Maven wrote:majxmom wrote: And surely they recognize that where they came from (America), people look very unalike, and suddenly everyone looks very similar
Um maybe to you but thats a pretty ignorant statement. It's not like all Asians are running around with name tags to recognize each other.
In fairness to majxmom, there's a significant difference between people looking very similar (the claim majxmom put forth about the people in Japan) and people being indistinguishable (which is the only thing I can imagine leading to the Japanese toward the use of name tags to recognize each other).
Japan is more racially homogeneous than America, certainly, and the ancestor base is likely smaller (on average) than it is for even a grouping that consists entirely of European descended Americans.
Whether a horse could notice such things, I have no idea, but for the sake of Scientific open-mindedness, I'll refrain from dismissing the possiblity.
Anyway, quite possibly horses lack the memory to be disconcerted for long by changes in enviroment and handlers.
Nonetheless, there have been cases where horses have evidently formed attachments to dogs and goats (etc.) and didn't get over it a few days after the dog or goat died like you'd expect.
Whether a horse could miss a groom in that way, I have no strong basis for saying either way.
-llbean
