Association between Infrared Thermography, Blood Count and Creatine Kinase in the Evaluation of the Welfare of Vaquejada Horses

Abstract

The Quarter-Horses regularly participate in non-traditional sports that simulate activities on cattle ranches. In the vaquejada races, the horses run at about 30 km/h, reaching maximum heart rates of around 200 bpm, indicating the great physical effort during competitions and with that could impact welfare. To test the hypothesis that vaquejada horses can be evaluated for the quality of welfare through a combination of non-invasive and invasive methods, an experiment was developed that aimed to assess the quality of welfare through thermography and blood biomarkers before and after vaquejada races. Ten vaquejada horses, which were in regular competition, were submitted to the vaquejadas racing test were used. Thermography was performed in 14 regions of interest (head, neck and thorax) in the following phases: pre-race and +1, +4 and +24 hours of the races. Blood samples were collected in pre-race, immediately after and +1, +4 and +24 hours of the races. Results were submitted to ANOVA and Tukey's test, with p set at 5%. Thermography showed that local temperatures before the race and +24 hours after the races were similar (p > 0.05), as well as between +1 and +4 hours after the races (p > 0.05), which showed higher surface temperatures than the first group (pre-race and +24 hours) (p < 0.05). There was also an increase in red blood cells, hemoglobin and hematocrit immediately after the vaquejada races (p < 0.05) with a return to normality +1 hour after the races. Plasma proteins rose after the runs and How to cite this paper: Silva, C.

The Welfare of Horses Competing in Three-Barrel Race Events Is Shown to Be Not Inhibited by Short Intervals between Starts

“…However, it has been observed that there are no increases in cortisol, IL-6, or IL-1β because of physical exertion. This is consistent with previous research on quarter horses that participated in vaquejada [2,19], a sport like 3TB running in terms of its high intensity and short duration.…”

“…Nevertheless, the results are important because they indicate that there is no inflammation caused by the bits and harnesses commonly used in this equestrian sport, provided they comply with the official rules. Similar results were observed in these areas in vaquejada horses [2], where no changes in local temperature were observed.…”

“…As described above, after the races, all animals underwent a recovery period of approximately 10 min with the horses at a walk and then were sent to their boxes, with available water and fresh forage, without being bathed so that the body dried naturally to not compromise the thermographic images. The regions evaluated were the ocular caruncle, buccal commissures (corner of the mouth), masseter (Masseter) muscles, neck with emphasis on the area of the trapezius (Trapezius Cervicus) and brachiocephalic (Brachiocephalicus) muscles, the barrels/costal arches, and the flanks, all on both sides except the caruncle only on the left, as described and adapted from Silva et al [2] (Table 1). Left and right measurements were analyzed separately.…”

“…Findings also considered the level of experience of the horses and the riders and the pre-competition conditions of the horses (training, rest periods, diet, etc. ), including the numerous causes of poor performance and gut microbiota composition [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10]. These different studies expand general knowledge about the impacts of physical exercises that occur in training and competitions and can be used in the evaluation of the welfare of horses used in different equestrian disciplines, whether classical (racing, jumping, etc.)…”

“…Due to these characteristics, authors have investigated the influence of this type of physical effort, both for the evaluation of performance and for the possible diseases resulting from 3TB races [11,[13][14][15][16][17][18]. However, few articles have associated health and welfare assessment methods in 3TB horses, such assessments being more common in other equestrian modalities, such as vaquejada [2,19], running [20][21][22], endurance [4,23], and jumping exercises [10,24,25].…”