Whatever you decide to use to secure your horse’s mane, we recommend only leaving braids in for about 7 to 10 days. If needed, and the mane looks good, you can tentatively leave braids in longer. Can I leave my horses tail braided? But leaving it braided can pose a Read more…
Foals love to chew anything in their path. But older horses might be chowing down on tails, too, and that could mean a few different things, including nutrition problems or plain old boredom. Nutrition Imbalances: A lack of forage is the most common reason cited for tail-chewing. How do I Read more…
Even without complications, tail alteration is cruel because it changes the way a horse can use his tail and sometimes prevents him from using it at all. Tail function is important to equine well-being. Is it OK to cut a horse’s tail? Trimming the top of a horse’s tail creates Read more…
Poll evil is a traditional term for a painful condition in a horse or other equid, that starts as an inflamed bursa at the cranial end of the neck between vertebrae and the nuchal ligament, and swells until it presents as an acute swelling at the poll, on the top Read more…
The shoe could be applying excessive pressure to the sole, or the angle changes that were made are more than the horse could handle. If the horse was trimmed, the problem could be excessive sole removed and sole bruising, or angle changes. Can a farrier cause lameness? Yes, a horse Read more…
Docking. Docking traditionally has been performed to prevent the tail of the horse from interfering with harness and carriage equipment. Specifically, if a rein passes under the horse’s tail the horse may clamp its tail down and cause the driver to lose control of the horse. What does it mean Read more…
Anatomy of an equine tail It is made up of approximately 18 vertebrae—some horses have more, others have fewer. The bones are progressively smaller from the root of the tail to the tip; the last one is pointed. Can a horse break their tail? A fractured tail may sit at Read more…
The spinal nerves arise from the spinal cord and extend axons outward into the front and hind legs and to the chest, abdomen, and tail. Does it hurt a horse when you pull its tail? MYTH: “Pulling a horse’s mane doesn’t hurt! They don’t have nerves in their hair follicles Read more…
In the racing world, there have been many reports of horses killing small animals, particularly dogs and cats. There are also several startling accounts of meat eating horses in this Carnivorous Horses article. Do horses get along with cats? Horses should be able to coexist fairly easily with cats; most Read more…
If horses do not receive proper nutrition (or any food) for long enough, they’re likely to trying eating whatever they can find in an effort to survive. Horses may also try pieces of meat given to them by humans for curiosity’s sake. What happens if a horse eats meat? The Read more…