Preparing Your Horse or Donkey for Veterinary Care: Practical Training to Establish Good Behavior, Relieve Stress, and Ensure Safety

The only book available dedicated solely to the conscientious preparation of the horse and donkey for routine and emergency medical care.

Equine behavior expert and trained ethologist H幨鋝e Roche provides a practical, fair, and scientifically researched set of techniques to help train your horse or donkey to "cooperate for care." Specifically, her goal is to ensure that veterinary examinations, treatment administration, and health monitoring are safer, easier, and less stressful for all involved.

Making the decision to prepare your equine to cooperate for care will save you valuable time, as well as improving the quality of your relationship with your horse or donkey (and veterinarian, too!). With small steps that can be regularly incorporated into daily activities, your horse can learn to accept:

• Human touch in sensitive places.


• The taking of vital signs.


• Clipping and bathing, such as that needed before wound treatment.


• Dental care.


• Inhalers or nebulizers.


• Drawing blood.


• Medication administration.


• Eye care.


• X-rays and hoof and lower limb treatment.


• Being weighed on a scale.


• Treatment rooms, stocks, and other care locations.


• Urine collection.

In addition, readers learn how to identify a problem that might need medical care, and how to recognize pain, fear, and impatience in horses and donkeys. With helpful hints on preparing for a veterinary visit, both at your home barn or at a clinic, as well as preparing for hospitalization or long-term stall-rest, this highly illustrated reference is an invaluable starter kit for remarkably better interactions with your horse as you work toward his improved health and well-being.