Mares have fallen out big time

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springtime13

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Just thought I'd run this by you all, since you're so helpful. I keep my mare in a mare's only field, with about 5 mares of varying ages from 5- 20ish. My girl is 12 now and has been in the field for 8 years. She's always been a clingy over friendly type and hasn't had any problems with any of the others. Like a typical livery yard, there's the usual slow changes to the herd dynamic, with probably one in one out on average every year.

Anyway, earlier in the week it all kicked off, my girl was caught chasing the head girl's 5 year old relentlessly, biting her and chasing her into corners to kick her. The woman had to go in to protect her mare, and just managed to get her out. No lasting harm was done to the health of the 5 year old, although she is now petrified of my girl. What can cause this sort of issue? It seems out of character for my mare who has never caused problems like this before. I have been asked to have her in all summer at night so she can't cause anymore problems and will never be allowed out with the 5 year old. Does anyone have any thoughts on why this happened?
 
Was your mare, or the 5 year old in season? What are their normal ranking positions?

Many of mine have been in season this past week and there have been serious hormonal ructions going on in a very settled group. Mares that never associated have been buddying up, best friends have been bitching, lowest rankers have been sharing hay piles with the Boss mare.

Sunshine, spring grass and hormones have a lot to answer for I feel.
 
My normally placid mare took a violent dislike to another once in the 25 years had her. It was horrible and right out of character as she was never anywhere near dominant. Many years later she was attacked by a five year old for no apparent reason in a field of seven mares who had rubbed along for a couple of years without trouble, and it became a real issue whenever this other mare noticed that I was around. I had been on the yard years too. It didn't help that the field narrowed by the gate and my mare would get caught there, and I got caught up in the middle a few times. It ended up that I couldn't go to the field on my own and someone had caught and held the other mare. The yard was closing and the YO wasn't interested so we moved to what proved to be an awful yard sooner than we wanted to. If it hadn't been for the other mare we might have found somewhere more suitable.

I hope your problem is a one-off, it can cause awful problems with the other owner.
 
Op - I'm glad it's not just me!! I have three mares at home and the pony started WW3 against my 3 yo a couple of days ago. She got several good kicks in before baby horse decided to fight back!! I've never seen anything like it - and nothing has changed at all in 12 months they've been turned out together!

I rather suspect its hormones playing a part, so I've separated the 2 scrappers for a few days. Fingers crossed they'll be ok again soon!
 
Sorry, than other mares. She used to be the dominant mare in the herd but as she has aged, dropped in status particularly when we introduced a fitter 4yo mare who bullied her to bits - I ended up getting rid of the younger horse which sloved that problem, but not a great solution in your case OP! I wonder though is it worth exploring a gelding as a potential fieldmate?
 
Sasha started bully girl tactics with another mare who she had been ok with , this was two week ago. So I put her in with big lad! Soon stopped her.. He won't put up with moody mares.
We think she had just sort of found her feet in the heard, as we have had her 6 wks now. Just testing she was. Big lad soon put her in her place..was funny to see actually . He snakes his head at her and threatens to nip, and she soon backed off. Seasons have a lot to do with it.
 
Thanks everyone for your contributions. It's a really strange scenario, and I wish I had seen it to be able to get my head around it. I personally feel it was a ranking thing, as my girls is 3rd in line and the 5 year old has been seen to be trying to raise herself up the pecking order. I expect she has pushed her luck with my mare and she chose to punish her publicly. However, the head girl disagreed and said she felt it was a too severe reaction for a pecking order squabble. Choosing the head girl's to pick on was a particularly bad move, I feel I will have to be looking for a new yard asap, which is a shame after 8 happy years there. Looking on the positives, at least no one got hurt :D
 
Is there enough grass? Seasonal time of year. A 5 year old cannot be higher up in the pecking order than a 12 year old, so yours was putting the younger one in its place. I wouldnt have seperated them because when they are put back together the argument hasnt been finalised, just watch them, but unless they have shoes on pthere shouldnt be to much damage caused. If not enough grass give hay but spread it around so they can all get.
 
I agree. There is plenty of grass for them and the youngster is due to go in a pen due to having lammi last year. Really don't want to have my mare in all summer and know that if any of the others come in with any dinks out of them my girl will be getting the blame :( head girl says she won't be happy even with her girl in a pen because my mare might drag the electric fencing down to get in with the youngster in the night. She is being branded as some kind of killer mad horse which saddens me greatly.
 
If you may need to move because your horse gave the head girls horse a rollicking your head girl shouldn't be head girl. I have a bully horse, my gelding is a right old beggar with other horses, for that reason I've kept him with my own horses or with a friend who is like minded that horses are horses and will I give other a hiding occasionally.

I was on a livery yard with him for about a year, I was head groom and we popped him into our established herd, three of the horses had been there longer than me (10 years) and the others ranging from three to five years. He played to fool for a month then the carryon started and we had open rioting in the field. We booted up all horses had rugs on and they it left to sort it out. Reason being is that if we took horses from the field it would go on longer. If it got too rough one of us would split it up, wait five mins then leave them to it again just to give them all a break.

It sorted itself out with only one horse have a nasty kick and the herd was fine afterwards as everyone knew where they stood in the pecking order :)
 
Have you spoken to a vet at all? My mare, who is generally very quiet in the field, was caught beating up my YO's youngster several years ago. She cornered him by the gate and then kicked seven bells out of him. It was completely uncharacteristic of her, but the YO felt she had no choice but to ban her from the field and place her in an isolation paddock. Anyway, I then spoke to the vet about possible hormone problems and he came out and scanned her. It turned out that there was a problem with her ovaries (can't remember what exactly) which was affecting her mood. She was on Regumate for a month and was then back to normal and allowed back out with the rest of the herd. I've never had a problem since, so it might be worth considering whether something similar could be wrong with your mare.
 
My youngster has come in today with cuts on 2 legs and various tufts of coat missing due to a fight she had with another youngster in the field. Apparently they had to be broken up as it was getting pretty bad :( I hope it's a spring thing and nothing else.
 
I have heard of similar when a mare has "forced out" an injured horse from the heard. Horse wasn't showing any illness or injury but when vet came out to see the horse after mare had attacked him he took blood and found the horse to have a virus. When sorted horse went back out with the herd and harmony restored. Very strange but suppose it's nature to protect the heard from vulnerabilities.
 
Thanks for all your support everyone :) I think considering no one actually got hurt it's all a bit over an over reaction. No blood was drawn, no vet was called out. But still, on a livery yard I guess you do what you're told or you leave. On the whole it's a lovely yard and I'd hate to leave. I don't really want to pay for her to be in at night all year round but I guess you have to sum it all up a bit.

In terms of my mare I need to get the vet in anyway as I've been she's been a bit borderline unsound behind recently. We had a thermal imaging person in last week and the results showed seriously hot hocks and sacroiliac. If she has to go in for scans I'm sure they could do her ovaries as well. I do wonder if she has some low grade pain it might have made her cranky.
 
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