Spooking a horse in a rainforest

[annarti]

Setting~ Deep in a tropical rainforest; think South-East Asia more than South American jungle. Monkeys, squawky parrots and other birds, billions of insects and mosquitoes. Hot and humid, storms like clockwork around 4 in the afternoon. Quite mountainous but relatively flat where they are now. Kind of like this, but not so bad at ground level. They

Comments

[cattraine]

A brightly colored, loudly screeching tropical bird flushed from the foliage would do the trick.

[annarti]

Is that likely to spook all the other horses, though? I really just want to get this one, and in such a way that it looks like the other guy planned it.

[irish_horse]

Trained war horses won't spook. A really placid draft horse might jerk, but wouldn't go nuts. Skittish riding horses? Definitely.

It's also possible that the bird pops out of the bush in a place where only the spooking horse in question can see it - also, don't forget that horses don't have binocular vision - what they see from the left eye can be totally alien to them when they see it again with the right.

[annarti]

I'll just have to make sure the other two skittish probably-thoroughbreds are on the other side of the mob at the time, with plenty of calm horses around them to keep them bolting as well. What they can't see can't hurt them, right? :D?

[toscaterrier]

Horses can eat mangos and bananas, but the leaves and bark of the mango trees are poisonous for them. And storms will have less of an effect if they're acclimatized in any way; most horses can get used to just about anything if they're desensitized enough

[annarti]

No response is too long! I know bugger-all about horses so this is all fantastic stuff :D

The one to be spooked has only recently been added to the herd, so definitely not a dominant personality. I'm hoping that will be enough to save the others from anything more than a shy backwards? I'm not sure I can find a plausible reason to separate it from the herd completely, but I can certainly put it in with the best-trained of them and hide the other two skitty ones on the other side.

[toscaterrier]

Well, I love talking endlessly about horses, so that works out well! x3

[annarti]

There we go, the deed has been done with the help of a spider. RIP, flitty grey thoroughbred, you served well in your couple of weeks you were in the plot <3

(Being on a bolting horse would be terrifying! I've had a look at a couple of YouTube videos demonstrating that and 'one rein stopping' just to get my head around it. Scary stuff!)

Thank you so much for all your help! I love this comm <3

[enemyfrigate]

As toscaterrier said horses have really individual 'triggers', if you will. I used to ride a very spooky thoroughbred who freaked right the fuck out when a bird would fly out of a tree, but never reacted to rabbits bolting from nearly under his feet. We used to speculate that he must have had a bad experience with a bird flying out of a tree at some point in his youth, his reaction was so strong. I took the time to get him used to a barking dog on the next property over, so he wouldn't be an idiot as I rode him down to the ring, but after a year or so of not reacting to that dog anymore, he started up again. Go figure

[annarti]

Eee magnificent, thank you! I do have one character who's likely to at least know a few plants that'd be safe for the horses to eat the leaves from, so they should be able to get by there

[annarti]

Believe me, they are most certainly not barrelling! They're not actually riding the horses at the moment, rather leading them through and checking for trip hazards with their own feet before fragile horsey ankles would get caught. I know it's going to be nothing like a well-travelled forest trail (there aren't any locals here, just monkeys and the odd tiger, and no trails save for those trod out by the local tapirs) but I guess what I meant to say is that they're not doing a full-on bush bash. It's open enough that they don't need to get out the machette to hack vines and trees out of the way just to move forward, but I'm aware it's not safe enough to ride and leave the horses to their own devices. Also, quite handily, it means my guy with the bolting horse won't be on its back to stop it bolting when it does :D

[poniesandphotos]

What you want are ground bees. That particular horse has the misinformation to step in the nest and get stung badly, this causes it to bolt. The others can go around, and since they are not getting stung (much) they're unlikely to bolt. Bees also have the bonus of stinging your characters as well, which will hurt. I've been there, it's unpleasant.

[annarti]

Oooh I like that idea. Fire-ant nest, even. My saboteur walks over and knocks the nest without noticing, moving on before the ants have a chance to do anything, then the flitty thoroughbred steps on it and they attack in numbers. Thanks for that!

[chalcopyrite]

Feeding the horses: I recall reading that a lot of the equine casualties in WWI were due to horses having inexperienced handlers who didn't know how or how much to feed them. More data-dased

[annarti]

I don't suppose you'd know of any one particular tropical leafy plant that'd do the job? Just because I like to exhaust real world possibilities for relatively mundane issues if I possibly can. The less fantasy cop-outs the better :D I can easily just shove a few million suitable real-world plants into the rainforest, otherwise, 'yellow-flowered horse-leaf' it is ;)

In my personal experience of the tropics, getting properly dry is hard enough at the best of times, let alone days from civilisation and with no hint of a breeze on the forest floor. Methinks the horsies are going to get some skin problems. Sorry, guys. Never mind, it's fantasy, we have a healer for you :D

And yes, it's actually my intention to knock this horse off--it'll be breaking its neck after the bung ankle sends it over, so not even magic healing will save the thing--so all good there!

[annarti]

Sounds like this is all stuff I should really be establishing several chapters back before they even end up in the middle of freaking nowhere, since it's all more tropics-related in general and not necessarily something that would change too much whether they're in a city or way off the beaten track. Some sort of powder (maybe even ash from the fire, once it's cooled?) would probably work to draw out moisture, I'd imagine. As you say, it's a sodding rainforest, there'll be something in there :D