Thanks to the rain we’ve had recently, grass is popping up all over. The horses’ heads are down and they are doing what comes naturally. Sometimes it’s hard to wrap one’s mind around “naturally.” We are trying to get the five horses out together during the day to give them a most natural environment, but it isn’t always comfortable, at least for me. For example, we recently put Digger, our newest horse, out with Snitch, Party Girl and Spirit. Spirit has decided he needs to keep his distance from them and chases him away when he tries to join the group. Spirit isn’t “wrong,” she’s just being a horse and following her true nature, but it’s difficult for human me to see Digger left out. What to do?
People have been studying horse behavior for eons and have come up with lots of ideas for managing that behavior in a humane way. But I’m still not sure we humans “get it”….we aren’t horses after all so how could we? (I’m not even sure, despite all of the information out there, that we have it down as to our own human nature, so it’s not surprising we haven’t figured out what it’s like to be another species.) We may try Digger with Sheldon and see if that can be a good pasture relationship, or we make try some other combinations and see how the horses get along. We definitely don’t want any horse getting hurt as they sort it out. But no matter how we proceed or try to interpret what’s going on, the true nature of the horses will prevail.
I am not a horse and perhaps can never know the true nature of another species, and I may not be able to figure out what is truly “best” for the horses, but maybe with an open, loving heart, and a watchful eye my best guess will suffice.