Originally published on Substack
Actually, there are usually many of them. They arrive in noisy white clouds, screeching and tumbling through the trees before settling among the horses to dig through the grass and pull at roots and shoots.
Nobody today looks at them and thinks: what beautiful pets. We should put them in cages. Because somewhere along the way, society understood something important about birds.
We understood that flight matters. Flock matters. Choice matters. Social bonds matter. Movement matters.
We understood that a bird can have food, water, veterinary care, and still live a deprived life.
A parrot sitting alone in a cage, unable to fly, unable to choose its companions, unable to forage, unable to behave like a parrot, is no longer widely accepted as normal or harmless simply because humans enjoy looking at it.
And yet we struggle to extend the same logic to horses.
Horses are also intensely social animals. They evolved to live in groups, moving and grazing together over vast distances. They form close bonds. They groom each other. They rest together. They scatter together. They rely on social relationships for safety and emotional regulation.
Movement for a horse is not exercise in the way humans think about exercise. It is biology. It is circulation, digestion, joint health, respiratory health, emotional regulation, social interaction, and nervous system function all woven together.
A horse standing alone in a stable for most of the day, unable to move freely, unable to choose companions, unable to graze continuously, unable to behave like a horse, is not necessarily thriving simply because humans provide excellent feed, rugs, supplements, and veterinary care.
And yet modern horse management often asks horses to live in ways that would horrify us in other species. Isolation. Confinement. Restricted movement. Controlled feeding. Artificial diets. Limited social contact.
Then we act surprised when behavioural problems emerge.
When a parrot develops stereotypic behaviours, plucks out its feathers, screams constantly, or shuts down emotionally, we recognise distress.
When horses weave, crib, box-walk, grind their teeth, become explosive, become numb, become "cold-backed," anxious, reactive, or depressed, we often frame the problem as an equipment, training or veterinary problem — instead of asking whether the environment itself is biologically impoverished.
We understand that a bird deprived of flight suffers psychologically. But we are still reluctant to acknowledge that a horse deprived of movement, social bonds, agency, and continuous grazing may suffer in remarkably similar ways.
Because horses have become normalised inside systems that prioritise human convenience, performance, and control.
But there is another side to this conversation too, and it matters.
Because welfare is not solved simply by opening a gate.
People love the idea of freedom. We love the emotional image of it. The cage door opening. The horse finally "just being a horse." The retired athlete out in a green paddock under a blue sky.
But the older I get, the more I wonder whether we confuse freedom with welfare.
At our paddock, the horses live beautifully. Rotated pasture across large acreage. Herds. Movement. Shade. Social contact. Horses can gallop, rest, graze, interact, and choose where they want to be 24 hours a day. For many horses, it is close to ideal.
But there are some horses there who do not entirely settle into it. They are not neglected. They are not abused. They are loved. And yet they struggle.
A former Grand Prix dressage horse who spent years in intensive management. A high-level showjumper who lived a life of precision feeding, controlled exercise, stabling, rugs, supplements, routines, human supervision, and constant structure.
People imagine these horses will instantly relax into "natural" life once retirement comes. Some do. Some absolutely flourish. But others seem psychologically stranded between worlds. Too managed to fully adapt to freedom. Too shaped by humans to suddenly become independent of them.
And this is the contradiction we rarely talk about honestly. Humans create dependency, then congratulate ourselves for removing the structures that dependency was built upon. Sometimes we even call it kindness.
Dressage presents itself as the softer sport. The harmonious one. The discipline of partnership, patience, and lifelong bonds. We tell ourselves our horses are not disposable because we love them. And often we do. Deeply. But love does not erase dependency.
Many elite sport horses are just as shaped by intensive human management as racehorses are. Their feeding is controlled. Their turnout is controlled. Their exercise, posture, movement, emotional regulation, social contact, and daily routines are controlled.
Then one day the work ends.
And we say: "He can finally just be a horse."
But what if the horse no longer entirely knows how?
A cockatoo raised around humans may never fully integrate into a wild flock. A racehorse may panic in open pasture. A retired dressage horse may become anxious, hypervigilant, or physically diminished once the structure it understood disappears.
That does not mean the answer is more confinement. And it certainly does not justify exploitation.
But it does mean we inherit obligations when we shape animals around human systems. Not just while they are useful. Not just while they are profitable. Not just while they are emotionally rewarding.
For life.
An animal can be deeply loved and still psychologically shaped by captivity, management, training, and human dependence.
And once we acknowledge that, the real ethical question begins.