Eli5: Why are horses afraid of camels?
In: Biology
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In my experience horses, especially high strung breeds like thoroughbreds are scared of pretty much everything. We’d have the horses going mad in the stable area and I’d run out expecting to find a snake only to find the horses spooking for some tiny buck. But in the wild horses herd together and since they’re strictly herbivores there’s no need for them to mix with any other animal so their fight or flight is strictly geared for anything unfamiliar.
This is somewhat of a misconception. Generally, camels are raised around horses and have some fimiliarity w them, thus they are not “afraid” of their sent. Back during the Crusades European knights told tales of mounted camels sending their horses running for the hills. This was bc the horses had never encountered camels and were suspect of their unique scent, not knowing if they were predators. By the second Crusades, Holy Roman Empire war horses were being raised around camels to prevent this. It is merely a matter of unfamiliarity.
Horses are in general quite nervous animals, easily spooked by pretty much anything whatsoever. That’s why they are somewhat tricky to control.
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