It surprises me that fairly young (relatively speaking;), intelligent horse people still believe things like, women should be extra careful around stallions during their menstrual cycle, because they'll (the stud) become aroused. I wish I could find some literature to cite because I know I've also read what I & other women I know have personally experienced. Stallions are attracted to a mare's scent when she is in estrus, ovulating. The scent of a woman menstruating is entirely different & is not sexually stimulating to a stud horse.
I've been around & have handled studs since I was a kid. I have never had a stallion behave any differently toward me when I was/am menstruating than when I'm not.
But then, there are still men (& probably some women, too) who think a woman shouldn't handle a stallion under any circumstances.
Hi, HP! Can you think of any studies that dispute this notion? I know I've read something, somewhere. (tho it quite possibly may have been anecdotal rather than scientific evidence ~ I simply can't remember)
ELizabeth Hardy (12.38.198.125)
Posted on Wednesday, May 15, 2002 - 04:52 pm:
I can not say I dispute what your saying but I witnessed a Stallion try to mount the handler.Fully erect and all . now I can not say she had her period ;Maybe she simply looked good to the stud or he was just trying to dominate her ...
This stud never behaved that way prior to that one incident and she had been handling him for over 2 yrs. there were no mares in view or even close by either.
I am more inclined to believe it was just a case of bad behavior then anything else or that she may have been handling a mare who was in Heat..
Though I have heard that statement that women should be carefull around stallions during their monthly cycle was never quite sure if I beleived it .... and have never seen any thing to prove that statement...
Liz
Jos (142.177.94.143)
Posted on Wednesday, May 15, 2002 - 05:15 pm:
Although I am familiar with the "old wife's tale", I have never seen any scientific proof to back it up. It is my belief that this is a throwback to the days when men handled stallions almost universally and it was considered impolite and improper to discuss sexual matters in front of ladies.
To further this argument....
When a stallion is teasing or breeding a mare, he is responding (in part) to the odour secreted by the mare connected to estrogens that are secreted in turn by a follicle. The mare for her part of the response to the estrogens is displaying estrus behaviour. We can see therefore that estrogens are an important part of this. Remember too that estrogens are given to ovariectomized mares to encourage estrus-like behaviour.
Estrogen, estrogen, estrogen (or if you are from anywhere other than North America, oestrogen, oestrogen, oestrogen!)
So where is the estrogen when a woman is menstruating? There isn't any - at least not in significant levels.
We should therefore be more concerned (if we were "old wives") with a woman handling a stallion close to her ovulation, when there is estrogen coursing through her veins at elevated levels, and I am sure she smells different!
But we're not.
Kelly (63.172.47.237)
Posted on Sunday, May 19, 2002 - 06:37 pm:
During breeding season, stallions are more sensitive and stimulated. I have noticed that they may detect a change in smells more readily at this time. The mares are in season and the stallions are constantly checking the smells. They may be reacting to any differing smell at the time.
I try to wear the same perfumes, etc. and change nothing. I have seen some very well mannered stallions react dramatically to a woman that was menstruating. It has happened, and therefore should not be dismissed intirely. It could be that they react to the scent change, not the fact that a woman may be menstuating. I caution women that work around my studs about this, and will contine to do so. More often than not, I find that these old wives tales have merit for some very unlikely reasons.
I'd have to agree with Jos that stallions in general aren't going to be "stimulated" by a woman during her menstrual cycle any more than a stallion is going to be lusting after a bitch (female dog) in season! The scent factors are so different across species.
However, as Kelly says stallions are quite attuned to any CHANGE in smell and if we show up one day smelling really different to a stallion that knows us well then of course he's going to notice. I've had stallions take special note when my clothes were done in another detergent, for example. I've seen stallions really like (or dislike) the strong perfumes some women wear; it's entirely natural to see a stallion "meet" a new person by sniffing him or her for a while to get their scent, just as he'd do with any other social entity introduced to him for the first time.
Related to this, there are more than a few stallions with whom I've worked that were moderately aroused by any CHANGE in smell or environment. A new gelding moves in a few stalls down, a new person comes to give them massage, and most of all they trailer to a new place for the first time. Not surprising; many males like novelty in general (we're all a bit ADD at heart I think!), and stallions are nothing if not male.
