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20 Trivia Facts About Horses
Do you know the difference between a foal and a colt? How often do horses actually rear? Enjoy these tidbits of horse trivia, and if you are lucky I might even throw in a bonus at the end.
- Horses evolved from an animal that was small and had five toes.
- Prehistoric horses did live in North America but vanished for some reason, only to reappear when brought over by early explorers.
- Horses are measured in “HANDS”, one hand is equal to 4 inches, or 10 centimeters. A horse who is 15.2 hands is 15 hands plus 2 inches.
- Ponies are smaller than horses, generally any horse under 14.2 hands is considered to be a pony, however some breed exceptions do occur. A pony is not a young horse. This fellow is a pony, most ponies tend to be stocky, with legs slightly out of proportion to that of a horse.
- The word “chestnut” might refer to the color, as this photo is of a chestnut colored pony, or a growth on the inside of the horses leg, they are above the knee on the front legs, and below the hock on the hind legs.
- Draft horses, are the large work horses, they are typically very gentle and calmer than other horses, ponies are often sneaky and mischievous.
- Appaloosas, horses who typically have spotted rumps, don’t get their spots right away, but they develop in the first year.
- White horses are very uncommon, however grey horses are not. A grey horse is born colored and turns grey over time, some faster than others. A white horse is born white. The horse in the photograph is five years old, he was born black and is slowly turning grey. Many horses turn grey faster than this.
- The Arabian, as in the photo, is one of the oldest and purest breeds, in fact even if a horse is 99.9% Arabian, it is still not considered to be a purebred. Arabian blood is present in most other modern breeds, including the Thoroughbred.
- A stallion is an intact adult male horse, a mare is an adult female horse, a gelding is a male who has been castrated. Foals are baby horses, colts are boys, fillies are girls.
- Horses cannot vomit.
- While most horses have only four gaits, the walk, trot, canter, and gallop, there are some breeds noted for additional gaits, usually smoother to ride. Such breeds are the Peruvian Paso, the Tennessee Walking Horse, and the Icelandic Horse, for example.
- The hoof of a horse is similar to the fingernail of a person, it grows continually and must be trimmed.
- Horses can live well into their 30’s, ponies typically have longer lifespans.
- Racetracks in North America typically run counter clock wise, but in other parts of the world, the horses might run clockwise or straight, some tracks even have slight rolling hills.
- At shows with jumps, “Hunters” are judged on how pretty the horse looks going around the course and over the fences, “Jumpers” are judged by how many fences they knock down, and how fast they go around the course, faster times with fewer fences down, is the goal. Hunters have considerably lower jumps.
- A horse with a broken leg can be saved, however it is extremely costly, and hard. Horses cannot digest their food while lying down so a horse with a broken leg would have to be kept in a sling for recovery, something very few horses would tolerate.
- Horses are herd animals, they prefer the company of other horses, but do well with other animals too, like donkeys, sheep, and so forth. Proper introductions are always a must.
- In books and movies you often see kids owning “stallions” in reality stallions are very strong and dangerous, not many children would be strong enough to handle one, and most horse shows will not allow a child to ride a stallion. You often see pictures or scenes of horses rearing, again in reality they do not rear up that much, unless they are trained to do so, or fighting, as might be the case of two stallions fighting for a mare.
- It might surprise you to know that the Hippopotamus is closely related to the Horse.
- As a bonus, straw is yellow, horses sleep on straw, it is dry and absorbent, it has very little nutritional value, straw is the stems of cereal grain type plants such as oats. Hay is green, it is what horses eat. There are many different kinds of straw and hay.
Bonus Trivia
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6 Comments
Cool article – thanks for the info!
Just wondering why can’t horses vomit? Good article for those of us that do not much about horses.
They cannot vomit because they have a muscle stopping food coming up from their stomach, people have this too, but when people are sick the muscle releases, it does not do this in horses. It would have to be a dire situation for a horse, for this to fail.
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a famous you tuber has looked at this, nerimon is his name
Another Fact on Equines, although not horses.
Zebras are BLACK with white stripes, their muzzles are black and skin is black.