How Horses Spend Their Time
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The average riding horse, with a single owner is probably only ridden about an hour a day. A lesson horse, or a horse used for working cattle, racing, carriage rides, police work, or trail guiding may work considerably more. Many horses are ridden or driven much less, and some rarely, if at all. So, what does a horse do when we are not riding or driving or actively caring for it in some way?
Horses spend most of their time eating. The length of a horse's digestive system is about seventy feet on average. This depends on the horse’s size of course. The horse’s stomach is very small in comparison to the rest of its digestive system. The stomach is designed to slowly digest many small meals, rather than one or two big ones during the day. Unlike cattle, who take time out to chew their cud - regurgitated food which they give a second chewing to, horses keep eating small amounts, constantly keeping their stomachs partially full.
So, in the wild horses spend most of their time in search of forage. This means they aren’t just eating all day, they’re also traveling to find food. The constant search for forage means a horse can easily travel over twenty miles a day. Of course, if pasture is plentiful, they don’t have to travel as much, perhaps as far as the nearest water hole. However, when grass is scarce, it’s not unusual for horses to be constantly on the move, eating a few bites here and there as they find it.
Horses in the wild will spend about two-thirds of their time eating. Our backyard horses rarely have to travel to eat, and this partly explains why it’s easy for a horse that doesn’t work too hard to get overweight. The only exercise they may get is walking from the round bale to the water trough and back. Horses that are kept in smaller pastures, or in stalls may spend up to half of this time just standing. And this is why habits like weaving and stall walking may develop. The instinct to travel and eat is still strong in domestic horses, and when they don’t have to, they find another way to expend energy.
Sleep time is important too. Horses may spend anywhere from two to six hours sleeping a day. Mature horses sleep much less than young horses, especially foals, who often nap after every meal. Young foals can spend about half the day snoozing. Mature horses may only sleep a few hours every day. They only sleep deeply for a few minutes at a time. A very old horse may doze more frequently. Some horses will lie down for long periods of time, while others seem never to lie down and always stand to sleep.
The remaining hours of the day are spent allogrooming - when horses groom and scratch each other, hanging out and sometimes, playing. Younger horses tend to play more than mature horses, although some remain quite playful throughout their lives. Horses, like humans, take time with friends to simply enjoy life. |
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