Horses are incredible creatures that are well-loved by so many people. Here are 15 interesting things you may not have known about these majestic equines.
- Horses can sleep standing up because the tendons and ligaments in their legs allow them to be able to stay still for long amounts of time while being upright. They are also capable of sleeping when lying down.
- Horses have a nearly 360-degree field of vision due to where their eyes are located. This is an evolutionary development to detect any potential predators. They cannot see directly behind them which is one of the reasons they run in herds.
- Horses can’t breathe through their mouths. Unlike humans, they can only breathe through their noses though it is unclear why this is so.
- You can tell the age by a horse’s teeth! Although it is important to give the horse proper dental care to make sure they are not in any pain or have any underlying issues.
- Horses can live to a ripe old age. Living beyond 30 is now no longer unheard of simply because humans have become better at looking after these animals since we domesticated them. Great horses who compete in Flemington racing among other great tracks can enjoy a long and happy retirement after their racing careers.
- Horses are highly intelligent. Their docile nature may make them seem unintelligent but it has been proven they can pick up basic skills and without them, humans would not be where we are today.
- For more than 3000 years, most horses have lived side by side with humans and that is because we domesticated them that long ago. Much like dogs, whom we domesticated much earlier, they have been our companions and have made life much easier for us.
- There is a common misconception that horses are native to North America but that is actually not the case. Horses came from Europe across what is now the area around the Chukchi Sea when it was a connected landmass.
- The ancestors of horses looked much different to their present-day counterparts. For example, the Hyracotherium was a dog-sized creature that you wouldn’t recognize as a hose if you saw one today. To be fair, these animals lived over 50 million years ago.
- Horses are actually measured by hands as opposed to the usual feet or centimeters. This is because in ancient cultures there were no standard measurement tools so the hand was used and this measurement method continues to this day.
- Horses are strictly herbivores. The way they have evolved due to their teeth and their digestive tract allows them to only subsist on foods such as grass, hay and grain.
- Horses have reflexes that are over five times faster than that of an average human. This is one of the things that makes horses great racing animals.
- Horses have a vastly different respiratory rate than humans. While we generally take 12 to 20 breaths every minute, horses take around 8 to 14 breaths.
- Horses can’t burp. Their digestive system is a one-way flow so they can’t vomit either. This is why they are prone to colic.
- Arabian horses are different to most other horses in that they have one invertebrate, tail bone and rib unlike others of their kind.
There may be more weird and wonderful unknown facts about horses but the 15 above are a good start!
