The Bond Between Horse and ....................?

Alone in a herd of 22 Horses

Everyone knows that horses are herd animals; it’s one of the first things we learn about them. When I first met Popeye, he stood alone in a herd of 22, at the time it never occurred to me that he had never learned to bond with his herd mates. But after living with him for about a week I realized that he wasn’t just aggressive towards me, he hated the horses too. In all of his 8 years, he had never made a connection with any living being. Sad, but true.
Once I had a halter one him, I tried working with him at the end of a very long 22 foot line. Even this proved dangerous for me as Pops is very smart and learned that even on his blind side he learned he just had to find the line and strike where ever it was and he might get me, he certainly got me to back off that way! Pops needed to learn to bond with someone and I was not eager to bond with him at all. I have always thought that the trust between horse and rider should begin with the rider. Horses, while 1000 pound unpredictable animals, are actually more predictable than some may think. Being herd animals, they always run to the herd to safety, 99.9% of horses will run away before they attack, Pops was the .01% that would stand and fight, every time. So while those words are easy to say, they are not so easy to live. I didn’t trust Pops as far as I could throw him.

Pops, Doc and the Chair I Sat In

To start my attempt to bond with Pops, I would sit in a chair outside his gate, place his feed tray inside next to me and read to him though the reading was mostly to alleviate my boredom while waiting for him to feel comfortable enough to approach. . It took him several days to come up and eat, and when he did, he would try and chase me off first. Safely behind a metal panel, I was able to hold my ground and he eventually, and tentatively came up for the candy. That gate led to a pasture where I kept Doc, my two year old stallion, who is easily the friendliest and most curious horse I have. He could not resist coming and bugging me while I was there and he became obsessed with the new horse. There were several days of snorting, blowing, stomping, gate slamming and squealing before one day, Pops seemed settled. He ate quietly while Doc and I watched him from the other side of the fence. I decided that it might be a good idea that Pops bond with Doc before I did, after all, Doc can run away faster and kick harder than I can, so why not?

Doc and Pops Hanging!

I’ll admit being a bit nervous about putting an aggressive stallion with my young prospect, but at the time I was still not aware of how old Pops was, I had been told he was two. With the 22 foot line still attached to his halter, I turned him loose with Doc, wondering if I would have to dip into my emergency vet fund. But the expected never happened. They never stalked one another, nor challenged each other for leadership. Apparently there is a quiet communication amongst horses that we as humans will never understand. Pops and Doc were fast friends. They behaved as if they had been raised together and were Playing like Colts! Watching two studs play is still a bit nerve wracking, they rear, they buck and they kick at each other. But the attitude is relaxed, and for the first time since Pops had arrived, I saw a playful comfort in him.

A Little Play Fighting

Since that day, Pops, as the older horse, remains the leader. He does however, check with Doc when strange things concerning people present them selves to him. Doc even explained to Pops how the stick and string were perfectly safe and not to be worried when touched by them. Doc allowed him to investigate his blanket to know that they were safe too, though Doc’s blanket didn’t survive that! A year later, when Pops still was uncatchable, Pops got loose on 30 acres, Doc brought him in. Doc has been amazing for Pops and was his very first Friend. Pops still has issues with other horses, but because of Doc, he lost his fear of them. He’s made other friend since then, he was partnered with another gray Arab that looked just like him, and he currently loves to hang with my big Belgian, Jack. Being able to bond with another soul allowed him to be receptive to me. It wasn’t all roses right away, but you gotta start somewhere!

Stand still While I Scratch

Look, It's Just a Stick

Seriously, it's just a stick

Wanna Taste it? It doesn't taste like carrots,I  don't know why they call it a "Carrot Stick"

Awwww

One of My Favorite pics. They are Literally Attached at the Hip!

Popeye's Tail

Popeye in his previous home

                                         
                                                     

Yes, I really do want to write about Popeye’s tail, not his Tale per say, just his wonderfully long pure white tail. When visitors come to meet me and my horses the very first time, they often feel like I have gone to great lengths to impress them. Each and every one of my horses will have their manes neatly braided and their tails safely tucked away in their protective tail bags. It looks like I have spent several hours preparing my horses to make a good first impression. After you get to know me, you will find that I am actually oddly obsessive about my horses manes and tails, it’s a bit weird, I’m not sure why I do it, but tangled manes and tails drive me batty.
When Pops first arrived, a perfectly muddy dapple gray horse, his mane and tail had not been touched for 8 years. After he let it grow wild, he had rolled in the mud, he had picked up burrs, no one had ever brushed it out. You can only imagine how much it irked me not to be able to get my hands on it!

