Ezra

The spousal unit's new horse is, ah, interesting.

We were letting it graze in the front pasture, and it was fine until Pete (the uber-goofy German Shorthair mix) decided to start running back and forth along the fence line.

Horse started acting like it was distressed, kicking and running about. Thing is, I think the horse was having fun. I.e. I think the horse was pretending to be upset at the stupid dog-beast. When I put the dog in the house the horse kept looking over the fence as if to say "hey, where'd my friend go?"

Honestly if I had a good sturdily fenced yard (that wasn't full of chickens) I'd let the dog and horse into the same yard and let them play their goofy horsey-dogie games. And if the dog got a hoof in the midriff then maybe it would learn a lesson about messing with creatures that outweigh you 12 to 1.

I'm also thinking that the horse is going to be a bit too spirited for the kids to ride until they (and he) are older. He's not exactly well behaved on a lead line. He does what he is told but often has to be reminded that "I am the Human and I am IN CHARGE".

It's not exactly a bad thing that the critter wants to play. It's just that when a 1/2 ton critter wants to be playful things can get a bit dicey for us much smaller critters.