Book review for The Horse's Mind

"All the world will be your enemy...and whenever they catch you, they will kill you."

Teresa recommended a book and it came in the mail yesterday. An old, used, library edition with the plastic cover libraries use. I love that - in fact, I want to be the person at the library who puts the plastic covers on books. The crinkly sounds reminds me of being read to as a child. There is a stamp in the book that says Withdrawn from Wiltshire Library and Museum Service Stock - Wiltshire is a county in Southern England.



The book reads like a text book and I enjoyed the chapter Mental Adaptation which lists types of learning, and discusses Lorenz, Pavlov, and Skinner's models. I keep underlining passages; it is exactly the stuff I learned in my animal behavior classes at UW.

The physiology chapter reminded me of the Watership Down quote above. 

As I make my way through the book I wish I'd had the book 30 years ago, when it was written. I'm fascinated with the tidbits I never thought about before, and am finding where my holes in my knowledge are (reproduction).

It's wonderfully scientific, with diagrams, not just illustrations.

Lately I've been fascinated with the design of a horse's leg, the one-toe thing. I watched a dissection on YouTube and the book supports what I saw. Did you know that at an early stage, the horse fetus has more than one toe? Most mammals have 5 digits, and the horse has at least 3 in the womb (and is genetically coded for 5). But they change into other parts, such as the splint bones. Why one toe, and why a hoof at all?

Supposedly a hoof is better on rocks than a paw. Assuming mountain goats live on equally rocky ground, why two toes for them and one for horses? The book gives speed as an answer. A goat doesn't need speed as much because it has horns. I thought a cheetah is faster, so why not paws, until I realized a cheetah doesn't move around as much as a horse does every day. So hooves are better for wandering and speed combined. This article also mentions the cheetah vs. horse thing.

In the physiology chapter, there was a discussion about the horse's vision, and I was drawn in to some ideas.

Is the frontal blind spot big enough to block out an entire human? The book says so, that if you stand in it, the horse will turn his head away in order to see you. And then it says, "this is likely to be interpreted as 'not wanting to be caught'."

Then it said that when a horse takes a jump, it is doing so from memory of where the jump was.  Of course a horse can see the jump at take off, the jump extends outside the blind spot on both sides of the horse. But then I realized seeing with the R and L eye simultaneously does not equal binocular vision, and binocular vision is required to judge distance. So in fact, horses judge distance to the jump based on memory.

There is a lot more about vision in horses, including how horses will tilt their heads as they walk on hillsides to keep their near-panoramic vision complete. (I've only ever seen this in green horses.)

Regarding learning, it says the reason a horse "forgets" its training in new environments is the same reason you might not immediately recognize someone who is familiar, if that person is out of context. It took me a few minutes to recognize my post carrier at the grocery store because he wasn't wearing bright yellow driving a bright yellow car and holding mail in front of my house. This is just one theory but I buy it.

Everyone knows this, but it can't be overstated:

"Even horses kept in lion-free conditions are constantly aware of the possibility of this horror. For us, remembering these imaginary lurking lions is a short cut to understanding the basic mentality of the horse."

The first, major and vital problem of being a horse is  that it is almost totally defenseless and it tastes good. Its teeth can bruise but not tear, and a horse cannot see where to aim a hoof very well. It can only run away. (paraphrased).

Of course we all know that if we're tense or nervous, the horse picks up on it. But it's more than that,  it's a human saying to a horse in its own language, "You are in danger": "Signs of body tension are alarm signals. Since horses tend to generalize their social feelings to include us, they interpret signs of body tension in people to be alarm signals too."

The book lists actual scientific studies which I find fascinating and odd (will a stallion mount a cow when blindfolded). There are photographs of sonogram images of horses' neighs, how the neigh changes based on the situation.

One part I disagree with is a section about how horses instinctively know to take care of their hooves. Um, what!? "Anything that threatens his feet threatens his life and horses are extremely careful to avoid anything that threatens their feet, which includes any untested surface. Horses follow each other, for if the leader's feet are safe then so are the followers'."

I think this is a stretch - they aren't thinking of their hooves, but the concept of getting trapped in a bog and being unable to escape is always there. I think it's more fitting to say they're worried about their legs getting stuck, rather than their hooves. But then again I don't think they're thinking about a body part, just the concept of entrapment.

The author is no pushover. In discussing the old-fashioned technique of laying a horse down and sitting on its head to restrain it/dominate it, she says that if a horse behaves badly and falls, it is worth sitting on its head for a while to let him think about the consequences. *lol*

You know the author is European, "It is difficult to convince wild horses that bread is food."

Something I doubt: "Gypsy horses are often cut proud to obtain muscle." Purposefully proud-cutting a horse?! Wouldn't it be better to geld them late rather than geld them incorrectly? But if the author is from Europe she likely knows more gypsies than I do.

Also, a horse with ears flattened gives up his sense of hearing entirely. How can this be proven?

The book tries to teach us how to read horse's expressions with descriptions, drawings, and photos. For example, the upper lip of a tense, worried horse can be identical to that of a horse enjoying a massage. Aggressive ears can be just as flat back as terrified ears. An upward nose thrust means "move" (which is a signal I use daily), while a bobbing head can mean "let's play" or a horse that is trying to judge distance. A jerking head is a falling-asleep horse. The white of the eye does not necessarily mean temper, the horse might be trying to extend its peripheral vision. And so on.

I read the book in two days. My favorite part was something reiterated 3 times:

Long-distance riding suits a horse's nature, because covering territory in a group is their most common activity. (paraphrased)


I've always believed that if horses had to choose a sport, they'd pick endurance, for this reason.

If you can find this book, you should read it. Thanks Teresa.