The objective of this study was to determine haematological variables (red blood cell count, hemoglobin, hematocrit, mean corpuscular volume, mean corpuscular hemoglobin, mean corpuscular hemoglobin concentration and coefficient of variation of the distribution curve of red blood cells) and blood biochemistry (total plasma proteins, fibrinogen, urea, creatinine, uric acid, total cholesterol and triglycerides) of pleasure horses. Therefore, we evaluated 46 Mangalarga Marchador horses, 32 males and 14 females at different ages (6.83±0.65 years). The animals were kept stabled at different pleasure horses training centers, which presented similar nutritional management and conditioning regimen. We evaluated the sex group (male and female) and age groups (younger than five years, between five and ten years, over ten years). The results indicated differences in the mean corpuscular hemoglobin concentration related to sexual group (P<0,05), and in the variation of total serum protein concentration (P<0,05) related to the age groups. The results suggested that there are important differences in biochemical and hematological parameters in horse riding toward sex and age group, except for mean corpuscular hemoglobin concentration and total plasma proteins concentration, which do not compromise physical performance of these animals.
biochemistry; equine; erythrogram; sport