Morgan horses at the Hadley Farm in Amherst, Massachusetts were observed in order to generate an ethogram in which various behaviors, bouts, and states could be analyzed. For the purpose of this project, we focused specifically on the foals and their interactions with other foals and their mother. Their fathers were not present at the time and so many behaviors could not be observed in which a foal may exhibit in the presence of its father. This project was conducted under the idea that we would be able to organize and categorize the foals behavior into tables which would then allow us to run a reliability test, time budget analysis, and a sequential analysis. These tests would help further understand the horses intention and even allow us to predict what behaviors the horse exhibits in a certain sequence. After coming through 180 minutes of footage of the horses, their behaviors were recorded by multiple group members, cross analyzed, and sorted accordingly. In total, 62 behaviors were observed and they spanned through five distinct categories. After obtaining a reliability test across 10 minutes of footage and focusing on several distinct behavior types and bout, we reached a peak reliability range of 35-50. The time budget analysis showed that feeding behaviors along side the foals mother are most prevalent whereas play behaviors exhibit the lowest proportion of time. Thus, we concluded that the foals exhibit unique behaviors depending on their environment, if they are alone or not, and who they are in the proximity of.
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