On October 29th, my friend and I took our small horse trailer over the mountain to pick up two rescue miniature molly mules. As usual, we knew nothing about them. A lady at the facility loaded them. Our 2 horse trailer’s divider cannot be removed anymore – it took a winch to latch it into place the last time (we do loan it to others in need… I think we have to stop doing that, we need it too much ourselves), so each mule was in one stall. But, at first, the smaller one tried to climb in with the lady and the bigger mule. Without thinking much about it, I moved over to direct the little one to the other stall – she kicked me square on the thigh. Ouch.
The small one was obviously unhandled. The other, totally “in your lap” confident. We had a safe trip home with them. We had secured a board atop the back of the trailer above the rear doors, in case they might get turned around (so they would not be able to “jump” out). We did not tie them, they were not haltered… we came home nice and easy, stopping to check on them often.
Back at Dharmahorse, we had the Quarantine Pen ready for them to share. We backed the trailer up to the open gate of the pen, made sure all perimeter gates were closed and opened the trailer doors. Nothing. They just stood in the stalls. So we gave them time to settle. It gave us the chance for Mark to put a halter on the tame girl through the feed door (she was on the left side).
Hindsight really is 20/20. We should have turned a halter inside out & put it on the littler one, fastening on the off side… but, truth be told, it would not have actually helped. She might have even gotten hurt wearing it because we could not have taken it off (I had no leather halters that small!).
Two hours passed (I’m not kidding). They would try to step down, but it scared them to back out. We comforted them and did try to drive them backwards with some swishing of a bag at their chests. Nope. They were stoic.
Realizing the trouble was the “drop” as they stepped back, Mark got a pallet with a piece of plywood on it and we set it (carefully) at the back of the trailer. I watched the little one (we named her “Pumpkin”) like a hawk! To step down now was only an inch down. We put a longe line on each side of the haltered molly (we named her “Willow”) and ran the lines back to “line drive” her, straight and steady, to back out.
Willow yielded to the lines and backed out – the second she did so, Pumpkin came out like a flash! Willow was obviously a “pocket pony”, so we took her halter off. Pumpkin was obviously totally feral… untouched by human hands (except, as we later learned, being trapped by panels to enable the blood draw for her Coggins test and microchipping). Which actually, was a breach of trust for her. We had our work cut out for us!
Fortunately, we have on our team, a remarkable woman training the green equines. Her skill and compassion are a thing of beauty. When we were able to break quarantine and eventually separate the mules, this lady started the long, patient process of building Pumpkin’s trust. First, she just stood, neutral, in the pen with a wand and directed Pumpkin to face her, then to stand, then to let the wand near her and to eventually, touch the wand with her nose. She slowly got to rub Pumpkin with a glove on the end of the wand. And today, she had her first touching of the little mule’s face with a glove on her hand! See the video
Here you can see the difference in their personalities! And over the Christmas weekend, Willow went to a wonderful adoptive home (on trial for 10 days, it has to be right for Willow and her new family). While Pumpkin and the other equines here need to be in sanctuary, Willow is physically and emotionally healthy, young and loves people – she needed a family of her own.
We’ll see how it all works out for Willow. She will always have a home here, but her new digs include 5 acres, a barn, pasture and a stablemate. Our fingers are crossed!
Stablewomen 