Maureen's Blog

I think of my horses – any horse really – as a unique individual with a fully formed personality, wants, needs, and desires of his or her own, and as sentient creatures.  I do tell my horses what to do, but I like to think I do it in a way that is as respectful as possible.  I am sure in the past I have not been as sensitive as I could have been.  Just from lack of perception and maturity on my part.

I always laugh when Parelli goes into his routine that he (and his students) ask the horse what to do and have a “partnership” and “play” together.  I am 60 and have been around horses since I was 15.  What Parelli and most people do with horses is not play.  I have had two horses, both TB stallions who did play with me.  The first one taught me the game he liked to play, and which I enjoyed wholeheartedly, and the second, years later, enjoyed playing the exact same game the exact same way.  It had nothing to do with “work” or with obeying my “requests”.  It was pure play for fun.  Most people would probably warn against it, but that is because so few people really give credit to the horse for being extremely intelligent and kind.  It appears, since I’ve tried to start the game with other sexes, to be at least a stallion only game, and perhaps a TB stallion only game.

Anyway, I do not try to pretend that when I tell (and yes it’s an order) my horses to do something that I am asking them.  To ask implies that the askee has a choice.  If there’s not a choice it’s not a request.  There are times when I do ask my horses to do things and they do have the choice of refusing. But that is more along the lines of true play.

As I become older, and hopefully wiser, I pay more and more attention to how I tell my horses to do things, as well as to how they respond.  I know that they are always ahead of me.  As with the move.  I’m pretty sure they knew we were moving before I did. As for the actual getting in the trailer and riding to the new place, I was somewhat concerned, as the last time most of them were in the trailer it was for a 3 day trip!  I foresaw some potential issues.

To give credit to the horses, I feel they were happy to leave.  There was a lot of killing at the place where we’d been living.  Chickens, ducks, rabbits, racoons, etc.  I know it disturbed me and them both.  In fact, Huey was so unhappy that he, Bettina, and Lucy basically formed their own herd within the herd and would often keep to themselves.   Huey was the first horse I loaded, and he normally puts up a couple minutes of minor fuss, then goes on.  He never hesitated for even the slightest second, just walked to the trailer and in.  Confirming my feeling that he was glad to leave.

Next came Bettina.  For convenience (mine) I had left her in the round pen so I wouldn’t have to walk all over to get her.  She couldn’t see the trailer from there as there is a hill, and the trailer was on the shoulder of the road, at the bottom of that hill.  As I lead her, with just a nylon halter and a lead rope clipped to it, toward the gate to the pasture, she walked quietly half way.  Then her head went down between her stiffened front legs and she crow hopped like a bronc.  But, she never pulled the rope out of my hands – and she could have, easily.  It was clear to me that she was just expressing her feelings.  First, she wasn’t sure where Huey was, but second, she had friends among the horses we were leaving behind.   She wasn’t saying she didn’t want to go, or wouldn’t go, just that she was upset by the whole thing.  After expressing herself, she walked nicely to the trailer and loaded.   I tried to load Lucy, but she is just too big (read wide) for the end spot of my 3-horse slant.  So she was left behind.

I returned a few days later to get Chance and Lucy.  Chance loaded like Huey had.  When I went to get Lucy, I expected a tantrum, which I had gotten the other day, but, surprisingly, she walked very nicely down to the gate and to the trailer.  But she wouldn’t get  more than halfway in.  Lucy is a very social horse, and I wasn’t surprised she didn’t want to leave.  She is a dominant horse and used to getting her way, and also is a busy body, wanting to be in on everything.  Leaving the herd would be hard for her.  My friend Marilyn had come to help me that day, so I asked her to just go behind Lucy and cluck and ask her to go in.  Lucy backed up from the trailer immediately.  Clearly that wouldn’t work.  I went back to waiting for her to get in, but I could see that would have been an extremely long wait.

Lucy knows that the whip means go.  She is not afraid of it, but understands it as a command, not a request.  I had Marilyn stand about 15 feet behind Lucy and hold the whip.  Then I just had her move it.  Not toward Lucy or in a threatening way, just move it.  Because it was so subtle, Lucy went in.  If it had been any stronger she would have refused.  She had made her statement, and so had I.  Each in our own way.

The next two horses to go were Zola and Shadow.  Zola loaded right up as had Huey and Chance.  Shadow is a huge girl and I expected she would take a while to go in.  I tie back the divider between the second and third horse in the trailer and let her have the whole area for herself, and still she is too big to really be comfortable.  She did walk very quietly to the gate and to the trailer, so I knew she was ready to go. However, when the remaining 6 horses came galloping over and screaming for her, she did balk.  But she didn’t become uncontrollable (which I feared).  When they left she could relax a little, and went on.

