Measure your horse’s welfare?
Equine Welfare is a big topic, this check list is not the end all, be all, but it's a good reference to get us thinking!
When we consider animal welfare we generally think, food, water, and shelter, right? These are the first and foremost. The horse should have a safe, clean home with food, water and shelter from the elements appropriate to your climate. It's not just "do they have food, water, and shelter?" but is it clean and species appropriate? Giving your horse a bucket of dog food isn't going to help! As much as having filthy, undrinkable water, or a shelter with broken boards and nails sticking out. Having it isn't enough, it needs to be safe, clean, and appropriate for the species. This means clean water that isn't frozen or boiling hot or filled with algae or muck. This means access to forage as much of the day/night as possible (slow feed if necessary). Feed that meets their individual health needs, consult a nutritionist if you're unsure how to do this, don't just read the label on a feed bag. The shelter should be appropriate to your region, if you get blizzards - make sure it protects from wind and heavy snow and will keep their water from freezing (within reason). If you have high heat, provide plenty of shade, etc...
Beyond these basics there are other aspects to consider. Shelter is important in extreme weather, but freedom and room to be a horse is vital to an emotionally healthy horse. Ensuring your horse has as much turnout time as possible in as large a turn out as you can manage. We don't all have hundred of acres, we can compensate for this by using techniques like track systems, paddock paradise, strategic field arrangement and enrichment.
We also need to consider their need for socialization, as a herd species they must be allowed to spend time with their equine peers. The better their peer group, the more their behavioral needs will be met, ensuring mental health and reduced behavioral problems. We want to ensure the horse has peers they can engage in play, social grooming, huddling in weather, resting together, and sharing resources. There shouldn't be heavy resource competition, fighting with injuries, or any individual isolated from the group. These are signs something needs to change in the herd or management.
We can improve a horse's welfare to make up for short-comings we might have in our keeping, through enrichment. Times when our horses need to be on stall rest, or quarantined from the herd, or otherwise compromised welfare, we can use enrichment as a way to support their mental health through this (hopefully short) time. Good enrichment is anything fun and novel that engages the horse's mind and stimulates natural behaviors. Toys, puzzler feeders, various social arrangements, new smells, mirrors, and so on can engage your horse's mind and keep them behaving like a healthy horse, even when life isn't perfect.
We also want to consider the work we ask our horses to do for us. I'm not referring to positive reinforcement, fun playtime, which I'd count as enrichment, I'm referring to something the horse would not do if left to their own devices. Riding, driving, exercising, a little is beneficial for their health and stimulation for their body and mind, but too much becomes detrimental. This one is one we want to keep at a delicate balance with careful consideration to the individual horse in front of us, what their needs are like.
We can measure this through observing stress behaviors. Learn to see and recognize stress signals from the horse and observe how often they appear and in what situations. Only work? Only in confinement? When they run out of hay?Learn these and use this information to improve their quality of life overall.
There are sometimes the horse's health can compromise their quality of life. Sometimes their health requires unhealthy confinement, or it's difficult to provide them appropriate amounts of forage, or their in chronic pain which can't be helped even when everything else is perfect. Having a knowledgeable medical team will help you provide the best for your horse and know when it's time to let them go. When their welfare is completely compromised due to their health, and it's not getting better, we have one last kind gift to relieve them of this suffering.
Our goal should always be the best welfare possible for our animals! But we also know that the real world isn't perfect all the time. We do the best we can with what we have. The goal is to use this chart as a guide to help see what we can improve for our horses. All our horses are individuals, so be sure to consider their personal needs as you look at this.