Are You Setting Your Horse Up For Bad Behavior?

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At the same time, each horse’s behavior was documented, with the researchers noting the amount of time spent indulging in normal activities, such as eating or napping, as well as behavior that would be considered undesirable, including head tossing, cribbing, stall walking and acting aggressively toward people or other horses. Each horse’s training regimen was documented, as was his exercising heart rate, so that the intensity of his training could be classified as light, moderate or heavy.

When comparing all of the data, the researchers found no link between different training routines and behavior, but they did find significant association between undesirable behaviors and low dry-matter intake (compared to NRC recommendations) and less time spent eating. The NRC recommendations call for horses in intense work be fed 2.5 percent of their body weight in dry matter daily. The recommendation for horses in moderate activity is 2.25 percent of body weight daily and 2 percent for all other horses. In contrast, the study horses with the highest incidence of undesirable behaviors had an average dry matter intake of less than 1 percent of their body weight daily.

That doesn’t necessarily mean the horses were malnourished but that their meals did not support their mental well-being, explains Leonir Bueno Ribeiro, Doctor in Animal Science, of the State University of Maringá, Paraná, Brazil: “They did not receive sufficient amounts of food, mostly hay. I wouldn’t say that they were hungry, however. This fact caused the horses to get bored [and engage in undesirable behaviors].”

The researchers also found that the larger study horses were more likely to develop undesirable behaviors, a consequence of the failure to calculate feed rations based on each horse’s size, says Ribeiro.