The Wild Thoroughbred

From the time of her birth, Goldie was hardly ever touched by a human.  Sure, her owners fed her and her dam, along with her two older half sisters, but no handling was ever done.  She was allowed to live like she was a wild Mustang, instead of a Thoroughbred with a possible racing future.  In the late spring of her yearling year, Goldie's life changed, when she met me.

I was working on a ranch in Texas, where Goldie's sire stood at stud.  Goldie's owners wanted her dam to be bred back to Goldie's sire, so we took the horse trailer to go pick up Goldie's dam.   The owners also decided that we should take Goldie and her older half sisters, too.   They were in desperate need of farrier care and some handling. 

It took over an hour to get the 4 of them loaded onto the trailer.  The older sisters had some handling, but not a lot.  Just enough that a halter was able to be put on them and they would lead a little bit, but not great.  We loaded the older sisters first, then Goldie's dam, and Goldie had to be herded onto the trailer.

Despite what her name may be, she was not gold in color, actually almost a dark bay, with only a hint of red to her coat.  I don't think she even had any white markings, maybe a tiny star, but I don't remember, for sure.

Once back at the ranch, it was my job to start teaching Goldie about humans and start her early training.   Since I had some experience with Mustangs, I decided to treat her similar to how I had been successful with them.

Goldie was put in the barn, if you can call it that, as it was more of a 3 sided building with 4 foot high panels on the front.  You could open them up and give the horses a small run area.   Her area was usually kept open and it measured about 16 x 32 feet, at most.

I would stand by her feed bucket as she ate, so she would get used to my scent and me being present while she ate.  At first, I did this from the other side of the metal panel, and when she had accepted me being there, I would then stand beside the bucket, but on the same side of the panel as she was on, so I was now in her space.  I wanted her to get used to me being there, my smell, my voice, my movements, etc.

Once she became more relaxed about that, I started to hold the bucket and have her come to me to eat.   She could only eat if she came to me and stuck her head into the bucket I was holding.   This took a few days, but soon she caught on and started to accept this, so then I moved to the next step, which was trying to touch her.

At first, every time my hand moved towards her, no matter how slowly, she would jump away and run to the back of the pen.  But, she'd soon come back, hunger for the grain winning over her fear of me.  

A few more days passed and I was soon petting her gently on the head.   So, i then hung the bucket back up on the panel and stood next to it, again, as she ate, this time I had both hands free to try and touch her.  First just her head, then her neck, then her shoulder, each day a little further.

Everyday we made slow progress in where I could touch her and pet her gently.  When I'd try to go a bit further, she'd still wheel and run to the back of the pen.  I never feared her kicking me, even though I am pretty sure she was kicking out in my direction, as she ran away, but something told me that she was not mean, and would not intentionally hurt me.

We were making great progress and I added a halter to the top of the feed bucket, for her to stick her nose through, in order to eat.   This did spook her quite a bit and the next thing I knew the ranch owner was running out of the house and yelling at me that I was doing this all wrong and I was going to get hurt.   So, she decided to take matters into her own hands and show me, what she considered, the "right way" to deal with a wild horse was.

I had spent weeks building up a relationship with Goldie and my heart sank as this woman returned with a lunge whip.  She entered the pen with Goldie and all I could do was stand by and hope and pray she would not undo all my hard work to gain Goldie's trust.

A common practice, which I was aware of before this woman decided to show me, is to use a whip as an extension of your arm, but since I am legally blind, this actually is more dangerous for me, then the way I was doing it.  I do not like using whips, unless I have to.

This woman reached out and started touching Goldie with the end of the whip and GOldie completely flipped out.  She was racing around the small pen trying to find a way to escape, but there was no way out.  Goldie was scared out of her mind as this woman insisted on continueing to touch Goldie.   This went on for what seemed like hours, but was maybe 45 minutes.   Goldie never accepting the lunge whip touching her.  I was almost in tears knowing how scared Goldie must have been.   She had only known my kind hands and now a whip was being flung at her, she was hit with it, several times, it wasn't just used as an extension of a calm hand.

We left Goldie to settle down and I had to listen to this woman tell me that I had to do the same thing the next day.  That my way was taking too long and she thought I was going to get hurt.

But in my way, Goldie never raced around the pen frantically looking for a way out.  For me, with my vision, that is way more dangerous than me standing calmly at one end of the pen, just trying to calmly touch her as she ate, and if she needed a break from me, she could just go to the back of the pen and I would let her have her moment and then she would always return to me.

The next day I tried to stand by the bucket, like I had done all those days, even weeks, before, but Goldie would not have any part of me.   I started to cry, I couldn't help it.  I told her how sorry I was, but that the lady was my boss and I had no say.

I quit that job about a week later, never regaining Goldie's confidence.   I had other reasons, not just the Goldie experience for leaving this job, but it was part of it.  I think the main theme of the difficulty is the lady's insistance that her way was the only right way and that any variation of that was wrong and dangerous.   I tried to explain that I had to do things differently, sometimes, due to my eyesight, but like many others, she just didn't understand or want to understand, she was stubborn in her thinking and not willing to believe that there could be more than one right way to do something.

Experiences like what I went through with Goldie leave me wondering why do people insist on their way always being the right way and the quick way being better than a slow way?   I will never understand people like this.   I need to do things a bit differently, because of my vision, this doesn't make it wrong, it just is what works for me and I still get great results.   I have never been seriously hurt by a horse, but if I do get hurt, it happens to sighted people all the time, it won't be due to my vision or my techniques.

I had been very successful with the Mustangs I had worked with, see my post on "The Mustangs of Hawkeye Hill", for more details, and I know that if Goldie and I had been left alone, just a little bit longer, I would have had that halter on her, had her leading, had her loading on a trailer, accepting tack, and eventually a rider.

Someone else was brought in to work with Goldie, after I left, and I don't know all the details, but she was eventually broke to ride, but I don't think she ever made it to the track.   A shame, as she was a nice filly, just was never given the chance from the start.