In my experience, the odds increase greatly once the mask has started to decompose.
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the crows bring us golf balls as rewards for having water for them, there is a golf course a mile or so away to the west
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And hoof picks.
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When I was a yachtie I learned the expanding seach pattern the Coast Guard uses. Iâve actually found a few lost shoes. Walk a straight line then make a turn with a square corner. Walk another straight line a litle longer with a square corner. It is much better than wandering around or trying to do circles. I find my head isnât looking all over the place if the line is straight. If you use your soft eyes your peripheral vision helps. Years ago I rode Intro B and the judgeâs comment was âcircles donât have square corners.â No one ever told me that. Square corners are much easier and more accurate,
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This search pattern was integral to the findings I described above. The lacrosse ball was located at the vertical 3d line. I look forward to someone else finding the shoe in 10 years, once it is burped up from the Bermuda Triangle.
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I would like a drone programmed to find lost shoes, but I think fly masks would be even easier. Bonus points if the drone has a little hook with which to snag them and bring them back!
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Shoes go somewhere else, I believe. They sink straight to the center of the earth. Some sort of magnetic pull. If they do not, no lost shoe will ever be found before a two year period or longer has elapsed.
Once when trail riding, a friend and I found a shoe. With a hoof still attached. A horse had died some months before up on a hill far above the trail and periodically pieces of hoof and bones would either wash, roll or be carried down by animals. The first time it happened, the girl who found the leg bone raced back to the ranger station full speed, screaming about a dead horse. The rangers were like âum, yeah, it died awhile ago and why you running? Itâs dead.â It wasnât going to get any deader thatâs fer shirr.
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thatâs a heart stopper!
My BO seems to have a knack for finding masks, just as well since the little love likes to hide them.
My most annoying fly mask search -
Walked the 20 acre pasture in very hot weather. Finally gave up. As I was going out the pasture gate, I glanced at the water trough (right next to the gate!!) to see if it needed topping off. Yup. Fly mask in the water.
All that walking when I could have found it in the first minute of searching. I always started with the trough after that. Of course, I never found one in it again.
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We have a family of 5 foxes that live in the fence line bordering my field. Everything my horses lose becomes a toy to them. They take the fly masks and whatever else into my round pen and run up and down the mounting block with it, bury it in the footing etc. It makes it very easy to find. They also steal things from neighboring fields and bring me those items too- I have other horses fly masks, some fly boots, a XXL dog collar (still done up), various small container, a deer skull, some empty bottles. Itâs pretty entertaining to see what Iâm going to get every day lol
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we had foxes until the coyotes came in
regarding lost fly masks, the greater the cost the increased probability of it never being found
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Would a Tile work for finding a slipped halter? My mare gets hers off about once a month.
My gelding lived at a barn with a creek running through the two pastures (mares in one, geldings in the other). Lost his fly mask one summer and I never found it. A year later pastures were switched, and I found his halter hung up in the willows of the creek in the opposite pasture. He lost the mask in pasture A and I found it in pasture B.
My horse solved that problem years ago. When Cashel introduced the long nose model I hurried out to find one. It looked good â he is a Paint with a pink nose. I had to call Cashel to complain, however, because it didnât stay on. Answer #1: cut the fringe on the underside of the nose. It didnât work. People thought fringe would stop flies from crawling up the nose. Answer #2: cut the ears off. Some horses donât like them. He is one of them. When he has his riding mask on ears donât bother him.
The thing is, most stores donât carry long nose without ears so I have to cut them off. It costs about $3 more for ears on the mask. I canât give them away. I figure he wasted about forty bucks over the years.
We retired to a luxurious 20-stall barn that includes fly spray, fly mask, other fly clothing, and sunscreen for turnout. His nose stayed pink becasue they got enough sunscreen on daily. I switched to Walmart Equate 50. It is cheap and works. A test had it at the top of the list for meeting the 50 spf concentration.
I have to tell this story to my farrier. In his truck, he has a preserved lower equine limb, cut into cross-section with hinges on the side, so that it can be opened like a book. He uses it for anatomy demonstrations.
I gather that client reactions to the leg take three forms:
(1) Cool! You have a leg in your truck.
(2) Of course you would have a leg in your truck.
(3) The same reaction that the high school anatomy teachers got when presenting a sheepâs pluck in front of a squeamish student.
I would probably be pretty unnerved if I found a lower limb with shoe attached while minding my own business out on a trail, though.
I have found small animal remains while out on a shoe hunt in the back field. I try to move them out of the field if it can be managed with a pitchfork.
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