Herd politics........how do you deal with them?

Enfys

Enfys

Well-Known Member
Joined
11 December 2004
Messages
18,085
Visit site
I was rather hijacking another thread on this subject, but am interested how people turn out their horses and resolve bullying, randy geldings and flirty mares etc.

Do you turn out in compatible groups?
By size?
Age?
Sex?
Individually?
 
Compatible groups of similar sizes. I don't care whether they are mares, geldings or stallions - if they get along happily then they can live together.
smile.gif
 
Well at my yard there are a couple of horses turned out alone but with others around just a fence between them because they have agression problems. Most of the horses are in small groups mine and my sisters horses have a field together. The oldies are in a field together as they need the most feed (which is the only reason)

Then the biggest field is a HUGE mixture of young/old horses they are a herd, but there is one strong horse in the group thats always been in charge. As long as they get along they all get put together
 
We generally separate the mares and males. Recently we havent had a lot of mares, but a few colts. We have no worries about putting the mares in with the geldings if needs be.
Obviously the colts are separated from the mares, and these are usually grouped with anything that needs feeding. The colts are generally up to 3yo, so obviously need a different diet to most of the older horses.
ETS. We generally dont worry if they kick the crap out of each other to start with. They soon learn whos boss and sort themselves out. Once they are out in the field, they are there for months so the issues dont last long.
We do have one gelding who tries to mount other geldings, but doesnt bother with mares. He generally goes out with his 'bitches', hes even very good with past mares and foals - no idea why, was gelded late but nothing untoward.
 
Have to say, we have one herd. They can all go together. Currently the fat ponies come out during the day and into a starvation paddock. No problem with jiggling, can leave any two together.
Had 6 in the paddock (size of a dressage arena) for a day or two, no problems.
We generally also don't do introduction times. We let the new one out, add a quiet companion. Add another when they're settled and so on. Never had a problem yet although these past two days I think we've had a herd scuffle, as they've all come in with scrapes!
 
My field has 3, not grouped for any particular reason other then the rest are all owned by the one person so have a field of their own. It works well in winter but not in summer as Chex is a fat pie, whereas K (also old) needs all the grass she can get. The other is going away soon anyway I think. He's always been in mixed herds, mares and geldings, old and young - it seems to work well, he can play with the youngsters or chill with the oldies!
 
We have several main herds and some satellite ones.
The main safeguard is enough space for horses to escape. Nothing is turned out with another horse in less than five acres, and the main herd has around 60 to roam over most of the time.
We have a seperate summer herd for mares due to foal, and then they all go back with the main herd prior to weaning, that way the foals integrate with the others with their dam's protection, after that an Auntie takes over when we remove the mares.
The competition horses tend to stay as a group and not go in the main herd, we have one of just ridden mares, and another that is a mix, with a quite bolshie old gelding as the main member and others added or taken out as we train them or if they need special attention like feeding. The mini shetland aged 36 goes where the hell he likes he can get under the taped fences ad roams pretty much the whole farm.. He develops a tummy in summer so he is removed to lose some weight in a small paddock when that happens, but otherwise he eats ad lib haylage with the rest.
I find that the main herd divides into pairs and colours. We have two piebalds who are always together , a couple of big horses who are also an item, and then it's down to age as with the four foals who stick together, familes, (often four generations can be seen grazing in a group) or their colours.
The coloureds will allow greys, chesnuts roans and spotties to join their gang but not any bays.
The greys will allow a black but not bays.
The bays allow chesnuts and the odd grey but no coloureds.
Laugh you may but I swear it's the truth!
Then we have the actual bullies. Some go by size, for instance a gelding who is 17.2hh started at the bottom of the herd in the pecking order but now has first choice at the hay feeders.
As the horses age they get pushed further down the pecking order too so we tend to kep a different barn full of haylage for that group, as they won't go in the big barn with the bullies.
If anything gets too bolshie I remove them and put them with a bossy gelding who puts them in their place..
I can honsetly say I have learned more about horses since running the herd system than ever before, they are nasty devils to each other and have very strict rules with each other, so it must be doubly difficult to change homes and friends when they move..
 
I can verify that I have exactly the same thing happens in my herds also. Spotted horses are never with brown horses and greys are allowed to be friends with the Spotties. The brown horses all hang around together. I have 4 herds and this happens in all of them....horses are definitely colourist.
 
My 4 all go out happily together and they are two mares and two geldings ranging in size from 14 hands to 17.3 and from 4years old to 20. They have all been introduced slowly (apart from Tilly who was an orphan foal). Ella was the most recent addition - 7 months ago - and we put her in a separate paddock to see if there was going to be any squeeling or aggression with an electric fence between them. I am not a believer in just chucking them all in together and letting them sort themselves out. If you give them time to get used to each other separately, there shouldn't be any problems - as you can see from my piccies.
 
I completely concur with the colour theory, ours bays can always be seen together, coloured geldings are ostrachised, although the coloured mare(being our only mare) is loved!
We have 5geldings and one mare as well, no divisions. Works well. I found the only problem was when we had 2 mares.
 
