Are you met with an excited whinny as you enter the yard with your horse's bridle ready for a hack? Recent studies have shown that horses use the whinny to convey social information among each other.

Research carried out by the University of Rennes, in France, supported the belief that horses have a social knowledge as well as a process of vocal coding/decoding information.

Their studies involved recording the whinnies of 30 adult domestic horses – 10 stallions, 10 geldings and 10 mares.

Twelve horses heard either control white noise or whinnies emitted by group members, familiar neighbours or unfamiliar horses. While the control sounds did not evoke any response, horses discriminated the social category of the callers they were familiar with and reacted with a sound specific behaviour such as increased vigilance and attraction.

The studies revealed that some of the frequency and timing parameters carried reliable information about the caller's sex, body size and identity. Horses listening to the whinnies showed an increasing amount of interest in the calls as the familiarity of the caller increased.

The study therefore confirmed that horses have their own signature whinny which relays information about themselves to other horses who can discriminate between the sound of horses they do and don't know.

Research around your own stable will soon show you that horses have a range of noises conveying different feelings from the hungry nickering around feed time to the excited whinnies as you tack them up in their horse bridle ready to go out for a ride.