Why is there such a disconnect?

[milliepops]

i think words like happiness or enjoyment are human constructs though, you can certainly see a horse getting pleasure or a positive feeling from something, like a tasty treat, or a good scratch, or bucking round the field with exuberance or a foal whizzing round doing zoomies... is that essentially the same thing in a horse's world?

i'm not sure how that meshes with what we ask of them tho

 

[palo1]

Palo I’m not sure what approach to keeping domesticated horses you think I was advocating and have a problem with?

Horses learn by repetition and how they react to a situation is based on previous positive or negative association and experiences. Most of the things we are able to do with horses are as a result of the time we put in to training them to co-operate with us and accept our instructions. The horse would not do those things without our input. We make the training positive and we hopefully end up with a willing partner that trusts us to lead, even in situations that it is at first unsure of, such as loading into a horse trailer or being shod/clipped or whatever.

Horses are generally curious of humans, provided they have not had a previous bad experience. How many of us have taken on a horse that has had a bad experience? We all know how much re-training and positive experiences it takes to overcome bad ones. They are certainly capable of independent thought. Do they feel human emotions such as happiness or enjoyment? I don’t think so. Do they feel content because their needs are met, they have a routine and they are intelligent enough to remember what happens next through repetition? Definitely.

I don't have any problem with anything you said @Upthecreek I was disagreeing with you though about horses and boredom/lack of stimulation in the average domesticated setting if not ridden/doing groundwork etc. I don't know for sure of course but I believe that horses 'need' more than many of them get when 'just' living in the same small area if we are to try to fulfill their natural 'horse-ness'. It is a complex subject and I certainly don't have answers to the problem of what we ask animals to do, what we expect them to tolerate in terms of living conditions and what they may actually need or chose. ' Tis all!

 

[Ample Prosecco]

Toby used to squeak with excitement. Dolly loves company. Horses make long standing friendships with each other. Jenny looked after little kids to the extent of trying not to let them fall off or refusing to canter, just trotting round a course of poles slowly despite being a total pocket rocket normally. My Shetland user to never stand still till one day I was upset and she stood like a rock and let me cry into her mane for ages. I’m sure a behaviourist could try and explain all that away but Im not sure why we should believe they have such a limited range of emotions. I think they can absolutely feel happiness, excitement, compassion, friendship and love. Not in the way we do of course, but I think they have a rich and complex emotional life.

 

[palo1]

Toby used to squeak with excitement. Dolly loves company. Horses make long standing friendships with each other. Jenny looked after little kids to the extent of trying not to let them fall off or refusing to canter, just trotting round a course of poles slowly despite being a total pocket rocket normally. My Shetland user to never stand still till one day I was upset and she stood like a rock and let me cry into her mane for ages. I’m sure a behaviourist could try and explain all that away but Im not sure why we should believe they have such a limited range of emotions. I think they can absolutely feel happiness, excitement, compassion, friendship and love.

I think it is really hard to put our emotional labels for things on to animals but I do agree generally that horses (and other animals of course) have far greater emotional range than they have been given credit for. All of the research around marine mammals suggests that as well. I don't know what we could call those emotions and behaviours either as we only have human-centric ones of course! I tend to assume that if I am unsure of a horse's response, that it is probably more complex than I imagine. That is at least 1 reason why training and communication with animals needs to be as clear and sympathetic as possible I think.

 

[AntiPuck]

There are some excellent posts in here, and it all makes for very interesting reading. I must admit that I do go back and forth in my mind as to whether riding, and all that goes with it, is "cruel" to horses or not.

I've met a lot of people who are in the "horses are naughty and need to be bossed" camp, and have always felt very awkward in those moments because usually it was their horse and not mine so it's hard to argue or refuse in the moment.

I think my summarised opinion is that, many animals (including humans) have to do things they probably would rather not - we owe it to each other to try and make that as bearable (if not enjoyable) as possible, wether that's being fair to other humans or putting sufficient effort into caring properly for horses or other pets.

