As prey animals, horses often react to sounds and sights that startle them by fleeing. While helpful for survival, it's not always beneficial in show-ring settings where what's startling the horse isn't truly life threatening.
Dr. Clare Hole of the Department of Veterinary Medicine at the University of Cambridge noted that auditory perception is key to how a horse responds both behaviorally and physiologically. Competition horses are often outfitted in ear coverings in hopes that the sound outside the show arena will be muffled, allowing the horse to focus on the job at hand.
To see if noise-dampening ear coverings actually worked, Hole and a team of scientists used 18 horses familiar with ear coverings, which had a variety of competition backgrounds. The horses, some with ear covers and some without, were then presented with five sounds often heard in barn or show environments. The sounds were played at 67 decibels for 20 seconds. The scientists tracked both heart rate and behavior response of each horse.
The noises included: an unfamiliar whinny; a crowd clapping and cheering; a horse trotting on asphalt; feed being scooped and poured into a bucket; and the song We are the Champions, by Queen. Horses had the biggest behavioral and heart rate changes to hearing the horse trotting on asphalt, which may trigger their flight response, the team said.
The scientists found both behavioral and physiological response differences between the horses wearing ear coverings and those not wearing the coverings: the horses wearing ear coverings were less responsive to the sounds. The responses varied by sound, they noted.
They conclude that the overall responsiveness to sound suggests that noise could have an impact on the horse's focus and attention during competition and that ear coverings may reduce stress in competition horses.
Read more at HorseTalk.
The post Sound Off: Ear Coverings May Make Horses Less Reactive appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.
