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Convincing dad that junk yards are not good places for horses!

4K views 23 replies 9 participants last post by  luvs2ride1979 
#1 ·
My dad is an old-fashioned farmer type, and knows nothing about horses (he's not even allowed to ride them any more, after he tore open Magic's mouth with his heavy handed 'yank their heads around' riding style), and for the most part, he's happy staying away from the horses. The one thing I can't convince him of, however, is that the junk yard across from the farm is not a good place to let the horses in!
In the summer, the horses' second pasture is a stretch of land originally intended for cattle, surrounded by a electric fence. Just a little ways outside that, is the junk yard/burn pile/collapsed machine shed with a smallish 'lake' thing right in the middle. The junk yard itself has a permanent fence around it. Usually when I put up the electric fence, there's a good yard between the fence and this junk yard. My father, however, once in awhile decides that the grass is too long in there, so he pulls down the fence and opens the pasture to the junk yard! And he usually does this while I'm off at school or work, or if I'm gone for the weekend. :-x
I always lecture him on how they could get hurt, and he always laughs it off. Well, about a month ago, a wind storm whipped up and blew down a still-standing portion of the machine shed and Bandit came up with scratches and cuts all the way down his hindquarters. (Mostly superficial cuts, thankfully.) And when the farrier came out a few days ago, and I showed him a break in Dante's hoof that I'd thought had been caused by a kick or a big rock... he said it was where an old abscess had blown out! I've also pulled pieces of glass and metal out of the mud in all the horse's hooves, and pieces of rusted wire out of their tails.
And yet my dad keeps saying "They're horses, they'll live." or "Give him some penicillin, he'll be fine."
I always put them fence up as soon as I find it down, and dad hears about every cut and scrape they get while in there, but I just can't seem to get it across that one day, one of them might get seriously injured! How can I make him take me more seriously?
 
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#2 ·
I bet that old shed is made of aluminum... that is some pretty sharp stuff. I had some extra aluminum from when my barn went up stacked beside the barn, next to the riding arena (NOT in a turn out area). A little girl was riding my mare, who decided to graze, she walked right up to the aluminum, took one step back and SEVERED the tendons in her right leg. She SEVERED an arterey and sliced a vein in the other. $6,000 later she has a permanent limp but is ride-able. Tell him that.
 
#3 ·
I have the same sort of dad. Unless there is some loss of money or equipment thats going to be caused by the horses, there is no sense in nagging him about it. You could offer to mow or take the weed eater into the junk area to knock down the weeds when they get high. That way he won't be tempted to let the horses "mow" it.
 
#4 ·
Good luck convincing your dad. My father in law bought a shetland pony many years ago so his other grandkids would have a pony to ride (my girls had their own pony). He had planted a bunch of clover for hay. My husband and I both warned him not to let the pony anywhere near the clover (she had already foundered once at some point in the past - before he got her). Needless to say, he didn't listen. He thought the pony would like a treat - some nice tasty clover instead of the old bermuda and bluestem. He left the pony in the clover field for several days. By the time we found her, it was already too late and she had died. My father in law still believes to this day that the pony died from old age - but she was only 10. The poor pony died a very painful death - founder and colic both, from what I remember - due to his ignorance. And that man is very PROUD of his ignorance!
 
#5 ·
@Farmpony: The aluminum off the building is long gone (they scrapped most of it for the other dilapidated buildings on the property), for what little good it's worth. All that's left is the wood posts with the rusty nails sticking out... and on the wall-section that fell down recently, they had a collection of rusty handsaws hung up. :/
But, yes, I've told him about how those handsaws could fall and cut a horse, or the roll of wire that was half-buried in the dirt could wrap around a leg (I got ****** and latched it onto the dad's truck when he parked nearby, so that when he pulled away, he had to pull that wire out with him.), and actually spent an entire day with two of my (very good) friends picking up pieces of broken glass and metal out of a small section, piling them in a few 5 gallon buckets, and spreading them out in the living room on a piece of plastic, then hiding all his shoes. So far, the message hasn't gotten across.