 

[Upthecreek]

i think words like happiness or enjoyment are human constructs though, you can certainly see a horse getting pleasure or a positive feeling from something, like a tasty treat, or a good scratch, or bucking round the field with exuberance or a foal whizzing round doing zoomies... is that essentially the same thing in a horse's world?

i'm not sure how that meshes with what we ask of them tho

I agree they have a range of feelings which causes them to react in certain ways. For me that’s a much better descriptor than emotions.

 

[Ample Prosecco]

Palo I edited to add to my post as you were replying but yes I totally agree re complexity and on how hard it is for us to understand them.

 

[Upthecreek]

I don't have any problem with anything you said @Upthecreek I was disagreeing with you though about horses and boredom/lack of stimulation in the average domesticated setting if not ridden/doing groundwork etc. I don't know for sure of course but I believe that horses 'need' more than many of them get when 'just' living in the same small area if we are to try to fulfill their natural 'horse-ness'. It is a complex subject and I certainly don't have answers to the problem of what we ask animals to do, what we expect them to tolerate in terms of living conditions and what they may actually need or chose. ' Tis all!

I loved reading about the hill ponies, it must be amazing to have the opportunity to interact with them on the wild Welsh hills. Very jealous!

 

[piebaldproblems]

This is not the case in my experience. Feral horses hooves demonstrate an enormous level of adaptation to weather, grazing etc and laminitis may occur but I have seen no evidence of it routinely. I would be interested to see that study and alongside comparable work related to an ordinary population of domestic horses.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22621688/ is one example, but yes a comparison of domestic and feral horses (especially of the same breed, like the Welsh) would be very useful

 

[Pearlsacarolsinger]

I don’t think things were better in the past though. I was always hungry to learn but my early horsey influences taught me that horses were basically lazy, naughty, evasive and needed a firm hand. On no account must they ‘win’. They needed ‘breaking in’ which involved blood, sweat and tears.

The ponies at the riding school were either utterly dead to the leg or regularly ‘went psycho’. All the kids wanted to ride the ‘psycho’ ones and it was a mark of achievement to survive a ‘psycho’ moment in a lesson. We admired kids who could ride the wilder ponies more than anything. Horsemanship meant sticking on when things went wrong.

This was back in the 70s and 80s. I bought my first horse in the 90s as an adult and was in a BHS yard where the yard manager got on horses who were misbehaving and thrashed them. I didn’t like it but assumed everywhere was like that. I never allowed my horse to be hit but I really didn’t have an alternative way of dealing with problems. Luckily my horse never presented me with any.

This makes me very sad. I grew up riding in the 60s and 70s at RS and learned right from the beginning that if your horse didn't do what you were meant to be asking for it was your fault because you were asking incorrectly. The RIs were a husband and wife team, who were very much into hunting and showing, so very traditional.
A few years later, when I had my own horses, I started to volunteer with RDA, coincidentally (?) at a RS owned and run by another member of the same hunt. Again if the horses didn't do what was expected it was recognised that it was the fault of the people around them - the handlers, rather than the riders, who were very definitely not called out on their riding. Even though out of earshot of the riders, it might well have been said that the horse's reaction to a particular riders action was not surprising.
I just do not recognise the 'naughty horse' comments as coming from RIs who know what they are doing and certainly wouldn't pay anyone who made those comments to try to improve my riding.
Perhaps that's the difference, I know when I pay for lessons that I am paying to improve my riding, which has the knock on effect of improving the horse's way of going, rather than paying to improve the horse's performance.

 

[Ample Prosecco]

I didn’t grow up in the UK but in Hong Kong so horsemanship knowledge was rare. Literally no one owned their own and there were no working horses. Just race horses. But horsemanship standards at most riding schools and yards have not been exactly inspirational since I came over here either.

 

[Pearlsacarolsinger]

I didn’t grow up in the UK but in Hong Kong so horsemanship knowledge was rare. Literally no one owned their own and there were no working horses. Just race horses. But horsemanship standards at most riding schools and yards have not been exactly inspirational since I came over here either.

So what did you do when the RI ragged Toby about? I would have sacked her on the spot! If clients put up with that kind of behaviour from the so-called professionals, they will never change their ways.

 

[palo1]

I loved reading about the hill ponies, it must be amazing to have the opportunity to interact with them on the wild Welsh hills. Very jealous!

