I was told she was easy to load into a trailer, but the day we picked her up it was a 15 minute battle to get her into the trailer. A good friend of the family offered to board her since i had no place of my own and couldnt afford very much for board. S, has a lot of experience with horses and had studied Equine Massage Therapy as well as competed in barrel racing for years.
Every chance i had i was out there trying to work with Indy, she was great when she was in a corral by herself, but as soon as the herd came up she changed her personality completely and was at times extremely possesive over me. Before introducing her to the herd we thought it would be a good idea to have her feet done so S brought out her ferrier and offered to be there when he came to trim Indy's feet, I had been informed by the previous owners that she stood perfect for the ferrier no issues and when i looked at her feet they were evenly trimmed so no major signs of being difficult again was i wrong, the ferrier could barely touch her feet without her trying to bite and kick him even with S holding her the ferrier felt she was far to dangerous for him to trim and recommended we work with her on that before calling him out again. I was not impressed to say the least.
So Indy was introduced into the herd which created even more problems in the herd of about 20 horses their were a few yearlings that she started showing extremly high amounts of agression to... one of them she ran into the fence and it later died from a baseball size hole in its neck she left it with. I was heart broken but not willing to give up on her yet i could see that she had potential but it was getting her to that point that was difficult. Everytime i went to see her it became more and more difficult to get her out of the herd she started running away from me playing a game of "chase me" that i was not particularily fond of, im sure i could have bribed her with grain easily but i really dont think that is very productive i mean sure you catch the horse but your teaching it to only come when you have grain... thats just me i guess. When i was able to catch her she reared a few times trying to get the lead out of my hands and once placed in the outdoor arena to start our work she would run from me and kick out at myself or anyone else around, S had to advise her kids not to go anywhere near her.
Im pretty sure it was around that time that S asked to seperate her from the herd, i was more than happy with that choice i didnt want her to injure herself or any of the other horses out there. Our training had made NO progress and i was working on making arrangements to bring a trainer out to help me because at this point i knew i was WAY over my head with her.
One night i got a text from S telling me that i needed to get out to the farm as soon as possible something very bad had happened and i needed to call a vet while on my way out. I started bawling immediatly i knew that something had happened Indy had done something and i started thinking i would have to put her down. I packed up my family and went out to the farm to wait for the vet to meet us there. On the way S sent me a few pictures of what had happened and i couldnt stop crying.
When we got out there S had brought Indy into the barn, she had tried to get back in with the herd and jumped the 4ft fence for the pen she was in and ran across the property and tried to jump in with the herd she made it over the bottom 3 wires but got stuck between the top and the bottom 4. Her left from leg was cut open so deep that you could see the muscle cut in 2 (i have photos but they are pretty graphic if you would let to see message me and i will send them to you). The vet came out and stiched everything up but she still would not put any weight on her leg, for a week i was out there all day everyday giving her bute (which was impossible) and cleaning the stitches as i had been asked but it didnt look like it was getting any better to me. I could see that it was starting to open up again after about a week i was just hoping that the muscle had taken and was starting to heal.
I recieved a text from S telling me that it had opened back up and the muscle had not taken, at that moment i knew i would have to put down my very first horse after only months of owning her. I was heart broken and to top it all off the original owners had heard that i would be putting her down and they called me at work to tell me i was not doing all i could for this horse and they would just come "pick her up" and deal with it themselves. Heart broken i asked S to take care of it for me and she agreed. A few days later i went to pick up my tack and ontop of the saddle i found a big peice of her mane and tail.
I am still very sad about losing Indy but it was probably for the best... i would have never forgiven myself had she hurt anyone else i just wish there had been more i could do for her. I still have her mane and tail and have found a lady who does amazing tribute work for reasonable, i guess ill get around to it when i feel like dealing with it. Right now its hidden in a keep sake box until i can handle going through it all again.
Horse Hair Jewelry (this is the link for the lady who does the tribute peices she is very talented and i am sure will ship anywhere, so please check out her site!)
Maybe tomorrow i will start on the leased horses lol, we will see how that goes!
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