The last horse to go was Roxanna.  Roxie is a horse that I used to have a difficult time catching, though for the past several months she has not tried to avoid the halter, even for worming.  Still, I knew she could be obstinate if she wanted to be.  Our relationship is unlike any I’ve had with another horse.  And because I have no agenda for Roxanna, I am allowing it to unfold truly naturally.  I allow – for the most part – Roxanna to control it.  She is a unique horse, maybe because she is a mustang – I don’t know – but I have never had or worked with a horse who is so attentive to me and is so expressive in indicating she wants a relationship.  Yet who has not trusted me 100%, or even 90%.

As I went to get her to load her up, I knew this would be interesting.  She saw me coming, obviously, from a long way.  Clearly I had a halter and lead rope (I never try to hide my intentions).  Clearly I was coming for her.  She watched me.  I watched her.  What would she do?  It is not unlike her to let me get right up to the point of putting my arm over her neck and then leave.  In all honesty, I expected her to  move off before I got there, and then we would play our old game of I will follow you until you give in (about 5 minutes).  What a surprise when she turned her body to face me dead on, then took a step in my direction!  A first!

There was no doubt in my mind that she knew I was coming to get her to load her in the trailer and take her away.  She is a very, very, smart horse.  For her to take that step said to me that she was ready to go.  I was even more amazed when she took several more steps toward me – in essence ‘meeting me halfway’. When I went to put the rope over her neck, I wondered if she’d move away.  But no, she stood right there and allowed me to put the halter on.

To me that will remain a very special moment for a long time to come.  Even as I write this it fills my heart with emotion and brings tears to my eyes.  It not only marks a new level in our relationship, but any time a horse truly chooses to do what you want of their own free will it is an amazing feeling.

When she loaded onto the trailer – and it took her a few minutes to get ready – it was with calmness and purpose.

And so the last horse was on her way to Wild Dreams Farm.

 

It’s been a while since I’ve posted and it’s been a busy time.

First I hauled my travel trailer to the farm – I will be living in it until the house is renovated. Once I was in place I started working on fencing. I had purchased a weed eater, however, it was not up to the task of tackling weeds that were over my head. I resorted to hedge clippers to hack out a fence line for my first enclosure. Not pretty, but it was effective.

Once that area was finished, I hauled in my two oldest and most stable horses, Huey and Bettina. The ones I felt would be least upset by being alone in a strange place. All was good. The second day the horses were there I decided to enlarge their area to include a 2-stall section of the barn. It took longer than I thought (more hedge clipper work) but I finished just as it was nearing dark. As I was moving the portable fence posts and the electric tape, I created a 20 foot gap. And what did the horses do, but go out it! I wasn’t too concerned and honestly thought, if anything, they would head for the 2 horses at the end of the property, owned by a previous tenant. Wrong!!! I closed the gap, turned around and they were gone. There was absolutely no sign of them. No sound. Nothing. I walked to the meadow at the top of the hill – where I felt they would have gone but they weren’t there. Now it was fully dark.

I called the Breckinridge County Sheriff’s office and reported them as missing, in case someone found them. The next morning I was up again searching. Since it was long grass there was not even a hoof print as evidence of where they’d gone. I called, in hopes that they’d at least whinny to me. Nothing. In town at Southern States (farm store) I let them know I’d lost the horses and left my name and number. The woman at the counter – brilliant – suggested I call the radio station. Her husband suggested I contact the vet, whose home backs up to that area. I took both suggestions. Back to more searching.

Thankfully, I was exhausted from more fence line clearing and all that searching and could sleep. But I was awake at first light every day. I had images of them being shot (there was hunting going on) and lying dead in the woods. I imagined all kinds of dire fates, from falling, to being caught in barbed wire. I pushed it all to the back of my mind, but really, I was sick with worry.

To make a long story short, Monday morning I got a call from the vet’s office. The horses had been spotted via the vet’s ‘trail cam’, which he uses to watch deer. What a relief. I had been afraid they had headed back to Paris! Dr. Burke gave me directions to his farm and I headed out with the horse trailer. I arrived, saw the hoof prints and the pile of manure where they had passed. I searched the area for a couple hours but gave up. Saw no more fresh sign and another pile of manure further up the road toward the main road, indicated they had gone that way. At the junction of the dirt road and the main road was a house. I knocked at the door and asked the woman who answered if she’d seen two horses. She said she had! As I was hoping it was not too long ago, she said her husband and a neighbor had gotten them corraled. She pointed and there they were!!! I was never so happy to see them. I thanked the woman profusely, and gave her a hug, then loaded them up in the trailer and hauled them home.

In all they were gone 5 days. Torture for me – vacation for them.

I will add however, that the next time I enlarged their area (it was secure) and I took down the unnecessary line of cross fence – leaving at least a 300 foot gap – Huey watched me closely, but never made the slightest move toward the open area. So maybe it wasn’t such a vacation after all. It was over an hour before any of the now 6 horses made a move to leave the area they’d been in, and then it was very tentative and they didn’t go far past where the cross fence had been.

As of Thursday, all 7 horses are now here at the farm. What a relief.