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Abbey Road · Jan 3, 2016 8:12 AM

I just want to celebrate with some horse people who will understand...

I keep my horses on a friend's property. He is mainly into cows but he has two mares he rescued who live with my two... he doesn't do much with either of them. One of them is an in your pocket kind of girl but the other has always been all but untouchable. She was abused.

Over the past six years, I have been working gradually and when I have time in between working with my two and well, life in general, to earn her trust. I have gotten her to where she will eat out of my hand when I feed, but if I try to touch her she is gone.

Well, over the holidays I hardly had time to get out to the farm at all. When I went on New Year's Day, "V" was the first to come toward me. She stopped about 10 feet away and you could see the gears turning. So I fed them, and I was standing by my mare Storm while they ate. Storm's low girl in the pecking order and normally I don't let anyone push her off her food but when V came looking to do that, I let her... but I stood my ground, about 2 feet from the dish. "You want it, fine, but I'm not moving." She stood thinking. I offered a carrot. She took it. Within a couple of minutes she was letting me touch her all over her face but if I touched her neck, she'd spazz... but then she'd come back, and stand, and just hang with me. It's maybe the third time she's allowed me to touch her at all and the first time there wasn't food in my other hand.

Yesterday I went again, and again, she sought contact. Sometimes it was too much and she'd back off, so I'd retreat, and then I thought "Let's try something..." and I walked away from her.

She followed. In fact she followed me for a good long time (like a classic Monty Roberts "join up", although there was no round pen involved), licking her lips and letting me stop and rub on her (just up to her neck, though).

I feel like a kid daydreaming of the beautiful big black horse that will allow no one else to touch them, like half the horse stories I read as a girl, and even though I've been working with horses for most of my life, it makes me giddy. <3 Here's hoping we can do more... she doesn't technically belong to me but I am free to do whatever with her, since no one else can do anything with her. I'd like to get her to where she'll at least allow vet and farrier.<br />
Here she is. I have NO idea what breed she is... any guesses? I estimate she's a good 16 hh (obviously, I've never measured).

RipshinCreekFarm · Jan 3, 2016 8:26 AM

Love this! I have been there as well with my driving pony. West went from skinny and scared to a roly-poly, in your pocket pony. V is a beauty. She reminds me of the pmu horses that would run through our auction years ago. A lot of those were qh x percheron.

MoonAcre Stables · Jan 3, 2016 9:24 AM

Oh theres nothing better than skittish horses that come to you. I'm happy for you! I know the feeling lol never any horses that were as scared as her but quite a few very timid ones over the years. Shes got a sweet face

Baya · Jan 4, 2016 8:30 AM

Looks like a warmblood of some sort abbey

Abbey Road · Jan 4, 2016 11:00 AM

I doubt she's a warmblood... here in TN the stuff that's likely is mainly stock horses and Tennessee Walkers. PMU horse never occurred to me, but the QH/Percheron mix... yeah, maybe. She's built like a Quarter but big for the ones that are generally bred around here, and I don't see too many black ones, either.

I'm off to go see her and my girls. :)

Cheers · Jan 4, 2016 12:02 PM

Could be some old style heavy boned thoroughbred in there too. And the older style TWs were way heavier than the fine boned ones you see in show rings now. Without photos that are closer to "conformation shots" and a good look at her way of going it's hard to tell, but she's certainly gorgeous! I'm glad you're slowly making friends!

Salvistar · Jan 4, 2016 12:28 PM

Congrats! If you could get a side view conformation shot it might be easier to guess her breed. My initial thought from her head was thoroughbred, but Tennessee walker would fit too.

Breezey11 · Jan 4, 2016 2:23 PM

She could be an appendix qh

PaintsStables · Jan 4, 2016 3:07 PM

My grandfather raised Walkers. To me the head photo is definitely Walker, but the body photo angle she looks TB/QH. I hear what you are saying about how long it took to get close to her, and what a wonderful feeling when they finally let you touch them.

