Yes, it`s true. I could hardly believe it myself. How did this happen? Well, I was starting to get a bit frustrated with Dreamer as she is a thief or food hoarder. We had already separated her from the minis and placed her in the large pasture with the horses because she kicked at anyone who came near the food. We figured the horses would put her in her place. Which they did. At least Chase did. However, our filly, Sierra, didn't get the memo and Chloe is far too nice and happily shares her ration. Which isn't really a problem but that a miniature horse does not consume as much hay as a full size horse. But try telling Dreamer this. She would out eat Chloe and Sierra and hoard most of their portion. So I had one fat pony and two skinny horses. This wasn't working. Next to putting all the horses in their stalls at feeding time, the only other solution was to separate Dreamer yet again. So catching her became a priority.
Yesterday, we had a huge storm here. I brought all the horses in as well as the miniatures. Except Dreamer. She refused to be caught. We tried several times and was successful in touching her but the minute that halter came near her face, she'd turn and take off. As it was storming and freezing, we gave up and decided to try in the morning. We ran her into the mini's pasture where it is much smaller and less room for her to run from us.
Before bringing all the mini's back outside today, I knew we had to catch Dreamer and remove her from the mini's pasture. We already had her new home picked out. It's a small pen area at the far end of our backyard but adjacent to the horse pasture so she would still be able to see all the horses and not feel isolated.
So this was how we caught her. We had no plan. We just crossed our fingers that she would be hungry enough to trust us. We first filled a bucket with feed and hoped it would be enough to lure her in close enough. No such luck. So then we tried a small amount of hay. We wanted to keep her hungry and wanting to keep coming back to us so only used small portiions. At one point she came close enough to me that I was able to reach out and pet her. So I had a flash of brillance and layed the hay in the center of a makeshift noose made from a leadline. When she bench down to munch on the hay I would swiftly lift the noose and slip it around her neck. Great idea but it didn't work. Well, I got is as far as her nose, then she pulled out of it and ran.
Next, we brought in the dogs. We hoped they would chase her around the pasture and wear her out so that she would beg us to take her out of there. It didn't work. She outsmarted them. Ivy, our Border Collie is the main dog we use as she has a natural herding instinct. However, she will stop chasing her target if it stops moving when cornered up against a wall or fence. That's what border collie's do. They will push the herd or in this case the pony up against a barrier so they can no longer move forward. So that's what Dreamer did. She'd stop near the fence causing Ivy to stop chasing. So we cancelled that approach and decided we needed to corner her with a gate or something so she couldn't run past us. I headed back into the barn and got our portable fencing. However, as I was setting up, Farm Girl hollered out that she caught her. I turned and saw her struggling with Dreamer trying to tighten the noose. Apparently she used the same method I used with the hay inside the noose but used the bucket of feed instead. Once Dreamer had a taste of it, that was it. Farm Girl snagged her.
We led her to her new pen where she finally relaxed, devoured the feed and hay we provided for her. Farm Girl stroked and cooed her (of course having her tied to the fence the entire time) until finally slipping that loathsome halter over her head.
Big moment.
All the horses inside the barn were happy, I'm sure, that the rogue had finally been caught and they could go back outside.
We took all the mini's back to their pen with the exception of young Tex. Tex is about nine months old. And should be weaned from momma by now. She's a bit underweight and I'm sure that has alot to do with her little man sucking her dry. So last night we separated them in two different stalls but were able to still see each other. It went well so this morning we decided to take it a step further and leave Tex inside the stall while mom went outside with the rest of the gang. Tex called out but not excessively or even in a state of panic, just kind of like he notices she's missing and asking her to come back. Willow, Tex's mom, went out to the pasture without any fuss and called out a couple times but really didn't seem to upset.
So I had some work to do in the barn which took a while but I could keep an eye on Tex who was being penned with the other two intact males in the barn...our billy, Caesar and our ram, Dodge.
They seemed to be getting along great, so didn't suspect anything was wrong. I stopped for lunch but before I went in, I decided to go and check on the mini's. It was a good thing I did because this is what I noticed.
To be honest, I wasn't sure what I was looking at. But as I got closer I realized Willow had gotten herself into quite the jam.
The horse's pasture is to the left and the mini's pasture is to the right. Willow hand managed to wedge herself between the horse pasture fence and the last post in the mini's pasture. I had intended to nail the fence to the post when we built the mini pasture but had forgotten to do so, but the mini's never went near it and so I figured it wasn't necessary. However, in a mother's desperation to return to her son, she picked the only weak area in the fence line. And managed to stick every limb in her body through a gap in the fence.
The worse part was her head. She had somehow managed to stick it through one of those small openings. I tried to free her myself but in the end had to run in and ask for Farm Girl's help. We would manage to free a leg then she would loose her balance and fall through a different opening. We tried pushing her backwards but it was impossible, her huge head and neck were tightly wrapped around the fence. As we tried to free her, she would struggle trying to help us release her until finally at one point she collapsed from exhaustion and cold. She was shivering and I had no idea how long she had been trapped inside the fence. There comes a time in a dying animal's last few minutes when you know they have given up the battle and allowing death to take over. I've seen it more times than I like to admit since moving to our farm. And I saw it in Willow as she lay twisted in the fence. Thinking I may have to cut her free, I decided to try one last time. Me and Farm Girl shoved as hard as we could on her head, trying to free it, mindless of the fact that Willow is a known biter. If we pushed her in any way that hurt or she felt threatened by, we didn't doubt she'd retaliate with a big chomp to our hand.
But miraculously, it worked. Her head was finally freed. We figured it would be easier to pull her forward then push her back. So we did that but then her back legs were caught all the way up to her groin. I had Farm Girl push her back just enough for me to bend her leg and free it. It took some doing but finally, her leg was free and Willow was out of the fence.
I couldn`t believe we managed to do it without cutting the fence, getting bit, or kicked. It was as if Willow knew we were there to help. Farm Girl walked her around for a bit to get the blood circulation back in her legs while I head into the barn to retrieve a hammer and staples. No more escapes for this young momma.
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