“Most of the time horses whisper with their body language. A peaceful head nod, tiny twitch of the tail, the intention to pick up a foot with a shift of balance—these say all they need to another horse. Occasionally, a horse shouts or yells a message at another with extreme gestures or movement, but usually horses say what they need to at the lowest volume necessary. Even if they “turn up” the volume, they are experts at then turning it back down, calibrating the movements of their language precisely."
~ from an article on Horsenetwork.com
When is it play or merely interactive behaviour, and when is it not?
We run Recognising Equine Behaviour workshops here at Wadi Farm, and one of the things we seek to impart is recognition of 'on' and 'off' behaviour. Horses activate and deactivate, as we do, but their ability to 'go with the flow' means they do this hundreds of times a day. Many people have simply never had the opportunity to watch and learn the differences between play (normal interactive) behaviour in horses and (occasionally) dominance related assertive/resource protective behaviour in horses.
I personally do not believe in a dominance hierarchy with horses. That's a human thing. Years of observation have taught me that horses share leadership, or even share following. As Lucy Rees (Ethologist) notes, there's synchrony more than control. Yes there's a lead mare and yes there's a herd stallion, but whether or not that's true dominance, or merely genetics and shared leadership...? For me personally, the jury is still out. I see the latter.
Reality, as I see it, is that we are all followers. We are all following something.
Horses, to varying degrees in their day, also always use 'calming signals' with each other and other beings in their world, including us. There's a separate blog about this, including the history of the identification of and research into calming signals. It's worth a look.
I also do not like to use the word 'aggressive'. I can honestly say that I have never seen a wild horse or a horse who has never had a bad experience at the hands of humans become (fear) aggressive. Merely boundary protection/assertion. It's the human who often misinterprets what they see, because yes, humans can indeed become aggressive. I have - sadly - seen fear based, boundary protective aggression towards humans in horses that have been ignorantly or deliberately mistreated/confused/abused. I've experienced such aggression first hand and it's tragic as well as terrifying. Over the years we have had to make the hard decision to euthanise 2 fear aggressive horses that could not be de-stressed/deactivated. And perhaps, in the end, they did not want to be. Because they did not want to continue to live with humans. It is post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) to the extreme, and hard enough to witness, support and understand in humans...
It can be devastating to deal with in animals. You can get many of them through it - but it takes time, patience, positive (only) training, and a great deal of compassion and understanding. Anyone who has ever rescued an animal from a sad or negative situation, and that animal is a quivering emotional wreck, will know what I mean. So will anyone who has ever had to help a human (including themselves), through such trauma.
You have to remember to care for yourself through it all too.
But I digress. Play vs assertive behaviour. I am often asked how to help introduce new horses to each other and how to know when they are being accepting or not. There are several things you can look for, but first things first...
Give them time, give them space. Don't immediately judge what you think you see.
Horses in a herd play rough. And that's okay. Imagine a pair of 400kg thirteen year old boys practising wrestling or play-fighting using martial arts and you get my drift. Colts and fillies play in the same way. Their bodies are much tougher than ours, build to withstand bites, bangs, kicks and slams. Our bodies are built to withstand the human-downsized equivalent (without bringing deadly 'tools' into it), so we naturally assume that the normal interactions we sometimes see between horses are 'fights'. They are not. A proper contest between two or more stallions, or the very fierce and intimidating disputes that occur between lead mares/prospective lead mares, are seriously full-on and once you have seen the real thing, you will never mistake lesser interactions again.
Full-on boundary arguments between horses can involve teeth, hooves and the full weight of the horse behind them. As in body slams. There is screaming, snorting, biting resulting in thrashing and the tearing of skin, kicking - including repeated full-on double-barrel kicks, blood and bruising. I have, over the years, seen a 700kg mare deliver a full double-barrelled kick to a stallion and nearly knock him over. I have seen the same mare exactly time the length and strength of her kick with one leg to gently but firmly knock a curious foal that was not her own away from her rear end. Horses know. They know their own strength and they know exactly where to place their teeth and hooves. The same as we know how to put one foot in front of the other. Trust me, they are gentle with humans, for the most part.
It may be hard to hear but 90% of the time, if a horse kicked you, it meant to do so, and in their mind there were sound reasons behind it. Very occasionally it can be a complete accident. They don't make physical contact for either revenge or perverse pleasure. Sometimes it's the only way they can verbalise distress, anxiety, pain or confusion. Particularly pain or soreness.
If you can't work out why your horse is reacting negatively towards you, or you cannot understand their behaviour towards other horses, please, get a professional in and try to establish the facts, and the truth.
Having said all this, if a domestically raised horse has not been herd raised, and has never learned how to calibrate or associate 'naturally' with other horses, fear based dominance and aggression can also result. As can what seems to us like hysterically excited or 'smothering' behaviour. (One horse won't leave the other alone and tries to keep it away from other horses or even humans, or tries to constantly mount it or suckle from it, unnatural behaviour like that.) This sort of odd behaviour requires herd socialisation training and sadly isn't something that can be fixed overnight. But it can often be corrected with time and understanding. Some horses need to learn, or re-learn, how to be horses. Find a way to let them.
