Field Mates - What would you do?

[Mbronze]

BTW i am new to having a mare, so if this is not unusual please forgive this post...

My 5yr old girly goes out in a field with four other horses, of same age,height & sex.

Recently they have introduced another young 4yr old into the field who runs about like a looney and antaganises all other horses, all the other horse have run away from it or ignored it (but not mine)....

Ardra decided last week that she had enough and gave it the kicking of it's life, it kicked back but didn't do any damage (thank goodness

)

Anyway girl of new horse comes up to me and tells me all about this incident and that she is going to move fields to some smaller mares that may not gang up on her.

New horse moved fields today, then jumped out of field back into my mares field, Ardra got upset with all this carry on and gave new mare a good telling off again..now this poor horse is cut and bruised and all sorts, owner is very miffed at me because she wanted to produce it to be a show horse (me thinks that isn't going to happen

) but anyway..

This girl just puts this horse out for 24hrs for the first time in a new field, shouldn't she expect something to happen if she can't be bothered to come down and check...

Am i responsible for my mares bad behaviour in the field or is it just a horse/mare thing. Could it be that Ardra is 'top dog' of the field and is just trying to put this new mare in her place?
She gets on with any other horse, isn't nasty to people, i just don't know why she hates this horse so much.. thoughts please

 

[suebingham]

Sounds exactly like what a mare with a good sense of equine propriety does when there is a "disturbance in the force" to me. Horses and chickens both have (for lack of a better term) political hierarchies that would put the Medici's to shame.

 

[lizzie_liz]

My mare is similar. We have had her since she was 4. When I first had her she was turned out with about 15 horses both mares and geldings. They would all come charging to the gate, she would get cornered, panick and thus kick out. She kicked one horse right on his hip bone!!

At our current yard since we have been there she has been turned out with about 3 or 4 other mares. A couple of which will follow her around and get all attached to her, so occasionally she would kick out at them. She will only kick when she gets trapped or provocked. However apparently most people on the yard now think she is evil!! However all the horses who have been kicked in the fields have not even been out with mine!!

I think what your experiencing is that your mare is the dominant one and is just what to sort the pecking order out

 

[gladelpone]

I am at a very small yard where my mare goes out with one old lady but is very much in charge. She too is very nice natured in all situations but in the field I think they definately revert back to the natural way of doing things with one mare in charge and it happens to be mine and at your yard, sounds like it is yours.

 

[teapot]

Sounds like a typical mare response to be. If you think that in a natural herd, the head mare will be the boss over all of them (even the stallion) due to the foals, it's a defense mechanism really.

And shame on other owner for just chucking horse out in a new herd and not checking/keeping eye on them. Plus I think most people would be surprised NOT to see the odd war wound

I remember when I was working, someone turned one of the geldings out into the mare's field by accident. This gelding certainly wasn't small but the following morning, well you should have seen the state he was in - he was out with them for about 14hours, let alone 24

It'll settle down hopefully. Is there any chance the other horse can be introduced slowly into the herd by grazing the other side of some leccy fencing for interest, just an idea. Not all herds work though so don't worry too much