Thank you for sharing your experience. I was fascinated by it all and truly enjoy the detail you went into.
Iâm glad your friend could get some closure and have her friend with her. It is hard when you have to bury an animal and leave them behind. Iâve done it with both dog/cats and horses. I have never felt the need to bring them with me though. I did have nightmares with my one mare who was buried in an area that houses were being built. I was scared they would dig her up but nothing ever happened thank goodness.
Just FYI for anyone who might need bones cleaned, bury them in an fire ant hill (if you live where there are fire ants). That is what my farrier does when he harvest horse legs for his collection.
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Yes! This should be pinned or put into some âuseful linksâ thread, along with the equally awesome one about what to expect when you buy the horse. That one went into all sorts of very useful information on rigor, stiffness, legs breaking and avoiding that, when rigor isnât an issue, etc. I wonder where that thread isâŠ
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Glad itâs done. Youâve been a good friend.
I would strongly advise you to discard the clothes you wore last night. I hope you did not wear your those shoes into your house.
For posterity, how did yâall fill the hole in? The existing sand has remains mixed thru it, and for health reasons should be covered by 6 ft of earth.
Did you bring clean sand to top the grave with? Was any lime used?
If not, is it possible to place temporary fencing to keep contaminated soil from being tracked about the property, and cover the soil with clear plastic and allow the sun to heat up the soil and sterilize it for a couple weeks?
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This thread has me worried about my beloved childhood pony. The farm where I grew up riding has a lot of horses buried. The main pasture had been a landfill. In my early years riding, it was not uncommon to see bricks and tires and things pop up. So we tended to bury horses out there, as the land already had enough stuff in it that it was not really buildable.
Fast forward to my pony being gone now 13 years, with him being the last of my personal horses who lived on the property an the only one of mine buried there. The property was sold to developers due to some unfortunate circumstances. The soil is pretty much the same as OPâs. Sandy, southern coastal.
I am horrified by the possibility that anyone might be unearthed as the new owners turn this property into a shopping center. And no, I donât want to go back and try to recover mr. pony. He lived the vast majority of his almost 30 years there.
Oh boy. That was super interesting and not particularly gross butâŠ
When I got to the part about his mane and tail some definite waterworks happened at my desk. Iâm very glad it was a success and that your friend feels at peace with it. I feel very lucky to have my old mare buried on a dear friendâs farm where I can sit on a nice hill and visit her. I donât think I would have the stomach to see her again at this point. It was tough enough to hold her halter when we had her euthanized.
Very glad it was a good experience for you and your friend.
one of the things I wish I knew when we were burying Spooky was about the limbs. I will put it in this thread too:
When you have to deal with burying the horse (and I am terribly sorry when/if you do), find some baling twine or old rope - bring the horseâs head either to his chest or to his shoulder - pull his front limbs forward and fold them like they would be folded if the horse was asleep. Tie those limbs together and wrap the rope around the horseâs neck to keep his head either folded to his side or brought down next to his legs. Do the same for the hinds, and bind them so that the horse is folded with his limbs underneath and not âoutâ from him. Once the horse is in the hole you can untie/unbind him and it will âset that wayâ.
Do not read the below if youâre squeamish:
We had a very, very hard time extracting Spooky from his stall. He passed away due to a lightning strike charge carrying into his stall â he was inside the stall and collapsed against the wall in such a way his neck was propped up by the wall but his body was not. There were four of us with a truck and chains, and it took us a while to pull him from the wall enough that he could be pulled out of the stall. By that point his body had already begun rigor mortis and it was very hard to fold his limbs in a way that we could pull him out without damaging the stall or breaking his limbs as his neck had stiffened completely and was practically parallel to his withers. It meant that if we pulled him straight out, his legs and neck would catch on the doors and prevent him from being moved. We couldnât pull his legs without his head getting stuck, and his neck was so stiff we couldnât move his head/neck at all. Thank god for good friends and strong trucks - they were worried I would not want to see a chain wrapped around my boy, but he wasnât my boy anymore, it was just a husk and he was gone. Easier to think of it that way. We ended up flipping him as upside down as we could and bringing a chain around his shoulders, through his legs with supporting ropes on his front legs - it would have been impossible to extract him keeping him on his side.
The man doing the burying, a husband of a very dear friend of mine, could not make it out until the next morning. It was so hard getting him in the bucket, again, because of all the flailing limbs and stiffness. Hard seeing him upside down with legs in the air too. Harder even seeing the dirt fill over him, Wishing I knew about the rope trick, I think it would have helped ease the image and he would have looked asleep and not dead.
I hope to never have to use this hard-learned lesson again, but there you go.
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Thanks for the report. I would have thought that insect activity would have taken care of the internal organs.
Iâm going to have Callie exhumed eventually.
When I lived in Atlanta for over 20 years, I sent every deceased dog and cat, fortunately all mine lived a long time, well into their mid and late teens, back for burial in Savannah via Delta Dash. The guys at the airport at Delta knew what I was shipping in dog crates and were really good to deal with.
Yes, clothes stayed outside last night and were pitched into the garbage which was picked up this morning. Shoes were my old pair of muck boots which have been replaced, so those shoes too went in the trash this morning.
