welfare | Horse Racing Free Tips

Study: Australian Thoroughbreds Retired Sound Easier To Rehome

After a outcry of public concern regarding the fate of Thoroughbred racehorses when their racing careers were over, a study team was created to assess the incidence, risk factors and outcome for retiring racehorses in Australia.

Drs. Kylie Crawford, Anna Finnane, Ristan Greer, Clive Phillips, Solomon Woldeyohannes, Nigel Perkins and Benjamin Ahern investigated how many horses were retired from racing at the Brisbane Racing Club in Australia over a 13-month period. The team invited all license trainers at the track with three or more horses in work to participate: 27 of the 40 eligible trainers agreed to take part in the study.

It was determined that a median of 544 racehorses were in training each week, with 110 horses retired during the study; 56 of these horses were retired involuntarily because of things like musculoskeletal injuries, cardiac conditions, respiratory concerns or behavior issues. Of these problems, musculoskeletal issues were the most common, afflicting 40 of the 110 horses. The remaining horses were retired voluntarily.

The study team found that 108 of the 110 horses that were retired were repurposed–nearly 46 percent were used as performance horses in their next career. Two of the study horses could not be located. Horses that were retired without injury were 2.28 times more likely to find a performance-horse home.

At a 14-month follow up, it was discovered that four of the horses had been euthanized and one was sent to an abattoir after aggravating an old injury. No horses were euthanized or sent to the abattoir by their racing owner or trainer upon their retirement.

The team notes that long-term outcomes for the horses were not completed. They conclude there is insufficient control over the long-term welfare of retired racehorses.

Read the full study here.

Foals Need Specific Pain Ethogram, Scientists Say

Equine researchers are encouraging the creation of a pain ethogram just for foals. Drs. Johannes van Loon, Nicole Verhaar, Els van den Berg, Sarah Ross and Janny de Grauw have found that foals express pain differently than their adult counterparts. They feel creating a pain-related facial expression scale unique to foals will assist with their welfare. It's important for people caring for foals to recognize when they are experiencing problems, as well as to assist them in managing pain and determining when pain-relieving drugs are working.

To test their theory, the scientists took 60-second videos of 20 foals that were between one day and six months old that had had diagnosed painful conditions like colic, post-operative pain or an injury. They also took video before and after pain medications were administered.

They showed the videos to three observers who didn't know which foals were healthy and which were not, or if they had received pain medication. The observers, a senior anesthetist and two of his vet students, had undergone a two-day training to identify equine facial expressions and what they mean.

It was discovered that though foals and adult horses shared some of the pain-related expressions, like holding their ears back and tightening their eyelids, major differences were also observed.

Painful foals did not:

Show the whites of their eyes when they are in acute pain, like adult horses do. This is most likely because foals show the whites of their eyes all the time as they look around.
Exhibit a flehmen response when in acute pain—it's actually healthy foals that were more likely to curl their lip as they explore their environment.
Grind their teeth, even when they have them.

However, foals in pain did smack their lips, which painful adult horses don't do, though it isn't understood why.

Each observer had similar findings when watching each video. This indicates that that with basic training, horse owners and caretakes can easily assess pain in foals in their care. The scientists suggest that more research is needed to confirm the pain-related behaviors of foals. The team hopes to develop ethograms specific to types of acute pain, like musculoskeletal or colic pain, as well as for chronic pan.

Read the study here.

Poor Manners In-Hand Lead To Poor Behavior While Ridden, Study Shows

Horses that are dangerous under saddle show several in-hand clues about how they will act when ridden. Horse owners and riders should be aware of these behaviors so they are prepared for what the horse might do with a rider astride, report Drs. Nicole Romness, Kate Fenner, Jessica McKenzie, Ashley Anzulewicz, Bibiana Burattini, Bethany Wilson and Paul McGreevy.

The research team used 1,584 responses by horse owners to the Equine Behavior Assessment and Research Questionnaire (E-BARQ) to come to their conclusions. E-BARQ is a global database of horse behavior that allows riders to benchmark their horses against thousands of others in terms of welfare, training and behavior.

The scientists found that bolting, bucking and rearing are dangerously common; nearly 91 percent of pleasure horses in Britain had one or more of these tendencies, E-BARQ responders showed. These tendencies can reflect on a horse's experiences, health or history, the team said.

They found that:

Horses that have issues loading onto a trailer, spook at other animals or don't lead or tie well tend to bolt.
Horses that have issues loading, are intimidated by other horses and don't tie well tend to rear.
Horses that have issues loading, spook at other horses, don't lead or tie well and that don't like having their heads touched tend to buck.
Show jumpers had an increased tendency to rear, while show and companion horses had an increased risk of bucking compare to pleasure-riding horses.

They concluded that good ground manners translate to better behavior under saddle. Addressing issues before a rider is aboard could allow horse owners and handlers to fix them before training measures escalate to involve more force. This would improve the safety and welfare of both horses and riders.

A Little To The Left: Does “Sidedness” Indicate Stress?

German researchers have completed a study that shows horses tend to become more “left-eyed” and “left-legged” when they are in stressful situations. This shift suggests that horses may be using the right side of their brains when confronting challenges; the right side of the brain deals with emotions. When the horse learns to handle the stress, they tend to revert back to left-brain hemisphere processing. The left side of a horse's brain deals with routine, reports The Horse.

Researcher Isabell Marr suggests that changes in laterality could be an effective tool in monitoring how horses are handling changes in their management or training. A shift to the left suggests a horse is stressed. Observations should be made about how often the horse uses his left side compared to his use of the right.

Sensory laterality is a horse's tendency to use one side of his face more than the other; using one side of the body more than the other is motor laterality. A stressed horse may shift left, but when he learns to cope with the stress, he will generally shift back to the right. Laterality is also associated with personality. Horses that tend to step forward with their right front, which indicates left brain dominance, tend to be more optimistic toward new stimuli.

The researchers followed 12 3-year-old sport horses as the geldings were shifted from being field-kept in a herd with no work regimen to box stalls and the beginning of under-saddle training. The scientists looked for correlations in laterality shifts and fecal stress indicators.

They found that when the horses were first moved into the box stalls that they preferred to use their left eye and ear for exploring and listening. By the second week they preferred the left leg over the right, observed by which leg they placed forward while eating.

The scientists conclude that laterality could be used to monitor how a horse is handling environmental changes; ongoing laterality may indicate a negative effect on his welfare.