Transcript:

[0:03]

Do animals feel emotion? Think about that question. What's your opinion — do they have feelings? I asked that of my students one day in class. It was an animal ethics course, and the response was a little surprising to me because I didn't quite expect it, but they all laughed — fifty-something of them. They all giggled. They all thought, "Oh, that's such a preposterous question. How can animals have feelings?"

[0:38]

And I, you know, shook my head and said, "Okay, here's a teaching moment," as I'm thinking through how am I going to address this. And I used an easy example — because today's all about horses and their feelings, but at the time I used dogs, because we could relate to them. They live in our homes. We interact with them pretty intimately — you know, also horses too — but I said, "What about when you get home and your dog hasn't seen you all day, or dogs? How do they react?"

[1:03]

And I have two — tails are wagging, jumping up and down, barking, excited. Think of a pack of wolves in the wild when they come back from a hunt — all the young wolves come out of the den and they're all yipping and yapping, and they're happy. It's signs of happiness. That is an emotion. But then what about fear? Oh, you've been a naughty dog. You know, my youngest, she's like, "Oh, what did I do? What teddy bear did I destroy today?" And I'm like, "You naughty dog," and she's like, "Oh, I did something wrong," and she cowers. And she's loved — trust me, I love my dog, gosh — but she still displays, like, "Uh-oh, what did I do?" So that's a fear response, right? We always talk about fight or flight in animals — those are emotions. So I explained to my students, absolutely, animals have emotion.

[1:59]

Now, we have to be careful. We don't want to anthropomorphize animals — meaning they're on our level of cognition of humans — but when we talk about animal welfare, happy horses, they do have a level of sentience. These are beings that think and feel and problem solve. I mean, I use the example of the crow — a bird that I saw in person last year. I saw a crow literally drop a nut in the middle of the street, fly off, wait for cars to pass over it, and fly back. I literally observed that behavior. That shows a level of thinking and critical thinking. So animals — their feelings, their thought processes — are a lot more complex than, historically, we've given them credit for. And that's why we now have the five domains of animal welfare, and the way we understand them are changing.

[3:01]

Now, for those that have been around horses a lot, you've probably observed this behavior. But let's say you have two pasture mates — and I remember this story. This was my mare, Tari, who I got to train and ride for quite a while a few years ago. We kept her in a large pasture with mares once she transitioned from a riding horse to a broodmare. Well, she had a really good friend — and I don't remember her friend's name, but I remember I went to go get Tari one day from pasture, and I haltered her up, brought her outside the fence, and her friend — we'll just call her Bella — walked with Tari all the way. And I knew they were close, they had a close, tight bond.

[3:48]

They were nickering at each other. I got Tari, closed the gate, and as I walked away, I could hear Bella whinny really loud — and she had a loud neigh — like, "Don't leave me, Tari, where are you going? Please come back!" And that's typical on horse farms around the world — whenever you separate pasture mates for whatever reason, or you know, going for a ride or whatever, they have some separation anxiety — again, feelings. And then when I brought Tari back, Bella came running to the fence, and they were neighing and nickering. Once they got close and I put Tari back into the pasture and I closed the gate, I just watched them — because I love, love horse behavior — and they pranced around, galloped a little bit, and then they settled down and did some allogrooming, and then they settled down and grazed. And I walked back to the barn — you know, just one of those days you just love to watch horses.

[4:50]

So absolutely, these animals have feelings. And the purpose of this video podcast today is to talk about signs that your horse is happy — you know, what are the things that you can look at as an owner and say, "Yep, my animal seems satisfied, happy in life." Then we're going to talk about some of the studies — it's very interesting and very fun to investigate: can horses tell if we're happy? How perceptive are they to our own emotions? Because we talk a lot about that in training. And then we're going to finish up with owners — their perceptions of their horses’ happiness. So, a very fun podcast, a fun topic to talk about.

[5:38]

Now, when I asked that question, you know, "Do animals have feelings?" — and my students didn't… you know, they probably weren't behavior experts, and these were all undergraduates studying hard, many of them going on to be veterinarians or trying to become veterinarians — and I think it's important to get across to anybody that works with animals that yes, they have emotional states. And we know this is in horses. And the research, as we do more and more of it in the equine world, we're understanding the depth of those emotions with horses.

