Horse attacks child!

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Over2You

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I could not believe my eyes when I read this, but a stallion in Perth (Australia) has attacked a toddler by picking him up and throwing him several metres. The boy later died in hospital and the horse was put down. As tragic as this was, I feel there was no need whatsoever for the latter to happen. I am absolutely sick of animals being blamed when more often than not it is the fault of the human. It must have taken a heck of a lot of provocation for a horse to do that!

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22912673-2702,00.html
 
Exactly.
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Poor little boy!
Ive also got to ask why on earth kid was allowed in the field with a stallion.
Ive seen mares kill sheep, and stallions can get quite teratorial so it honestly doesnt suprise me that a horse could do that.
It could just of easily been a kick from the horse a child of that age wouldnt survive a kick from something that size. So i do have to wonder why the child was in a field with any horse let alone a stallion
 
I do agree that its not the animals fault-thats the easy way out stallion has been made to be scape goat. I used to have a stallion and still have a child! Why?? Because no matter how much I trusted my horse, and how unlike a stallion he was my daughter knew that she was never to go near Pidge with out me. We had sheep and Pidge was forever picking them up by their fleeces and thowing them...however I think they liked it as they always went back for more, and in fairness they did jump on him and butt him.
If they hadnt blamed the horse then who elses fault would it have been?? Surely not te parents?? Why cant people puttheir hands up and say it was their fault??
 
Poor horse, how could anyone blame him for what he probably saw as an inturder in his space! I had a similar situation about 40 years ago, a chap climbed over two fences and went to put his toddler on a loose pony's back. Pony grabbed child by the shoulder and flung him into the air then whirled round and got him with both back feet! She was known to be aggressive but was behind strong fences, child was shockingly bruised and battered but no apparent lasting damage. Father was slammed for his actions in court and no penalty imposed on the owner or the horse. Wonder how this would have been dealt with now.
 
You really need to think here who is to blame! Why the hell was a toddler in the field with a stallion! That is just madness!!!

I totally agree with the fact that the stallion should NOT have been put down! They are still slightly 'wild' in some ways!
 
Now where are all of those lovely anti dog people....'Don't you think horses should be banned'? What a danger they are.....
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Very unfortunate, thoughts go to all connected
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RIP little one xx
 
At the risk of opening a big can of worms...
The stallion was doing what comes naturally to it - as do the fighting dogs that attack people. The child should never have been in the field with a stallion as children that are attacked by vicious dogs should not be left alone with them...!
I don't want to start the whole debate off again and haven't commented on recent posts regarding dangerous dogs etc. but have followed them with interest.
Poor child, R.I.P.
 
We have a donkey next to my parents house and one day an irate mothen came down with a kid with a fractured elbow as the donkey had attacked him - they thought it was ours as we had horses.
Now why did the donkey attack the kid? Cos they were throwing stones and stuff at it and so it got fed up and went for them when they cornered it!

And she wanted the donkeys owners to compensate her!! BAH! some stupid people!
 
take it by "lovely anti people" you mean me ! I'm not anti dog, I questioned why people wanted to own rottweilers, pitbulls etc thats all Anyway I don't see why thats come into this case at all but as you asked.............. I suppose you could make a comparison between SOME stallions and SOME dogs but the main difference is surely that nobody keeps stallions in their homes, gardens etc or takes them out to roam the streets. I'm sure there would be an outcry if they did !!!
I should resist pressing the submit button now as I'm sure you will take offence at what I've said but here goes.....
 
Honestly, some people.

Why don't people seem to care where their kids are when there are horses around? Let alone a stallion who might never have come into contact with children and might well have been cooped up and fired up.

I know of a yard where the manager's little boy was always running around, completely naked in front of 30+ liveries and in the fields, in the stables etc etc. How he didn't get squashed I don't know
 
Sorry I was looking at it from the teorectical point of view, that taking a horse out into a village is the same as a taking a dog. Your still out in public. Not trying be argumentative, just making a point that it could be seen as the same thing and there hasn't been public uproar about that!

Never the less that doesn't take away from the fact, this was a tragic accident, be it a stallion, mare or gelding, the toddler should never of been in the field in the first place.
 
you are just trying to be argumentative, you can't say that the way people treat and keep dogs is the same as the way stallions are kept.
life is sometimes dangerous, surely all we can do is try to minimize the risks and take care, expecially with our children.
 
Not wanting to get into a massive stallion and dog debate here, but I would be interested to know what type of a life the stallion in question had.

As we all know there are people who manage to keep them living out 24/7 in a herd of geldings, and at the other extreme there are people who keep them in a box with maybe 1 hour exercise or turnout a day. Likewise, there are people who own pitbulls (for example only!!) who keep them mainly in a cage ready to fight, and there are people who treat their dog like any other dog taking them for walks and having them in a family home with other dogs.

Without getting into a "you should, you shouldn't" debate, surely its more likely that the stallion or dog that was kept in the least "natural for them" situation would be more likely to exhibit extreme behaviours than one who had been well socialised.

By the way I'm not trying to get at or criticise anyone!
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- Just trying to say in a very long winded way I wouldn't be suprised if the stallion's environment and the way he was handled turned out to have been a factor in why the stallion decided to do this.

Either way, poor kid and poor stallion.
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I got horses and children and i NEVER mix them together,,,safety comes first...Poor little boy and my heart goes out to his family but also poor stallion that was put down and punished for no fault of his won in my eyes....<<<<<Please dont shoot me down >>>>
 
I kept my stallion in a herd of mares and he was/is the most wonderful horse around. I walk him out, and always have since he was little, and he has never been a troublesome horse ever.

