Horse and dog incident this morning

[DrHildegardeLanstrom]

Had quite a scary experience on our morning walk this morning.
My dog and I have crossed this field and the others with horses on many times and have never had any incidents. I have been around horses all my life and understand how they can be inquisitive. My dog is under full control on a short lead and is well behaved around horses.

This morning he was with me on a short lead as normal, and my DD was with me. The field had several horses, all grazing at the bottom of the field well away from the footpath route. As we got halfway across, two trotted over and reached us in no time.
One came up and sniffed my dog very close, which scared him so he barked. The horse instantly turned around and kicked him, luckily a glancing hit which appears to have done no damage.
We turned around straight away however the horse kept trying to kick us (I really thought I was going to be kicked) and was blocking our path. My DD was very scared, so I sent her to run back to the gate and managed to get there myself despite being pursued by the horses.

There is no damage done, however I have never experienced such a thing in 30 years of horse experience. The horse clearly felt threatened by us being there and came across the field.

AIBU to email the yard and make them aware?

I agree with this, it is an entirely believable situation. And even a horse with normally OK ground manners might not respond to verbal cues from someone it doesn't know, when in the middle of a field and in perhaps a rather belligerent mood.

Can you confirm OP if you were on a public footpath, recreation space, etc or were you possibly trespassing on private land? It really is very relevant to your OP. Councils everywhere own land they rent/lease out and often not for Public Use.

@Toomuchtrouble4me Have you never been to New Forest?

@DrHildegardeLanstrom no thoughts on the matter other than I love your name!! 😆

When the horses trotted up the OP should have put her daughter and dog behind her. I'm assuming the right of way runs down one side of the field, in which case there would be a hedge or fencing where daughter and dog could have been shielded by mum.
A field is usually fairly flat and OP would have seen the horses before they got near enough to sniff the dog and it was a bit daft not to keep the dog behind her and tell it to sit.
If, as she says, she turned round to go then the horse (which was facing her as it nosed the dog) could not have kicked unless it too turned around. Horses can't kick with their forelegs.
Something not quite right.

A similar thing happened to me - on a public footpath, 5 horses came and surrounded me and my dog. One of them stood on his tail. He was terrified, as was I.

I let him off the lead, and they chased me and him. DH then managed to distract them to come over to him, they surrounded him, while me and dog made run for it, but we weren't fast enough and they chased us again and surrounded us while I fumbled with the bloody rope that tied the gate shut.

My friend told the landowner about the incident - and he just laughed and said 'oh that person was obviously not used to being in the countryside then'. I've lived here my whole life.

The whole thing was fucking terrifying, I cried my eyes out - its' a public footpath close to my home which I have walked on literally my whole life since I was little. I will never go there again. That farmer and his arrogance have ruined it for me.

For what it's worth the law does NOT state that dogs must be kept on a lead around livestock - it says they must be kept under control. So a dog can be off lead in a field with animals if you're confident you have control of it.

How many farmers have you seen with their dogs on a lead in a field?

What a load of bollocks - plenty of footpaths cross through the middle of fields, and no fields are not usually flat - have you never been to the countryside?

OP said the horse nosed her dog then spun around to kick it with its back legs.

The only thing that is not quite right is your logic and ability to read.

OP confirmed it was a public footpath

Happened to me many years ago. Was crossing a designated public footpath across a field with my son who was about 10 at the time. Horse came running across the field, flung around and kicked my son on the thigh. The bruise was amazing and he was lucky not to have his leg broken. Had no idea who owned the horse so could do nothing to inform them.

Unpopular opinion but this thread just cements for me that horses are just awful, unnecessary animals.

Some of the stuff you hear horses getting away with … if it was a dog they wouldn’t have had that second chance.

I’m not a dog person either in case people think I’m a ‘dogs can do no wrong’ type.

Give me a nice, slightly standoffish cat every time!!

There are a lot of unreasonable mares on this thread. That sounds really scary OP and I’m glad you’re all alright.

I hope people can see the link between this and the thread about feeding horses. The people who think it's OK to feed horses when they are out and about are one of the reasons horses mob people going through their fields. Usually horses only approach people if they think there's something in it for them. Even then, if horses come over, if the situation is handled properly you should be safe but things like barking dogs, loud people, foals in the field... can change the situation.

For what it's worth the law does NOT state that dogs must be kept on a lead around livestock - it says they must be kept under control. So a dog can be off lead in a field with animals if you're confident you have control of it.

While this is technically correct, if you are walking through a farmers field and signs ask you to have your dog on a lead, then that's what you should do - out of basic respect to the land owner if nothing else.

How many farmers have you seen with their dogs on a lead in a field?

It's irrelevant because the law doesn't apply to their own dogs on their own land.

This has happened to us before, DH nearly got kicked in the head by a horse - we were on a public footpath with the dog on the lead as well. It doesn't take much effort to section off a metre round the edge of a field to keep people safe, it really riles me!

