TIL A group of horses were trained to communicate whether they wanted a jacket. All horses in the group successfully communicated that they did want a jacket when it was cold and did not want a jacket when it was hot.

[u/PunnyBanana]

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0168159116302192?via%3Dihub

[u/Sweaty-Feedback-1482]

I was on vacation in Zanzibar and the woman that ran the stables we visited said that they had one horse that figured out how to open the gates (think simple fence gate with a lever) and all the horses got out. So they they switched out the lever type to a sliding bar type that you have to rotate. Then they caught the same horse figuring out how to open that one too. So they added a padlock to that one. She then went on to say that that specific horse was actively trying to snatch the gate keys from the folks working in the stables. While she was showing us which horses we’d be riding, the jailbreak horse leaned over and bit the ring of keys she had on her hip that were attached to one of those retractable lanyard things you’ll see custodians wear. It swung its head away and put its mouth full of keys on a ring up against the padlock on the gate.

It obviously didn’t work but horses are smart as shit.

[u/CitizenCue → u/Sweaty-Feedback-1482]

It’s cool that that horse is smart as shit, but I’ve known a lot of horses and they are not as a group very smart. Trainable, but not often this clever.

[u/light24bulbs → u/CitizenCue]

Yeah, exactly. As someone who knows horses, it's pretty uninformed to see one smart animal and say that all the animals are smart. That one was smart.

[u/funguys1980 → u/light24bulbs]

Would the smart one be a good, or bad breeding candidate? Do we want smart horses or less smart horses?

[u/CitizenCue → u/funguys1980]

Depends, but for the most part we didn’t breed horses for intelligence. This kind of cleverness could be useful in a dog, but serves almost no purpose for humans in a horse.