Mare Afraid of Cows

[ACP]

My sister’s new mare arrived at my daughter’s farm recently. She’s been a show horse all of her life, and at age 11 has always been a city girl. She is totally scared to death of their cows. They have a long driveway with pastures on either side, cows on one side, horses on the other. The mare was turned out with the other horses in the larger pasture after a few days in smaller paddock with one or two of the other horses. She was happily trotting down the fence line when the bull, cows and babies came up the hill to drink. She froze, then spun and fled to the very top of the hill, scrambling and shaking. This wasn’t a “Gee, look at that, I think I’ll snort,” type response. She was really terrified.

Every day when she’s turned out she stands on the upper slope and looks to see if the horse eating monsters are visible. If she can see them she turns around and heads for the pasture gate, and has herself a little hissy fit.

Any suggestions, other than giving it time?

[MyGiantPony]

Some never get over it - my Tally was terrified of cows. Some are ok if they are in a group but not alone, some will get over it in time.

[clanter]

T![](me is all is needed.

We too had the “show horse” who spent years being pampered, could be at home in stall anywhere.

I remember the First cow, First miniature horse was even more excepting, the first time walking over a running stream (well after all it was water running down the gutter in the street… pretty close to stream),

But prissy show horse did overcome all of the new Firsts to later become a national champion trail horse doing fifty-five mile trail rides…and all the time being very pretty about it.

from this
[IMG]http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b386/clanter/FoxieGoldCup1991.jpg)

to this
[IMG]http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b386/clanter/CTR.jpg)

[IMG]http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b386/clanter/lastscan-1.jpg)

[enjoytheride]

Give her time. I took my older mare to a cattle herding clinic over the winter, she had never seen a cow in her entire life. She went from shaking in fear in the morning to wading into a herd of cows and taking chunks out of them in less than 8 hours.

[goodhors]

With older horse, could be a while! Our old mare WOULD NOT get near cows at Clinics, watched them close riding down the road, but “knew the fence would protect her” from the galloping heifers coming to see us. So never pushed HARD to be cow accepting.

Well DD wanted a calf for 4H, and she got it for Christmas. He had a paddock between the two groups of horses, so he couldn’t get injured, was handled daily so Old Mare HAD to have him nearby to eat her hay. She was terrible for the first few WEEKS, running away instead of eating even. Hunger won, she got close to eat out of the farthest feeder from calf. THEN the face making started!! She had the most threatening expressions on her face, teeth showing like an Alligator towards the happy calf. He didn’t care about her faces!

It took a long time for her to just be “accepting” and not worked up over it. And this mare has YEARS of experience facing down all kinds of situations, not spooky or a “normally” silly horse at all. Just hated cows. I did start adding a cow pie in her clean stall daily, where she couldn’t run off from the smell. I do think that helped some. Some cow pies in your horses paddock, stall, might help if she is not in view of cattle at all times. Gets her used to the smell, to associate it with live cattle smell in a herd looking at her.

If you get really desperate, you could put her beside a bovine, in adjoining paddocks for close exposure. Just remember that horse KNOWS each bovine is an individual! So they KNOW that there are “general” cows and then there are Watson and Ruby! Horse CAN tell each bovine apart!! Our Old Mare had to learn each calf as a new experience, but it took a much shorter time than that first calf for her to “settle”. She still doesn’t like them, but not a big enough deal to run from anymore! The geldings LOVED the calves, had morning “run to the field” races every day the calves came out. Horses on one side, calves on the other side of fence, and would go neck-n-neck down the fenceline. Calves usually lost because they would start kicking up their heels instead of running.

Time helps, but how fast you want her over it, may mean some closeness by stalling or paddocks beside each other.

[La_Gringa]

Find a local ranch/western barn that does Ranch Sorting. Go to one of the practices, and go in and sort Cattle. I have seen the most chicken horse get over their fear of cows by just doing this a few times. They go in with another horse that isn’t afraid and they get it… fast. I have seen many horses that have never seen a cow or those that are “terrified” get over it in one session. No joke.

[rhinestone_cowgirl]

Can you turn her out with cows?

[TBROCKS]

[QUOTE=rhinestone_cowgirl;7711549]
Can you turn her out with cows?[/QUOTE]

I second this. When we got our cows, the horses wigged out. One by one they got turned out with the cows for a few days. One by one they got over it. My older TB was herding them around and having the time of his life in a couple of days. The rest kept a distance but totally got over their fear.

[enjoytheride]

For the older horses are harder comment my mare met her first cow at the age of 19. Now she eats cows for breakfast.

[Appsolute]

I agree with others - as soon as the horse learns that they can MOVE a cow - all fear leaves them.

[clanter]

when we moved from Kentucky our mares who had been with Holsteins and Charolais thought an alien had landed when our neighbor brought in some Angus from his ranch … they stood their ground but with very wide eyes adding a snort or two

They didn’t like gray horses either, never could get them over the gray thing they seemed to look down at them as lesser horses