Are You My Mother? Research Advises Breeders to Decrease Weaning Stress for Foals by Providing Older Female Companions

When it comes to weaning or separation of a mare from a foal, everyone has an opinion. Every breeder has a system. No doubt, every horse has a memory marker. And for some animal behavior scientists, every researcher has a mission to shed light on this defining act or moment. Let's face it: being born must be the most stressful thing that can happen to anybody. But being weaned cannot be too far behind it in the list of traumatic experiences. Most humans come to terms with it eventually and the situation in animals is probably no different. How weaning takes place, however, can have a dramatic effect on the length of time required to overcome the shock. The latest work of the team of Christine Aurich at the University of Veterinary Medicine, Vienna found that weaning is least stressful if foals are given the company of familiar adult female horses, even if they are not related to them. The work is published in the current issue of the journal Stress.