As a vet who generally deals with small companion animals, horses have always been an enigma to me. The study of equine medicine, husbandry and surgery was an integral part of my veterinary course at university, and I certainly know more about horses then the average Joe, but I have never treated horses and that makes me very rusty in this particular field.
During my studies, many of my fellow students were from farms where horses were common. These friends grew up with horses like I grew up with dogs and cats. They knew how to communicate with these majestic beasts and I envied them. Like people who are scared of dogs and cats, during my initial contact with horses I felt quite nervous and fearful.
It was not an illogical fear - and it was not the fear of their size and power, or the pain they could inflict on an unsuspecting attendant.
I was used to cows and bulls, which can be twice the weight of a typical horse. There's an important difference between cows and horses: horses have a keener sense of survival, some would say intelligence. Their fight-or-flight response is much keener.
It is this flighty personality that one has to respect and be wary of when dealing with horses. I remember seeing for the first time a horse's skull in anatomy class and it was scary. It wasn't the skeletal features that were scary but the sheer size of the thing, welded onto a massive muscular neck, that made horses scary to me in those early days.
I realised quickly that horses were potentially very dangerous. Not only could a kick or being trampled be fatal, but a swift swing of its head could knock you senseless.