[6:24]

So just recently, a study — Carol Hall and a bunch of others out of, around the world — you know, New Zealand, Australia, UK — a lot of authors talking about assessing the equine emotional state, and they're explaining why we're still in the early stages of understanding this. There's still a lot more research to be done. We're going to talk about the grimace scale today — that is becoming more of a pain assessment tool — you know, horses' grimace and what does that mean.

[7:00]

A lot of this science is still breaking, and just to quote the beginning of the article — I have it here in front of me: "The study of animal behavior has increasingly included consideration of the emotional component of behavioral responses, with the ultimate goal of being able to assess subjective experience — that is, how the animal feels." So, it goes on to talk about how horses have positive experiences, negative experiences, things that are pleasant to them, unpleasant to them, reward, punishment — all of that. What does that mean? And so I think really, too, where this is going to benefit you is how we train them — you know, how we, quote-unquote, "break" horses. We don't want to break horses anymore — we want to train them. We want to do it from an empathetic point of view.

[7:59]

And I know that's a huge debate — and oh wow, you know, even if you just look at podcasts on training, there’s a hundred of them: different philosophies, different ways to train. But from a science perspective, from an equine educator perspective, I think what's exciting is we're getting a deeper understanding of horses and their mental states. So as we get into the 21st — even in 100 years, 22nd century — how we trained horses 50 years ago, 100 years ago, 1,000 years ago will not be acceptable, because we'll have a greater understanding of how these animals operate.

[8:39]

Now, my area of research — a lot of what I studied — was stress. Okay, so we have happiness, which we're just learning how to assess, we're just learning how to quantify as scientists, and then I did the opposite — and that's with stress. Now, stress comes in many different forms. I was looking more at physical stress — so exercise stress on horses and their impacts. But there's also behavioral or mental stress.

[9:18]

So stress is very easy to assess scientifically. One of the easiest ways is we look at taking blood cortisol — and, you know, different ways to do it without getting too much into the depth of it — but we did look at cortisol levels. Then we looked at vital signs. So, I exercise mares and look at recovery times, and then look at impacts on nutrition, look at impacts on reproduction. Because we like to go out and ride and exercise our horses — which is good, it is healthy for them — but it's still a stress, a stress on the body. That's why we exercise — so our bodies recover, and we're healthier, better cardiovascular health, all of that.

[10:01]

So we're looking at other things too, like oxytocin. Oxytocin — this is kind of emerging. It's one of these hormones that we look at that helps during times of stress — it's released and helps suppress it. So the point of it is, we can look at a horse and we have different markers — not just behavior, what's abnormal, how do we assess the horse visually — but also biologically. You know, how are they responding? So we can look at that with stress. Now, looking at it with happiness, as we're going to find out in some of the studies, we're trying to look at some other markers biologically to show signs of happiness.

[10:41]

So when we ask the question, "Can horses be happy?" how do we look at that? And one way scientists are doing that is through evaluating the horse’s behavior, right? We know horses are social animals. We know they form tight bonds — Tari and Bella, very, very tight friends, close friends. We know that. We observe them. We observe them in the wild — you know, the bands of mares and young horses and foals with a stallion — tight social bonds there. We're recognizing now these social bonds — it's not instinct, it is emotional attachments. And they're starting to validate some of this empathy that horses have for each other.

[11:40]

You know, I grew up watching wildlife videos — and zebras, and zebras being taken down by lions and other top predators — and you wonder, does the herd look back and go, "Oh well, at least it wasn’t me"? No — I mean, they have empathy, and we're starting to validate that. So one of the ways that scientists are doing that is this qualitative behavioral assessment that we're using to validate feelings in animals. So it is a work in progress, but in the last 10–15 years, this area of science has really grown. So yeah, science is saying animals have behavior that shows emotion, and the complexities of it are being investigated. We're looking at not just biology, but then we're also looking at ways to evaluate animals.

[12:43]

I'll tell you something else that's crazy — in 2024, artificial intelligence, we're starting to see that leak into the scientific studies. I can only imagine the excitement in behavioral sciences that they're setting up cameras and they're using AI — training AI — to recognize certain behaviors, and they're starting to quantify this. Because the research I've done looking at horse behavior — it's very time-consuming. You're talking hours — all day — and sitting there with a check sheet and a stopwatch and binoculars and your focal animals, and every 15 seconds you're looking up and writing down a behavior. Every 15 seconds. And you do that for hours and hours and hours. It's difficult. And then you miss certain behaviors because it didn't fall into that 15-second check.