Pops the day after his arrival

Halter breaking Popeye was obviously my first priority, my incentive was to get the knots out of his mane as fast as possible! There was absolutely no way to get close enough to Pops to get on a halter, he would simply attack me and drive me away. I spent two weeks sitting outside his pen reading to him while he ate in order for him to get used to me. I would read him heartfelt stories of horses written by Kim Meeder, thinking her inspirational stories would calm him. Unfortunately, Pops, like so many horses, doesn’t speak English and after two weeks he still had serious concerns about letting me near him.
So I went with a more aggressive tactic, I stood in his pen and tossed my lariat in his general direction. At first, when he saw the rope coming at him, he would bolt and run as fast as he could to get away from it. This went on for a good half hour or so until he finally calmed enough to let it touch him. After a while, he was standing quietly and let the rope drop on his back, on his hind end. It would fall and I was pretty pleased that he was finally being touched by something unfamiliar to him. With such good progress, I would like to say that it ended there with no issues, but that just wouldn’t be true. As I tossed the rope in his direction one last time, I realized my mistake. The rope sailed through air as I thought to myself, maybe I shouldn’t have left the loop at the end of the lariat, which naturally dropped over his head and settled around his neck.
Oh Sh*t! All of  sudden I now had a wild horse at the end of a rope which was snugly around his throat. Now please believe me, I am not a roper and if I had thought I would ever catch him, I never would have thrown the rope in the first place. In fact, in all the years I have had a lariat, I don’t think I have ever caught anything with it. I’ve just always thought they were handy to have around, you know, for dragging logs or something. Now that I had Pops in a potential deadly situation, our hour long gentle touching session had become something very different.

Yep, that's the lariat around his neck 

I tried flipping the rope back up over his head, but since this was a new thing for Pops, he panicked and bolted. Thus tightening the rope around his neck. Fearful he would either choke or break his neck, I had to quickly come up with a way to get him close enough to me to get the rope off. I was lucky enough to have a wall to stand behind, with two posts 12 feet apart that were cemented into the ground. I took one end of the rope, went around the first post, down the side of the wall, around the second post and then pulled. Pops didn’t move and the rope got tighter. Just before he blew up again, I grabbed a handful of rocks and threw them at his hind end, he shot forward closer to the first post, the rope loosened and I got a bit further away from him. We rested, then repeated this process probably about five times until Pops figured out that to release the pressure and get away from me, he just had to follow the rope.  The whole process took nearly 4 hours, but in the end, I had his head touching the first post next to wall, I had the other end of the rope tied to the second post 12feet away. After he settled a bit, I stayed on the other side of the wall while he kicked and struck at me, reached over, got the halter on with a 22 foot line and cut through the lariat as fast as I could. It fell off his neck when he broke free, the halter stayed on and he was properly caught. I never replaced that lariat, I doubt I ever will!
So what does this have to do with Popeye’s tail? Like I said, tangled hair drives me batty!

His tail had tangles just like his mane

At this point, Popeye’s tail was a black dread-lock, though I suspected that it was supposed to be white. I had to get close enough to him to be able to brush it out, but he was still hell bent on demolishing me. The two posts, 12 feet apart, worked out well so I would take the very end on the 22 foot line, run it behind one post, pull him up to it as I walked away, and tie him off to the second post. He was allowing me to be within 20 feet of him, so I found myself a 20 small plastic PVC pipe, and proceeded to attempt to touch him with it. Popeye would bite, strike and kick at the pipe, breaking the end of it off, thus getting me a bit closer to him every time. Eventually I was able to stroke him with my training stick, and when he stopped trying to destroy that, I got my hands on him. I then got my hands on his mane, and then on his tail. I think it took me three days.

This is the only pic I could find that shows how I did not tie him to the post by his head, but to the post 12 ft to his left

My OCD tail obsession doesn’t mean much to most people, but I thought about it today. I brought Pops in out of the pasture, and the little turd had a blackberry branch stuck in his tail. Not a big one that is easily removed, one of those small long ones that wraps it’s way in and out through the whole thing, tangled throughout the braid. I very loudly chastised him as I brought him in to fix it. I mean really, 10 acres if open space and he had to find the one blackberry bush with the most thorns?! I tied him up and began working on his tail. I yanked, I pulled, I detangled, I complained. All the while, Pops stood perfectly still, and probably fell asleep. As I got his tail put back together, I thought back to day one, where my current behavior would have gotten my head taken off. Pops has come such a long way and is a constant reminder to me that every horse, no matter how many mistakes you make along the way, will learn to trust his rider. It just takes time, and sometimes a bit of creativity. By the way, isn’t his tail gorgeous?!