Q: I manage a small boarding and training barn. In recent years our clientele has become mostly comprised of kids whose families are pretty new to owning or even being around ponies and horses. On the one hand these folks have been a lot of fun and very satisfying to work with, but on the other hand I feel especially responsible for and concerned about their safety in ordinary horse handling. In this regard I have been fretting more and more about the whole deal of hand-feeding treats. I am old-school and prefer to never hand-feed treats to horses, particularly ponies. But lately I’ve more or less had to give up trying to convince clients of that. The current trend seems to be a belief that a horse or pony without treats is unloved.

Hand-feeding treats creates the nuisance of horses and ponies constantly nudging and nipping at people. It’s bad enough for our skilled staff to deal with it, but my greatest concern is that somebody who is not able to deal with that safely, or even one of the barn girls caught off guard, is going to get hurt. I am especially nervous about the kids who like to hug and kiss, so are right there face-to-face with a nippy pony. Or, as is usually the case, when a pony or horse gets nippy for treats, the unskilled treat-givers often react in ways that create a head-shy, anxious horse. What are your comments? Any ideas on how to convince people that treats are not the best way to show affection?

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A: I certainly agree that unskilled hand-feeding of horses can very quickly create a huge safety concern, and not just with kids. This issue is not much different from so many things skilled horse handlers do every day and take for granted, but then can be shocked to find that inexperienced folks are unfamiliar with potential safety concerns and can easily and unknowingly put themselves at high risk of injury