I was a 4-H horse leader in Oregon for years. We used to take our club to JL symposiums. I decided to get a BLM 2 year old gelding from a rodeo, after he was used in the wild horse race. Casey Jones was so scared of all humans, but wouldn't let a man close to him at all. He would strike, and kick anyone who tried to touch him. He never bit though. I had a 4 stall barn with a nice size pasture attached to it. I kept him inside for a week. I would feed him in a different stall to get him to change so I could clean them. That was when I discovered he wasn't a gelding, he was still intact! I tried first feeding him by hand. He would take it, but he would strike at me when he did. Once he stopped striking, I let him out into the pasture during the day. He learned when I whistled to come into the barn to get fed at night. I followed what I had learned at the symposiums. I turned my back to him when he came in and then he started checking me out by sniffing me, then he would go on into the stall. It took about two weeks, but he finally let me touch him. Within a month, I could halter him and taught him to lounge. No striking or kicking unless a man walked in, but girls or even with younger boys he was fine. I found a female vet to geld him. He calmed down even more after that. I was saddling him at two months and riding him by 10 weeks. He never did trust men again though. I had to have a female farrier too. I lost him when he was 11 years. I had moved and was boarding him at a real big barn way out in the country. Some how the 10 horses that were on one side of the barn got turned loose one snowy night. He and 5 more of them got on the railroad tracks, those 6 were killed. No one every did figure out how they all got turned loose. The owner thought one of the horses that was gate savvy let the others out.

RipshinCreekFarm · Jan 4, 2016 3:28 PM

Do you know where and when she came from? I said pmu, because that is what she looked like, and while you would think of the northwest U.S. being the place to find them, a lot of them ran in auctions in north Alabama, from 02 to 08. When you said Tennessee, it made me wonder. The ones they brought down here were wild as hares. One memorable night one tore a stock trailer apart and escaped to run down U.S. 431. A man down the road from me bought one, and she crashed through a four board fence and totally disappeared.

Cheers · Jan 4, 2016 3:36 PM

Paints that is a tragic story! I'm so sorry!

MoonAcre Stables · Jan 4, 2016 3:38 PM

I agree with her looking like a walker and also looking like qh/tb lol. do you have a full body shot from the side?

PaintsStables · Jan 4, 2016 6:58 PM

Thanks Cheers, I was out of the state at the time also. I was actually in California for Christmas. My very best friend took care of everything for me, so I could stay with my family. It was 32 years ago though, I have had a couple of nice horses since Casey.

Casey was off of the Pendleton Oregon wild horses range. He was after the BLM put the draft horse stallions out. He was big, he weighed almost 1200, but was only about 15 hands.

Abbey Road · Jan 4, 2016 7:17 PM

She really does look like a TWH... but not gaited is a deal breaker on that, no? Or maybe she's crossed with something?

Paints, I'm so sorry to hear about your mustang boy :( My mare, my first horse, is a BLM Mustang. She loves people, but put a cowboy hat on and she's out, and if you raise anything over your head she gets pretty wary, too. If only they could tell their stories.

Here are some side body shots, two motion shots. I don't have any trotting photos but she definitely trots.

Cheers · Jan 4, 2016 7:23 PM

My understanding of gaited breeds is that they all walk/trot/canter/gallop but may also have the natural proclivity to gait, whatever their special gait is (tolt, rack, pace, whatever Pasos do) and that natural talent can be further refined/trained, much like refining the way a dressage horse carries itself in a specific "frame" and develops extended and collected versions of the regular gaits. But I'm by no means experienced with gaited breeds...

PaintsStables · Jan 4, 2016 7:43 PM

She may be a TWH cross, now that I see the side photos, she still looks like she has some in her. If she is a cross she may not be naturally gaited. I know a couple of horses my grandpa had he had to tease them into it. Out of the 6 or 7 TWH he had, one also trotted as well as had walk, and he single footed, and paced also. I heard that is rare, but I am not sure on that.

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