Adopting natural and better horse management practices for happier and thus healthier horses.
“A happy mind is the key to good health”
This adage is as applicable to animals as much as to humans and more so to horses. Horses were primarily herd animals in the wild until they were domesticated and trained by man to serve various objectives like transportation or war conquests.
I have been advocating adoption of natural stabling and training practices that can be as close to nature as possible, practically, to see the positive change in the behavior of horses and their trainability or ride ability.
Stabling.
Many of our indigenous breeders are used to the habit of shackling the horse’s hinds (single or both) properly stretched out so that the animal cannot change its position. The reason cited being “space constraints” or it being easier to clean out the lidh as it is deposited in the same area continuously.
The front is again tied up near to the feeding bowl or Ghaman, so that its head can also move in only up or down largely vertically.
This is more pronounced in the case of the ignorant lot maintaining the breeding stallions.
The mare or stallion stands thus in the same position for most of the day except when it is taken out to drink water or for retiring at night. (Night box is also a rarity)
A shackled animal is a frustrated animal. Being a natural grazer, it is born to graze, to move out continuously at pasture and relax itself. Absolute restraining and hobbling frustrates the animal and stiffens its limbs This practice of shackling often precipated into serious medical conditions like hoof / coronet abscesses, lacerations in the fetlocks and resultant secondary infections. Accumulation of fluid in the joints also is a direct result of restricted movement. Squatting in hard floors results in capped elbows.
Feeding.
The horse, as detailed below needs a continuous intake of water in small quantities to enable the smooth passage of food along its digestive tract. By keeping the animal away from the availability of water for most of the day or taking the animal out to water periodically, is a criminal act which not often then more results in colic conditions. I.e. blockage of the digestive tract. poor skin condition and several other digestive disorders.
This is more important in winters, when they do not consume enough water while eating hay.
Horses have single stomachs, very much like humans. So the passage of food is a singular passage. In natural conditions the horse keeps grazing lightly and moving about. This results in a very small quantity of ingestion of grass or seed at a time. Over a period of 8-10 hrs of grazing an animal may move few kilometers and eat few kg. But it’s always little at a time, continuously.
Our horse feeding habits have changed to suit our conveniences. The horse is offered hay at a stroke twice or thrice a day and the seed or rich grain is offered all at once, again twice a day mostly.
Ideal stabling conditions demand the horse is either let out to pasture in a small enclosed ground either alone or with other social able animals and the grass or hay is made available to the animal regularly at 5-7 intervals across the day with continuous availability of drinking water. Grain has to be in really limited quantity and its availability really spread across the day in tiny measures.
Horses that are isolated and stabled alone are deprived of contact with other animals can develop stable vices such as wind sucking and weaving. They tend to get depressed and would not have a easy temperament. Aggressive behaviour is more pronounced in such cases. A stressed horse will have weak immune system and
Given enough space horses love to romp, play and hang out together. This also helps develop social skills that help keep harmony in the herd. horses are herd animals, they relax more in company.
Group pasturing enables the mind of the animal to remain relaxed and regular feeding at short intervals helps it, as it consumes only as much food as it is comfortable ingesting at a time, since it is aware that the next food cycle is not too far away. It avoids gorging and regular, continous availability of water smoothens the passage of dry cellulose across the stomach. A relaxed state of mind also emanates from the animal getting due space to move, play and roll at will. Such animals will always show more love, will tend to be less vicious and grow optimally.
Space or lack of it cannot be allowed to be used as reason for shackling the animals. Better would be keep only as many animals as you would have space, rather than trying to compartmentalize and pack the animals.
Ideally same practices should be followed with the stallion, except for the exception that the mares in heat would have to be isolated. I personally, have followed this practice with great success in transforming the mental behavior of my stallion. How many breeding stallions can ride in comfort and in total command, with several mares in heat? How many breeding stallions can be allowed to come near your chair and put their noses in your pocket or play with you harmlessly? My blog at http://equsmarwari.blogspot.com/2008/09/humayun.html .relates my joy and experiences of keeping stallions free of all shackles. I am sure most of my friends would be enthused to see a happier and free animal rather than a frustrated stallion which would rear the moment it it’s brought out from the stables. Exasperatingly most breeders demand this quality as a proof of the stallions breeding power or libido, which is nowhere near the truth.
Tack
Use of barbed bits is a demonstration of the rider’s inefficiency in riding abilities and lack of time devotion to practice and training the animal more than the poor animal’s nature or inability to stop when commanded.
Use of smooth snaffles relax the animal and breeds a feeling of trust between the rider and the animal. Most horse breakers or trainers take @ 15-21 days to train (break) the animal at the age of 2-3 max, after that it’s the rider who manages the riding and the training. Riders do not devote enough time to train the animal and it results in the poor animal doing what it was born to do …. Run….The horse runs when it’s happy, Runs when it’s scared. Its only by concerted training can this running be bridled and channeled into an enjoyable activity. Unable to post the trot, which is the natural gait that the animal is born with , most riders at our end ride or worse pace with a tight rein and barbed bits. Riding is a relaxed passion, with reins hanging loose and smooth snaffles and the animal getting the command from the seat first, then the legs, and lastly from the reins. And the animal responding by maintaining its gait till it is nudged to change the same. Our community tends to work reverse with reins and barbs doing 90% of the commanding, legs 10% and the seat… well what’s that?
Modern training methods need to be adopted to enable the indigenous horses compete in internationally accepted structured sports, otherwise the Marwari’s innate endurance abilities and famed intelligence will remain just a mantle for show and nothing beyond. This would be catastrophic for the breed in the long run...
Let’s breed healthy, stable and feed our animals naturally and give enough time and dedication to training our Marwaris for modern sport.
