[Animals] How to breed and tend to horses

Welcome to your next "Animal 101" lesson of the Farming Simulator Academy! Today, we’re focusing on horses. We'll show you how to buy and care for your stately four-legged friends, and how to earn money with them. Let's start!

(Video coming soon!)

Breeds, Housing & Feeding

You can choose between multiple breeds: gray, pinto, palomino, chestnut, bay, black, seal brown and dun. The difference is purely visual.

Housing options

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There are multiple options for how you can accommodate your horses: pastures, barns and large barns. While a horse pasture requires you to provide feed and water and houses only a few horses, the barns only require you to provide feed and have enough space for breeding. We recommend a barn instead of the pasture.

Feeding options

To feed your horses, there are multiple options. To gain 100% productivity (affecting health, reproduction and overall value), you are required to feed them a base ingredient (either oat, sorghum, or the oat bigbag) and hay as a food supplement. If you just feed them one of the base ingredients, they are only 60% productive. If you feed them only hay, their productivity decreases to 40%. 

How to get water: If you keep the horses in a simple pasture, which requires you to provide water, you need to deliver it with a tank trailer. You get water by either filling it from a water tank that you can buy in the "container" tab of the construction menu, or you just revert the tanker trailer attached to your tractor into water - a river or lake, for example. Water from a lake or river is free, tapping a tank container is not. 

What You Need For Horses

• You will need a tractor plus front loader attachments to transport straw and the food to feed your horses. 
• You will need a barn and straw to provide shelter and keep them cozy. 

Optional:

• You need a tank to fill up the drinking trough if you bought the horse pasture instead of a barn.
• You may use a trailer. You can use it to transport the animals from the animal dealer to the barn. 
  • Tip! You do not have to buy a trailer. It only costs a tiny fee to buy or sell them directly at the barn. Only go ahead if you want the full role-play experience. 
  • Tip! Look for the horse icon at the dealership when shopping for a trailer in the "animal transport" section. It indicates that horses can be transported with this trailer.
• You will need a truck or a dolly if you have bought the large transporter. A dolly serves as a link between the tractor and the trailer and saves you money. Small trailers don't require a truck or dolly - a tractor alone is enough.
  • Tip! When shopping for an animal trailer, if "combinations" is displayed, click it to see, if a truck or dolly is required to use it.

Equipment Selection (recommendation) 

We recommend starting with the horse barn. This will cost a little more, but you will save the cost of buying a tank and the step of filling up the watering trough. Also, you can breed more horses as there is more room for offspring.

We chose the following equipment: You need a tractor and front loader attachments - you can buy the attachment configuration for the tractor at the dealership when parking the tractor in the designated customization area. 

• Tractor: John Deere 7810
  • + front-loader attachment
  • + bale spike
  • + pallet fork

Let’s go to work!

Got everything you need?

Step 1: Buy the horses

When you buy horses at the barn, you can have them delivered for a small fee. Alternatively, if you have bought a trailer, you can drive it to the cattle shop and buy cattle on-site to transport them yourself. We recommend, buying them directly at the barn to save money for the trailer.

Step 2: Feeding the horses

Horses eat a mixed feed consisting of a base ingredient and hay as supplement. Unlike cows, however, you do not have to mix the feed yourself. You simply deliver both components to the stable separately. If you grow oat or sorghum on your farm, you can use the harvest and deliver it to the barn. Same for hay, if you mow grass and turn it into hay.

You can also just buy the ingredients from the dealership. Buy a bigbag of oats and a bale of hay. Deliver both to the barn by using the pallet fork for the bigbag and the bale spike for the hay. 

Tip! If you grow oat or sorghum on your farm, you should prepare for winter by storing some of it in a silo. In case you run out, you can always buy the food at the dealership. 

Step 3: Providing straw

To keep the horses comfy and happy, they need straw. You simply fill it in like the feed in the stable. You can buy bales of straw at the dealership and deliver them with the bale spike, or you produce straw yourself. 

Step 4: Brush your horses

It is also important to take care of the horses' hygiene. If you look at a horse with the cursor, you will see an information box in the lower right corner. You should brush your mounts regularly to maintain their health. When you look at the horse, the symbol of a brush appears, and you then press the respective button to interact.

Step 5: Ride your horses

Make sure that you ride your horses regularly. When you are sitting on the horse, you will see your riding progress in the top corner. Ride each horse 100% every day. This is the only way to increase their physical condition and thus their value when you sell them.

Step 7: Selling the horses

When you have trained and cared for your horses long enough, you can sell them. This is done in the same way as buying them, either directly at the stable or by transporting them to the livestock dealer at the point of sale. On the animal screen in the menu, you can click on any animal and sell them on the right side of the screen.

Breeding Horses

Whether horses reproduce, depends on three factors: Their age, the space available in the barn and their health. From the age of 22 months onwards, the horses are mature and can give birth to offspring. But this is only possible if there is room for more horses in the stable. Also, the health of the horses always needs to be at 100%. You can achieve this by feeding the animals regularly.

Tip! If you want to transfer your horses from one stable to another,  just ride them to the respective stable.

Well done!

Congratulations, you have successfully sold horses! Take some time and start the next lesson when you are ready. And don't forget to brush your horses every now and then. Keep at it and you'll be a top virtual farmer in no time!