FIG. 5.

Leading limb preference during obstacle negotiation. Overall, animals had no bias, although there was a strong trend to a left hindlimb preference at 8 weeks post-injury (†; A). During complete clearances (B), however, the ipsilateral hindlimb was the dominant leading limb at all post-injury time points (+,†) as crossings that were led with the contralateral hindlimb were significantly decreased (*). No hindlimb bias was present during stumbling corrective responses (C). During other responses, the contralateral hindlimb showed a trend toward being the dominant leading limb at 2 weeks post-injury (D,†). After 2 weeks, however, a bias for leading with the ipsilateral hindlimb emerged. By 8 weeks there were significantly more encounters that were led with the ipsilateral hindlimb than with the contralateral one (‡,+). Overall, the number of other response crossings was significantly decreased from 2 weeks (*). Error bars denote SD.