{"id":2145,"date":"2010-04-12T08:19:01","date_gmt":"2010-04-12T12:19:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thegreathorse.com\/?p=2145"},"modified":"2017-06-02T17:12:10","modified_gmt":"2017-06-02T21:12:10","slug":"little-horse-on-the-prairie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thegreathorse.com\/book-blog\/2010\/04\/little-horse-on-the-prairie\/","title":{"rendered":"Little Horse on the Prairie"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The horse is prey and never forgets it: his motto is to <em>\u2018run away to live another day.\u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.thegreathorse.com\/book-blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/04\/0100_wild-feral_band.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-9729\" alt=\"Wild stallion Lazarus and part of his band in West Warm Springs HMA, OR | Bureau of Land Management, Office of Public Affairs \/ Wikimedia \/ Public Domain\" src=\"http:\/\/www.thegreathorse.com\/book-blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/04\/0100_wild-feral_band.jpg\" width=\"250\" height=\"195\" \/><\/a>Horses are built for speed over distance, and with a good headstart he is safe from his natural predators.<\/p>\n<p>The only hole in the equine\u2019s survival program is the time it takes to reach top speed. To solve this problem horses come \u201cfully-loaded\u201d with highly advanced bio-technology to detect predators.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>The Super-Human Horse<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>An equine\u2019s sense of hearing and smell rivals that of a dog, with additions of swiveling ears and a canyon of a nose that sifts the wind with every breath. Their eyesight is much different than our own, featuring extreme motion-detection ability and a field of vision of almost 360 degrees, with only a few blank spots right behind and in front (which is why you never walk up behind a horse, and why jumping is such a challenge).<\/p>\n<p>Equine abilities extend beyond the human experience. A horse\u2019s legs serve as a sounding board to feel ground vibration, and can even recognize a person by their walk. Horses also have an amazing \u201cphotographic\u201d memory and are able to see well at night.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Horses don\u2019t see the world as humans see it<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>As you ride, the horse has mapped out the robin in the hedge 100 yards away, noted a freshly-painted mailbox and the spot where a dog barked seven years ago \u2026 even as feels the rumble of a distant train and responds to your cues.<\/p>\n<p>We don\u2019t share the outlook of horses, the same mind or same senses&#8211;we hardly share the same world. Yet somehow, implausibly, a close partnership was made &#8230; and is still kept.<\/p>\n<p>Photo: <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/File:Horsescd1l-095.jpg\">Bureau of Land Management \/ Wikimedia \/ Public Domain<\/a><\/p>\n<p>_______<br \/>\n<small>Copyright \u00a9 2010\u00a0 John Allen Royce, Jr.<br \/>\n<\/small><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The horse is prey and never forgets it: his motto is to <em>\u2018run away to live another day.\u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[359,137,142,158,154],"tags":[364,157,116,383],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thegreathorse.com\/book-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2145"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thegreathorse.com\/book-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thegreathorse.com\/book-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thegreathorse.com\/book-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thegreathorse.com\/book-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2145"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/thegreathorse.com\/book-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2145\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15199,"href":"https:\/\/thegreathorse.com\/book-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2145\/revisions\/15199"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thegreathorse.com\/book-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2145"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thegreathorse.com\/book-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2145"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thegreathorse.com\/book-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2145"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}