ADHDkillingme
Unpopular opinion but this thread just cements for me that horses are just awful, unnecessary animals.
..
Give me a nice, slightly standoffish cat every time!!

Your cat will try to kill you to eat you.

Just saying

Pawtriarchal
There are a lot of unreasonable mares on this thread. That sounds really scary OP and I’m glad you’re all alright.

unreasonably stallions

I noticed your dog whistle.

Had anyone ever noticed how often female = bad

That is exactly what my mare does on occasion to other horses. Something sets her off, she gets really angry, she corners them so the can’t escape, turns, double barrels then for about 10-15 minutes then just walks off like nothing has happened. She’s a bitch with other horses. In the years I’ve owned her she’s only done it a handful of times, and through sheer luck she’s not injured anything seriously. But I’m telling you it’s full attack, I’ve had people try to stop her with jump poles, and lunging whips - nothing.

because of this madam us either kept on her own or with one or two other horses who are not the in your face types, apparently they are the ones she dislikes.

this is also the reason she isn’t kept near public footpaths. She adores people and is the sweetest thing to humans, but if someone stated feeding her in the field it is likely she would pick a fight with any other horse in there, and there would be a possibility someone could get caught up in her outburst.

As has been said numerous times, public rights of don't always go along the edges of fields and farmers aren't allowed to move them without permission.

By law, they must keep the original right of way clear and accessible at all times. They can't just move it to another point in the field, even if it would make everyone's lives easier by doing so!

Fields come in all shapes and sizes, often with PROW straight across the middle of them.

horses can strike out with one of their forelegs or they can rear up and use both. They can also turn on a sixpence and kick out with their hind legs quick as anything. Just showing a distinct lack of imagination as to how a horse could be facing the OP one minute and then kicking out at her the next

Just to please some of you, here is the PROW

Well, when I was unfortunate enough to have my 3 horses in a field with a PROW through it I set up a track about 6ft wide on either side of the path using electric fencing. I couldn't use permanent fencing because it wasn't my field and if I had it would have been difficult to use a tractor in there for maintenance. The fence was powered by a car battery and I paid out for an energiser. There were loads of signs on the fence warning that it was electrified, which meets legal requirements. There were notices at both ends of the path explaining that the electric fence was to ensure the safety of walkers and asking them to keep their dogs on the lead. Also notices explaining that one of the horses had a serious medical condition and feeding him anything at all could kill him. It lost me a lot of grazing of course...
I think the problem was that this revealed just how entitled the people using the path were, in terms of using my field and feeding my animals. I got yelled at because someone's off lead dog got zapped. "We always let him loose for a run in here". I also found food in the field obviously thrown over the electric fence for the horses to eat. Little known fact - some salad items are poisonous to horses. Horses can choke and die on an avocado stone... My car battery was stolen. Then my energiser was stolen. I climbed into brambles and put them there to sort that out. Then I found the fencing pushed down, breaking some of my plastic posts. I replaced them with fairly lightweight wooden stakes (bearing in mind that all of this had to come down when the horses moved out for field maintenance and was costing me money). Got there one day and found that someone had systematically chopped my electric tape into pieces.

Meanwhile, fortunately for me, my life was changing dramatically. I was able to move my horses first to a lovely rented property, then to a brilliant place that my partner brought. I feel so, so lucky.
The field I left is now full of cobs owned by travellers. They put a stallion in there from time to time to breed the mares. Foals are born there. The general public are back happily letting their dogs loose and feeding the horses. Leaving bags and dog shit in the field. It's a disaster waiting to happen but now if a horse hurts someone the owner will never be able to be identified.

Maybe there was something/somebody annoying the horse before you were in the field and triggered the horse to behave how it did.

Letting the stables know is a good idea, it’s not a complaint, it’s looking after the horses and any other path users before there’s a more serious incident with greater consequences.

This is silly. If your argument is that horses (other ancient horses, who may or may not be in any way genetically linked to this horse) have been in that field/on that land for 500,000 years, well, so have humans and dogs, and any horse that behaved like that would've been on a spit over a fire by the end of the day, not reported to the council.

I find it hard to believe that a horse would stand on a dog's tail, it would be most unusual as horses are normally very wary of strange dogs.

Dogs in fields of livestock must be under close control (ie. walking to heel) and remain on the actual footpath which if the footpath goes across the middle of a field is unlikely to happen unless the dog is walking to heel.

The Countryside Code also states :
"On Open Access land and at the coast, you must put your dog on a lead around livestock. Between 1 March and 31 July, you must have your dog on a lead on Open Access land, even if there is no livestock on the land. These are legal requirements."

I was responding to someone who said that the right of way pre-dated the horse being in the field. Horses were wandering the land and probably grazed the field long before rights of way existed. Of course it was not the same horse, but that's not the point.

dog whistle 🙄