[13:37]

With AI, we're now able to set up cameras in pastures — and this is ongoing today in other species around the world — and AI is able to go through and check off all these behaviors. So we're getting… I can only imagine where we're going to be in five, ten years. It's going to be really exciting for us, especially when it comes to equine behavior. How do we train AI to do that? And how do we train people like me? How did I get trained in recognizing behavior? And that's really understanding how horses communicate — not just vocally, but really body language. You know, what does their body language tell you? And I talk about this in podcast after podcast, class after class — you need to get your eyes on your horse every day.

[14:29]

Somebody — if you're away, if you can't do it in your facility — somebody needs to see that horse in the morning, somebody needs to see that horse in the evening. Because not only is it important for things like colic, but if they're injured, if they've hurt limbs, if there's a lameness issue, you want to be able to recognize that. And it's important for welfare, and we have a moral responsibility to do it. But only you know what your horse is like, because you're around them every day, or mostly every day. So you know your animals really well. So you'll be able to recognize when things aren't quite right.

[15:09]

Right? So the whole purpose of this podcast is signs that your horses are happy. Well, the first thing is you have to know when they're not happy — when things aren't right. You know, are they depressed? Are they lethargic? Or are they just normal? You know, normal behavior for them — normal behavior usually means it's a happy horse. Things are fine, content, you know. But then there are other things you can look at that show happiness. So we're going to talk about that. But, you know, every day — are they eating normally? Are they interacting with their friends? Is Tari and Bella still close by each other, or is Bella way off in the pasture by herself in the corner? Whoa — that's not right. Okay, I know that horse isn’t okay. Something's wrong, so we better investigate further.

[16:00]

So it's important to understand what's normal — then we can go and look at, you know, the happiness scale, or if there’s something wrong. But other things — when you do visual assessment — veterinarians talk about this all the time, a lot of studies on that. You know, when you look and do a visual appraisal of your horse, it's not just behavior — look at their skin, their limbs. No cuts, lesions, no bleeding. Not showing any signs of disease. Are they dropping weight? Are they putting on too much weight? That will key you into some management things. When they walk, are they walking normally? Can you detect any lameness?

[16:45]

And then we look at behavior — social behaviors, like I said, with other animals, but also social behaviors with you. If, when I walk out in pasture, I'm used to Tari standing still for me or turning and walking towards me because we have that close relationship — but then one day I go out to pasture and she bolts — that's not right. That's not normal behavior. Or if I do catch her, and I do have her haltered up, and I bring her into the barn and I'm grooming her, and she's just irritable today — ears pinned, grimacing — you know, talking about the grimace scale — trying to maybe bite me — you know, that's not normal. That's not a good horse–human relationship. So those are things to show you that the horse isn’t happy. And then you investigate further, and maybe call your veterinarian if you're very concerned. And I would always say, if you're ever concerned about your horse's health, it's worth a phone call — absolutely.

[17:51]

So what are some of these signs a horse is relaxed or happy? Things when a horse is calm — some calming signals. These are patterns of behavior that horses use to diffuse stress, maintain a peaceful environment. You know, it's funny — it's like with these calming signals, with humans we do it to diffuse stress. So we have strangers coming up to us, and I'm always smiling, like, "Hey, how are you?" You know, "Hi!" It's just part of my culture and what I've learned. And we use that to diffuse a situation, to show we're not a threat. And so horses do this with other horses to show, "Hey, I'm calm, I'm happy."

[18:35]

So, things that they do — and you probably see this with your dogs too, because I talk about this, I do see it with them — when you do eye contact with them, they might turn their head away. So, horses — they come nose-to-nose, one might turn a head away, like, "Hey, I'm not a threat, everything's cool between us." Yawning — that's a sign of diffusing stress. My dogs do it all the time with each other. Horses do it. Blinking — horses may do that more. Licking, chewing, or even rolling. Rolling is always a great sign of relaxation in horses — like, "Hey, I'm not a threat, look, I'm rolling. Look at me," and doing that.

