'All You Need to Know About Horses' by An Expert

All You Need to Know About Horses

The bond between humans and horses goes back many thousands of years.  It has always been a mutually beneficial arrangement. Horses, being placed on the food chain immediately between sabre-toothed tigers and grass, needed protection and humans needed transport that could, with encouragement, outrun a sabre-toothed tiger, so both parties were happy.  Fast-forward to the 21st Century and the situation remains very much the same.  Horses need somewhere to while away the hours between grazing and humans need something to fall off.  Both parties are happy, except those who have just fallen off.  In the photo above, the bond between horse and human shines through:  Shelley (right) gazes with adoration at her owner (or to be more accurate, at the carrots he is holding)

The Beast of Burden

Imagine a life without horses.  Life would have been much harder, although the horseless carriage would have been invented a lot earlier of course.  Horses have now been introduced to most parts of world, apart from those where there is no grass such as remote coral atolls in the South Pacific. The photo above shows a remote Pacific islander carry their shopping (banana leaves being a popular local delicacy it would appear) home from Tesco, which is even more ubiquitous than the horse.

The horse is still an important means of motive power in some parts of the world.  The average power output of a horse is one horsepower, which is convenient.  The heavier the load, more more horsepower is needed.  This driver in Uzbekistan has miscalculated the horsepower required to pull his vehicle and probably needs one or two more in order get his wagon rolling.  In the meantime his horse enjoys an unparalleled view of the marketplace.

Feeding your Horse

Horses love grass; in fact they could happily eat it all day, and usually do.  Fortunately grass is completely free and grows all over the place, with the exception of remote Pacific atolls, so your horse can eat its fill.  This makes horses exceptionally efficient as lawn mowers and the enterprising horse owner can often support their horse's upkeep by renting it out to neighbours.  A note of caution though:  horses do not discriminate and will eat anything that they think is vaguely grass-like.  Shergar (above) chomps his way across a neighbour's lawn having started with an entree of nasturtiums and enjoying a side salad of dahlias and crysanthemums.  On this occasion the lawn-mower rental is unlikely to be very lucrative for the horse owner.

Unfortunately grass is only a snack for horses, much as sweets and crisps are for children.  Despite spending all day chomping on grass, horses also need at least two nourishing meals a day.  These meals mainly comprise expensive chopped stuff with added carrots.  Horses would sell their grannies for carrots and a typical daily intake for one horse is shown above (in the horse's opinion).

The final constituent part of the horse's diet is hay.  After the carrot and chop meal, the horse tucks into a net or two of hay to while away the evening looking forward to the following day's grazing.  Hay is irritating scratchy stuff, especially when you have to stuff it in a haynet.  It would be simpler to just drop the hay in a heap on the floor of the stable, but if the horse didn't have a net to pull the hay out of it would have nothing to do all night.

Your Horse's Tack

You will need some tack to give you something sit on and grab hold of when riding your horse.  It also comes in handy if you need to lead your horse somewhere, such as out of your neighbour's flowerbed.  Without a bridle or head-collar to lead your horse by, you would have to stick two fingers up its nose, which looks untidy.  In the photo above, I am riding Hobo with a bare minimum of tack.  This is because I wasn't concentrating and forgot to put on his bridle.  And his saddle.  Fortunately a friend was on hand to grab Hobo before I came to a sticky end.

Tack need not be ostentatious or complicated, but don't let that put you off.  Horse owners love nothing more than to admire each other's tack and the more impressive it looks, the better.  My wife's new saddle (above) is a typically understated example.  Whilst a threaded gold inlay is not strictly necessary for riding purposes it adds to the aesthetic appeal, she tells me.

Riding Disciplines

Having gone through all the hard work of getting a horse and finding somewhere to keep it, you might now like to think about what you are going to do with it.  Horses like a spot of exercise as it is something to take their minds off where the next meal is coming from.  A bit of hard work never harmed anyone and horses can sometimes be persuaded to undertake moderate activity for up to an hour, as long as they get the following day off to rest and get over the traumatic experience of actually doing something other than eating or sleeping. In this section, I will introduce you to some of the exciting activities available to you as a horse owner.

Show jumping is sometimes described as freefall parachuting for people who don't like heights.  The aim is to canter around an arena persuading your horse to leap over a sequence of jumps, until your horse either dislodges you or fails to clear the jumps and brings the whole lot crashing down around its (and your) ears.  The fact that it would be a lot easier for the horse to throw you off than to go to the effort of ploughing through a load of wooden poles speaks volumes for its natural intelligence.  As a show jumper you become familiar with the supercilious sneer on your steed's face as you pick yourself out of the dirt.  Again.

