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.
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.
It depends a lot on circumstances. Rural people often own land they aren’t using optimally. Cows also mean extra labor with milking and such. You might not want to do that. Keeping three cows is small time in the first place and not very efficient.
Rural living, agriculture, and forestry usually means you have a surplus of something and those around you do as well.
I know rural people. They might work a job in a shop, office, or contractor, but have some small time agriculture on the side. A lot of that is done in direct exchanges in the community as well. Like, Ben gets to take some firewood from my forest and in return he houses my horse in his stable. Gertrude can use my unused pasture to graze her sheep. Or I might be growing oats, so feeding a horse is basically free for me. Joe owns a ranch with a few horses where the wealthy keep theirs for a fee. I can trade him oats for a horse directly.
These types of arrangements can be very good (tax free) business and also strengthen social bonds.
Yep. Land where I grew up was notoriously cheap if you didn’t get the mineral rights. You could be poor as fuck and have a tar paper shack on 10 acres and have zero time to produce anything useful on the land. Horses aren’t expensive to buy. You can get used tack and hay and oats were inexpensive where I grew up. Maybe a hundred bucks a month to own a horse (this would have been over 30 years ago, definitely more expensive today)? This was not for racing, heavy work, or horse girl stuff, but you could take care of one for not much if your hobby was riding or if you just liked having a horse around. Or you have zero land and help your neighbor with chores and your horse lives next door.
I do pretty well for myself but I’ve got an arrangement like that right now. I go help out on my buddy’s small ranch every year during the summer. I help enough that there’s a horse out there that’s mine, on paper at least. He gets the same treatment as the rest of the horses and I own all the gear. Costs me some time, but in all honesty it’s time I want to be outdoors anyway.
the very rich and the very poor
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.
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.
It depends a lot on circumstances. Rural people often own land they aren’t using optimally. Cows also mean extra labor with milking and such. You might not want to do that. Keeping three cows is small time in the first place and not very efficient.
Rural living, agriculture, and forestry usually means you have a surplus of something and those around you do as well.
I know rural people. They might work a job in a shop, office, or contractor, but have some small time agriculture on the side. A lot of that is done in direct exchanges in the community as well. Like, Ben gets to take some firewood from my forest and in return he houses my horse in his stable. Gertrude can use my unused pasture to graze her sheep. Or I might be growing oats, so feeding a horse is basically free for me. Joe owns a ranch with a few horses where the wealthy keep theirs for a fee. I can trade him oats for a horse directly.
These types of arrangements can be very good (tax free) business and also strengthen social bonds.
Yep. Land where I grew up was notoriously cheap if you didn’t get the mineral rights. You could be poor as fuck and have a tar paper shack on 10 acres and have zero time to produce anything useful on the land. Horses aren’t expensive to buy. You can get used tack and hay and oats were inexpensive where I grew up. Maybe a hundred bucks a month to own a horse (this would have been over 30 years ago, definitely more expensive today)? This was not for racing, heavy work, or horse girl stuff, but you could take care of one for not much if your hobby was riding or if you just liked having a horse around. Or you have zero land and help your neighbor with chores and your horse lives next door.
I do pretty well for myself but I’ve got an arrangement like that right now. I go help out on my buddy’s small ranch every year during the summer. I help enough that there’s a horse out there that’s mine, on paper at least. He gets the same treatment as the rest of the horses and I own all the gear. Costs me some time, but in all honesty it’s time I want to be outdoors anyway.