I have, however, always been extremely careful of other people going into his field. He would never mean to do anything dangerous to anyone, but I watch his body language the whole time and if an ear twitches in the wrong direction, then I go and catch him up. He is now a gelding, however I still treat him much the same as when he was a stallion.

No pregnant women or children were ever allowed to go into his field, however my daughter used to go in there and hop on his back. Her mare lived in that field so when she wanted to ride, she would go into this field. She has grown up with horses and is older than this toddler, but she is still very careful about going into ANY of my fields as I run decent sized herds, so you have to always keep your wits about you.

Poor little lad and if the stallion actually attacked the child, then it was right that it was put to sleep. If it just picked him up and threw him then it should have been rehomed with someone who knows something more than these people, about stallions.
 
Toddler shouldn't of been there.

This happened to me when I was 10 but it was a gelding. Daughters horse of the yard owner he was a narky horse & grumpy. Any how we use to run the horses from the field into the yard loose then put headcollars on them to tie up.
I bent down to the pile picked up a headcollar for Tally as he was stood behind me. Jenifer said thats too small, so I bent down to pick a different headcollar. Tally decided he would bite me on the shoulder picked me up & tossed me a couple of meters!.
Jenifer chased him with any headcollar belting his arse!
I had a tshirt, sweater & waistcoat with padded shoulders (like shooting waistcoates) He left teeth mark imprint on my shoulder front & back.
He wasn't put down he did bite me 4 years later after I had put someone on him checked his girth (which he hated) turned to check horses next to him & he bit me on my spine. I did turn & belt him one & he never touched me again!
Tally lived fro another 10years without biting sadly he got kicked in the field & shattered his foreleg.
There will always be accidents around horses & sadly this is what happened to the toddler.
 
"There will always be accidents around horses & sadly this is what happened to the toddler. "

Very true and very sad.

However, I believe it was right to put down the stallion. My reason? That if you had let it live, youd have a stallion that had learned it was OK to pick up and throw people around. That's so dangerous. As soon as you let a horse know that it's stronger than you, that's a dangerous situation.
 
I can't open the website to read the story so I don't know how old the child in question was but I do know that toddlers can disappear quickly if a parent's back is turned for a moment. So perhaps this is not a case of the child being allowed to get in with the stud but of a child wandering in to see the "horsey" while parents' backs were turned for a moment. That raises the question that if the horse was known to be agressive why wasn't it kept in a more secure pen? Like woven wire or solid boards down to the ground that would discourage people from climbing over or under the fence or a hot wire to keep the horse from reaching over the fence, locks on gates and stall doors, etc. IMHO, all stallions have the potential to be dangerous, more so than mares or geldings. Therefore they should be only kept by experienced horse people who have the knowledge, experience, and facilities to manage them. I can't fault the people for putting the horse down. I'd probably do the same. We don't know what this horse's temperment was. Perhaps it was just mean or nasty for whatever reason and its owners had been in denial about it.
 
Bonny, its all to do with the handling of the animal and amount of common sense (not intelligence..there is a difference) that the owner and/or parent has. That is the reason for accidents like these.

What makes a Rottie different to a JRT? A Jrt is capable of killing a ewe, a ewe weighs alot more than a baby or a toddler.
 
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However, I believe it was right to put down the stallion. My reason? That if you had let it live, youd have a stallion that had learned it was OK to pick up and throw people around. That's so dangerous. As soon as you let a horse know that it's stronger than you, that's a dangerous situation.

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Sorry - but that's nonsense! We're talking an 18 month toddler - who shouldn't have been IN the field - not someone who was handling the stallion regularly. I suspect the stallion saw this small moving object and didn't even recognise it as a person - therefore he wouldn't have associated what he did to the child (probably in playfulness) with the people who normally handled him!
 
I have copied it for you.


Toddler killed in freak horse attack

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December 12, 2007

AN 18-month-old Perth boy has died after a horse picked him up with his teeth and threw him several metres.
The toddler and his mother were in a paddock on their property in Oakford, south of Perth, when the accident happened on Monday afternoon.

A police spokesman said the horse picked the boy up by the neck with its teeth and threw him into the air several metres.

The boy had been in a critical condition and died in Princess Margaret Hospital this morning.
 
[ QUOTE ]
So perhaps this is not a case of the child being allowed to get in with the stud but of a child wandering in to see the "horsey" while parents' backs were turned for a moment. That raises the question that if the horse was known to be agressive why wasn't it kept in a more secure pen?

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The story reports:

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The toddler and his mother were in a paddock on their property in Oakford, south of Perth, when the accident happened on Monday afternoon.

[/ QUOTE ]

So the mother took the child into the paddock - so presumably didn't believe the stallion to be aggressive!
 
Few years back a stupid parent let it's child go up to one of my dogs and shout in her face from about a 1ft away, fortunately our Bessie bless her was a very good mummy type Collie and was used to our children from babies upwards and didn't bite the kids face off, but what a stupid thing for the parent to let the child do.
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Bessie the Tricolour on the right, she was the best ever, broke my heart to lose her, Ben on the left not too long for this world as he is a really old boy now and very doddery :-(

Stallion wasn't to blame, parents fault for letting kid in the field.
 
My goodness me where were his parents? Poor little boy. The stallion was more than likely just protecting his own space.

This is sad for everyone involved.
 
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