I should probably post this to equestrian...

[coneycat]

...but since laws are different everywhere it makes more sense to look into it for my locale.

I was at the barn briefly last night and the barn owner told me that she happened to walk out back in the afternoon and caught a neighbour kid and one of her little friends in the pen with two of the mares, brushing them. Apparently the neighbour girl (BO

Comments

[bogwitch64]

Gadzooks, that's annoying! I mean, I feel for the kid. She's probably one of those horsecrazy young ladies who dreams of having one of her own without having the slightest idea of what a huge responsibility having a horse is. I know. I was one of those girls! And I did have a horse in my teens after a child-sized lifetime of wishing.

I kept my horse in an all-Arab barn. Some of those horses were worth a LOT of money. They had very strict diets. Every once in a while we'd have kids come from the neighboring develpments with bags of carrots and apples. Not good. And the back paddock was for the babies, which of course attracted every kid in existence when there was one or two in there. And I, of course, was the barnhand in charge of the baby barn tasked with keeping the kids away...while cleaning out stalls...and taking care of my own horse. It was insane!

[coneycat]

I do feel for the child, and I have at least one memory of doing something foolish when I was decidedly old enough to know better so if I'm honest... no moral high ground. But the thought of a kid getting hurt, especially if there was nobody around at the time, makes my blood run cold. I really, really hope this is the last time this kid does such a thing.

Thank God we don't have any real babies, because yeah, the sheer cuteness factor would be enough to make a kid lose her head. Not, one hopes, literally...

[bogwitch64]

Those little suckers can KICK!! I got kicked by a bitsy baby once (I'm hoping by accident! She was frollicking and I got in the way.) Man, that hurt! I thought she broke my shinbone!

[coneycat]

Yeah, and the thing about babies is, they don't know any better! They won't whoa, they won't lead, they won't get over, they won't respect your space--because these are all things they have to be taught, and they haven't been alive long enough for anyone to do it! And they're largish and frolicsome!

I mean, I wouldn't let kids loose near Mitzi, who is ten and gentle and likes kids... and is spooky sometimes. The two-year-old at our place is a nice little filly, but she hasn't been handled anywhere near enough. And there are a couple of big horses who need more miles on them before I'd lead them past a kid. The prospects chill me.

[buymeaclue]

Oof, this is why I will, if I see someone I don't know milling around the barn, ask if they need any help or are looking for someone, etc. I don't know every lesson kid or parent, but I figure that if they're a lesson kid or a parent, they'll say as much, and life will go on.

I think a lot of people just aren't familiar with horses and don't understand that they aren't just big gentle dogs (although I don't encourage people to pet random dogs on the street, and oh, the yelling I got a few months ago from a woman when I advised not let her kids climb all over mine, especially without asking first!), and oh, I do sympathize with kids who just want to pet the ponies! But better for everyone if someone can intervene and shape that petting desire a bit.

[coneycat]

I think a lot of people just aren't familiar with horses and don't understand that they aren't just big gentle dogs

I have had a remarkable number of conversations with people in which they've said something like, "It's weird a horse reacts like A, when my dog always does B."

Me: "The difference is, dogs and cats are predators, and horses are prey. They're wired differently."
Non-horsey person: *makes face of sudden understanding "Oohhhh..."

I am also all sympathy, unless the kid is a brat which most of them are not. And when I was a professional manure-mover I used to be friendly to random wanderers-in. It was just a lot easier in a place that did have staff, and you could be pretty sure someone would be around to spot unexpected visitors. Our barn is small and private and sometimes unattended. I just hope the BO is able to find the kid's parents and explain things. Or that, you know, they decide to enroll her in lessons at one of the local lesson barns, so she can have actual horsey contact and learn stuff. Fingers crossed!

[serennig]

We've had "tourists" come by and pat the horses before. We're never entirely sure if they're maybe someone's family, or what, so you never want to assume and come across unfriendly. Sometimes they're shopping for a barn for themselves, and that's why they're wandering. It doesn't help that there's a "Visitors Welcome" sign at the front, a leftover from its days as an exclusively polo barn. There are no horses at the front though... you have to drive all the way in to find them. I keep saying we ought to teardown/replace/paint over the Visitors Welcome sign, but nobody ever gets around to it (takes two people

[coneycat]

He was in there, with heavy equipment, digging up the ground, with my horses right there!

You... have no idea what kind of face I'm making right now. o_O doesn't begin to cover it.

I find most people are quite nice about identifying themselves if I ask them--"I'm Bay Mare Kid's mother! I'm never out here!" and I've actually been gently accosted a time or two by new boarders who didn't know me, so I don't mind speaking to someone who doesn't seem to know what they're doing. I've given a few guided tours to people whose curiosity was satisfied and I never saw them again, which is ideal from my POV!

[serennig]

This fellow has an ongoing lack of respect for the Barn as a private property separate from his own. He's been caught dropping branches into the barn's wastepiles, and even dropping trash in the barn's dumpsters -- without paying for it, of course. There's historical reasons (obvious from satellite imagery ;) as to why this confusion might arise -- the properties were once one, but were split in a divorce and he bought the house part. He still actually has to use the barn's main driveway in order to access his rear shed/garage

[coneycat]

Yeah, there are times when "well, nothing bad happened" just doens't cut it anymore. And I have a real hot-button issue with people treating my stuff like their stuff and not even asking. Grr. There's the line where you don't want to be nagging the guy all the time, but you also don't want to tacitly accept what he's doing in case someday he ever did get hurt and decided to sue. Honestly, people!

[coneycat]

Heck, the only horse at our barn who's ever kicked me is Mitzi. I startled her, she kicked. And this is a horse who goodness knows likes me.

As I said to bogwitch64, I have at least once done something stupid that I should have known better and gotten away with it. That doesn't make me in any way more eager to see some other kid (who probably doesn't know better) taking the same chance. Someone's luck is apt to run out.

Also, OW! I'm very glad your bite incident didn't turn out worse, but OW!

[chocolatekettle]

Eep. That's worrying for many reasons, really. The child's safety, the horses' safety, the gate...
I remember bringing sugar to horses in a field down the road from our house, when I was wee. But I wouldn't have gone in to the field because I didn't know the horses or their owners (and also because of the polite but firm sign informing all comers that the mare was extremely protective of her foal). Still wouldn't, unless there was an urgent reason.

[coneycat]

You occasionally still see signs on the stalls at horse shows: "Some horses bite." Doesn't indicate that horse is a biter, but it's a good warning.

With any luck, the fact she got caught and scolded will deter this particular kid from coming back. It would have been nice if she'd been able to organize her parents to come with her to ask to see the horses, though. I'm always in favour of helping someone get their horsey contact. Just, you know, safely!