Killian Gets What he Deserves

My neighbors moved the billy goats gruff over one pen, and put two of their horses in that pen which boarders my property.  This is fine with me, and even the Miss Melody was fine with it when we were riding the other night.  They don't smell near as bad.

The next day I put Sassy and Killian out for their pasture time.  The back of my pasture opens into the catch pen at the end of my arena. This borders the neighbors property as well.  It is separated by an 8 foot tall chain link fence.  

Sassy being the social butterfly that she is, made a point to over and say hello.  

Killian, of course, went over to start trouble.  

While I did not see the altercation, in fact I was not even aware that there had been one, I have evidence of what happened.  

The next morning I went out to feed and saw Big K with a large swelling under his throat latch and clearly there was some sort of wound because the flies were all over it.  

My initial response was to freak out (internally of course- externally I was cool as cucumber)  and think that my horse had strangles.  I have seen strangles first hand and at a glance it could have easily been just that.   Then I went into the pen to have a closer look.  

Ya know how the top of a chain link fence is?  With the hooked over pieces that are spaces exactly 2.34 inches apart?  Well Killian has two long scratches all the way down the length of his neck which match the top of that chain link fence perfectly.  

Under his throat is a fairly deep little gouge which is where the flies were congregating.  He also has another small gouge down at the bottom of the scrapes.  While they are not deep enough or big enough to warrant stitches, the fly issue demanded attention for sure.  

Because he is swollen, I went ahead and started him on penicillin for a few days, and have just been cleaning with Betadine and water.  For the fly issue I slather on my Natures Edge, and it does seem to be working until it gets so warm it melts and runs down his chin.  

From a forensic point of view it is easy to see what happened.  He went up on his hind legs and tried to reach over the chain link to get at the other two horses with his teeth. There is no stabilizer bar on the top so it folded down just enough for him to lay his throat over it.  Since the tops of the wires are folded down, he had to gouge himself on the way over.  I'm sure it hurt.  

I hope it hurt a lot.  I know that may sound mean but seriously, this is getting to be ridiculous. 

His whole, "Must have all mares" attitude is really getting to be a pain.   I think that very soon I am going to change my rotations to geldings one day, and mares the next.   If that doesn't work then he will start spending his time out...a l o n e.  

I also have shut off access to the catch pen.  I only had it open so grazing horses could have shade. However, I have yet to see a single grazing horse actually use it, so shutting that gate doesn't bother me too much.  Doctoring horses....THAT bothers me! 

Tomorrow we fly out to Wyoming.  We are going up for a memorial service for TC's dad who passed away in April.  The family decided that it would be better to wait until the weather was nicer for the actual memorial service...so that people would actually come.   

I am super excited to see my son Colton and my Grandson Nikko, who just turned a year old last month.   I am also super excited to not have to go to my J-O B for several days.  The cool part is that we come back on the second, I will work the third, and then have 3 more days off.  

I think I will spend some time in church those three days. 

The church of the desert.

The one where I ride my horse to where there are no people and we re-establish our conscious contact with the God of our own understanding.  

We have not had any desert riding in a long time....we are past due.