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NEW YORK (NYTIMES) – No one can talk to a horse, of course. But a new study asked if the horses were trying to tell us something when they sniffed.
In the study, published Wednesday, July 11 in the journal PLOS ONE, researchers in France have determined that the sniffing exhalation that horses often do can be a sign of a positive emotion .
Mathilde Stomp, a PhD student at the University of Rennes who led the research, said that she sought to understand if the snort could be used as a measure of the horse's mood.
She and her coworkers recorded 560 breaststreaks among 48 private school and horseback horses. ] All horses sniffed – as little as once or as often as 13 times per hour.
Horses mainly sniffed during quiet, relaxing activities, and those who spent the most time outdoors sniffed the most, according to the study.
When a horse sniffed, the researchers also noted the ear position of the animal; Ears pointing to the front are a known signal of a positive internal state, Stomp said.
The researchers also developed a composite score of the stress level of each animal sniffing, with measures including how long a horse has been facing the wall in his stall, as well as his level of interaction or aggressive behavior towards the researcher. Stomp said his job was motivated by the desire to help people better understand and meet the needs of their animals.
"We think that with this acoustic indicator, perhaps they will be able to test when their horses are in good condition or not," she says.
Not all horses can snort into contentment, but rather into or Sue McDonnell, a specialist in equine physiology and behavior at the School of Veterinary Medicine of the University of Pennsylvania, said that we do not know enough to draw conclusions about the health of a horse. emotional state of his snorts.
"I think it's a huge overshoot, an overinterpretation of their data," she said.
McDonnell, who daily observes the flock of his school, adopts the more traditional view that sniffing is a way of clearing the nasal passages of a horse. She noticed a difference when she lets the horses feed on short grass blades compared to longer ones, which are more likely to tickle their noses. Horses eat grass shorter, just as enthusiastic as longer blades, "but they do not do anything that sniffs," she said.
Horses also sniff in negative circumstances, McDonnell said. If they encounter an aggressive or fearful situation, their "fight or flight" reaction includes an adrenaline rush that dries their mouths and noses.
Once the situation resolves and adrenaline levels drop, secretions like saliva and mucus begin to flow again, says McDonnell. She looked at the stallions who were sniffing as their adrenaline levels dropped, suggesting that the flow of mucus had made them noisy, she said.
Again, horses probably use sniffing to communicate in one way or another to other members of the flock, alerting them when the danger has passed. But that does not mean if a horse is happy, she added.
While Karyn Malinowski, professor and director of Rutgers University's Center for Equine Science in New Jersey, discouraged the practice of assigning human emotions to animals, she said the findings of the new study had sense. The horses she studies manifest emotions, such as grief when a close companion dies, so she believes that they are certainly capable of happiness. Malinowski said the study also aligns with his physiological research which shows that horses are much less stressed when they are allowed to live on the outside, rather than in stables
.
In the new study, horses that lived in more natural conditions sniffed more often, and even the horses at the stable snorted more when they were outside. "I've been studying stress for 40 years, the worst thing that can be done for a horse is to keep it inside," Malinowski said. Outside, "they are happier, healthier, the air is cooler."
Lauren Brubaker, a Ph.D. A student from Oregon State University specializing in human-animal interactions said that the study also matches the experience of people from around the world. Riding
"You hear a lot of riders, instructors and trainers saying that they are looking for horses to do this sniffing behavior while they're riding, because they're not sure. they believe that horses relax and release adrenaline, "she said.
Brubaker said that it was too early to conclude that sniffing is a form of active communication. She would like to see research on sniffing behavior when horses are riding, pulling cars, being used for therapy and performing in shows or races.
Stomp said that she was planning to do some work. to study if the dust levels in the stalls affect the sni ff, to further explore his hypothesis that sniffing is not limited to nostril compensation
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