posted on June 16, 2001 10:38:09 PM new
So my mule, Sweet Fanny Adams, and I went out solo again last evening. I was feeling comfortable on an endurance saddle I was trying out (on loan from a friend)--much more comfortable than on the western saddle I've been using that also seems to pinch Sweet FA a bit at the withers.
All in all things were going OK until...emus entered the picture. Sweet FA had stopped dead, staring across the street. All *I* could see were two sheep grazing in an overgrown back yard. After much coaxing & turnabouts I finally got her to continue on and all *might* have been well if I hadn't turned right at the corner & crossed the street to circle toward home. I had a brief glimpse of three emus walking about in the front yard of the corner house--then Sweet Fanny Adams slammed to a halt, which had me going toward her neck then, like lightning, she zoomed to the right (back across the sctreet). I, on the other hand, went just as swiftly to the left and went slamming & then skidding into the pavement!
As I picked myself up I saw that Sweet Fanny Adams, bless her heart, had stopped when she got back across the street & circled back toward me before standing still. I gimped over & took hold of her reins with no problem. Some people who'd been driving by stopped to see if I was OK. I have road rash down one arm, on the palms of both
hands, and one knee is banged & swollen. My face is *very* attractive, what with the scrape on my cheek & chin, the weird star-shaped cut over my eyebrow & the purply-red "black" eye.
The moral of this story is that mules & emus do *not* mix & that one should always look past the sheep to see what is on the other side...
posted on June 16, 2001 11:17:48 PM new
I knew that a horse has breed into it's genes from millions of years of predation that a target store bag stuck in the weeds is but the snout tip of a carnivore the size of a T-Rex waiting to pounce and crush it in one mighty gulp. But I thought mules were more sensible.
posted on June 16, 2001 11:40:24 PM new
We are having bizzare animal day (week/month) here, too.
I live in a bacwards county that allows fireworks not only on the fourth......... but ALL year long! Our 110 lb dog took leave of his senses sometime last year. He is so petrified of ANY fireworks, even the little twinkly things now that he just goes bananas. In the last year he has;
chewed the cedar siding off the house along the back door in a 2' X 4' high area trying to get inside with us where it's 'safe', unfortunately we were not home.
Chewed the cedar siding off the house in a matching area in the front........... but the security alarm wires ran through there somewhere and the alarm rang for an hour and a half until a neighbor came over and cut them. (no cops showed up, so much for security) He was trying to get inside with us where it's 'safe', unfortunately we were again not home.
We have chainlink fencing around front & back. He has tunnelled out so many different spots that a stranger would think we have a grizzly bear escaping/breaking in. (huge clumps of shepherd/rottweiler hair stuck along fence bottom). We are in process of laying cinder block with rebar and pouring concrete all along fence bottom but he digs faster than we can afford more cinder blocks ('member when those things were about 50 cents each?)
We'd completely resided the front with T-12 which is flat and he couldn't get a grip so he chewed the wooden door frame OFF up to 4' high, threw all my potted plants off the porch and had himself worked almost to a heart attack by the time we got home.
He is a very good boy and we rely on him. He's perfect with kids and very impressive if you take him for a walkie. He NEVER escapes just to galivant. He never goes anywhere or runs around. He doesn't want in the house other times, stands at the door and patiently waits to go out on his rounds.
Any sugestions? I would use a sedative if we were still in California where you only (legally) were allowed to shoot them one day a year. (and we just anticipated New Years as an extra 'given') I would give him a beer if it was a known day. But being uninformed we feel helpless to cope. I don't want to start a good boy on a drinking problem.
posted on June 17, 2001 08:58:48 AM newgravid: To be fair, what mule (or horse) would be prepared to come upon a 4 ft. tall emu in the normal way of things? And, we were out solo. Mules & horses are herd animals. Prey animals. When out solo they are much more alert & nervous than if they are in a group. And, she had had shown me that something ahead was bothering her--but being a human I forced her to go on. As predators, we humans tend to not empathize with or understand the feelings & reactions of prey animals we deal with.
posted on June 17, 2001 09:03:16 AM newimmykidsmom: I sympathize! My dogs have never had such a severe reaction to fireworks as yours does. But I, fortunately, live in California & I always stay home on July 4th because I worry about careless people shooting off fireworks that might go into my yard & scare the dogs.
Your dog's reaction is so severe that, if I were you, I'd find a good trainer in your area that specializes in neuroses like this in dogs & have him/her work with the dog to overcome the extreme fear of fireworks.
posted on June 17, 2001 09:53:43 AM new
You have a point there. I guess they are such a strange shape they are hard to classify. Bigg enough to be a worry though.
The wife and I go to a hotel on /Sanibel Island and the last time there a large gator had taken up residence in a nice pond in the landscaping. It was embarrassing that it ignored everyone else but when I went to the pond it would retreat to the middle and keep turned toward me. I can move very quietly so one day I left my change in my room and when I was going to the beach I snuck a look from the balcony to see where it was and used the curve of the bank to hide from the gator and snuck up on it. When it it turned it's head to look at some kids on the other side I silently stood up and when it turned it's head back and I was standing about 6 foot away it dug a hole in the grass like a cultivator getting out of Dodge. It stayed under so long I was starting to think it had another way out.
I know I am large but that does not seem to me to be enough reason to be that afraid.
I have snuck up on other animals - for example I have climbed above big horn sheep and sat down to wait for them to come up past me and they just kind of give you the old fish eye from about 20 foot away if you sit quiet, but do not get all frantic and have a panic attack like this thing.
posted on June 17, 2001 10:05:26 AM newGravid: you don't, by any chance, wearing a belt or boots made out of gator hide do you?
Horses & mules can find the strangest things (to us) to be bothered about. A large rock at the side of the road. A small windmill in someone's yard. A plastic bag caught on a fence. *Water* on the ground. We tend to forget that they do *not* have depth perception as we do, and that their field of vision (though much wider than ours) has a "hole" directly in front of them due to the spacing of their eyes. Add that to the fact that they are prey animals and you come up with a whole different philosophy on just what is scary or to be avoided...
posted on June 17, 2001 11:11:50 AM new
LOL - no no "green" gator products to worry her....not even picking gator from my teeth.
Once I took my wife within two foot of a HUGE gator out in the swamp. He was in the 7 to 8 foot range. She had a similar reaction like your mule. Got upset when I stopped and pointed and she could not see him. Then I said "yellow eyes" softly and it clicked into her recognition what he was and how big. I assured her that if he came out of the water for her he WOULD be belts and boots before he realized what had happened to him because we both weigh about 400 lbs and I had a 20 inch cane knife in the small of my back that
will cut 5 inch logs in one stroke. Sharp enough to shave the hair off your arm. She still was not happy until we were a couple hundred foot away. I am much more afraid of brown bears that these fellows. Made her real twitchy though.
I have road rash down one arm, on the palms of both
