Horses and Behavioural Resilience: Made - Not Bred

Professor Nat Waran OBE  | NavigateWelfare

(with special thanks to Leigh Wills (Foal NZ), and Justine Slater (Kirkwood Thoroughbreds, NZ)

Breeders and Racing's Social Licence to Operate

Like any industry that works with animals, thoroughbred racing depends on public trust. That trust does not come from regulation alone. It’s built through clear, consistent, and credible care for the animals at the centre of the industry. This is what people mean by social licence: society’s ongoing acceptance of an industry, which can grow stronger or weaker depending on what people see and believe about how animals are treated.

Breeders play an especially important role here. The choices made on the stud farm, in the first weeks and months of a foal’s life, help shape the horse that later enters training, races, and is seen by the public. A horse with behavioural difficulties, poor emotional regulation, or signs of stress-related problems is not just a performance issue. It is also a welfare issue for that animal, potentially a human safety problem, and also one that can quickly become visible to the public if it impacts on performance. By contrast, a horse that is calm, adaptable, and easy to train tells a much more positive story about the industry that raised it.

What makes this especially important is that science now gives breeders clear, evidence-based guidance on both what can compromise welfare and what helps horses get off to a better start in life. The knowledge is there, and so are practical approaches that can be used on stud farms. The task now is to help these evidence-based practices become accepted approaches and normalised across the industry.

The choices breeders make in those early months are not only welfare decisions. They also shape how the industry is seen by others.

The Breeder as the ‘Developmental Architect’

The thoroughbred industry invests heavily in genetics. Breeders choose bloodlines carefully, arrange veterinary assessments, and make reproductive decisions designed to produce horses with the physical and physiological traits needed to race well. That matters. But we now know that genetics is only part of the picture when it comes to the horse a foal becomes and the success it may go on to have.

Breeders also shape something that has had far less attention: the foal’s early environment and experiences during one of the most sensitive stages of development. Decisions about mare management, weaning, social contact, and early handling all have measurable, lasting effects on the foal’s emotional regulation, stress responses, trainability, and long-term welfare.

Thinking of the breeder as a developmental architect, rather than only a genetic curator, better reflects the real scope of the role. A resilient, trainable thoroughbred is shaped not only by its genes, but also by the experiences it has early in life. Both are influenced by the industry, and both deserve the same careful, evidence-informed attention.

Setting Horses Up for a Good Life

At the recent International Thoroughbred Breeders Federation (ITBF) conference held in Paris, we framed our invited presentation around the idea of horses living a good life, not as a vague aspiration, but as a clear, science-based standard for welfare. A horse with a good life being one whose needs are met, whose experiences are mostly positive, and who can cope well with the demands placed upon it.

For horses, evidence and experience shows that this means access to other horses, enough forage, and freedom to move. It also means positive, consistent interactions with people and an environment that encourages exploration, choice and opportunity to express a range of natural behaviours, rather than a living environment that create ongoing stress and reduces their ability to cope. The concept of the Three Fs: Friends, Forage, and Freedom, offers a simple way to describe what a healthy early rearing environment should provide. These are basic biological needs, and when they are missing, the effects on equine quality of life can be both immediate and long lasting.

Horse Temperament: Stable, but not Fixed

One of the key themes in developmental science relates to temperament. Research over many years shows that horses differ in important ways in fearfulness, emotional reactivity, and what some researchers call “horsonality,” and that these differences can be seen from an early age. Temperament helps predict how a horse will respond to training, handle new situations, and how likely it is to show evasive or difficult behaviour under saddle.

Long-term studies show that once these traits are established, they often remain quite stable throughout a horse’s life. In many cases, a fearful foal becomes a fearful three-year-old. What a horse shows later in foundation and race training reflects, to a large extent, what happened during those earliest stages of development.

Whilst studies show that horses are born with their own individual traits, encouragingly they also suggest that emotionality such as fearfulness can be modified through structured handling and positive experiences especially during the sensitive windows of early life. A foal’s future life experience is shaped by the quality of the early decisions made around it, which is why the breeder’s role matters so much.

What you see in a foal’s temperament is shaped by early management experiences, for better or worse.

The Mare as the first Educator

One of the most practically important findings from developmental science, and one that is still not widely appreciated, is how much the mare shapes her foal’s emotional development. Research shows that a mare’s own habituation to new stimuli can influence her foal. When calm, well-habituated mares were exposed to novel things in front of their foals, those foals showed less fear and more exploratory behaviour than foals whose mares had not been habituated. These differences were still present when the foals were tested again at five months of age.

The mare is not just a passive influence. She is an active teacher. Her emotional state, past experiences, and everyday responses to the world help shape her foal’s developing emotional system. In a very real sense, a calm, well-managed, and well-habituated mare is one of the best early-life supports a stud can provide.

This has direct implications for how broodmares are selected and managed. For example, mares that are chronically stressed or socially uneducated are not only welfare concerns in their own right, they may also be less able to provide the developmental environment their foals need.

Weaning: A Critical Transition Period

If there is one area where the evidence most clearly, and perhaps uncomfortably, challenges common practice, it is weaning. It has been described as the most stressful event in the early life of a domestic horse. Research consistently shows that the way weaning is handled has lasting effects on behavioural health. There are many ways to do it, but confinement-based weaning, where foals are separated abruptly and housed alone in stables or barns, is linked to much higher stress and a greater risk of development of abnormal behaviours. By contrast, paddock weaning with social contact, ideally in mixed-age groups, is associated with much better welfare outcomes. This difference in immediate effect on the emotional wellbeing of the animal matters for later life welfare outcomes, and it is something breeders can directly influence.

