzzz.

Good horse training is about as exciting as watching paint dry, but it’s always worth it.