Castration / introducing to herd

[pdarlison]

Does anyone here have experience of introducing a recently castrated male to the herd. When I say 'recently' - my horse was castrated at a relatively later stage (nearly 5) and I don't intend to introduce him to other horses for some time yet.

I am very interested to hear of people's experiences. The poor fella hasn't had any interaction since he was weaned and has been kept in isolation to a degree. He hasn't touched a horse for 4+ years. Without a doubt this has had an affect on him and the frustration borne the signs of aggression - hence why I had him castrated 6 weeks ago before I bought him.

We'll take things slowly and build up the closeness (albeit with a dividing fence), but of course there comes a day when you just have to go for it!

 

[wench]

has he been used to cover?

 

[mealrigghallstud]

Definitely go for the slow approach as he will basically be totally socially inept so have no clue how to interact nicely - make sure you put him with a dominant horse that will put him in his place so he doesn't learn to bully. Just graze them next to each other so they can touch but are still separate.
My friesian stallion had no contact with other horses except to cover until we bought him at 5. We put him in with a well established herd of grumpy older brood mares and they did sort him out and he is now fine and runs out with a few of our girls in the summer - he is now 10yrs old. It greatly depends on the individual horse -if he is aggressive it will be from being isolated and frustrated, gelding him should calm him down enough to learn and not be nasty to others.

 

[pdarlison]

No he hasn't covered anything. Thank heavens for that Hi 'Blackhorses'...one of my previous horses was a Friesian. I bought him also as a stallion, had him gelded before transporting from Holland. He was a different kettle of fish. Very full on, but the hormones soon calmed down and within 6 weeks of castration he was out with the herd. He did 'snake' in to attack the herd leader (bad move), but a swift rebuke put him in his place (to the bottom of the pack). We did catch him on two occasions however having his way with one of the mares when herd leader wasn't looking ;-) He took quite a few knocks but at least didn't injure himself or any of the other horses. The situation I'm in now, I can't subject any of the other owners' horses to potential injury.
Like you say it's going to take a long time before we're all confident we can expose any of them to a situation. I need a gentle infertile carthorse mare...!

 

[hollyandivy123]

"We put him in with a well established herd of grumpy older brood mares and they did sort him out"

i second that, alpha mares tend to be top pecking order, just make sure no shoes are on and fence him next to them for a couple of days first then take the fence down