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Is Your Horse Into Everything? He Could Be An Equine Study Star

Researchers from Nürtingen-Geislingen University of Applied Science in Nürtingen, Germany, are seeking videos of horses doing unusual things – like opening stall latches or creatively stealing their friend's food – to feature on the Equine Science Talk YouTube channel. This channel is produced by equine behavioral scientists to highlight research advances and promote discussions of equine problem solving and innovation.

If you have a horse that's found a creative way to solve their “problem,” the research team would love to see it for possible study and video inclusion. The innovative strategies horses use are behaviors they don't typically show in a natural environment.

Click here to view the YouTube Channel.

For more information on how to submit videos, please contact konstanze.krueger at hfwu.de

3D Printer Gives A Draft Horse Reason To Breathe Easier

When Ronnie, a 2,000-pound draft horse owned by an Amish family in Clark, Missouri, started having trouble breathing, he was taken to the University of Missouri College of Veterinary Medicine. There, equine veterinarian Joanne Kramer surgically created a hole in the horse's windpipe to help him breathe easier and bypass a permanent airway obstruction.

However, there was still an issue holding Ronnie back. He was a working horse and needed to be in top physical shape to meet the demands of his daily farm tasks.

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“After the tracheotomy, Ronnie was just fine walking around, but he had some extra skin around the hole in the windpipe that kept flapping into the hole when he was out on his family's farm plowing the fields, causing him to tire very easily,” said Kevin Keegan, a professor in the College of Veterinary Medicine that oversaw Ronnie's recovery. “What we needed was some type of device to put in the windpipe hole that would allow air to come in while still blocking out the extra skin, dust and bugs.”

So, Keegan teamed up with two undergraduate students in the MU College of Engineering, who are also members of MU's 3D printing club. The collaboration resulted in an innovative solution that highlights the power of precision medicine, one of the key cornerstones of the NextGen Precision Health Initiative.

“We created a device using thermoplastic polyurethane filament, which is a flexible material,” said Holly Anderson, a senior from St. Louis majoring in biomedical engineering. “Most filaments tend to be much harder and stiffer, but we needed something we could squeeze into the horse's trachea that wouldn't crack or deform over time.”

After the first prototype was created, Keegan and the students tried to schedule a meeting with Ronnie's owner, but that turned out trickier than expected because the Amish traditionally do not use cell phones or other forms of technology.

A woman who serves as an intermediary between the Amish community in Clark and the general public was able to help Keegan and the students arrange a time for the visit. But soon after arriving on the farm, they realized the device was too big for Ronnie's hole in the windpipe.

“So, we knew we needed to make some adjustments,” said Griffen Mustion, a junior from Springfield, Missouri, who is majoring in biomedical engineering. “I stuck my fingers into the gap of the horse's throat to see how deep it was, and then we went back to the 3D printing lab to make some tweaks to the device's size, height and depth.”

Eventually, the students found the perfect balance between making the device stiff enough to stay in place, but flexible enough to bend and expand to the right fit. They returned to the Amish farm and successfully inserted the device into Ronnie's trachea, which drastically improved his breathing and allowed him to resume his farm duties with the rest of the draft horses.

“This was a great opportunity to combine my passion for 3D printing with an opportunity to help a patient,” Anderson said. “I've always been interested in how prosthetics can help in the area of biomedical engineering and being able to improve the health of Ronnie the horse was pretty cool, too.”

Mustion added that while the patient was a 2,000 pound horse in this case, the project showcased how 3D printers can be utilized in precision medicine to help animals or people with various health issues.

“3D printing allows you to customize your product so that it fits the patient perfectly,” Mustion said. “With rapid prototyping, you can make tweaks until the product is how you want it, and that ties into precision medicine because we want to design solutions for patients that meet their needs exactly.”

Keegan, who has been an equine veterinarian at MU for the past 30 years, has recently been contacted by a horse owner in Texas with a similar problem to Ronnie's, and the team is now collaborating on another custom device to see if they can help.

