Do the horses in funeral procession look stressed?

[Gozleme]

Don’t know a lot about horses and am just musing while watching tv… but I noticed one in particular throwing its head around a bit and they like a bit out of step with each with quite a bit of head throwing at times

This must be a stressful situation for them with all the people and music.. or are they specific “parade horses” that are used to this sort of thing?

They're trained for this

This - they only pick horses for these types of duties with the right temperament. Similar with police horses.

Yes, although there are different schools of thought. Some 'horsey' folk think this is the norm and it's fine to apply pressure constantly and force a horse into submission. Others will see tension and stress. It's unnecessary to have a Calvary now I think. Time to do away with horses in work like this.

Naa they just go round the local pony clubs and round them up for special occasion.

😳

Have you never been to London Op?

They look perfectly at ease to me. They are used to it, in fact I was just thinking how fantastic they’ve been and how well trained they must be to represent the horse community in such an elegant way.

Trained doesn't equal happy.

The head tossing is likely just because the horse would like to walk a bit faster than it’s being allowed to at the moment. Mine do this if they’re feeling a bit impatient. It’s not stress, just like a kid getting a bit bored…

The royal mounter police horses are gorgeous btw!

Mounted.

@Flaunch - Yes. I actually lived in London for a short time as well. Was there some kind of mandatory horse unit that I should have passed first?

Thank you for the more helpful responses

I’m glad to hear that they seem at ease, and the impatient about waking pace also makes sense @FlowersFlowersEverywhere , I had wondered if that might be a sign that they are scared.

I always think that it is a bit shit to sit on a horse.

And interesting @WildFlowerBees that some people interpret behaviours as stress while others don’t

Exactly this. They are walking along sooooo slowly that it must be frustrating. Mine would do exactly the same thing, she has no patience whatsoever. Just wants to crack on and get going.

They probably just want to go faster than they're allowed, or a fly has landed on them

The Canadian Mounties - did they bring their own horses from Canada or use them from here?

There would be no point having them otherwise, unless you are passionate about growing roses.

The walking pace of a horse is faster than the walking pace of a human, so they are having to be held back to go slower than their normal gait. Sometimes they get slightly pissed off, that's all.

And if anyone thinks that you can force a horse into submission - lol. You've never tried to force a horse to do anything, have you?! They are a prey animal. Any kind of fright or panic, and they're off at 30mph.

Horses don’t exist as transport for another animal.

Haha you can't force a horse into anything!

Those parade horses just want to walk faster

As an equestrian myself the first thing I said to my husband is some looked stressed. Headshaking is a sigh if stress in horses and no matter how much training you give them they have never bee. Theohgh anything like this so yes, some of them were showing clear signs of distress.

Yep. Just because they're trained doesn't mean it's ethical or in the horses' best interests. If you asked the horse does it want all that tack on it and placed in a totally unnatural setting or does it want to be in a field with other equines allowed to display natural behaviours then I know what it would choose every single time.

They interviewed the mounties earlier in the morning and they said they were horses based here that they had gifted to the Queen in recent years.

A horsey person told me they go through vigorous training, where flowers/water are thrown at them, music/drums and crowd cheer recording played etc. She said horses are incredibly trainable and when they do the head thing (she didn't call it head thing, she called it something else), it's, as others pointed out, because they are impatient to walk faster.

Fascinating animals.

I get SO much out of keeping my horses in a natural herd environment, watching them interact, watching the different hierarchies within the herd, having them come over to me and interacting with me on their terms, doing groundwork with them. I find this comment really sad that there's 'no point' having them if you can't ride them. They don't exist as commodities for humans.

👆🏻what @rickandmorts said.