Stupid Me, Parts 1 & 2

Lest you think that by writing about Ugly and crew I am lording my superiority over them, I submit the following example of how even someone who knows horses well can do something stupid while thinking herself quite clever.

I needed to weed some raspberry beds and the day (Friday) was sunny and gorgeous. I had Weasel the dog outside with me (no leash, of course - first bad move, but she had been so good lately) and the lawn needed to be mowed and so I decided to bring Junior across the street for some grazing time. I would multi-task like a maniac and get three things done at once! How clever is that?

Knowing that I couldn't expect Junior to just stay in the yard, I decided to tie his lunge line (about 25 feet long) to an old tire which he could then drag around while grazing. I figured that it would remind him to stay in the yard but would not be too confining.

I brought him over, tied him to the tire and worked on the raspberries. I had a tense moment when he got himself tangled in the line, but he sensibly disentangled himself and went on calmly grazing and the dog reclined in the shade of a cherry tree, calm as can be. All was bliss for half an hour.

While congratulating myself with a Barq's, disaster happened. Junior spooked at something and the dog jumped up and ran over to him, further compounding the problem. The line was going from front to back between all of his legs (but not tangled in any way) with the tire about 10 feet behind him. Of course, the sight of the suddenly terrifying THING coming along behind just made it worse and he began to move off at a good clip. I grabbed the tire to try to get him to stop, but between his legs as it was he wouldn't slow down and I had to let go.

By this time he was in the neighbor's yard and picking up speed, the tire flying and bouncing along behind him, spurring him on. He rounded the row of arborvitae and headed towards the neighbor's barn at a dead run, the dog hot on his heels, thrilled out of her little mind about this adventure. I heard boards breaking but couldn't see what had happened, when he came bursting through the next arborvitae hedge, eyes wide with terror. One of the little bushes caught the rope and it broke, along with the tree, and off he went up the driveway towards the neighbor's in the back - thankfully away from the road.

He rounded the pasture where Dumb and Ugly keep their horses behind an electric fence that is not actually on and has no flags on the wire (you horse people know what I'm talking about) Oh, yes, he went through that fence like it was butter and into the pasture with Dusty and Apollo, who were rushing around and snorting encouragement the whole time. Meanwhile, Weasel has gone back to the Walker's house and is trying to pick a fight with their two dogs.

I ran up to that damned dog and hauled her back to the house by her collar, all the while hoping that the three horses wouldn't get it into their head to leave while the fence was down.

I ran back to where the horses were and had to chase Junior down and get him back into his pasture. Luckily he had only one small cut on his shoulder and had managed somehow not to get himself tangled up in all that wire.

I repaired the fence he took out first - it was only thin fiberglass rods with little clip thingies and all I had to do was put them back on the rods and re-string the wire. No biggie.

The bigger damage was to Robin's barn - Sweetie was very understanding and put in a new post and fixed the damage and I think that everything is okay now.

I will not, I repeat, I will not tie Junior to a movable object again. I will not ever again assume that if things are calm now that they will remain so. I will never again assume that since Junior has seen everything that there is to see around the house a million times he won't spook at one of those million things.

I have learned my lesson. I am once again humble.

Stupid me, part 2 -

And then, the following Sunday, more bad luck. Junior has been lonely and has begun to pace again, so I asked Robin if Bear and Baby could come over and play and eat down the pasture which I'll have to mow with a weed whacker if he doesn't get it munched soon. I had them over once before and had no trouble - Bear is a little protective of "his" mare, but the three of them get along and if Junior has company he eats and is not so hyped up all day.

So in they went Robin went home and I came inside to co some chores. About an hour later I went out to the yard where Sweetie was working on something or other and we were watching the horses, wondering where Bear was, as Baby and Junior were grazing alone.

"Oh, there he is," says I, watching him canter across the pasture. "They finally crossed the creek I hope they eat that tall grass so we don't have to cut it."

Bear continues across the pasture, going faster and faster, with Baby and Junior coming along behind him on the other side of the creek. "Oh, shit!" I saw what was going to happen just before it did - disaster!

Bear is an 18 year old, very sensible horse, not given to large fits of panic like this, and he never works at a fence or causes any problems in the pasture. He has a wound on his right rear leg in front of his hock that has been a chronic problem since he injured it 15 years ago, and on this day it was quite large, open and terrible to look at. The vet said to leave it open to the air and put some stuff on it, blah, blah, blah, so we weren't worried about it and he still came over to play, even though it will bleed profusely if he aggravates it. It's been going on for some time, but he hasn't been lame and the vets (yes, shes taken him to several) do not seem overly concerned.

So, back to the incident - Bear decided to try to squeeze between the fence (3 vertical feet of square mesh fence topped by one strand of barbed wire all mounted on T-posts) and a tree, a space of about 10 inches. He didn't fit, needless to say. Sweetie and I saw him hit, saw him thrashing, and both almost died in shock. I yelled at him to get some wire cutters and took off across the street.

When I got there, Bear had the mesh fence down to 18 inches and three legs on the outside (injured leg on the inside still) and was stuck with the strand of barbed wire across his left shoulder going horizontally back to his tail. The fence was holding and he quit moving as soon as he realized what he had done (thank the Goddess for that!) A neighbor saw the whole thing and was there with wire cutters as fast as I could ask for them. I cut him loose, he delicately lifted his injured leg over the fence, stepped into the driveway and started to freak out and pace back and forth. Now that it was safe, I guess he figured hed throw a little fit and work off that adrenaline.

I had Harley run and get Robin, as I was not sure I could get Bear back across the street and into his barn without further injuring him or myself. She came on the run and I went back with her to assess the damage. He had a few small superficial cuts from the fence on his shoulder and a tiny cut on his left hock, and the wound was bleeding freely, but Robin assured me that it did that often and it didn't look like any more damage had been done. We hosed him down and put him in his stall and then Sweetie and I proceeded to work on the fence for the rest of the day.

See? Even experienced horse people have bad days.

There's more to Bear's story, and once I know how it turns out, I'll add it here, with Robin's permission, of course.