@Vida: I do go after the more open areas with the pull-behind mower on the 4-wheeler, and when I'm out burning down weeds in the ditches, I go in the junkyard and start burning down some of those weeds. Half the time he's letting them in there when there isn't anything for them to eat there anyway, but he still uses the "they can tromp down the weeds" excuse.

@dee: Oh, my dad likes to give the horses random not-good-for-them foods, too. As soon as any bread in the house starts to mold, I have to hide it in the bottom of the trash, because he'll throw it to the horses... mold and all. He likes to give them cattle grain, too, and if his brothers throw out bales of hay that were for the cattle (usually because it got wet and moudy, or it's covered in raccoon droppings) dad "rescues" it and tries to give it to the horses because "they're not worth anything anyway."
 
#6 ·
what a shame. it will be terrible if anything happens to them. you'll have to think up something really good to convince him to stop putting them in the 'junk yard'
 
#8 ·
He gives them cattle grain?????? I would kill him. There's all kinds of additives in cattle feed that is bad, i.e. deadly for horses in TINY amounts (like teaspoon size).

Last summer I came home to Soda eating a pile of corn in the pasture. Apparently dad thought it would be a nice treat to empty out the hopper for the corn stove and give it to the horses. It was like a 5 gallon bucket full of freaking corn. Argh. Of course, after I explained it to him he asks before giving the horses anything like that.
 
#9 ·
It's not like store-bought cattle grain, or I really would kill him. No, it's just a mix of alfalfa, clover, and whole oats that they throw at the cattle once in awhile. Everytime he gives it to them, the whole herd comes up with diarrhea; our vet has me give them this stuff that's like pepto-bismol for horses (pro-cmc or something, I think? I don't have it in front of me), to help keep them from getting ulcers and the like.
 
#10 ·
Oh thats way better. :) I was like WHAT????!!! Well it could be worse, I know old farmers that do try to feed the cattle feed to the horses (thankfully they've been caught before they actually did it).

I think a goat or two is in order here. They could just "show up".... Or since your dad says the horses aren't worth anything find some way to evaluate them and what they would sell for and tell him that's what they're worth... or you could play the dirty card and the next time he says that ask him how much his daughter's happiness is worth. Then tell him that's the worth of those horses. That might make him think for a minute.
 
#11 ·
Oh, I'd love a goat... We almost bought one, once, because both my mom and I think they're adorable and one of my friends used to have some goats that ran with their horses. Dad always complains that they smell and are hard to keep contained... but I see a lot of people just tying them out like a dog. Does that usually work out OK?
I did once look up the worth of our horses... I found a site that you put in all the horse's basic info (breed, gender, age, training, temperament, etc.) and, sadly enough, Ruby was worth the most at about $400. And that was before the horse market went down. (I never had Tanner and Magic evaluated, though. Since they're papered, they're probably worth more...) But dad doesn't consider them to be worth anything because the most money I get out of them is maybe $12/year at little local shows. ^^; And the most we ever paid for one was $500 for 2-Pak.

I always play that dirty card; I'm his only child, so I always say "You wouldn't want your favorite daughter to cry, would you? Cause I would if one of them got hurt..." (And he knows full well how upset I can get, even over little scratches that the horse himself probably doesn't notice.) His response is always that if they're so smart, they won't get hurt, or something like that.
 
#12 ·
Argh, that would be frustrating. At least my dad knows that horses aren't smart (at least in that sense). Hehe, he actually calls them "el stupido". He doesn't say it meanly, kind of jesting and with affection. Of course we still have very un-safe fencing, but I can only do so much at a time. I don't know what to tell you. I believe you can tie the goat out, but I wouldn't tie it in the junkyard area it would probably get tangled. How big is the area? Could you fence it in with goat proof fencing? My mom just suggested a donkey? I'm not sure how well that would work (how smart are they?)....
 