[19:19]

So there’s other things too that, you know, they show — their flanks, swing their heads, shake their necks. You’ve probably seen some of this. Stretching their jaws, their eyes are half-closed — all signs that horses are relaxed and calm. And if they’re meeting you or another horse, they may do some of these things to say, “Yeah, everything’s great, yeah I’m fine, yeah everything’s good.”

[19:44]

The other thing is, anytime you talk horse behavior, you always talk about the ears. Talk about the barometer of a horse’s mood — it’s their ears. Are their ears relaxed? Are they alert? That’s fine — alert is, “Hey, what’s going on?” You know, they’re prey animals. They’re always curious to their environment to make sure they’re safe. Relaxed, down, or off to the sides — that’s always a good sign of a happy horse. But then, when those ears are back — like when you’re riding — they’re cueing into you, but when they’re pinned, when those ears are back, that is, like I talked about a few minutes ago with Tari, not a happy horse. Right? Whatever you’re doing — back up, whoa, okay, what’s going on?

[20:26]

Observing that with horses — I was just with foals the other day, this little foal, Oscar, I think it’s on social media — he was pinning his ears at the other colts, like, “Stay away from Mom.” You know, he was just a little turd, he was great to watch. But that’s an indication — “Hey, stay away from me, I’m not happy.” Okay? But relaxed, forward, to the sides — that’s good. Signs of happiness, relaxation. Horses are happy when they’re relaxed and they’re just getting to do what they want to do — being a horse.

[21:06]

Where this research is going — and this is again where it’s exciting with AI and other tools that we use — is looking at facial expressions in horses. In years past, it wasn’t something we really looked at. Yeah sure, we looked at the eyes. We always like to say a soft, round eye — you know, not hard, not tight, nice and calm eye. But we’re finding that there’s a whole different fleet, or different categories, of facial expressions that horses are doing. So just in the last few years, they’re tying in facial expressions with biology — so they’re looking at oxytocin and some of these other hormones to say, “When they see this facial expression — wow, that horse is happy,” or, “Wow, that horse is not happy.”

[21:58]

And that’s kind of leading into some things like the grimace scale, which we talk about here in just a second. But this is not just in horses — they’re looking at it across species. But they’re starting to find different facial expressions that animals use. I know as humans, we’re very expressive, right? Like happy, sad, and we’re able to read it. As primates, we’re obviously very intelligent — the most intelligent species on this planet — and we can subtly detect facial expressions without even thinking about it. You know, we quote-unquote “instincts,” but it’s just learned behavior. And we know, “Oh, that’s a threat,” or, “Oh, that’s not a threat.” Like I said — diffusing stress, smiling, “Hey, how are you?”

[22:44]

One of the things we’re looking at in horses is eye shape, and then the wrinkles in their eyes too, and obviously ear posture, which we talked about. So this is leading to the development of the horse grimace scale as an assessment tool in horses undergoing different procedures. And this was created by Emanuela Dalla Costa — she’s known for this — where horses were going through castration procedures, which is pretty painful. I mean, obviously they have to be under pain relief and stuff, but there’s still some pain with it. And they were able to capture the horses’ faces and start to quantify by the negative experiences — so this grimace, how intense is that pain?

[23:32]

So what she was looking at, and her study partners were looking at, was the ears — obviously that was a big one. Orbital tightening — so those eyes — either wide open, partially open, or completely closed, like painful. You know, we’ve all been there. Tension above the eyes — so you can see the muscles above the eyes do that strain. Chewing strain, mouth or chin strain — like, you know, we grimace, it’s almost similar to how we do it. Horses do that. And then also their nostrils. So she came up with a scale looking at the differences — where it was either present or not present. So was it an obvious sign of grimacing or not? And if the ears were back, the orbital tightening was tight, strained chewing, strained jaw, tension around the eye, pronounced chin strain, nostrils — all of that — that was the end of the grimace scale.

[24:51]

And then when you look at facial expressions — you know, that’s the bad side of it. Then when we look at the other side — where horses were happy or not alert — that’s where you don’t have that orbital tightening, the ears are relaxed, the chin’s relaxed, nostrils relaxed. It has that really happy — that’s a happiness scale for a horse. When they’re relaxed and showing you that, “Yeah, things are good, things are okay.” Those are ways that they can do it when you’re looking just at the physiology and their general body posture.

[25:35]

Something we want to look at — I will say the creases in the eyes I always find interesting. And I noticed this the other day working with a horse that didn’t know me and just had that little bit of worry, you know, like just a little bit. I was like, “Oh buddy, I’m sorry, I know you don’t know me that well, but it’s okay.” And I was petting him on the neck and letting him sniff me, diffusing it for him. But I did notice that little crease of worry. And they do do that. Eye shape — if you really just want to see them like, “Oh, here’s Chris, okay, yeah, maybe I’ll get an apple today, maybe I’ll get a carrot, or get some pets and we get to go ride.”

[26:15]

So looking at body posture, looking at behavior, looking at facial expressions — you really should know the pain, the grimacing, recognize those signs. And then know that relaxed, normal, day-to-day — things are fine — that’s your happiness scale. That’s where the horse is like, “Great.” And then we’re correlating this with hormones, we’re correlating it with stress hormones and happiness hormones. The research is ongoing today as I talk and record this — in the world, somebody is evaluating that data, I guarantee you. Or they’re planning to do a study, or they’re in the middle of a study.

[26:56]

The next interesting bit of this, when you talk about, “Is your horse happy?” or “How perceptive are they of us?”

[27:09]

Right — when I was a young, budding professor at Clemson University — yeah, this was, geez, 15 years ago, 2007–2008 — there were some horrific fires back in my hometown, San Diego, California. And these were the worst that they’ve ever seen that I know of in my lifetime. I was obviously on the East Coast, United States, and I had family on the West Coast in San Diego — particularly my brother. And I went to bed and heard about these fires — because California wildfires do happen in the east part of San Diego. Well, woke up in the morning — overnight, we have these things called Santa Ana winds, which come off the desert. They’re really hot winds that blow out to the ocean — feels like a hair dryer in your face sometimes, it’s that warm — and it really makes these fires horrific.

[28:09]

The fires raced all the way to San Diego — within a mile of my brother’s home, within a couple miles of my childhood home. Many homes burnt down, and they stopped it, I believe, a couple miles away from the Del Mar racetrack where I used to work. That was the emergency evacuation point for all the horses in San Diego. And I was like, “Wow, it was a bad fire — it was really bad.” And I remember seeing an article in the paper of this woman with her horses, and she was spray painting her phone number on her horses and letting them go, because she couldn’t get them in a trailer and she couldn’t evacuate them. And people would do that.

[28:56]

So I used to use that story as a lesson in emergency preparedness — you know, what do you do when there’s a fire coming? The reason I’m telling you this story, and how it ties into horses being happy of all things, is because it got me thinking — okay, I’m a horse owner, I’ve got my babies in my backyard, I’ve got a fire coming. Holy smokes — like, wow, okay — and I’m starting to panic. My heart rate is racing, I am, “Oh my God, my house, my dogs, my family, my horses — what am I going to do?” And if I didn’t have a plan, I would probably fall apart and rush around and make a lot of mistakes. If I’ve had a plan, and if I’ve trained my horses to trailer properly, in situations like that, then I’m more calm, and I could approach my horse and say, “Okay buddy, Tari, Bella, whatever — here’s your halter, okay, we need to get on the trailer because we need to go.” And they can smell the smoke — they’re probably heightened and freaked out — but if I’m calm and collected, they’ll be calm and relaxed.

[30:13]

If I’m like, “Oh my God, T, we gotta go, hurry, hurry, hurry,” and I rush out there with my halter and I’m frustrated and upset, she senses that.

[30:23]

And that’s what this study is looking at — how perceptive are horses to human emotion and human facial expression? It’s not I’m running out there like a madman going, “Get in the trailer, we’re gonna die!” You know, it’s… even if I’m stressed and I’m strained, I’m like, “Okay, we gotta go, we gotta go,” and I’m looking up the hill, “Whoa…” You know? And sometimes, to finish out that story — in the San Diego paper, the woman put her phone number on there, let the horses escape, because if you can’t get them on a trailer, that’s the best thing to do — let them find their way. And she was reunited with the horses eventually, and people could call her and say, “Hey, I saw your horses out on this pasture, you know, this part of the county.”