“I think this project showed that custom devices for each animal are the way to go moving forward,” Keegan said. “Rather than a one-size-fits-all solution, we can measure the hole in each horse's trachea after the tracheotomy and 3D print a prototype to see if the device fits. I'm just doing my job, but it was a team effort, and I am happy to help.”

It’s Me! Horses Recognize Other Horses In Images

A study from Italy has shown that hoses can recognize their own species in images, but not other animals, reports The Horse.

Dr. Giulia Ragonese, with the Department of Veterinary Sciences at the University of Messina in Italy, has shown that horses can recognize 2D images of their own species. Dogs, cows, sheep and monkeys can also identify their own species in images.

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Ragonese showed 10 Franches-Montagnes horses images of other horses, pigs, donkeys, cows and sheep. Food was first hidden behind the images of the horses, then the test was reversed and food was put behind the images of other animals. The horses had to push the correct photo to find the food behind the image.

The scientists found that 80 percent of horses were able to distinguish horse faces from the others – including donkeys. However, they were unable to distinguish cows, pigs, sheep and donkeys from one another.

Ragonese said that this information offers insight into how the equine brain works, which is beneficial for equine welfare.

Peat Moss Or Wood Shavings: Bedding For Asthmatic Horses

The natural dust and molds found in bedding material often intensify the clinical signs of horses with asthma. Bedding materials differ in the inhalable and respirable particles they release, just as they have variable absorptive qualities and aesthetic appeal. While horsemen the world over use straw and wood shavings extensively, the popularity of peat moss often coincides with where it is easily obtained, such as in Nordic and Baltic countries. Finnish researchers recently investigated if the use of wood shavings and peat moss as bedding had different effects on the respiratory health of horses.

Researchers chose 32 clinically healthy riding-school horses for this study. The daily schedule of the horses included 18 hours in a stall, 2 to 3 hours of exercise in an indoor arena, and 3 to 4 hours outside in sandy paddocks. Horses were stabled in identically sized stalls with a common airspace and with the same level of ventilation. Researchers maintained bedding at a depth of approximately 4 inches, with new bedding added each day after stall cleaning to keep the depth consistent. Horses stayed on each bedding material for 35 days. Diets consisted of haylage and pelleted concentrate. Horses ate the haylage off the stall floor. Researchers performed lower airway endoscopy and sampling (tracheal wash and bronchoalveolar lavage fluid) for cytological examination at the end of each bedding period.

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While researchers found no differences in respiratory rate or tracheal mucus accumulation between treatments, horses bedded on wood shavings had more neutrophils in their tracheal washes and bronchoalveolar lavage fluid. The researchers concluded that “between the two bedding materials used in this study, peat caused less neutrophilic lower airway inflammation in horses.”

Asthmatic horses should be kept outside as much as possible, a management strategy that keeps many horses from having severe symptoms of asthma. High-performance horses must often be stabled to accommodate training and competition schedules. In these instances, medical management of asthma should be guided by a veterinarian well versed in the respiratory care of horses. Management decisions are often based on reducing inhalable dust and molds, which includes careful selection of bedding and forages.

Aside from forage type (haylage versus dry hay) or treatment (soaking versus high-temperature steaming), another nutritional consideration is the use of long-chain omega-3 fatty acids, particularly docosahexaenoic acid (DHA). In a consensus statement from the American College of Veterinary Internal Medicine, experts recommend the use of omega-3 fatty acids as a way to control airway inflammation.^° The most potent sources of omega-3 fatty acids available for horses are marine-derived oils, such as EO-3.

^*Monki, J., M. Sasstamoinen, N. Karikoski, M. Rajamaki, M. Roaekallio, J. Junnila, S. Sarkjarvi, M. Norring, A. Valros, S. Oranen Ben Fatma, and A. Mykkanen. 2021. Effects of bedding material on equine lower airway inflammation: A crossover study comparing peat and wood shavings. Frontiers in Veterinary Science 8:656814.