Post #1538241
2026-04-17 10:44 UTC
The rural population. If you own a piece of land and a small farm, keeping a horse is much cheaper. If you have a stable with a few animals anyway, adding a horse isn’t much extra work.
Replies (1)
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@frightful_hobgoblin@lemmy.ml 2026-04-17 11:14
It does cost a lot when you factor in opportunity costs of pasture. There's a reason we have the phrase "eats like a horse". Horses ate 63% more than moocows in this study: https://besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdfdirect/10.1046/j.1365-2664.2002.00693.x (Mules fix this.) Irish Equine Centre recommends 2 horses per 3 hectares: https://irishequinecentre.ie/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/Grassland-for-Horses.pdf I could be grazing 6 moocows (maybe 7) if I have 3 hectares, giving me 32,000 litres of milk or more. Only rich people can afford to turn pasture over to horses and turn down that money.