[31:14]

But you — whenever in situations like that — want to be as calm and relaxed, and you want the horses to be trained, because they can detect your facial expression. So this was a very, very interesting study that they looked at, where horses could perceive human emotion. And what they did is they put horses in — and there’s multiple studies that do this — but they put horses in this stall with a video screen, and they looked at it different ways. And just to sum it up, because I just found it fascinating to read — they did a visual with just a person’s face, and they observed the horses. Then they looked at their stress responses. Then they did just audio. Then they did video and audio. And then they really messed the horses up — they did different facial expressions with the audio. So, happy face with not-happy audio, and then unhappy face with happy audio — that must have really confused the horses.

[32:15]

But they wanted to see their behavior — and, in fact, the horses were able to perceive owner’s happiness, you know, and facial expressions. And the horses, when the owners were upset or angry, were more alert and more, you know — you saw that grimace scale, things coming in. If you think about it — the orbital tightening, the jaw, the nervousness, like “uh-oh.” And then you play the audio of an angry owner — and the same thing. And then they were more relaxed with the happy owner and the happy audio. And then there were mixed results when they mixed it up, because they really confused the horses — the horses didn’t know what to think. But probably, you know, I would think horses would be a little bit more on the side of caution as a prey species. So they do perceive your emotion all the time.

[33:08]

Now, the final piece of this is your perception of horse happiness. And I found — again, this was a pretty recent study — looking at a survey of horse owners on, “Do you think your horse is happy?” And it was really interesting — close to 95% said, “Yes, my horse is happy.” 5% said, “No.” And when they asked overall, “How happy is your horse?” — over 40% said “Very happy,” over 50% said “Somewhat happy.”

[33:53]

You know, and it just depends — it’s a day-to-day thing. And I think the important point of this is we are contemporary enough, we are critical thinkers as horse owners, we are connected to these animals that we recognize, yes, they have emotion. The broader general public in the world — when they view animal emotion — there’s probably a segment, I guarantee you, that doesn’t think animals have any feelings, that it’s all instinct. Which isn’t true at all. But obviously, I’ve been around horse owners, I’m a horse owner, my friends are horse owners — we all know our animals do express emotion.

[34:30]

So this does tie in with that. When they did a word cloud analysis — these are always interesting — and so they go and ask, “Describe in a few words, how would you know that your horse is happy?” And then there are just certain words that pop out, right? So if I asked you, “Describe in a few words, how do you know that your horse is happy?” — I’ll give you a second to think about it. Okay, so the big word that came out — “ear.” That was the biggest. How do you know if your horse is happy? Look at his ears, or her ears — you know, what are they doing? Eye. Body language. And then it goes down to “willingness” — willingness to be trained, willingness to interact with you. “Facial expressions” was up there — so we are starting to recognize that as horse owners, that yes, these horses do make facial expressions. We look at the creases in those eyes, we look at their nostrils. “Soft eye” was right with that. Halter — yeah, can you halter them? Behavior. Interaction.

[35:40]

So those are all the words that owners were putting out there. Then they asked the owner’s perception — “Do you believe your horses are happy when you interact with them?” Okay, so for you that work with horses or own horses — do you feel your horses are happy to interact with you? Close to 92% said “Yes,” only 2.7% said “No,” and about 6% said “No response/neutral.” So over 90% of owners — yes, when you work with them, they are happy. And again, it makes sense. You know, we call it enrichment for the animal — when you train them, when you ride them, that enrichment is helping their mental state, stimulating them. They want to work, they want to exercise, they want to be your companion. We know that — we’ve done the research.

[36:36]

And so, the behavioral research — when we do these things like exercise, to back it up, I talk about exercise stress — that exercise stress is healthy for horses. We all need exercise; we can’t just sit around all day, you know, we’ll have shorter lifespans. But when we look at the mental stress — you know, things like boredom, things like lack of exercise — all lead to abnormal behaviors in horses. So yes, that interaction, that training program, that exercise is all critical to them being healthy and happy.

[37:14]

Alright, owners — going back to owner perceptions: “Do you believe your horses are happy when you ride them?” Would you say yes or no? Well, close to 70% said “Yes,” “No” was 16%, and “No response” was about 14%. So there’s a little small segment that said, “When I ride them, they’re not quite happy.” Could be the individual horse, could be the type of discipline they’re doing — things like that. How about this — “Do you believe your horses are happy when you work them?” How would you answer that? Yeah, close to 81% said “Yes,” “No” was 10%. Again, those horses that are kind of stinky — and it could be, oh gosh, that’s a whole different topic for another day. I have a lot of empathy for horses that are, quote-unquote, “stinky” or difficult to train. There’s probably a lot of negative experiences with somebody. I ran into it all the time — horses that just didn’t like men. Just didn’t. And it was probably a previous experience, and I respected that. I said, “Okay,” you know, I had some of my female colleagues work the horse, or I wouldn’t. I wouldn’t push it. I didn’t take it personally. So that probably explains some of the “No’s” in there.