Above all else, however, a stallion who becomes our friend and "herd member" really gets to know us quite well. If we work with him alot, he sees us tired and happy and sad and upset and frustrated. . . as we see him. So if anything changes in us emotionally, he'll know for sure! Not sure if it's smells we give off, or body language, or that "6th sense" stallions have about the people for whom they care, but they know. This is one reason why people who are emotionally unstable do poorly working with most stallions - the stallions are too attuned to the instability and get spooked by it quite often. I've seen it happen with both men and women, over and over so that's not meant at all as a gender-specific comment.
In terms of scent, yes most all stallions will respond to a mare in oestrus. However, that same response can easily extend to other smells over time - or to no smell at all. Many of us work with stallions who collect on a phantom (or on the ground) with no mares anywhere to be found. They simply become accustomed to a certain stimulation setting and if they are made to be comfortable with this, it's fine by them! So one can imagine a stallion getting some inaccurante correlations built into his mind sometimes. For example, a few times when he is collected a man is wearing a specific cologne - to humans, it's not very noticeable but to a stallion in the process of arousal, it's probably like a huge red sign saying "SEX NOW!" to us visually-trained humans.
So then a few months later a new fellow starts at the barn cleaning stalls; he wears that same cologne. Yikes - instantly amorous stallion, nickering and chortling away as he drops and grows two hands higher in his stall! Well we might not be able to figure out "why" this happened since we don't do smells so well as horses (or dogs of course) but we can extend our stallion friends some understanding if they get the wrong cues from time to time.
A gentle reminder that this isn't the time or place for "sexy" behavior ought to help most socially-savvy stallions get their cues straight. On a side note, I pity anyone who walks in the stall of any stallion used to AVs smelling of KY Jelly (or whatever lube is used on the AV for them) - I think many of our "boys" used to AVs think of that smell as an automatic precursor to sex. Good thing we don't use those lubes for, say, cleaning their manes or we'd all some pretty frustrated boys to deal with :-/
If we ask our stallions to understand so much of our "human" world (stalls, trailers, competitions, human interactions, crossties, tack, riding, and 1000 other things) the least we can do is learn to look at the world a bit from the horse's perspective. To a stallion, the world is a cornucopia of smells - especially in breeding season. If we are aware of this all the time, it makes much of the "unpredictable" nature of stallions quite easy to predict, after all.
I'm not going to say I believe that stallions are stimulated by a menstruating woman, but I will relate a little story here. I was looking at a stallion, that I was considering buying, he was a 5 year old, and had been used for breeding mares. It was "my time of the month" and I didn't give it a lot of thought, as I had a stallion of my own at home, and had only experienced a slight difference of attitude with him at those times. (He would sniff and his nostrils would distend, and I would have no push his nose away from me, but that was as far as he went.) The 5 yr. stallion was in his pen, and his owner & I walked up to him, as he stood quietly, head lowered. The owner & I were talking about the horse, and the owner was telling me how quiet & well-mannered an animal he was, when the horse stepped a couple steps closer to me, and began sniffing the ground, then my shoes, and started sniffing the bottom of my leg, then further up it. I backed up, to a water tank that was behind me, when the stallion reared unexpectedly, and completely. (not a half-hearted attempt, but all the way up.) I was backed up against the tank, and leaned back as far as I could, just as the stallion's front hooves came down, barely missing the top of my head; I felt one hoof brush against my cheek, and one hoof actually went into the front pocket of my jacket and ripped it into pieces. I missed getting the top of my head caved in by just a couple inches. The stud leaned back on his haunches, and was going up again, when his owner caught his halter and spun him around in a circle, while I got the h#ll out of the pen. Later, talking to the owner, he said he was astounded the stallion had acted like he did. He had *never* shown aggression toward people, or mares, and he also said he noticed the horse had an erection. (I didn't notice, I was busy counting my blessings at the time). The owner was a man I trust, a responsible and very reputible breeder and I believe he was not misrepresenting the horse when he said he'd never acted that way before, and I truly believe this horse reacted the way he did to me, because of the fact I was menstruating. Now, I can't begin to explain exactly why this happened, but I am always extra cautious around our stallions and others' stallions for that time of the month.
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