New scientific evidence suggests that horses can be taught to communicate their preference to their handler as to whether they want to wear a blanket or not.
Isn’t this great news? :winkgrin:
Full text here: http://www.appliedanimalbehaviour.com/article/S0168-1591(16)30219-2/fulltext
I’m not sure scientific evidence was necessary. Cold, hunched, shivering horse wants a blanket. Warm horse with thick coat probably doesn’t.
One of my horses will communicate very clearly that she does not NEED a blanket if you try to put one on her. And she’s right.
That would presupose that we blanket the horse for the horse’s needs. Most horses are blanketed for the owner’s needs.
I blanket to keep my horses dry, to keep them cleaner in mud season, and to keep them warmer in the cold season (because my chilly horse is a pill to ride when he got cold the night before).
Both would survive just fine without blankets. They’d be cold at times, but would survive just fine.
Well my shivering horse wanted nothing to do with being blanketed this morning. Couldn’t get near him with the blanket. So no they don’t choose to be blanketed when they need it or are cold.
Cold horses want to be warmer. I don’t believe they are born wanting to “wear” a blanket, though.
I saw this/something like this a few years ago. I have considered doing something similar with one of my horses because I think it would be interesting. He is very into doing “tricks” and other work that requires mental energy, associating, and figuring. I think he’d be a good candidate.
However, he is so focused on giving the correct answer and can anticipate so he’d probably be thinking more about what he thinks I want than what he actually wants :winkgrin:
He currently rocks a high trace clip and doesn’t object to his blankets. He very obedient but very sensitive so he could object or he could do what he is told. Toss up, really.
Maybe it would be more appropriate to teach scientists how to read horses. Every so often we are subjected to some form of scientific “evidence” which proves what horse people have always known. I wonder if it involves funding ?
So there must be a person available 24/7 so that when a horse " decides" he wants his blanket on or off we can oblige??
The silly part of this experiment was they felt the need to have horses respond to symbols because hey, that makes them seem.smarter in human terms.
When I saw this report last year it did however inspire me to start asking my mare if she wanted her blanket on
She already plays fetch pretty obsessively
I hung the blanket at the back of the stall and said go get your blanket! And when she dragged it over to me I didn’t click and treat, just put it on her as the reward.
She did this a couple of times during our big cold snap. I didn’t do it every day as it wouldn’t work if she was already eating.
Then the weather changed to above 10 C/ 50 F and rain. I left her blanket off for the day. When I got to the stall I saw that she had evidently just dumped the blanket outside out of sight. It was only slightly wet so clearly she did this after she saw me drive up. I said go get your blanket! And she looked at me with big eyes saying but there is no blanket, silly human. Do you see a blanket? Of course not. So I rescued the blanket and hung it up to dry.
When the weather went cold again she fetched her blanket but when it warmed up she just looked blank again when I asked.
So if she wouldn’t bring me the blanket I didn’t put it on.
Now she is unclipped in a stall with paddock runout and really a blanket at all is optional, but she does get a cozy soft look on her face when her blanket goes on when it’s really cold. If it’s cold enough she doesn’t even act
girthy for the belly bands!
Actually the other inspiration for this was the horrible sleety day I left her blanket off but hung in her stall, which I didn’t usually do, and when I came back she stood beside it, looked at me, looked at the blanket, looked at me, but wouldn’t move. And just started grinning with delight when it went back on.
I think it makes her happy to know that humans can be trained to do simple tricks and to understand the most obvious and basic bits of horse language.
It’s called they trained the horse to respond to certain things. That proves nothing doesn’t mean horse wants a blanket on because it 20 degrees out. My horse was cold and wanted nothing to do with being blanketed. a few hours later he’s fine after eating some hay,when he had been shaking. He has very short not much winter coat,and showed very obvious signs of NOT wanting to be blanketed…despite shaking.
The question isnt, do all horses want blankets when it’s cold? Some do, some don’t. Some might prefer cold to the discomfort of a blanket or might find the blanket doesn’t really warm them up enough. Some might need to learn that a blanket is cozy and comfy.
The question is whether a horse has the brains to say yes or no to a blanket at this moment in time, other than just by kicking you in the head and running away. I think yes, if you are watching them carefully.
On the other hand their are times we might want to over ride their preference. Let’s say it’s a mild night but I know a cold front and sleet is due over night. I might put a good blanket on despite maresy making a few faces. Certainly if she was shivering.
I didn’t mean to imply that horses always made good decisions!
Yes, they can be trained to choose a blanket if they are cold. Assuming it’s a well-fitting blanket, many might choose to have you put it on them. But as you say, they don’t necessarily know the weather forecast, so without a personal blanket aide 24/7, it’s still up to the owner to make the decision. 
When it was 20 and precipitating, my herd was shoving each other out of the way to get under a blanket. When it was 40 and I went out to throw a blanket on Little Miss I -don’t-grow-a-coat, she snorted and high tailed it. If only I’d had some little cards so they could communicate. . . .
I have 3 horses. One sometimes needs a blanket. She detests wearing a blanket so if I get the blanket out and she doesn’t walk away, she wants it on and will stand for me to put it on. If she doesn’t want it, I won’t be able to get near her with it.
In my area, whether horses like them or not blankets are a common necessity, and I don’t mean because the humans are fussy. Throughout the winter we have very heavy cold rain hovering right around freezing temperature and often with steady wind. And because of that I try to avoid using blankets earlier in the year (mid to late fall) so I don’t hinder the onset of their winter coat. None of our horses seem to mind blankets at all, and while I think most of our horses would survive without them, the nasty cold rain would likely make them miserable. But even more so, the harder their bodies have to work to keep warm, the more they use up their nutrition and the more you have to feed them. This is especially challenging for aged horses and hard keepers.
There are, however, exceptions to everything. One of our neighbors who has mostly aged horses blankets them fairly often, and they seemingly couldn’t care less. All except for one. I once got curious and asked why the big Appaloosa gelding never has a blanket. The response: he cannot stand them. The happy go lucky retired trail horse who isn’t bothered by anything hates them so much that if you put one on him it will be on the ground in ten minutes flat. So she took the hint and doesn’t blanket him, and that works since he’s a stocky built thick haired boy. If the weather gets too rough even for him she just lets him into the covered, insulated arena.
All in all some horses may like blankets, some may not, some may need them anyway, and many horses just don’t seem to care. In the end though, as a few have already said, it’s still up to the owner whether or not to put one on based on our knowledge of weather.
It is also up to the horse to keep it on. Mine for one likes to play in the trees and recently removed the bottom half all the way around. He returned to me looking very proud of his mini skirt.
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