Blanket straps… when the hind legs get stretched and kind of loosen and are a little lower than they should be…watched another horse strep through it at the water trough and then hurt her leg -minor - as they tried to pull apart with horse’s leg in the other horses blanket strap.
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Breeders would send horses to start under saddle and as a barn rat started many of them.
One breeder had some awesome arabian colts, I had loved every one he sent, they were just great all around, I think he used them for endurance rides.
This one was brown all over and had hair like a stuffed toy, not slick like other horses.
He was very forward and game for any and all we did, really more like a dog than a horse.
We used to trail ride and find steep places where the cavalry practiced to slide down gullies and would go straight down headless, you had to help him slow down a bit.
We were taught how to do it, to always keep horse straight, not let it get sideways.
This one time as we started somehow he did get turned a little, sure enough stumbled and we both went down the long slide tumbling along.
At the bottom he was fine, not even a scratch on him.
These were like the places we rode down:
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I think the worst thing was when my mare decided to jump out of her stall from a standstill and got hung up on her belly. My neighbor, a police officer had to come over with a sledge hammer and beat the wall down to get her out (and he got kicked in the process). I don’t think anything was broken (other than the stall wall). My mare was fine. I put up wire fencing on the stall wall after that incident, but I’m pretty sure a determined horse could jump into that and smash through the wire.
The next most scary incident was when a friend’s horse caught her shoe in wire fencing on a trail ride. She went down, and in the process caught her back leg in the wire as well. My friend sat on her neck, and I could not get my hoof pick to loosen that wire. I had to ride to the nearest tree farm, jump their fence, and (very fortunately for all involved) find the nearest person with wire cutters. Then gallop back and cut the mare out without getting kicked in the process. The mare was absolutely fine- not a scratch on her. How lucky was I that the tree farm lead straight to someone’s shed and there was a person magically there with wire cutters when you need them???
Please pack wire cutters if you are going trail riding!
And perhaps the oldest scary incident: Don’t use a gate to teach a green horse to whoa from a canter. About the 3rd time on approach, my horse jumped the gate, threw me off on the landing, and proceeded to gallop straight for the highway. Someone just happened to be there to catch her for me so she missed ending up roadkill. Well, I did want a jumper!! Maybe not that much of a jumper. I limped home with a sprained ankle and told my mom “Don’t tell dad! I’m fine!” I kept that mare until she died. And she sure could jump, even if she had a million in one lameness issues.
This is not my horse, but as an example:
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preach it.
No joke, when people buy young “broke” horses that turn out not-so-broke, I sometimes think it’s a situation like this-the horse was mounted and just had no idea what the hell was going on. So he’s supposed to be “broke” because no shenanigans on record.
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Not so long ago, I admit to that. Supposed to be smarter by now.
Surely my tame gentle TB gelding can drag a lead rope and graze in the lovely unfenced green grass beside the barn for 5-10 minutes. Good for him nutritionally and mentally. He isn’t going anywhere else. What horse would leave that grass?
My horse would leave that grass. To hunt for horse cookies. Because he observed where horse cookies come from. Because he cares more about horse cookies than anything else on earth.
I momentarily freaked when I looked up toward the barn and – no horse. Where on earth could this horse be – where could he even go on this small farm where I wouldn’t be able to see him?
He was in the tack room. His whole 16.2hh 1200 lb self was in the 10 x 12 cluttered tack room. Having pushed through the people-door that wasn’t fully closed. Figuring out how to open the horse cookie container.
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Ahh, horses… Village Idiots when a plastic bag blows across the arena, and Rocket Scientists when it comes to finding treats!
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So true. I couldn’t believe it. Where the hell is he !!!
Then I caught sight of a brown haunch through the open door.
Fortunately he was calm about leaving the way he came. Especially when he saw the cookie container exiting in front of him.
The grooming area is right in front of the tack room door. Anytime he is there on a loose lead, he is trying to get back in the tack room. His head. His neck. His shoulders and front feet … fortunately we are good at quietly and calmly backing up through a tiny mouse door, compared with his size.
I cannot leave him to graze on a loose lead, unless I take him far away from the barn and the tack room. And watch like a hawk.
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This wasn’t me. I was just a witness. A fellow boarder had two horses. She took one into the round pen to free lunge him and tied his buddy to a plastic lawn chair outside of the round pen. You can see where this is going. Horse moved, chair chased him, and horse bolted through a fence. Amazingly, he only had some minor cuts.
