TIMIDITY. PANIC. STAMPEDE.
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.