When I was mixing up the horse feeds I received a phone call to say that my 3 year old Quarter horse gelding had finally found his inner cow herder and was chasing new born calves on the agistment property he lives on. This horse has lived with these same cattle on and off all his life! Why, today, did he decide it would be fun to give them a run for their money, and apparently he was really chasing them, and knocking them over, then trying to get them up so he could do it again. I think he mistook them for fluffy green balls! Understandably the owner of the cattle was not happy!!!
So I got the float on, and the kids back in the car, and off we went to do some impromptu horsemanship in the dark! They are running on a 900 acre dairy farm, and have had minimal handling in a long time. So for starters I was going to have to catch them! When I arrived, it was a peaceful scene. Three horses grazing calmly amongst a mob of cows in the full moon light. I was expecting carnage after the phone call I had!
To my delight it only took a couple of minutes to catch them. Getting them on the float took quite a bit longer. Silky, our old mare, was hesitant, and a little confused about the interruption to her settled life, she was pretty worried about being whisked away under the cover of darkness! But it didn't take long to reassure her that all was well, and she hopped on the float. Split has barely been taught to lead, and is a left brain thug, who was a left brain thug on right brain adrenalin, so therein lay our challenge! Silky was amazingly calm, nervous, but obedient, and stood patiently on the float while I spent an hour taking the time it took to convince Split it was ok.
This all sounds reasonably calm. I am leaving out the fact that their was a third horse involved, a thoroughbred, not mine, that spent the whole time galloping around the car and float and screaming out. I had two unconfident horses on line, in pitch dark with three small children to help. And help they did. They were amazing. Ciaran helped by sitting in the car for the whole time. Justin and Jack were awesome and I am so proud of them. I was just as happy having an 8 and 10 year old team of assistants as I would have with most adults I know. They were very patient, their skills were wonderful, and we all stayed calm! They had to keep themselves safe from the loose horse, calm the nervous horse standing in the float waiting, hold the young horse when I was putting the older on. They were in charge of the carrot stick outside, and their timing was immaculate. Every time that horse made an effort to think about the float, they stopped.
I was so proud of how they handled the pressure. They listened carefully, and did everything they were asked, when they were asked. It was a dangerous situation, and I trusted them completely.
We took the horses to town and got pizza for dinner as a reward for working as a great team! I am also proud of the horses. I was saying to the boys that it was a huge achievement to have done what we did in the dark in only an hour. It could have been a very different picture! In a different world we could have been chasing the horses around the huge paddock trying to catch them for an hour! My boys know no other type of horsemanship, they take it for granted that this is how things are, that you can drive out in to the middle of a couple of hundred acre paddock, catch an unstarted three year old, float load him, and be on your way! I love it!
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| My wild cow chasing horse, Split. |
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