Horse Trivia

The horse's range of smell is also more acute than that of humans.

Horses use their sense of smell to identify other horses and feedstuffs.

It may nuzzle you when you approach to it – the horse is trying to identify you by sniffing.

Smell plays an important role in terms of communication between them, for example stallions will detect estrus mare in smell.

Also the mare licks and nuzzles their foals after giving birth. This is also to identify its foals.

【Flehmen】

You may see the horses' facial expression like this.

This is often described as 'horse laughing' yet this is called 'Flehmen response', The horse is inhaling with the nostrils usually closed in order to send the scents into the vomeronasal organ, also called Jacobson's organ.

Flehmen response is often seen when it detect the scent of pheromone or urine of the opposite sex.

For instance, if you dry the mare and use the same towel on stallions, it may have Flehmen response.

Also Flehmen response can be seen when the horse detect the unfamiliar scent such as cigarette or perfume.

Sensitivity of horse olfactory are said to be about 1000 times than that of humans, you will see how the horse is superior to the sense of smell.

Many of you may think horses love carrots.

That's true but the horses also like fruits such as apples, bananas, oranges and some even like cube sugars.

Horses like sweet flavor – it is believed that horses like the sugar contained in the carrots.

Judging from their preference, horses must be a 'sweet tooth'!

They also like drinking sports drinks.

On the other hand, the horses don't like bitter taste.

For example if it detects something bitter in its feed, such as medicine, it may only pick what they want to eat and leave all unwanted feed.

Around the horse's mouth there is hair to touch , such as the beard , this helps the horse to measure the distance from the feeds and check what they are eating.

It also has sensitive lips. When it is eating, it can feel the difference in texture.

Yet, these preferences in feed depend on individual horses – some horses don't even like carrots.

Horses' tactile sensation, or touch, plays an important role in terms of the communication when you ride on a horse.

From moving a horse forward by putting a gentle pressure on their stomach to cantering it by sliding our legs, we use the horse's sense of touch as the tool of communication between humans and horses.

Particularly their stomach is extremely sensitive and acute.

As we also mentioned in the previous sense of taste section above, they can feel the different texture on the edge of their muzzle and select the appropriate feed.

This is how the horses can dexterously eat hay feed only even if there were some pebbles and wooden chips mixed into their feed.

They can feel a fly on a single hair and wave them away by using their tail or legs.

They shake the skin if the insects landed on the place where their tails and legs cannot reach.

They react really quickly even when a tiny insect landing on wherever on their large body, you can imagine they have a very sensitive tactile sensation.

As the picture shows, the horse like dust bathing and the original purpose was believed to remove parasites from their skin.

Majority of the horses like dust bathing, it might be also because this behaviour gives a nice scratchy feeling on their sensitive skin.