Thank you. Yes, it is an astonishing privelege and has certainly made me view our domestic horses very differently over the years. I had a horse a long time ago that was a lot of trouble and my OH and FIL (who is the hill grazier in fact) told me to 'loose him to the hill for 6 months'. As it is an enclosed hill (so not a vast many thousands of acres of mountain) this would have been possible but I couldn't let go of my worries, nor the rugs and shoes. I did turn him away but on the farm. If I had my time again I would take up that very kind offer as I can see how that life, those challenges and time out of ridden work and fulfiling the life of a feral horse etc could have helped him. It is possible for hill ponies to be looked after and most graziers I know do their best, often under very difficult circumstances and financial hardship, to do right by their feral horses. Visitors to the hills do sometimes see poor, wormy or sick animals which I appreciate is difficult and sad. I have had a hill pony collapse in front of my car (not one of 'our' hill ponies thankfully) - at the end of a hard winter and in honesty that horse probably died of starvation and disease of some kind. It was awful, very upsetting indeed. But that pony, if it could not cope with the winter or whatever else was the problem, had no place on that hill. Those that thrive are exceptionally valuable in that sense and have earnt their place. Those domestic horses that get dumped on hills and commons are in a dire situation on the other hand; with no knowledge or experience and a number of really quite serious and imminent challenges to meet. Awful. One of the loveliest days but also bittersweet is when we take the horses back to the hill in the Autumn. They have been able to grow fat at home (in fact we enable that weight gain to help them through the winter) and are de-wormed and jolly. We ride them to the hilll gate, remove the tack and let them go. They usually linger for a short while, chatting with us but then the moment comes where they set their head to the hill and trot off, single file and in true feral pony style - economical, confident and alert. Usually they stop at least once to look back at us but not always. It is enormously gratifying to know that they will have that time on the hill again. But back to the point - these feral horses have very full lives in the way that I don't see unridden/un-worked (eg in hand/driven etc) domestic horses having and that does bother me slightly when considering long or highly managed retirements or lives where a horse has increasingly 'less' stimulation or activity. I have had retired and difficult to manage horses at home and it is very difficult to make those judgements about happiness/quality of life as every situation and animal is different of course. It is worth considering though I think.

 

[palo1]

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22621688/ is one example, but yes a comparison of domestic and feral horses (especially of the same breed, like the Welsh) would be very useful

The conclusions on that study were a bit ambivalent and it would be interesting to know what sort of habitat those feral horses were captured on too. A comparison of horses from a similar geographical area both domestic and feral would be fascinating in relation to foot pathologies if nothing else.

 

[bonnysmum]

But back to the point - these feral horses have very full lives in the way that I don't see unridden/un-worked (eg in hand/driven etc) domestic horses having and that does bother me slightly when considering long or highly managed retirements or lives where a horse has increasingly 'less' stimulation or activity.

I have an awful lot yet to to learn about horses and horse behaviour, but I would assume our aim (as with other domesticated or captive animals) should be for them to be comfortable, stimulated & contented, and as with so many other animals they seem to be rather difficult to read on that score. But I must say that one of the things that makes me saddest of all is seeing a horse or pony on its own hanging its head in a field, and I see it a lot.

 

[palo1]

I have an awful lot yet to to learn about horses and horse behaviour, but I would assume our aim (as with other domesticated or captive animals) should be for them to be comfortable, stimulated & contented, and as with so many other animals they seem to be rather difficult to read on that score. But I must say that one of the things that makes me saddest of all is seeing a horse or pony on its own hanging its head in a field, and I see it a lot.

Yes, I agree with all of that and certainly think that a horse kept alone may well have a very compromised quality of life in equine terms. I think this is one change that could be made in welfare legislation that would have a huge impact for the good though obviously there are situations where horses have to be alone for at least a while. I know that many people will give reasons why horses can be alone and cope well but it is not easy for them.

 

[Shilasdair]

I wouldn't rate the articles in MDPI as a (picks words carefully) particularly reliable source.

Authors pay to publish their papers, and reviewers receive vouchers to help them pay to publish their own 'paper' in MDPI.

I've published papers, and have yet to pay a penny...