Field Behaviour

[Mbronze]

What do you think about the following scenario?

There are five mares in my field and my mare seems to be the most dominant (Mare A). She tells others where to go,what to do and when to do it and the others let her bully them around with very little fuss.

Now there is another Mare (Mare B) that appears to be second in the rankings of dominance.

So turn Mare A out in the morning, and every single time she walks out into the field breaks into a trot and then a canter ignores all the others and careers towards Mare B, who runs out of the way, Mare A then spins round kicking the air aiming at Mare B but never actually strikes her.

Everything then calms down and Mare B is split from the rest of the group and seems to only be allowed to graze with Mare A.

I am a bit puzzled by this behaviour as Mare A can be found in the aftrenoon grazing quite contently with Mare B, is it becaue she wants Mare B to herself or is it that she is just asserting herself in the pack each morning...?

I have too much time on my hands me thinks.....however field politics do confuse me..??

 

[AmyMay]

Sounds like Mare A thinks Mare B needs bringing down a peg or two...

 

[cobstar]

We had the same scenario when my new horse went into the field for the first few weeks with my mothers horse. My Mums horse seemed to think that my horse needed to learn some respect (and quite rightly so!) because he was a cheeky monkey and so he segregated him from the rest of the herd! My Mums horse is a sweetie and would never hurt another horse, he just wanted to sort out the pecking order so there was nothing at all to worry about. They soon settled down.

 

[charlotte1]

Yep i had this happen to my horse. She went out with a group of mares and the dominant mare would heard her away from all the others, the only horse she was allowed to talk to was her, but they were always together. She is not a dominant mare at all and won't stand up for herself so went along with it. She then went out with a gelding (just the two of them) and all was fine for six months then horses were turned out in the field next door, and the gelding would not let her talk to the horses in this field and would heard her away. With both horses it was through jealously, it was their friend and no one was allowed near her.

 

[ladyt25]

Is horse B relatively new? Generally the dominant one wants to keep themselves between the new horse and the established 'herd'. I have a very dominant gelding (pony as they generally) who we think may be a rig but he really asserst his authority and everyone knows their place. He never gets in striking distance and rarely actually bites a new horse (unless they don't respond to his 'warnings') but it's always been pretty terrifying introducing new animals.

Also consider whether this other mare has actually upset mare A earlier on. I swear my ponmy holds grudges. A horse lower down the pecking order (right at the bottom) got a bit over excited about feed one afternoon and bit said dominant pony - well you haven't seen anything like it - pony went ballistic and wouldn't let up, just kept going for horse who dared to bite him! He was in a bad mood with that horse all day and just kept having a go. If was quite entertaining as usually they get on pretty well (they're the two old men). horses are funny animals and maybe horse A is feeling that horse B is pushing her luck a bit and she wants to make it clear she is still top dog!