“A happy mind is the key to good health”
This adage is as applicable to animals as much as to humans and more so to horses. Horses were primarily herd animals in the wild until they were domesticated and trained by man to serve various objectives like transportation or war conquests.
I have been advocating adoption of natural stabling and training practices that can be as close to nature as possible, practically, to see the positive change in the behavior of horses and their trainability or ride ability.
Stabling.
Many of our indigenous breeders are used to the habit of shackling the horse’s hinds (single or both) properly stretched out so that the animal cannot change its position. The reason cited being “space constraints” or it being easier to clean out the lidh as it is deposited in the same area continuously.
The front is again tied up near to the feeding bowl or Ghaman, so that its head can also move in only up or down largely vertically.
This is more pronounced in the case of the ignorant lot maintaining the breeding stallions.
The mare or stallion stands thus in the same position for most of the day except when it is taken out to drink water or for retiring at night. (Night box is also a rarity)
A shackled animal is a frustrated animal. Being a natural grazer, it is born to graze, to move out continuously at pasture and relax itself. Absolute restraining and hobbling frustrates the animal and stiffens its limbs This practice of shackling often precipated into serious medical conditions like hoof / coronet abscesses, lacerations in the fetlocks and resultant secondary infections. Accumulation of fluid in the joints also is a direct result of restricted movement. Squatting in hard floors results in capped elbows.
Feeding.
The horse, as detailed below needs a continuous intake of water in small quantities to enable the smooth passage of food along its digestive tract. By keeping the animal away from the availability of water for most of the day or taking the animal out to water periodically, is a criminal act which not often then more results in colic conditions. I.e. blockage of the digestive tract. poor skin condition and several other digestive disorders.
This is more important in winters, when they do not consume enough water while eating hay.
Horses have single stomachs, very much like humans. So the passage of food is a singular passage. In natural conditions the horse keeps grazing lightly and moving about. This results in a very small quantity of ingestion of grass or seed at a time. Over a period of 8-10 hrs of grazing an animal may move few kilometers and eat few kg. But it’s always little at a time, continuously.
Our horse feeding habits have changed to suit our conveniences. The horse is offered hay at a stroke twice or thrice a day and the seed or rich grain is offered all at once, again twice a day mostly.
Ideal stabling conditions demand the horse is either let out to pasture in a small enclosed ground either alone or with other social able animals and the grass or hay is made available to the animal regularly at 5-7 intervals across the day with continuous availability of drinking water. Grain has to be in really limited quantity and its availability really spread across the day in tiny measures.
Horses that are isolated and stabled alone are deprived of contact with other animals can develop stable vices such as wind sucking and weaving. They tend to get depressed and would not have a easy temperament. Aggressive behaviour is more pronounced in such cases. A stressed horse will have weak immune system and
Given enough space horses love to romp, play and hang out together. This also helps develop social skills that help keep harmony in the herd. horses are herd animals, they relax more in company.
Group pasturing enables the mind of the animal to remain relaxed and regular feeding at short intervals helps it, as it consumes only as much food as it is comfortable ingesting at a time, since it is aware that the next food cycle is not too far away. It avoids gorging and regular, continous availability of water smoothens the passage of dry cellulose across the stomach. A relaxed state of mind also emanates from the animal getting due space to move, play and roll at will. Such animals will always show more love, will tend to be less vicious and grow optimally.
Space or lack of it cannot be allowed to be used as reason for shackling the animals. Better would be keep only as many animals as you would have space, rather than trying to compartmentalize and pack the animals.
Ideally same practices should be followed with the stallion, except for the exception that the mares in heat would have to be isolated. I personally, have followed this practice with great success in transforming the mental behavior of my stallion. How many breeding stallions can ride in comfort and in total command, with several mares in heat? How many breeding stallions can be allowed to come near your chair and put their noses in your pocket or play with you harmlessly? My blog at http://equsmarwari.blogspot.com/2008/09/humayun.html .relates my joy and experiences of keeping stallions free of all shackles. I am sure most of my friends would be enthused to see a happier and free animal rather than a frustrated stallion which would rear the moment it it’s brought out from the stables. Exasperatingly most breeders demand this quality as a proof of the stallions breeding power or libido, which is nowhere near the truth.
Tack
Use of barbed bits is a demonstration of the rider’s inefficiency in riding abilities and lack of time devotion to practice and training the animal more than the poor animal’s nature or inability to stop when commanded.
Use of smooth snaffles relax the animal and breeds a feeling of trust between the rider and the animal. Most horse breakers or trainers take @ 15-21 days to train (break) the animal at the age of 2-3 max, after that it’s the rider who manages the riding and the training. Riders do not devote enough time to train the animal and it results in the poor animal doing what it was born to do …. Run….The horse runs when it’s happy, Runs when it’s scared. Its only by concerted training can this running be bridled and channeled into an enjoyable activity. Unable to post the trot, which is the natural gait that the animal is born with , most riders at our end ride or worse pace with a tight rein and barbed bits. Riding is a relaxed passion, with reins hanging loose and smooth snaffles and the animal getting the command from the seat first, then the legs, and lastly from the reins. And the animal responding by maintaining its gait till it is nudged to change the same. Our community tends to work reverse with reins and barbs doing 90% of the commanding, legs 10% and the seat… well what’s that?
Modern training methods need to be adopted to enable the indigenous horses compete in internationally accepted structured sports, otherwise the Marwari’s innate endurance abilities and famed intelligence will remain just a mantle for show and nothing beyond. This would be catastrophic for the breed in the long run...
Let’s breed healthy, stable and feed our animals naturally and give enough time and dedication to training our Marwaris for modern sport.