#13 ·
We have the unsafe fencing issue, too (barbed wire), but in some senses, I can see where it works better than running all electric or panel fences. And except for once incident where, after a very heavy rain, Ruby slid down a hill and hit the fence, we've never had our horses get hurt in the fence... versus one of my friends, who's had her horses in part wood panel fence (with an electric wire across the top) and part electric tape fencing, and her horses are constantly getting into trouble.... wrapping themselves in the electric fence, running through the wood panel and/or getting legs and head stuck between the planks.
My dad doesn't even know the horse's names (he refers to them as "the little sh*ts", the "white ones", the "bid stupid one", and "the mare".) and has actually gotten 2-Pak responding to "Hey, stupid!"
The junkyard area is... maybe an acre or two. It has fencing around three sides, but we can't run permanent fencing down the third side because it gets swampy if it rains and the posts fall over. It's pretty much a drainage ditch on that side.
I might look into a goat... it seems lots of people around here are interested in getting rid of them pretty cheap. Probably not a donkey (or mule), though, because they eat more over the winter than a goat would.
 
#14 ·
I have barb wire too and really I've never had a problem (for like 15 years now) *knocks on wood*. Of course my friend's mare just blew through her barb wire fence (gun shot scare) and ripped the heck out of herself. Otherwise I have one strand of smooth wire electric in the paddock... I worry about it visability wise, so I may put up some white tape on the top and bottom.

But then again maybe I've never had issues because my horses have plenty of space and all get along just fine. A lot of the problems I've heard have to do with over-stocked paddocks/pastures and horses going after eachother & going through the fence. Or areas that are too small to allow the horse to get away from the scary thing without going through the fence. I don't really know though. :) If you get a goat post some pics.. I keep thinking about getting one, but my fence isn't anywhere close to adequate.
 
#15 ·
Yeah, we've had horses in barbed wire for 19 years, and nothing major... almost everyone around here does, too. I think it has a lot to do with if the horse(s) respect the fence, too. Except 2-Pak, who likes to lean across the top and eat grass on the other side, none of my horses will get near the fence. It's like electric fence -- they know it hurts, so they stay away. Versus a piece of wood doesn't really hurt them, just get in the way, so why would they bother to respect it, you know?

I talked to my dad today, too, about getting a goat. He said no, outright, because they're hard to keep fenced in and they doesn't tie up very well. He said maybe a sheep, though, because they'll eat the grass and the weeds (whereas the goat will supposedly only eat the weeds), and you can keep them in the same kind of fence as a horse. So I'm keeping an eye out for sheep. ^_^
We used to have a llama, too, that dad really liked. It ate a lot of weeds and such that the horses wouldn't eat, and I've heard you can break them to ride! XD
 
#17 ·
I'd love to, but llamas are harder to find than sheep (not real hard tho, they're always at the auctions... it's just that we know some people who would probably hand us a whole herd of sheep if we asked. XD), eat more, and seem to have worse personalities. They cost more, too.
 
#19 ·
Sheep would be a good alternative. You would just have to keep an eye out for bits of wire getting stuck in their wool. They are pretty good for junky areas apart from that, we run our 10 or so merino rams and 2 white suffolk rams in a paddock with a junkyard area (sheets of corrugated iron, old fencing wire, old machinery, etc...) and they haven't ever injured themselves. Not too hard to keep in, either.
 
#20 ·
So what kind of fencing do you use? My dad suggested this goat fencing that we have a roll of (it's basically smooth wire in big squares), but I saw what wire like that did to a friend's horse, and I'm hesitant to have the roll on the same property as the horses, much less actually use it.
 
#21 ·
Pretty much anything. Our sheep are all in normal (for here) 5 or so strand fencing. Smooth wire. Most of the fences have either a barb or hotwire on the top, but that's more for the cattle.

Pretty much anything that you can get good tension on (otherwise they will push through) and have either a few strands close-ish to the ground, or a mesh type fence, or wooden planks fairly close to the ground.
 
#23 ·
He already pays for the vet bills.... I pay for everything else, and my mom insisted on paying the vet bills. As far as treating the wounds... I don't think I'd trust him doing that. His idea of treating his own wounds is to dump some peroxide on them when they get infected.

Mom knows and agrees with me... she's always the first one to let me know when dad tries to sneak them into the junk yard. :wink:
 
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