We did not bring clean sand in to fill the hole, but the man who dug the whole was pretty smart in keeping the top 3ish feet of sand separate from the amounts he dug out that had matter mixed into them. There will be no animals on this pasture, probably ever again. All the remaining animals and humans on the entire property will be leaving on Monday, and this particular pasture is already empty. Once the move is completed, we donât expect to ever see another animal on that pasture again. Itâs a very hard piece of property to sell, and before my friend moved in (shes lived here 15 years) it was empty for 15 years. Itâll stay that way again until someone buys the 200 acres for development, Iâm sure.
We did place half a bag of lime (we improvised because we didnât think about lime until we were already digging and she happened to have half a bag in the shed) and mixed it within the bottom layers of sand. The âmatterâ that was mixed within the sand was the first layer to go back in, I have to say he was very methodical about how he dug it out and filled it back in, but most of the stuff that had âstuffâ in it stayed in the hole and wasnât actually bucketed out by the excavatorâŠwe had done that by hand.
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This is really important to know, although we never WANT to know. The part about tying legs and having them fall into that natural laying position is crucial. Thatâs how this horse was buried, he was curled around like how a horse would lay naturally. Very peaceful with his snout still resting on the ground.
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I would have thought the same thing before I posted this thread and someone responded with the fact that the depth would probably inhibit insects to make it that far to help the process. I was told had the horse been buried like, 2 or 3 feet in, heâd probably be gone aside from bone. But of course, not healthy to do so, and it could have easily washed up with the kind of rains we get here in summer.
Itâs quite a process!
âŠI just realized I have 2 the passed away 6 years ago nowâŠ
You are a good friend, and all I can say is sometimes feelings and âdoing whatâs rightâ, isnât always âapprovedâ.
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@beowulf , your post reminded me of a thread, âFolding a Dead Horseâ.
It was originally posted by @goodhors, back in November of 2008. I found it useful and I have the page saved, in hopes I wonât need it, but it is good to know if one does have the need:
https://www.chronofhorse.com/forum/forum/discussion-forums/horse-care/25721-folding-a-dead-horse
@One Two Three, thank you for the fascinating and sensitive post.
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I was very hesitant about reading this thread, as just the thought of loosing my Moosy can make me shed a tear. But morbid curiosity got the best of me, and I couldnât stop reading! It wasnât too gross either, no green faces, just a couple tears. I am really glad you wrote this article, and glad you were such a supportive friend during a hard time. Glad it went smoothly! This is an important subject, as this is part of working with horses. But it make the happy times happier
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Now, this may apply only to humans, but rotting bodies arenât usually a health risk to humans unless the animal/human died from an infectious disease. Immediately following death and during decomposition e coli can be a risk, along with some gastrointestinal bacteria, but after six years I would doubt that these bacteria would be still an issue.
I knew a burial specialist back a few years ago. One of her biggest irritations about the public was that everyone thought by touching a body they would develop some horrifying disease.
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OP - I want to thank you for posting this. I think itâs important to have perspective on these things and Iâd rather have too much information than none. Youâre a good friend for doing what you did. Iâm certainly not squeamish, but digging up dead beloved creatures is not for the faint of heart. This was helpful for me in a different way. I have a 23 year old neuro horse, whose been a much loved member of the family for 15 years. Heâs had a couple relapses & Iâve been agonizing over what to do when his time comes because I canât afford to cremate him (it can be done here in NEâŠcosts about $2K). I do have the land to bury him, but I expect that weâll sell our family home and retire somewhere south in the next 10 years. Iâve been conflicted about the possibility of him being dug up by a future landowner. I thought Iâd be ok with the fact the fact that HE was gone, and it was just his remains, but I know now, after reading this thread that I feel pretty strongly that Iâm NOT ok with that. Luckily, I do have some time to consider my options.
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Yes, I would think that might be too deep for insects. I also know that the soil type can make a difference. I wonder what my horse looks like now - 10 feet down in heavy, heavy clay (I mean literally you can make pottery out of it at that depth.) I wouldnât be surprised if the rate of decay was very, very slow and it is doubtful that there are any insects at that depth and in that heavy clay. Bacteria would have to do it all.
Glad you posted this. Maybe 1-2 years after I buried my dog at a friendâs farm, she was talking about digging around the area to get rid of Creeping Charlie or something. I was upset at the thought of her digging him up, but did wonder what would be left. I contemplated that if she did dig him up, maybe I should move him or cremate him. She ended up doing whatever and didnât say if she unburied him or not. Now I really wonder, almost 16 years later, if thereâs anything left of a 18 pound dog.
This was fascinating. We knew about doing some folding as soon as possible when the old guy passed on, DH is a hunter, if need be he was prepared to quarter him but he wasnât going to let me know about that! and luckily for us he was recently dead when I found him. I am very glad that for the owner, your friendâs sake, you approached it in the spirit of investigation so she was able to handle it. I am sure it was tough.
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Thank you OP, first for posting an interesting topic, and informative, but also for handling it with such a level of sensitivity.
It is best if a horse is put down to have it happen in an open area, and if the body cannot be removed right away, have it folded before rigamortis sets in.
When a whale washes up it is either towed out to sea, or, if a university, museum etc., wants it, it is buried in sand and left to decompose by bacterial actionâŠI donât believe there is a health hazard, but just needs a very long time to decompose.
We have a doggie cemetary but are on clay soil with a high water-table. My mind is still dwelling on the decomposition process and have lately done cremation for my dogsâŠjust because my imagination is weird. Unless it is summer time
the water table is high and as we dug the hole the water comes in and it is very unnerving to put your wrapped up dog into a cold watery graveâŠsorry folks.
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