The Welfare of Ridden Horses Part II

“For crying out loud” This term is a euphemism for “For Christ’s Sake” [Colloquial; early 1900s], an exclamation of anger or frustration.

Forgive my use of this colloquialism. Playing with words is my twisted sense of humor that helps me cope with frustration. Temple Grandin used to go cross-eyed when my twisted sense of humor reared its ugly head. My frustration stems from my ongoing shame when I hear the confabulations ( made-up words) used in modern equitation and the pseudoscientific explanations for naturally occurring processes with clearly defined scientific definitions. This unconscionable disregard must stop before I tear out what’s left of the hair on my head.
In my last post, “The Welfare of Stabled Horses,” I issued a “call to arms” to owners who want their horses to be horses. A well-planned campaign requires the troops to be armed with the most advanced and modern weapons to succeed. Here I present the most effective weapon I know and have used to understand horses’ emotional responses to the work I asked of them. I like to think of it as “mind reading.”

1. The Science of Hair Whorls and Laterality

Heart rate variability (HRV) differs from standard heart rate (beats per minute). It measures the interbeat intervals between beats that can show the emotional state of a horse (or man) during various physical or psychological activities. The photo is my 13-year-old HRV monitor and what’s in the package. It doesn’t work anymore, but I kept it for sentimental reasons. It cost me about $800, whereas the new, more advanced models are less than $400. Two tech dinosaur dummies like Temple and me figured it out, so any 12-year-old nowadays could master it in minutes.

Understanding Heart Rate Variability

Heart rate variability is a noninvasive measurement to assess the autonomic nervous system regulation of cardiovascular function. Evidence suggests that several factors influence the variations of one horse’s HRV to another, including genotype, behavior, environment, temperament, nutritional status, and pain. Understanding a horse’s heart rhythm variations helps veterinarians confirm important diagnoses, such as arrhythmias. But heart rate variation has also been used to understand better the effects of stress, pregnancy, exercise disease massage, human-horse interaction, behavior, equipment use, transport, and more. Chronic pain can also reflect altered heart rate variability.

Heart Rate Variability

Heart rate variability (HRV) measures the specific changes (or variability) between beats. This variability between beats is called R-R interval or inter-beat interval (IBI). Less variability in the heartbeats (a low HRV) indicates that the horse is under stress. In comparison, more significant variability (a higher HRV) typically means that the horse can tolerate stress or is recovering well from prior accumulated stress. So when a horse is at rest, a high HRV is favorable over a low HRV. But in an active state, a lower relative HRV is generally good over a high HRV.

HRV is linked to the autonomic nervous system (ANS) and reflects the balance between the parasympathetic nervous system (PNS) and the sympathetic nervous system (SNS)—the “rest and digest” and “fight or flight” branches, respectively. By balancing the two forces, the ANS helps horses respond to stress in their environment and regulate things like heart rate, respiration, and digestion. Essentially, HRV reflects the heart’s ability to react to different situations.

The use of HRV measures is easy, noninvasive, and highly accurate. My frustration comes from the fact this technology has been available for years and gone chiefly unknown. Hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of horses have suffered avoidable welfare concerns and misdiagnosis of biomechanical disorders, which were behavioral responses to stress. An HRV monitor costs a fraction of the cost of bodyworkers, and chiropractors repeated appointment costs are all for behavioral problems and stress reactions mistaken for pain. Millions of horses and billions of dollars globally could have gone to better the lives of horses worldwide. While this technology was under development and being adapted and improved for horse use, where were all the experts?

In everyday equitation, this is one way to use it:

Put the watch on your wrist and the monitor on the horse while it’s in the stall. The monitor stays turned on until turned off. The watch receives the HRV data telemetrically, and the data is stored in the watch until the session is over. At the end of the session, download the data to your desktop or laptop computer, and the time-sensitive data is analyzed and displayed on the screen in graph form.

Time on a regular watch on your other wrist or have someone record your time while the horse remains in the stall, eating or resting.

Halter the horse and take it to the crossties for grooming and tacking. Record the time spent on this activity and divide it by grooming and tacking up time if you want.

Take the horse to the arena and conduct the training session. Record the time spent on this activity.
Return the horse to the crossties when finished with training and the tack removed. Record the time spent on this activity.

Return the horse to the stall and time the recovery from the training exercise. Arbitrarily time the recovery time from 10 to 30 minutes.

Download the data from the watch to the computer, match the timing of each activity, and enjoy seeing how your horse felt about the activities from start to finish.

The graph attached to this post is a very short but dramatic example of what you will likely see between stressful and non-stressful activities and their intensities. The equipment includes the girth strap, the monitor, the watch, the conductivity gel applied to the electrodes or on the skin, the user’s manual, and a quick start guide.
My first reaction to seeing my horse’s emotions reflected in a real-time training session was HOLY CRAP. I can imagine many top-level Dressage, Jumping, and Race Horse trainers pooping their pants when they read this post in three minutes and 42 seconds of reading time!

Whew! I don’t feel so frustrated anymore! https://www.sciencedirect.com/…/abs/pii/S0168159104000607