This was me. I had a 3-year old gelding who I was in the process of backing. Horse lunged and did all the things really well. I decided to introduce him to side reins. God knows why I thought that was a good idea. He freaked out at being trapped by the side reins and kept trying to tank off on the lunge. I at least had the sense to stop him and get the side reins off, then resumed lunging.
I should note at this point that I was in the indoor arena. The indoor at this barn was a giant tin can, and it got hot and dusty as hell in there during the Colorado summer. Most people worked their horses with the doors wide open.
Anyway, my very upset youngster took a great pull on the lunge and ripped it out of my hand. He took off, out of the indoor. But did he run back towards the paddock where all his mates lived? No, he did not. He galloped in the opposite direction, down the barn’s very long driveway (easily half a mile), towards the busy, 60mph state highway. Highway 36. The main road between Boulder and Lyons. You’ll know it if you know the Front Range. A few other boarders had seen him go and had jumped in their cars, and one pulled up alongside me as I was running out of the indoor, yelling, “Get in!”
We arrived at the end of the driveway to find a passing motorist holding my horse, who was now calmly grazing on the verge of Hwy 36. I led him back to the barn, and he was quiet as a lamb.
The BO installed a gate at the bottom of the drive not long after that.
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Moved from an area with a 24h vet facility within 13min drive and at least five horse vets who do farm calls and several excellent 24h equine vet hospitals with multiple vets on staff 24-7 (Weatherford, TX) within 1 hr drive… to a place with two farm call vets (one seems not so competent and has been sanctioned by state vet board previously and one is never home when I call for emergencies…). There’s nothing like walking a colic case while you desperately call vets on the phone to see if someone can come to your farm or you can trailer somewhere and your dear hubby is out of state somewhere.
Have had several horses decide to roll next to fencing in pasture – legs through board fence, legs caught in field fence and stuck against a pipe fence are a bit tough and make you feel like a bad horse mommy when they’ve obviously been there quite a while and you were gone to work.
Acquiring barn help when you need to be out of town is also a big one. Nothing like being 1000+ miles from home and you notice the horse feeders haven’t appeared on the security cameras in over 24hrs, so you pile in the truck and drive home ASAP.
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last month we did a help a neighbor whose maiden mare was trying to deliver a foal who not positioned correctly. He had no way to transport the mare so we hauled her to the vets in Weatherford where four worked on her for a long while to save her life, foal was long time dead, Mare survived, we went back to haul her home for him
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so sorry they lost the foal, but glad y’all were able to help to save the mare!
Always makes me nervous to haul a horse for a stranger, especially when the horse is having a medical event already before we cram them into our trailer.
Weatherford Equine Hospital and ESMS have both done fantastic jobs for a few of my more difficult medical problems. I hauled a four week old septicemic foal to Weatherford Equine and it was all hands on deck for several days trying to help the little fighter try to make it. Kinda bites when you get a bill after you lose the baby, though.
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I LIVED THERE FOR 4 YEARS. Why did I move ??? 
I was thinking “sounds like ESMS in Weatherford” … I was also 10 minutes away.
One time horse had to be rushed over there and spent 10 days in the ICU. Tellin y’all, there are human ICU’s that don’t have care that good. They saved a horse that would have been dead at most practices. One of the techs wired a tiny superhero figurine to the front of his stall during the scariest part of the illness.
I discussed euthanasia decision points with the crew. They were attentive and sympathetic but 90% certain the horse would fully recover. He did.
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@Foxglove reminded me of this. Riding the powrlines. Came down a treacherously steep rock outcropped hill.you could see from ridge to ridge from the top, and at the bottom was a puddled stretch about two football fields in length, between the two ridges, along the swale. You could see the double track road going into the puddled area and coming out a fair distance on the other side. So down this steep cliff like hill to the bottom we went and came right up onto this puddled track. My quarter horse, always willing, nose down, took two steps into the puddle to find no bottom. He went down to where the water was over his withers, and finding no bottom, this ama,ing horse reared up and swiveled on his haunches out of there, and I grabbed his mane at this poll as he flew back up the cliff face. Scared the bejeejus out of both of us. When we reached the top, I was shaking so hard I slid off him and my knees collapsed. On the ground I saw he was shaking too from head to foot
Who knows how deep that water was. It could have been another cliff face we were swimming off, or jagged sharp rocks just below the surface, this small but steep canyon between ridges on the powerline. Of course, I was riding out alone, 10s of miles from home. Aieeee!
