Digitigrade locomotion is responsible for the distinctive hooked shape of dog legs. Unguligrade animals, such as horses and cattle, walk only on the distal-most tips of their digits, while in digitigrade animals, more than one segment of the digit makes contact with the ground, either directly (as in birds) or via paw-pads (as in dogs). ...

The digitigrade stilt is a peg stilt whose line follows the foot and not the shin bone. This allows costumers to mimic the walk of an animal. This allows costumers to mimic the walk of an animal. Because of the extreme stresses on this type of design they tend to be more rare; that is, fewer successful home-made designs.