All horse owners are convinced that their horse “speaks”. Interacting and bonding with our horse, we develop a keen sense that our animals are intelligent, capable of expressing complex emotions, and given the opportunity, they will also clearly show preferences, for instance, it may express reluctance at working in the sand school, but will merrily trot along for a nice hack, or it will perform tricks worthy of Houdini, just to escape a dull and boring box.
The interesting questions that arise from this, do we truly understand what the horse is trying to tell us, or are we interpreting it through the eyes and mind of a human, yet again engaging in miscommunication with our companion animals?
As scientists invest more and more time to unravel the mind of animals, some very interesting studies have recently been published.
One that caught my imagination is a recent study from the University of Newcastle, where researchers have found a way of asking pigs if they feel happy (http://www.livescience.com/animals/pig-emotions-happiness-deciphered-100727.html).
The scope of the study was to try to find out whether pigs feel optimistic or pessimistic about life as a result of the living conditions they live in.
The study set up is just as simple as it is fascinating. First they taught the pigs to associate the sound of a glockenspiel with a tasty treat, an apple. Then the animals were trained to associate the sound of a clicker (the one used to train dogs) with something unpleasant, such as having a plastic bucket rustled in front of them.
Then the group of animals was divided, one half going to an enriched environment, the other in a boring environment
The real experiment was then carried out: the researchers played a different noise to which the animals were not trained, and then observed how they responded. The pigs in the enriched environment had an optimistic outlook on life and approached to get a treat, whereas the ones in a boring environment were reluctant to approach, in case an unpleasant experience was waiting.
The researchers are careful to underline that it is early days yet, and we need to do more research to understand how animals feel and respond to the environment we offer them. Nevertheless, this is the first time that a experiment is set up in such a way as to directly ask the animal how it feels, in contrast to measuring the level of stress hormones and applying human interpretations to our findings.
Back to the wonderful world of horses – can this study be useful for horse owners and yard managers and help us offer our friends an environment more suitable to their physiological needs?
First, lets have a look at the horse’s point of view. Born to be wild, literally, its behavioral and instinctual basic set-up is for that of a prey animal.
The horse has evolved from the prairies and steppes of the Americas and Asia, they are obligate trickle feeders, meaning that the gastrointestinal and digestive systems are specially designed to cater for the nutritional needs of animals that are constantly on the move and eat as they walk.
Feral or wild horses also live in groups with a very clear social hierarchy, where the idea of mutual caring is the backbone of the social structure.
Compare this to the conditions of domestication, where in many ways we have provided a more secure life for the horse in as much as predators go, but beyond that we have imposed many physiological and psychological limitations to an already delicately balanced system.
For instance, traditional stables and boxes will often not provide the horse with an opportunity with direct physical contact with another horse, and quite often even visual contact can be restricted, an arrangement that can cause considerable stress in a horse. Box confinement also severely limits the horse’s choice of exercise.
Also, the feed we offer horses, the quantity, quality and even frequency, is scheduled rather to suit the needs of the yard manager and not the clearly identified needs of the horse.
So, is there a way we can look at all of this with fresh eyes and try to find a way to bridge the gap between what we imagine horses are telling us and what they in fact are saying?
The study from Newcastle indicates that we can engage in meaningful conversation with our horses. Maybe, rather than assuming bad behavior if the horse breaks out of the box, is sucking wind or eating down the interior of the box, we should ask ourselves if the horse isn’t trying to tell us something about how it feels about its life?
The positive angle here is that if we care to listen and understand what the horse is telling us, it is very easy, and not to mention cost-efficient to make minor adjustments in day to day management routines to accommodate the physiological needs of the horse, and in the process establish a deeper bond of confidence and trust between our horse and ourselves.