Again, allow space.
Chasing and anxiety or fear based bullying usually happens when a new horse is introduced into the current horse's space and that space is too small. Our idea of 'enough space' is very different to the horse's. They need to move and that means they need room to stretch out and gallop if interacting. If they don't get that, more often than not one horse has a go at the other, or starts to chase it around, or ends up chasing it through a fence. Again, this behaviour is being driven more by anxiety and fear and a need to protect what is regarded as it's territory.
When introducing new horses, as far as is possible, put them in a large, safe paddock (no holes or long grass hiding sharp objects or slippery, muddy surfaces, etc)...no rugs, no halters, no shoes if possible...and leave them alone. Let. Them. Sort. It. Out. If they have the space, what will mostly happen (if you allow it), is that they will come together, interact, drift apart, spend time alone exploring, come back together, drift apart...until they start to hang together. In the mean time there may be ears flat back, kicking, biting, a bit of chasing...but none of it should be extreme. If it is, or you suddenly see blood, fine, intervene if you must, but try to let them do what comes naturally and work it out. Give them time if at all possible.
As mentioned above, leave them alone. Remember - 'it's a relationship, not a love affair.' Keep checking on them or watch from a discreet distance. Why? If you are too close, one might hang around you for comfort or because they are anxious. They might then take that anxiety or protectiveness out on the nearest equine, which won't help. Proximity of humans can and will affect how horses behave. They may try to resource protect you from the other horse/s. Sometimes from two paddocks away.
When you feed them, ensure there is plenty of room between individuals. Feeding hay in separate piles sometimes helps give the horses an excuse to deactivate and relax while getting to know new individuals. They can put their heads down and eat - but they need to be able to eat apart if they so choose. Do not feed new equine acquaintances close together. If you are feeding hay, feed enough so that there's plenty to share and they don't feel the need to asset-protect their hay. Make sure all new horses can easily find and get to any water.
Remember that although there's often a pecking order in domesticity, it's fluid. Shared leadership, consensual decision-making. It depends on the day, on the environment and on who is new, on who is feeling like trying to move up a boundary rung on the ol' corporate ladder, on if the herd (even if it's only two horses) is suddenly in danger...it's very dynamic. Even in a well established herd. So there is always a fair bit of give-and-take, in between the serious task of grazing and resting. As I've mentioned before, horses 'activate' and 'deactivate' all the time. So they will always be asking questions, of each other and of you. Younger and less dominant personalities will always be testing those waters. And that's okay. It's perfectly normal. What you need to do is allow it. Without worrying or anthropomorphising.
I've included photos with this post that show a serious resource protection dispute between two lead mares which happened at Wadi Farm several years ago. We knew both mares well. It was not resolved and so when they called a break (which they do, in between bouts), we separated them. Continued short, sharp bursts of serious fighting are a sign that perhaps there's simply not enough space, which was the case here, despite our large paddocks. If that's the case then you need to accept it, and manage your horses accordingly. (We put a few horses with each mare in separate large paddocks with raceways between so that one mare did not kick the other through the fence, which had also happened.)
If you don't have the space to manage horses who don't get on, difficult decisions may have to be made. But look for management solutions first. Ask for advice from experienced, trusted sources.
These few photos show what an assertive interaction looks like. It's not pretty but it's rarely - very rarely - fatal. Unless fences or humans are involved. The Prime Directive of the horse is to survive. As an individual and as a species. Although you do hear of stallions killing geldings and sometimes mares killing other foals, it is most often because of a lack of space or (even more rarely) a genetic abnormality. Remember, domestically, the animal under fire is restricted and cannot get away. If they could, they would merely have been 'run out of town'.
Even in the wild, older stallions tend to die from injury related infection or illness, and older mares are left to predators. They are run out of the herd or left behind, not killed. 'Violence' in the herd and between herd members is rare. Drawing blood is even rarer. Horses understand 'application' and 'indication' of pressure (as described by Ethologist Lucy Rees), and they understand boundaries. They flow, far more easily than we do, between states. They don't get stuck in anger and so don't 'hit' one another until they bleed. Sometimes all it needs is a look to move a fellow equine.
Basically, in the end, if it's just plain old herd behaviour, or play behaviour, or horses trying to get to know one another - and they're in a safe environment - consider letting them be. And let them be themselves.
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(Photo info...starting from the top...the horses are reassuring one another because the two lead mares have come together and there's tension in the air...one lead mare tries to greet the other but the other will not acknowledge her except to try and take her place in the herd..a fight ensues and both mares ended up with minor injuries from kicks.
The young, dark grey filly you can see who remained close was not related to either mare but merely an anxious onlooker trying to calm things down. Not safe but she wasn't touched by either mare.
Behaviour wise, we have observed over the years - as most people will already know - that mares usually attack each other's rears by kicking. Stallions will do this but more often confront one another head on and rear and strike as well as bite.)
All photos (c) KA Waddington