[38:35]

Alright, final word cloud — because this is always fun: If you could change one factor in your horse’s life to increase or improve their happiness, what would it be? So you’re sitting, watching this, or listening to this — what’s one thing you could do to improve your horse’s life, to increase their happiness? And this is what we asked the owners. The number one thing that came out in this word cloud was “turnout.” So my question is — why don’t you do it? And sometimes, I get it — logistics, can’t do it. But if there are things in here that you can do — do them. And sometimes you can’t — you know, yeah, my horse would be happy if we were riding on the plains of Asia with all that green ocean of grass. Oh, they’d love it. I mean, that’s not realistic. But turnout — yeah, absolutely. More pasture, more paddock time. Grass. Paddock mate. More time with me. Herd.

[39:40]

So these are some of the things that owners were thinking about — how can I improve my horse’s lives? And I’m sure some of them did that, if they could. And then, if you ask the horse — so, final question: if your horse could change one factor in their life to increase and improve their happiness, what do you believe he or she, or they, would change? So what do you think? If your horse could talk to you and say, “This would make me happier,” what would it be?

[40:09]

The biggest word in this word cloud was “horse.” Give me another horse. Give me a friend. Which, yeah, I mean, sometimes, you know, horses get really lonely. They’re a social animal. Turnout. Paddock time. More time with me. Grass. Pasture. Food. Herd. Field. So those are the things that — if owners put themselves in their horses’ hooves — would make them more happy, right? So again, if you can do it, do it.

[40:39]

So just to recap all of this — signs that your horses are happy. I mean, you want to look and see that relaxed body language, they’re exhibiting those normal behaviors. Remember — 60% of the day, a horse wants to be eating. They don’t have these stereotypies or vices or abnormal behaviors that we see. No signs of stress. No signs of disease. No signs of lameness. Those facial expressions — we want those relaxed, soft eyes, relaxed jaws, lips trembling sometimes — that’s really just a relaxed horse. If they’re rolling on the ground to get some dust on their pelt, allogrooming their buddies — all of those things. But that facial expression is one. Those ears are relaxed.

[41:27]

And then the vocalizations — nickering with their buddies, greetings, playful sounds. You know, groaning sometimes — it’s like, “Oh,” you know, just relaxed. And they have really good social relationships with you and with their other companions. So it’s an important topic, and you should know what makes your horse happy. And you’re very sophisticated — I never downplay a horse owner’s intelligence. It’s funny — I’ve been doing this for close to 30 years now, and horse owners are very thirsty for knowledge. Horse owners are incredibly devoted to their animals.

[42:19]

So, you know, I just want to tell you — great job. Great job for watching this to learn. At this point, you’re at this point in the video — like, awesome. Great job, you know. And thank you for listening to me and sharing this time with me to evaluate this. And if you want to learn more, I just urge you to go to madbarn.com — on the top right, click on the Learn tab, just type in “happy” in the articles, and there’s an article called “How to Tell if Your Horse is Happy: Top Seven Signs.”

[42:52]

All of our articles are written and evaluated by PhDs, DVMs, equine specialists — we all have the degrees, it’s crazy — all in the horse industry, involved throughout the world, in the United States, in Canada, and really devoted to providing this information to you for free. That is the goal of Mad Barn. That is the goal — you will never have to pay for these YouTube videos or anything like that. All we ask is maybe follow — click the follow button on YouTube. Check us out on social media — TikTok, your social media choice, we’re there. TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, oh geez, YouTube obviously, the YouTube channel, YouTube Shorts, X or Twitter — check us out, Mad Barn. We’re pushing out all this free education. We’re going to keep these videos coming at you. Mad Barn Academy’s in the works — we’re going to have free college-level courses here soon, all of it.

[43:57]

Check out the website, check out the Learn tab, and keep following this channel. More to come. Take care.