I am glad you too see the colour thing happening Tia, we thought we were seeing things at first!
What is so funny is the way the variations such as the spotty on and the pink roan are allowed to join greys and coloureds, it's almost as if hey are saying they are sort of like them so can hang around with that gang..
Despite having all that grazing the contractor has fertilised loads of fields today and I can't use the small paddocks at all until it rains hard. The hay fields of course are out of use too.
We racked our brains to see where the stallion could go out to play and came up with two places, a cordoned off area inside the old indoor school looking out over the doors, or the bottom half of my garden..
Guess who has been outside putting yellow pipes over her young apple trees and tieing sheets round the bigger ones? I just hope the lush grass in there appeals to him and he doesn't wear a track round the edge..
 
we have 4 mares and 3 geldings in our field
there ages range from 4-30
and height from 12.3-16.0

there are the occasional scrap when there all stood at the gate waiting to come in but other than that they all get along great!

my horse loves it as he swaps between 2 mares depending on their seasons!
one is black and the other is grey.
 
we have same sex herds, although other places ive been have mixed.

we try to make sure 'friendlys' stick together and the groups are compatable. a bolsy youngster gets put in with the 'big boys' to learn his place etc. only real aggressive and dangerous horses are kept seperate.

and i have also noticed the colour thing - glad it wasnt me seeing things due to long hours and heat!!
 
I knew this would be interesting, Thankyou everyone.

The colour thing is fascinating.......I have only had 4 horses here this winter, 2 bays and 2 chestnuts, chestnuts were top rank, bays bullied. As I don't have herds the size of Henryhorns or Tias presumably this is purely coincidental as all "herds" however small have to have a ranking system.

This is the first time in about 20 years that I have been fortunate enough to have my horses at home and I have passed countless hours watching them and learning their habits, like at midday the threesome all move to one particular corner and two lie flat out whilst one remains standing, then one gets up and the guard lies down for her turn. I would know instantly now just by watching from my window if something was not quite right.

I hope your garden survives hh
smile.gif
 
Oh me too. I can tell just by a quick glimpse out of the window if there is anything wrong with any of them. You really can't know your horse unless it is at home with you. No matter how long you may spend at a livery yard....it just is not comparable at all to having them home and being on view 24 hours a day.
 
We have the main herd which is mares and geldings, then one of mine is in a field on his own because of his riggy behaviour and then my colt is in a paddock until he gets cut and then he will join the main herd.
The main herd has all sizes of horse and pony in it, from three shetlands to chunky 15.2 Welsh Cobs.
 
st our livery yard is seperate turnout by sex and thats it. then they are left to establish there own herd politics and we only intervene if theres a particular problem for instance one of our gets overly dominant every now and then so she is changed onto invididual turnout.

the rest sort there own life out. its very much the littles against the bigs! all the small ponies stick together although they all have a bigger buddy to protect them from baddies!!
 
When I first moved onto this livery yard there was no separation and we turned ours straight out with the herd and left them to get on with it. The horses went into smaller herds, but there were quite a few injuries, especially as there is quite a high turnover at the yard, so they were always having to re-establish the pecking order.

Chloe really struggled with the big group as she has personal space issues, and a few of the geldings weren't used to being out with mares, and would hassle her (and the other mares) - causing her to lash out!

They went into seperate mares and geldings groups last winter, and it's been much better. The groups are calmer, the geldings can play without irritating the mares, and there have been far fewer injuries. The two groups can also talk to each other over the fences, and it's also meant they've all got more space.
I've noticed the mares seem happiest in a smaller group of 3-5 horses, and split themselves up if there are more out.

We've got lots of bay/black mares at the moment, so I haven't spotted any colourist issues in our group - but we have noticed that the 2 old grey geldings are always together!
 
we have at the moment 3 herds if you will - the livery stabled horses - ie - horses who in winter are out in day in at night - these are now out 24/7 - we have moved into the field next to them their old pals - basically those that have lived out all winter - liveries dont like them suddenly mixed so they are next door so they can talk over the hedge (althou some liveries are now worried they will try and get together and get hurt!) then we have the fatties - in the field we used for winter that hasnt as much grass on it.

at the moment there are 7 livery horses - aged 1 to 36 - 12.3 to 17.3.
winter turned out horses are from 3 to 26 and 13.2 to 18+ hh
and the fatties are 6 to 22 years old and 39" to 14hh

ALL will be mixed eventually - is - fatties might be mixed when spring grass has passed.
they will then have around 35 acres to play on as we leave gates open between fields if poss so they can roam - and they will break off into seperate herds.
they all mix well - even the greys and 1 coloured. sometimes the oldies go off together but they more often tend to go off in couples - we have a few old married couples!!! The grey shetland loves the black shire - thats always fun to see! depending on the weather - the blacks tend to stick together.

as the ages are from 1 to 36 and they are all together - it can be a worry but they all get on so well - there may be the odd scrap - but thats normally at the start of spring when the mares have their 1st season and suddenly all the geldings think they have still gt it! we actually even once had a 5 month old mini shetland out with them all and everything was fine - she bossed all the bigger ones around!

i'm a great believer in trying to keep things as natural as poss - hence herds, mixed sexes/ages etc
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top