Mary Allen
Proper herd management has an impact on horse happiness and health. Reason enough to create a horse-friendly environment, to search carefully for the right pasture buddies, and to carefully integrate newcomers.
Daily contact with other horses is essential for the mental health of horses. But it is not only important that the four-legged friends share an open stable, pasture or paddock but also with whom. Because while a horse plays with good colleagues, celebrates grooming, and is thus satisfied and balanced, life in a disharmonious herd is getting on your nerves. Constant skirmishes increase the risk of injury, low-ranking horses are also constantly driven from their sleeping or feeding place and suffer from enormous chronic stress, which can lead to imbalance, weight loss, stomach ulcers, and even life-threatening kidney failure.
In order for different horses to be able to live together peacefully in a group and form friendships, three conditions must be right: a well-thought-out infrastructure from the open stable or paddock, sufficient space and feed for everyone, and clever herd management.
Size of the Exercise Area is Crucial
«A common problem in open stables and paddocks is that too many horses are kept in too small a space. The animals can no longer maintain their individual distance and cannot avoid each other – conflicts are programmed there,” says qualified horse psychologist Daniela Buhler. The size of the open stable and the adjoining paddock depends on the number and size of the horses.
Daniela recommends the formula 2 × height at the withers² as the minimum size for the lying area per horse, i.e. for example six square meters for a 1.70-meter tall horse if the feeding area and drinking trough are outside and the exercise area is constantly accessible. The run should be at least three times as large, in this case, 18 square meters. This information is to be understood as the absolute minimum size for a very harmonious group of horses. It is clear that two horses measuring 1.70 meters in a paddock of 36 square meters can walk around at a leisurely pace, but can by no means let off steam.
“One should also remember that some horses, such as Arabians who love to move, need more space to canter than, for example, a more leisurely Freiberger. In principle, of course, the following applies: the more generous, the better,” says Buhler. Access to fresh drinking water and an adequate supply of food is also very important. “If grass or hay is scarce, the dominant horses defend their claim to it – a situation that means a lot of stress for the weaker animals, because the horses in their natural habitat, the steppe, never have to wait until they are allowed to eat.”
Similar Types of Horses are Ideal
To prevent a horse from being cornered and injured during a fight, dead ends, narrow passages, and sharp corners should be avoided in the stable and paddock. Open stables should definitely have two entrances and exits (each about 2.40 meters high and about 1.50 meters wide for large horses) – this is the only way to ensure that lower-ranking animals can also make use of the space available and that there is always an escape route outside. Strip curtains made of transparent plastic, which are available from industrial and horse stores, keep the wind and insects out but allow the horses to get in and out without any problems.
The following applies to horses: Like attracts like. Horses of a similar type often get along particularly well with one another. But not only the breed, but also the coat color plays a role. One gray out of three browns is often an outsider, the same goes for piebalds. If you have a gray or piebald horse, you should put it together with other white or piebald horses. In smaller groups, the number of herd members should also be even.
In an Emergency, Troublemakers Must Be Removed
Within the herd, the potential for aggression and injury increases whenever new horses join the group and the hierarchy has to be reassessed. If possible, the composition of the group should not change too often for this reason. If new herd members are added, they must be carefully integrated.
Especially in the case of animals that have not learned social behavior or have even become aggressive due to husbandry mistakes such as years of “solitary confinement”, finding suitable pasture buddies often takes a lot of time and trial and error – not least because other owners are understandably reluctant to expose their horses to the risk of injury. In general, it is best to put an aggressive horse together with a few quiet peers who will initially ignore it and not get involved in big fights.