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well Parker County is one of fastest population growing county in the United States and I think the last road they built was decades ago
- One-half of the top 10 fastest-growing counties were in Texas: Kaufman County (8.9%), Rockwall County (5.7%), Parker County (5.6%), Comal County (5.6%) and Chambers County (5.3%).
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Don’t forget The Highway To Nowhere, the new town bypass on the west side. Although yes, that was probably about 10 years ago. That’s when I found out that where I was living in the country was Nowhere. It was great news. 
Because The Highway To Nowhere was exactly what was needed so that we no longer had to drive the horses to eastern locations (such as Texas Rose Horse Park) through the town square, past the 100+ year old courthouse, to get to I-20. We could just zip down The Highway To Nowhere instead.
It’s probably good that I left when I did. I can remember it as it was. Small tree-shaded country lanes. With a runaway black pony galloping along the side of the road, having the best time leading the people who were chasing him, halters and leads flying.
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I was in Weatherford for a couple months this winter and we had an ice storm and two tornadoes rip through so… it’s not a place I would choose long term even with the quality vet care. And the wind! I thought it was windy in Wyoming but Texas gave it a run for it’s money.
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That’s north, west and northwest Texas that have the wind. The rest of Texas doesn’t know anything about it. Unless a tornado or hurricane comes through. Harvey dumped flooding and mess on San Antonio, Austin and Waco, to give an idea of the massive reach of Harvey.
11 years in Colorado, which has wind 15-20 mph most of the time (it seems), and then I move to Weatherford and that is the first time I have to pull off of the interstate because the wind is moving the horse trailer around behind me in a terrifying manner. 
Did my best to angle the rig for a bit of a windbreak while I shifted heavy stuff out of the trailer tack room and into the back of the towing vehicle. Including a bale of hay (in a hay bag thank goodness). Making room by shifting light stuff into the trailer. That stabilized things.
I’m not a farm owner but I remember four incidents - one involving me, and three involving friends.
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A friend took her mare to a neighboring state to drop her off for breeding (this was many years ago when live cover was pretty much the only way to go). On the way back, she heard a slight noise and felt her truck sway a bit. Not sure what had happened, she started slowing down - and then saw her trailer pass her on the left side. Luckily It came to rest - still upright - in the medium of the interstate, before it could cross over into the oncoming lanes. She had already dropped the mare off and no vehicles hit the trailer or were hit by it, so no harm, no foul but it was a pretty sobering thing to have happen because she hadn’t looked at her hookup after dropping off the mare, so whatever was the issue, had BEEN an issue on the first leg of the trip. It was a miracle the trailer hadn’t come unhitched while still loaded (apparently it was the weight of the mare that kept the hitch on the ball).
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Another friend was taking a youngster to Devon for the big breed show. It was the only horse in the trailer and since the weather was pretty warm, she had left the top of the back open. She stopped a little ways from her home to fuel up the truck and thought it sounded kind of quiet in the trailer, so she took a peek. You guessed it - no horse. She understandably freaked a bit and retraced her route back toward home. She found the youngster a few miles back up the road, munching grass in the medium of the interstate. It had obviously jumped out over the top of the back door and was amazing unscathed except for some road rash and body soreness. Luckily it was in a very rural area and at a very early hour, so there wasn’t hardly any other traffic. Friend caught up the youngster and reloaded her. I can’t remember if she went back home or went on to Devon. Could have been the latter - she was pretty passionate about the breed shows.
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Same person as in #2 had a broodmare trucking along through the pasture with the other broodmares, when she tried to cut between two trees. Except it wasn’t two trees - it was one tree with two trunks growing from the same stump. They were at slight angles to each other so they made a sort of V-shape - and maresy didn’t realize how wide she had gotten and got hung up between the trunks. They ended up having to call the local volunteer fire dept. to come out to rescue the mare. Best I can remember, she was fine and delivered a healthy foal at the appropriate time.
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After morning lessons, a group of us were in the barn lounge eating lunch when we heard a horse squeal. We looked out and saw a loose horse talking over the stall door to a horse still in the barn. The barn had a slew of look-alike dark bays with no chrome, so we assumed it was one of the mares - and then I noticed the fifth leg. Yep, it was the stallion (sire of said look-alike dark bays), and he was romancing one of his daughters. He was the only horse on the property that required two latches - he was very clever at unhooking the top latch - and I was the guilty party that had forgotten to hook the bottom latch on his stall door after riding him. Thankfully we managed to gather him up before any mishaps occurred but he was quite proud of himself and eager to show it off.
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Those trailer incidents should come with a trigger warning … just kidding (sort of) 
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