There is a great deal more to being a horse owner than just providing food and shelter and enjoying activities with your horse – there are horsey chores to be done.
As we get older, those horsey chores can become more of a challenge and we need to take precautions to prevent injury.
This concept is quite close to home for me due to my own back and limb challenges and I am sure many of you readers have the occasional ache or pain due to horsey chores.
I recently stumbled across information I had saved regarding how to minimize back problems – it was in an EQUUS article written by Susan Kauffmann. The title was, “10 Back-Saving Techniques for Horsekeepers” and the information she identified was a great reminder as to what we should be doing for ourselves.
As many horse folk will acknowledge, we often “push through the pain” for ourselves in order to keep doing things with or for our horses.
I can say from personal experience that this may (and does) result in longer-term problems for us humans.
The tips identified by Susan are as follows:
Tip 1. Get the straight scoop on manure. This means when you are using the manure fork, do not twist your body while lifting the loaded fork or dumping the load into the wheelbarrow. Stand in front of the pile and push the fork forward rather than beside the pile and twisting your body.
Tip 2. Step, rather than twist, toward the wheelbarrow. Move your feet while handling weight – keep your elbows in and the weight closer to your body. The idea is to keep your breastbone (sternum) as centered as possible.
Tip 3. Bend your knees to lift or set down the wheelbarrow. I am sure that all of you have experienced this discomfort at one time or another where you bent at the waist, grasped the wheelbarrow handles and tried to lift the weight with your legs straight – ouch!
Tip 4. Make more runs with smaller loads. I know you want to get the chore done as quickly as possible but a back injury is not worth saving one or two trips. How many times have you mashed down the contents of the wheelbarrow to get one more forkful on and got the load so full that bits are falling off?
Tip 5. Dump the wheelbarrow slightly to the side. Rather than lifting both handles equally straight up, lift one handle a little higher and dump out the leading corner of the wheelbarrow. This prevents the possibility of hyper-extending your back and causing problems.
Tip 6. Switch activities often. If you use the same muscle groups for extended periods of time, you can cause repetitive strain. I certainly have run into this problem when stacking hay or feed bags. If the task is going to take more than 15 minutes, take a break or do another chore that uses different muscles for 10 minutes or so then back to your original task. The added bonus is if you have two or three chores going at the same time, you end up getting a lot more done!
Tip 7. Lunge or bend at the knees to lift heavy items. This is key when lifting those heavy water buckets or anything else off the ground.
Tip 8. Balance your loads as much as possible. Try not to carry things on one side as it puts a lot of stress on muscles, ligaments and discs.
Tip 9. Bend at the knees and hip when picking up feet. Too many times we just bend at the waist with straight legs when cleaning out feet — you will certainly feel the strain in your back when you do this.
Tip 10. Use a stool for “high” chores. Anyone who has braided a horse’s mane will know exactly what this feels like.
If you keep these tips in mind when doing your horsey chores, you body will be much happier.
Happy trails!
