Horses Helping Horses

[luvmimerle]

Just read the Stuck in the Swamp thread & it reminded me of our Belgians. My husband bought an old Belgian mare out of the meat pen at an auction. She had some age on her but was in good shape & very gentle & broke the best. We used her to break our colts & she was the best, she even disiplined them when they were misbehaving with a bite! We were breaking a colt in the winter on a sleigh and as we came off a woods trail & up onto a dirt road, the snow bank was deeper than we thought. The old mare struggled to get up out of the snow & onto the road only to slip on the icy road & she went down. The colt was still standing but the mare couldn’t get any footing to get up. She tried several times to no avail. Finally she just gave up , too tired to try. We weren’t sure how to help her, too far back in the woods to get help, so we unharnessed them & hooked the tugs of the colt onto her halter. That colt had only been harnessed a couple of times, but he slowly pulled her down the icy road a few hundred feet to a spot that was free of ice. He never hesitated a moment. The mare didn’t struggle either. We let her rest a bit & then urged her to get up. She stood immediately, now that she had some traction. After a breather, (for us & the horses) we harnessed back up & continued home. If that colt hadn’t pulled her to solid ground, I’m afraid we would have never been able to get her up in a timely fashion before she started to freeze up. We were proud of them both for being patient & helping each other and so thankful that this episode didn’t end in a tragedy.

[jen judkins]

That’s a great story!

[OldKat]

It really is a nice story. The other one, about the horse stuck in the swamp was too. 😎

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