Herd Behavior
In the wild, horses are herd animals. Highly sociable and dependent, horses need to maintain a specific hierarchy within a herd for a multitude of reasons. Horses are prey animals and as a result they have a potent "fight-or-flight" instinct. Due to this fact, herds often lack organization and direction without a hierarchy.
For many herds, the highest ranking individual is the lead mare, while stallions, should there be any, tend to stay on the outer periphery of the herd in order to push the slower members to keep up. Horse herds are often "harems", with many mares and a couple of stallions within the herd to mate with (Burton, 1999).
For many herds, the highest ranking individual is the lead mare, while stallions, should there be any, tend to stay on the outer periphery of the herd in order to push the slower members to keep up. Horse herds are often "harems", with many mares and a couple of stallions within the herd to mate with (Burton, 1999).
Horse Communication
Much like other organisms, horses communicate with every part of their bodies. Although, the most overt signals that horses give are through their ears, jaw, and body shape. Communication is highly important to the safety of a wild herd (Williams, 2004). For example, if a lead mare were to put her head up at high alert, the entire herd would take notice and go on high alert as a result. The stallions within the herd engage in herding behavior by using this same communication. If a stallion pins his ears and approaches on a mare with his head low, then that mare is likely going to move away from the stallion.
Here are a couple of examples of horse communication:
A horse on "high alert":
Here are a couple of examples of horse communication:
A horse on "high alert":
A mad/threatened horse: