Who is liable? Unplanned covering

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Dolcé

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This morning one of our colts was found in a neighbouring stud yards field. Somehow he has found his way across five fields, including five barbed wire fences and through two lots of mares to get into the field. There are no signs of where he has escaped, and there were little hoof prints up the track from our yard, plus you could see in the damp ground our gate had been opened. The pony does not have a mark on him, but obviously we can not prove that he has been put in there deliberately.

Anyway, the woman now wants us to pay for the mare to be scanned. Obviously, this would be reasonable and we would willingly pay if we believed this to be genuine. However, the woman has a reputation in the area for being a conwoman, and has also had the same mare to her stallion over the last couple of months. She also has a yearling colt in the field joining the mares, with bad fencing in between.

I honestly do not believe our boy has gone all that way away from his own mares to get to her (he is a rising two year old). She had removed the mare from the field so we couldn't see if she really is in season or not, but apparently "she had hoof prints on her bum therefore had been covered". The mare is atleast 14.2hh and he is 11hh and the other mares in the field were all driving him away and not letting him stand close to any of them. When we arrived he was grazing quite happily.

We have rung our vet and we can get them to come out next saturday and abort anything that may be there, and scan two weeks later. We are probably resigned to doing this, but would you in these circumstances? My feeling is that either her colt has escaped in with it and she wants somebody else to foot the bill of aborting the mare (she doesn't usually pay her vet bills or farrier, just swaps round them), or she has been covering it with her own stallion and wants us to pay for the scan so she knows whether or not it is in foal. She said she will speak to us tomorrow about having it scanned, so really need to know what you all think.

Btw, just a couple of years ago this woman tried to get a farmer whos cows had escaped into her field to pay for all her mares "aborted foals" even though none of these had even been covered.
 
I think you need to have a chat with the legal department at your insurance company. And some thick chain and padlocks for your gate.
In your shoes I might be inclined to tell her I'd see her in court and ignore her. But legal advise is probably the sensible option.
 
Sorry but this is a pretty simple one, your 100% responsible for keeping your horses/animals contained. Yours got out, if you could prove that someone let it out and you had proof etc. then they'd be liable, as things stand your horse got out and your liable for the concequenses of that, I'd padlock your gates in future, your neighbour sounds well dodgey!

The scan shouldn't be too expensive, you and your neighbour are bothy very lucky that no horses were seriously injured so I'd just pay up and count my blessings..
 
i would say u will pay 4 it, if there is a foal it will be aborted and u want a contract that states that before. that way if shes is looking for a free scan she would loses her stally foal and i dont think she will go through with it
 
Thanks, thats what we thought. The vet has said they abort first then scan after, so she will not be able to just get a scan done then say she is keeping it. It just infuriates me that she is getting money from us, but we are going to insist she uses our vet and we will be there when the vet comes.
 
Forget the bloody scan!!! No need

If you have to pay, get the mare injected so she aborts if she is pregnant.
If she isnt pregnant, it will do her know harm. We had to do that with 3 mares a naughty little colt got in with.

The worst thing that happens is the mare may sweat for 30mins afterwards. One of mine did, two of them didnt bat an eyelid.

No need for a scan!!!!
 
i would just say to her that you have booked to have her scan and anything in there to be aborted that way if she has covered it with her own stallion and just wants it checking but some1 else to pay the bill she will be more concerned the foal she "wants" will be lost.
 
Well, first off if your laws are similar to ours, you are likely liable.

But I'm a little confused - are you saying you think she went to all the trouble to take your boy out and bring him to her place just so she didn't have to pay her vet? That seems like an awful lot of trouble to go to.
 
Ditto what others have said, tell her you are getting the vet out to have the foal aborted, if the women kicks up a fuss about it tell her the other option is she pays for the scan and you will also bill her for the 'stud' fee, sounds like she needs playing at her own game!
 
I suppose what I am saying is that I can't believe that the pony had climbed through 5 barbed wire fences (without leaving any trace of climbing through them on the now soft ground) and passed through 2 fields with mares in to get to this particular field, whilst somehow breaking through onto the track and leaving hoofprints outside the field gate and prints going only one way towards the other yard. He would also be very clever to have gone the only other way, opened the gate between 2 of our fields and chained it back up (but not quite the way we do or put it back in the same position - it drags on the floor) and would have passed through a field with one of 'his own' mares in it, through that gate (where he left the hoof prints) and then past 2 other mares in the next field on before getting to the other yard's field.

I have just been and bought locks for the gates to make sure he can't 'escape' again! I don't really understand the logic but I know that the pony did not get into her field on it's own!
 
3Beasties said:
Ditto what others have said, tell her you are getting the vet out to have the foal aborted, if the women kicks up a fuss about it tell her the other option is she pays for the scan and you will also bill her for the 'stud' fee, sounds like she needs playing at her own game!
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Haha, we had already discussed that - she would be very lucky to have a foal from him, better bred than her 2 stallions and very beautiful - section A x arab - nice mix!!
 
Hope it is a scam otherwise your going to have trouble keeping him in, in future. What a talented boy he is, jumping 5 fences like that.
 
surely if you scan in the next few days you would be lucky to see anything! if the scan reveals a somewhat larger picture you would know (well the vet should) that it wasnt concieved last night! i would agree to have the mare aborted,(which the owner might not want?!!!) then scanned if necessary in a few weeks. some legal advice would be your best first step, and any documentation to go with it otherwise she might try to tap you for keep for the mare, foaling bills etc. do not admit liability but you as the owner of the colt are responsible for fencin in your stock. maybe your public liability will pay as it a result of straying? talented little chap if he did jump across! i would be thinking of gelding him with a neighbour like that!
 
ok, I have told her that he was put in her field rather than escaping, and that I doubt very much he has covered her mare as he cannot reach our 13hh mare (although I do realise it would not be impossible if they were both determined) but that as a gesture of goodwill we will pay our vet to come out next week to inject the mare and that she will come into season about a week later.

To be fair she seemed very grateful and went on to explain that it is unusual for this mare to come into season because she thinks she may have a cyst or something so it was just bad timing that she had just come in, and that it was good the injection will bring her back into season as she needs to get her in foal to her stallion before she sells her!!

Deduce from that what you will!!

I also told her that all the gates will be locked as from now!

He will be getting cut in the autumn along with his two pals, the vet is not really willing to do it until then and the second vet I called said the same and that it is just not worth the risk.
 
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Advise you have booked for an abortion, not a scan! A scan surely won't see much if it is this soon. If she won't agree then say well a scan is her cost, and you will pay for an abortion only. If she does not agree then ask her why, plain and simple. Sounds like a real conwoman, so play her at her own game. I agree that it sounds unlikely he managed to get to the mares field unaided...... were there footprints with the hoof prints you saw?
 
this lady is dodge city, to keep peace as a neighbour. get vet to abort no matter what, it wont be too expensive, apart from the call out charge. put locks on your gates, also put electric tape on top of your fence, i had to do this with my yearling colt he jumped 4 foot gate at standing not even runnng to it to get in to a mare in yard. when he got there he didnt know what to do as was just a yearling, but if we had of left him he would have worked it out. so we have to put tape on top of fence in field to now, as a annoying neighbours mares keep putting there head over are fence to annoy my 2 colts, so the tape keeps them away and happy. with tape fence is over 5 foot.
i was lucky too my boy never hurt himself, but do phone BHS if your with them just to ask, i think it is 24 hr line. goodluck
 
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