An example is the development of oral stereotypies such as crib-biting which are associated with maladaptive changes in the brain’s reward pathways. Once developed these are very hard to eliminate, and are then managed via various methods that block the activity but not the underlying motivation. Preventing their development in the first instance through thoughtful management of early stress events is therefore especially important for welfare later on. This starts with careful consideration of the weaning method, the environment, and the amount of social contact provided.

Where common practice and evidence differ, the industry has a real opportunity to close the gap.

Feeding, Forage, and the Foundations of Gut Health

Nutrition in the first weeks of a foal’s life is another area where stud-farm decisions can have effects well beyond the early months. A forage-first approach fits both the horse’s evolutionary biology and the growing evidence on gut microbiome development. The microbial environment established in the first two months plays an important role in long-term digestive health, immune function, and physical resilience. Anything that disrupts that process, including weaning stress, abrupt dietary change, low-fibre diets, or unnecessary antibiotic use, can have later costs even if they are not immediately obvious.

The timing and way creep feed is introduced also deserves careful thought. When concentrates are introduced too early or too quickly, they can disrupt the gut microbiome and, as research on stereotypy shows, increase the risk of oral stereotypies. A foal’s digestive system and behavioural responses are both shaped by its nutritional environment in those first weeks. Keeping forage at the centre, and making any feed changes gradually and carefully, fits the best available evidence on both fronts.

This does not mean supplementary feeding has no place in the rearing environment. It simply means it should be introduced deliberately, with developmental science in mind, and treated as a management choice with consequences rather than a routine step.

The Importance of Early Structured Handling

The long-term value of early structured handling is well supported by research. Studies show that foals given gentle, positive, well-timed handling in the weeks after weaning are less reactive and easier to handle more than a year later than foals that received no systematic early handling. These effects last, which means this early investment pays off for breeders, trainers, and jockeys alike by supporting emotional regulation, trainability, handler safety, and horse welfare.

One such science based approach is the the Foal NZ programme that we presented at the 2026 ITBF conference with tens of thousands of handling sessions safely completed, and where studs involved in the programme consistently report positive feedback from the people who work with these horses later in the industry. This programme shows that equine developmental science can be applied safely and at scale in ways that make a measurable difference for both horse and handler welfare. See more about the Foal NZ programme here: https://vimeo.com/1189198457?fl=pl&fe=cm

Early, structured, positive handling is not just a welfare extra. It is a sound investment in performance, safety, and the horse’s future.

Finally, equine behavioural resilience is made, not bred. It grows through positive early experiences that help set horses up for good and successful lives. The science is already available, and practical ways to apply it already exist within the industry. What is needed now is broader use of such evidence-based early-life management approaches for helping horses thrive throughout the lives – from birth, through racing and onto their second careers after racing.

The most important question for breeders to consider is whether a horse has been well set up to thrive

Key Considerations for Breeders

In summary, we highlighted the following key points during our conference talk:

• Broodmare management should consider behavioural experience alongside reproductive health. A mare’s habituation history and emotional state directly influence her foal’s development.

• Weaning method and environment matter for both immediate and long-term welfare. Abrupt confinement weaning carries the greatest documented risk of stereotypy, while paddock weaning with social buffering and mixed-age groups is linked to better outcomes.

• Early, structured, positive handling after weaning leads to lasting gains in trainability and emotional regulation throughout the racing career.

• Assessing temperament in young foals can help guide management decisions and, increasingly, breeding choices.

• Social contact is essential, always. Horses are social animals, and social deprivation has real behavioural and welfare consequences.

• Forage-first nutrition during and after weaning supports gut health and normal behaviour and good welfare. The timing of concentrate and creep feed should be planned carefully in light of stereotypy and microbiome research.

Selected References

Boissy, A. et al. (2007). Assessment of positive emotions in animals to improve their welfare. Physiology and Behavior, 92(3), 375-397.

Christensen, J.W., Beblein, C. and Malmkvist, J. (2020). Development and consistency of fearfulness in horses from foal to adult. Applied Animal Behaviour Science, 232, 105106.

Dwyer J, Roshier AL, Campbell M, Hill B, Freeman SL. Effects of weaning-related stress on the emotional health of horses—A scoping review. Equine Vet J. 2025;57(3):546–554

Flamand, Anna & Robinet, Louise & Raskin, A. & Braconnier, M. & Bouhamidi, A. & Derolez, G. & Lochin, C. & Helleu, C. & Petit, Odile. (2025). The social dimension of equine welfare: social contact positively affects the emotional state of stalled horses. Animal Behaviour. 221. 123055.

Lansade, L. et al. (2004). Effects of handling at weaning on manageability and reactivity of foals. Applied Animal Behaviour Science, 87(1-2), 131-149.

Leng, J., Moller-Levet, C., Mansergh, R. I., O'Flaherty, R., Cooke, R., Sells, P., Pinkham, C., Pynn, O., Smith, C., Wise, Z., Ellis, R., Couto Alves, A., La Ragione, R., & Proudman, C. (2024). Early-life gut bacterial community structure predicts disease risk and athletic performance in horses bred for racing. Scientific reports, 14(1), 17124.

Sarrafchi, A. and Blokhuis, H.J. (2013). Equine stereotypic behaviors: causation, occurrence, and prevention. Journal of Veterinary Behavior, 8(5), 386-394.

Visser, E. K., van Reenen, C. G., van der Werf, J. T., Schilder, M. B., Knaap, J. H., Barneveld, A., & Blokhuis, H. J. (2002). Heart rate and heart rate variability during a novel object test and a handling test in young horses. Physiology & behavior, 76(2), 289–296.

Waters, A.J., Nicol, C.J. and French, N.P. (2002). Factors influencing the development of stereotypic and redirected behaviours in young horses: findings of a four-year prospective epidemiological study. Equine Veterinary Journal, 34(6), 572-579.