Horse stories

"Quincy"

Quincy has finished his tour of duty in the Army’s Old Guard at Arlington National Cemetery and is up for adoption, free to a good home. He served as one of the highly trained caisson horses, led by the riderless horse. The tradition of a horse walking riderless to a grave memorializes the service member who will never ride again. The tradition dates back to the funeral of Genghis Khan.

Quincy worked eight times a day, every other week, in every sort of weather. He is only 11-years old, but is having trouble with his feet because of navicular disease. The horses start their day in the barn at Fort Myer at 4:30 a.m., when soldiers assigned to the caisson come in to prepare for the day’s funerals.

It is a solemn and dignified ritual.  The riders polish 314 pieces of brass tack daily and by 8 a.m., the horses are ready to go to the cemetery, where they stay until about 4 p.m.  The soldiers say the horses have been doing it so long they know their job. Before the procession starts, they act up as fresh horses tend to do in the morning, but they are all business when it's time to start work. 

Many potential adopters have turned in their applications for Quincy, so hopefully he will find a wonderful retirement home.

A horse lover

Here's another good horse story that was on CNN recently.  New studies have shown that horses can recognize human expressions, and distinguish between positive and negative facial expressions.  Most animals cannot read emotions across the species barrier, but for horses, recognizing angry faces might be part of their warning system to anticipate rough handling from humans.

Horses also have 17 different facial expressions to indicate their mood, which is one more expression than dogs have.  Cats have 21 facial expressions, but that's because they're always twitching their ears and whiskers around. I don't think cats are especially complex emotionally, but then cat lovers might disagree.