My Favorite Animal "Horse"

I am going to write about my favorite animal. The animal is horse.
 This picture was taken when I went to Hidaka area in Hokkaido. I touched these horses and spent happy time.

I think horse is very attractive and lovely. At the same time, horse is friend of human. Many people live with horses and we are given many good things from horse. Today, I want to write about characteristics and history of horse.

 

・Body of Horse

 Horse can run fast. As you know, horse’s leg is long and slender.  Race horse’s leg is especially slender. Compare with other animals, horse have a very characteristic point. Each leg of horse has only one hoof (a nail). For example, cow has two hoofs in each leg. Many other animals have some hoofs. We have five nails in a hand too. Few hoof and long leg make horse possible to run fast.

 Horses have hair on neck and tail. Hair of neck is short and hair of tail is long. Kind of horses have hair on their legs. I think moving hair with wind is charm.

Horses eat plants so they have many flat teeth. Those flat teeth can crush plants. Because horses have many teeth, their heads are long. Horse eats plants so is called herbivorous animal. Such animals should escape from hunter. Because of it, horse has very good eyes to find hunter.

In addition, horses have wide back, strong muscle and tough born. These things make speed and power of horse. Horse which cultivates soil has thick born. Contrary, a race horse has light and shin born. It is so poor that  race horses sometimes break their legs.  Horse’s body shows great fascinating points.

・History of Horse

 Do you know horse was as big as rabbit? In 54 million years ago, there was no horse which like today’s horse. Ancient horse lived in forest. In the forest they ate leaf and they were very small. First species of horse had 4 fingers and 4 hoofs. Next species had 3 fingers and became little big. 3 finger-horses began to live in grassy plains 20 million years ago. From the time, horses had become bigger and been able to run faster. In 2 million years ago horses was as big as present horse and had same number of hoof. During this process, many species came into existence. Donkey and zebra is this. In 4 thousand years ago, first wild horses were raised by human in east Europe. Since then horses had lived with human. Of course there are wild horses today, but the number is very few.

・Live with Horse

 Horses live with humans all over the world. They are not only pets. They work with humans and they are good partner of us. There are many works of horse. First, horses pull heavy things. When in farm, they pull big shovel to cultivate the soil. When in road, they pull a cart and a horse-drawn carriage. Horses can carry humans. We can go some place faster and can cut the time when horses pull us. We can go more far place too. But, there are mamy cars today, it is a pity I can not get chanses to ride horses. Second, horse can run fast. When in a race, horse can impress people. However, it is sad that we used horse in war. Finally, I think it is important role of horse that to cheer up   and heal us. Horse’s tender eyes always make us cheerful.

                                                                                             (To be continued.)