Horse vs. Bronco: What's the Difference?
Table of Contents
Main Difference
The main difference between Horse and Bronco is that the Horse is a domesticated (work) animal and Bronco is a untrained or bucking horse.
Horse
The horse (Equus ferus caballus) is one of two extant subspecies of Equus ferus. It is an odd-toed ungulate mammal belonging to the taxonomic family Equidae. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 million years from a small multi-toed creature, Eohippus, into the large, single-toed animal of today. Humans began domesticating horses around 4000 BC, and their domestication is believed to have been widespread by 3000 BC. Horses in the subspecies caballus are domesticated, although some domesticated populations live in the wild as feral horses. These feral populations are not true wild horses, as this term is used to describe horses that have never been domesticated, such as the endangered Przewalski’s horse, a separate subspecies, and the only remaining true wild horse. There is an extensive, specialized vocabulary used to describe equine-related concepts, covering everything from anatomy to life stages, size, colors, markings, breeds, locomotion, and behavior.
Horses’ anatomy enables them to make use of speed to escape predators and they have a well-developed sense of balance and a strong fight-or-flight response. Related to this need to flee from predators in the wild is an unusual trait: horses are able to sleep both standing up and lying down, with younger horses tending to sleep significantly more than adults. Female horses, called mares, carry their young for approximately 11 months, and a young horse, called a foal, can stand and run shortly following birth. Most domesticated horses begin training under saddle or in harness between the ages of two and four. They reach full adult development by age five, and have an average lifespan of between 25 and 30 years.
Horse breeds are loosely divided into three categories based on general temperament: spirited “hot bloods” with speed and endurance; “cold bloods”, such as draft horses and some ponies, suitable for slow, heavy work; and “warmbloods”, developed from crosses between hot bloods and cold bloods, often focusing on creating breeds for specific riding purposes, particularly in Europe. There are more than 300 breeds of horse in the world today, developed for many different uses.
Horses and humans interact in a wide variety of sport competitions and non-competitive recreational pursuits, as well as in working activities such as police work, agriculture, entertainment, and therapy. Horses were historically used in warfare, from which a wide variety of riding and driving techniques developed, using many different styles of equipment and methods of control. Many products are derived from horses, including meat, milk, hide, hair, bone, and pharmaceuticals extracted from the urine of pregnant mares. Humans provide domesticated horses with food, water and shelter, as well as attention from specialists such as veterinarians and farriers.
Bronco
A bronco or bronc, in the United States, northern Mexico and Canada, is an untrained horse or one that habitually bucks. It may be a feral horse that has lived in the wild its entire life, but can also be a domestic horse either not fully trained to saddle or poorly trained, and hence prone to unpredictable behavior, particularly bucking. The term also refers to bucking horses used in rodeo “rough stock” events, such as bareback bronc riding and saddle bronc riding. The silhouette of a cowboy on a bucking bronco is the official symbol for the State of Wyoming.
In modern usage, the word “bronco” is seldom used for a “wild” or feral horse, because the modern rodeo bucking horse is a domestic animal. Some are specifically bred for bucking ability and raised for the rodeo, while others are spoiled riding horses who have learned to quickly and effectively throw off riders. Informally, the term is often applied in a joking manner to describe any horse that acts up and bucks with or without a rider. The Wild and Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971 prevents the capture of mustangs from the wild for commercial use, and though the law has been weakened in recent years, “wild” mustangs and other completely untamed horses are still no longer used on the rodeo circuit, as bigger, more powerful animals that are sufficiently domesticated to be handled from the ground for veterinary care, travel, and stabling in small pens are more desirable as rodeo stock.
In the early American west, most cattle ranches simply allowed young horses to grow up in a feral state on the open range, capturing them at maturity to be broken in or “broke” to make them tame enough to ride. Sometimes Mustangs were rounded up as well, as the two populations often mixed.
Horse (noun)
Any of several animals related to Equus ferus caballus.
Horse (noun)
A riding and draft work.
“A cowboy’s greatest friend is his horse.”
Horse (noun)
Any current or extinct animal of the family Equidae, including the zebra or the ass.
“These bone features, distinctive in the zebra, are actually present in all horses.”
Horse (noun)
Cavalry soldiers (sometimes capitalized when referring to an official category).
“We should place two units of horse and one of foot on this side of the field.”
“All the King’s horses and all the King’s men, couldn’t put Humpty together again.”
Horse (noun)
The chess piece representing a knight, depicted as a horse.
“Now just remind me how the horse moves again?”
Horse (noun)
A large person.
“Every linebacker they have is a real horse.”
Horse (noun)
Equipment with legs.
Horse (noun)
A timber frame shaped like a horse, which soldiers were made to ride for punishment.
Horse (noun)
In gymnastics, a piece of equipment with a body on two or four legs, approximately four feet high, sometimes (pommel horse) with two handles on top .
“She’s scored very highly with the parallel bars; let’s see how she does with the horse.”
Horse (noun)
Type of equipment.
Horse (noun)
A frame with legs, used to support something.
“a clothes horse; a sawhorse”
Horse (noun)
A rope stretching along a yard, upon which men stand when reefing or furling the sails; footrope.
Horse (noun)
A breastband for a leadsman.
Horse (noun)
An iron bar for a sheet traveller to slide upon.
Horse (noun)
A mass of earthy matter, or rock of the same character as the wall rock, occurring in the course of a vein, as of coal or ore; hence, to take horse (said of a vein) is to divide into branches for a distance.
Horse (noun)
The sedative, antidepressant, and anxiolytic drug morphine, chiefly when used illicitly.
Horse (noun)
An informal variant of basketball in which players match shots made by their opponent(s), each miss adding a letter to the word “horse”, with 5 misses spelling the whole word and eliminating a player, until only the winner is left. Also HORSE, H-O-R-S-E or H.O.R.S.E. (see H-O-R-S-E).
Horse (noun)
A translation or other illegitimate aid in study or examination.
Horse (noun)
horseplay; tomfoolery
Horse (noun)
Heroin drug.
“Alright, mate, got any horse?”
Horse (verb)
To frolic, to act mischievously. (Usually followed by “around”.)
Horse (verb)
To provide with a horse.
Horse (verb)
To get on horseback.
Horse (verb)
To sit astride of; to bestride.
Horse (verb)
To copulate with (a mare).
Horse (verb)
To take or carry on the back.
Horse (verb)
To place on the back of another person, or on a wooden horse, etc., to be flogged; to subject to such punishment.
Bronco (noun)
a horse of western North America that is wild or not fully broken
“bronc|broncho”
Horse (noun)
a large plant-eating domesticated mammal with solid hoofs and a flowing mane and tail, used for riding, racing, and to carry and pull loads.
Horse (noun)
an adult male horse; a stallion or gelding.
Horse (noun)
a wild mammal of the horse family.
Horse (noun)
cavalry
“forty horse and sixty foot”
Horse (noun)
a frame or structure on which something is mounted or supported, especially a sawhorse.
Horse (noun)
a horizontal bar, rail, or rope in the rigging of a sailing ship.
Horse (noun)
short for vaulting horse
Horse (noun)
a unit of horsepower
“a 63-horse engine”
Horse (noun)
heroin.
Horse (noun)
an obstruction in a vein.
Horse (verb)
provide (a person or vehicle) with a horse or horses
“six men, horsed, masked, and armed”
Bronco (noun)
a wild or half-tamed horse of the western US.
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