Is your horse sleeping comfortably?

6 Facts about your horse's sleep:

1. Horses are polyphasic sleepers, spreading their daily sleep requirements over several sleeping bouts. This means they can adapt to range, climatic, and predator conditions by catching up on rest when it feels safer and when a comfortable location is found.

2. Sleep is divided into Non-REM and REM sleep. REM stands for Rapid Eye Movement and happens when the horse's muscles completely relax and brain activity increases to levels close to wakefulness while the horse is sleeping. Humans dream during REM sleep, may be horses do to? You not only see their eyes twitching and rolling, their ears, nose and hooves may move too!

3. Non-REM or "slow wave sleep" is where the brain activity is relatively quiet and the horse is asleep. Horses can sleep in Non-REM sleep while standing as their muscles retain enough tone to activate the stay apparatus that prevents them from falling.

4. When the lying conditions aren't comfortable enough for long periods lying down, horses make up for some of this by standing up to sleep.

5. Horses can only get REM sleep by lying down though because their muscles need to be fully relaxed to go into REM sleep. If deprived of safe and comfortable lying places, or are too sore to lie down for long, they may fall over as their brain and muscles switch from non-REM to REM sleep while they are still standing.

6. Horses who don't get enough time lying down may take longer to learn something new.

   
   

   Read more here with my download guide to sleep in horses

   
   

   And watch my vlog here: