Can you teach your horse to talk?

Horses are smarter than you think!  Talking as we understand it might be impossible but according to research done recently in Norway your horse can easily be taught to communicate with you. A recent study done by Norwegian Veterinary Institute showed that horses can learn to understand symbols in just 15 minutes of daily training. By touching the symbols in response they can tell us what they think.

“Would you like your blanket on?” was one of the questions and a surprising number of horses declined.  When it became really cold though, they answered the same question in the affirmative.  They chose to have their blanket taken off when it was warm and put back on when it was chilly.   We always knew that horses were clever but didn’t realise that we could communicate with them once they had learned to recognise what certain shapes meant.

The research went on for over a year and the horses gave one hundred per cent accurate answers to questions.  There were twenty two horses in the experiment and it was mainly related to whether the horses wanted their blankets on or off.  I wonder what will happen if we ask them if they want to be ridden – or not?