If you don't like the prospect of show jumping your way into an early grave, the more sedate sport of Dressage might be more to your liking.  If show jumping is the equestrian equivalent of a demolition derby, dressage is ballet for horses.  Dressage involves walking, trotting or cantering round an arena lined by a series of out-of-sequence letters whilst someone shouts orders at you, then the judges give rosettes to their mates.  The sequence always starts with 'Enter at A at a working trot'.  You could, if you chose, enter at somewhere other than 'A', though this would involve jumping over the fence.  Whilst this might impress onlookers with your innovation and creativity, the judges are likely to mark you down for not following the routine correctly, and will give another rosette to their mates.  German riders excel at dressage, as in so many other equestrian disciplines.  The photo (above) shows German dressage champion Anton von Hockenheim and his horse Schadenfreude executing a special trot developed by the German Army in the late 1930s.

A more controversial activity is foxhunting.  Opinion is divided on the subject; champagne-quaffing socialists believe that the fox is the persecuted victim of rich toffs and so New Labour has banned hunting foxes with packs of hounds.  It is still permissible to shoot, gas, trap or poison foxes, and indeed to run them over with a tank or strafe them with a helicopter gunship, so for the fox this legal nicety is somewhat academic.  It is also legal, as I understand it, to attack a fox with two dogs while their doggy mates stand around egging them on and a load of people sit around on horses blowing horns and waiting for the dogs to get on with it.  People who live in the country, especially those who breed chickens or rabbits, maintain that foxes are verminous familiars of Satan who represent a threat to their way of life.  The exclusive photo (below) suggests that this view might have some credibility.

Hacking out is the cheapest and most straightforward way of enjoying your horse.  It is simply a matter of getting on your horse, taking it out on the road and enjoying a spot of peace and quiet accompanied only by cars, buses, lorries and boy racers.  It is a chance for horse and rider to bond and get to know each other.  Horses, having spent many millenia running away from things that might eat them, are now nervous to the point of paranoia and will jump at their own shadow.  Shelley, a generally well-balanced and gentle mare, fell out with a sheep in a local field and developed an unrelated and irrational fear of the colour orange.  For the rest of the time we owned her, she would only go past the field in question if the sheep had popped out to the shops.  Hobo, whilst fine with sheep and not colour-prejudiced, is frightened of Bradford and refuses to go past the sign welcoming him  to the outskirts of the city.  The photo below shows some happy hackers standing around in the rain while their horses compare phobias and look for something to refuse to walk past.

Horse racing is often called The Sport of Kings, because unless you own a small country it is highly unlikely that you will ever be able to afford to compete.  Horse racing involves standing in a field looking at a bunch of horses in the distance whilst losing money.  Much like any other horse-related activity in fact.  Racehorses must, by law, be brown.  In order to tell the competitors apart, the riders have to choose something distinctive to wear.  As they all seem to have the dress sense of golfers on LSD the result is sartorial chaos, as the photo below shows.

How Much Does It All Cost?

To pay for your hobby of horse ownership you don't need a barrow-load of cash (above).  You need a convoy of barrows arriving in a steady stream from the nearest cash machine.  The list of things to pay for might appear endless, as indeed it is.  First you have to buy your horse and rent a stable.  Don't forget to insure your horse, against illness or injury (to itself or others).  Then you start splashing out on everything else. Hay, carrots, feeds, treats, tack, grooming kit, body armour, riding hat, some more tack, riding crop, boots, rain rugs, travel rugs, rugs to warm the horse up and rugs to cool it down again, water buckets, yet more tack, head collars, lead ropes, salt licks, shampoo, fly repellent, hoof polish, show shine, mane detangler, coat conditioner and yet more bloody tack.  Vets bills when your horse is feeling a bit off colour.  Then you need something to take your horse to shows as it's too far to walk and horses aren't usually allowed on the bus.  So you have to buy a trailer and a vehicle to tow it.  Or a lorry, which will break down.  You'll need riding lessons for ever in order to feel ready to go to a show, then show club membership for each show, entry fees and food on the day.  Take some money with you to the show as there is always a blasted tack salesman there.  An interesting fact is that it would cost you about £25 for an hour or so at a riding school for a quick hack out whenever you feel like it, with someone else doing all the hard work.  Buy your own horse and the upkeep is about £800 a month. 

The typical look of anguish on the face of the partner of a horse owner (above), on receiving a vet's bill for £200 for sedating his wife's horse so that it could have a haircut.  Horse ownership puts the problems of the world into perspective.  They are mere trifles in comparison.  A few years later and we see the same man looking a lot happier.  His horse having eaten him out of house and home, he has gone completely mad and moved to a landfill site near Wakefield where he spends his time mumbling to himself and collecting empty boxes.