Annie and Cathy Brown
Rip turned six months old mid-November; all the signs indicated both mare and foal were ready for weaning. Rip mainly spent his time with the older geldings and was increasingly independent. While Annie, his dam, was cranky when he nursed and seemed to be more interested in eating and flirting with her favorite gelding than hovering over Rip.
With winter rapidly approaching, I wanted to make sure I could customize Rip’s nutritional plan to his needs. That would require separating him at night, so he had access to top-shelf hay and youth-formulated concentrates. Even his own mother would hog that delectable food away from him, so Rip needed some alone time for eating.
In most instances, when a foal is weaned from its dam, the separation is permanent. The mare has often been bred again, so her energy needs to go to the fetus. The permanent separation may occur because the foal is sold, or the mare goes elsewhere, and/or the foal is housed with other youngsters in a ‘nursery’ pen, where he lives with same-aged cohorts until it’s time for training.
Having worked at a few different breeding farms when I was younger, I’ve had a lot of experience with weaning foals, but my situation with Rip is unique. We only have five horses, including Rip and Annie, and they will stay together as one herd.
At our ranch, the horses are together all day in a big paddock, then they come into separate stalls at night. Neither Rip nor Annie is going elsewhere anytime soon, so once weaned, they will live together again. Weaning would require some thought and strategy on my part.
Prior Planning Prevents Potential Panic
I had months to think about it, talk to colleagues, and factor in my previous experiences. I concocted and scripted a plan that I was confident would limit the stress for both dam and foal and gain me the nutritional and emotional separation I hoped for. I won’t say it worked 100%, but I think we met about 80% of the goal.
The plan involved a trusted friend and neighbor who agreed to take care of Annie for a month. They were just far away enough that Rip and Annie would not only be out of sight, but also out of ear shot. Confident that horses are good at living in the moment, I knew they would quickly forget about the separation when they had other stuff going on around them.
The plan was simple, really. First thing in the morning, our horses are turned out to the all-U-can-eat hay buffet in a big paddock. They parade out of their stalls one at a time, marching through the barn to the paddock in an orderly fashion. Late in the afternoon, they line up at the barn door and march back through the barn and into their stalls for the night.
My weaning plan would involve the routine Rip was already accustomed to, only with a slight detour.
The First Day of the Rest of Your Life
On W-Day, we had our truck and trailer parked just outside the barn, with the engine running and the trailer door open. As the horses marched out to the breakfast buffet, Rip followed his uncles out, while we ushered Annie and Casper (Annie’s BFF) into the waiting trailer and took off. My son Hunter stayed at the barn to monitor Rip and the geldings.
Annie was just happy to be with Casper and we were well down the road before Rip noticed Annie was missing. But he was in a familiar place with his two uncle-geldings, so things seemed normal. He ran about and searched for about ten minutes, then settled in with his uncles to finish his breakfast.
Annie was even less concerned since she was with her barn mate and was busy with the concerns of traveling to a new place. We only drove about a mile down the road and when we got to our neighbor’s place, I unloaded Annie. Then Rich drove away with Casper, back to our place. Casper is the primary caretaker for Rip (Uncle Mommy), so he had a more significant role in the plan.
Meanwhile, I introduced Annie to her new roommate, Cathy Brown, a 29-year-old Arab/QH mare. I won’t say Cathy Brown was thrilled to have a roommate, but Annie is pretty easy to get along with, so she tolerated it.
Annie was more preoccupied with learning the ropes in her new situation and with the handsome gelding in the next pen than she was searching for Rip. My plan was to stay there with her until I knew she was settled-in, but that didn’t take long.
By the time I got back to the ranch, Rip and the geldings were getting along just fine and it seemed like any other day at the ranch. Rip was glued to Casper’s side, and Casper was all-in on the mommy role.
The only real drama came that night when we brought Rip back into his foaling stall for the night. Even though Casper was with him for comfort and security, by habit, he expected Annie to be there. He was upset for a few minutes but soon calmed down and went about the business of eating with Uncle Mommy.
With part one of the plan fully executed, the ‘new normal’ was accepted by all parties, with relatively little drama. For Rip, the only hard part was breaking his nursing habit, which by now was less about nutrition and more about comfort. The geldings were uncooperative with Rip’s attempts to nurse, although very patient.
Annie settled right into her new herd, but every time I visited, she would beg to follow me back home. I suspect that was less about Rip and more about missing the comfort of her own stall (she’s been a stall baby all her life).
What Now?
In my podcast this month, I talked about the interesting parenting roles that our geldings assumed. Rip had no shortage of supervision, doting, play, and protection. Casper slept in the stall with Rip for a couple of weeks, nurturing him like broodmare would.
Gradually, we encouraged Rip to sleep alone in his stall, but with uncles on each side of him. He was not happy about this at first but by now, it seems normal to him and he’s comfortable in his stall at night. This part is important because, without this level of separation, I cannot feed Rip a proper young-horse diet. He’s growing at a rapid rate, so his nutritional needs are vastly different from mature horses.
Rip is sack-out in his stall at 4 am, with Casper visible through the stall window (photo taken from stall camera).
As his new life became normal, I started handling Rip more, to further his halter training. Before, all the halter training I did with Rip occurred with his mommy nearby as a security blanket. With Annie out of the picture, Rip automatically hooked onto me more as we went on walkabouts by ourselves.
When one of the geldings would go to the indoor arena for exercise, I would take Rip along for a play session. He could hang out in the arena like a big boy, and I’d let him run loose, roll in the soft, dry sand, and explore his curiosity in the novel environment.
We also let him run and play as we free-lunged the geldings for exercise. Rip could do whatever he wanted as the older horses went ‘round and ’round. Rip thought it was a party and a super fun game of tag-you’re-it, while the geldings clearly thought of it as drudgery.
Video of Rip running with Abner
Still too young for any real training, I only did these play sessions with Rip once or twice a week and only for short periods. Gradually, we began to introduce more leading skills, feet handling (it will be time for his first farrier visit soon), and a brief introduction to standing tied.
The hardest thing for Rip so far has been to learn and accept that he cannot run away whenever he wants and that sometimes he may have to do something he doesn’t want to do. This is a hard lesson for any horse to learn, and for humans too, as anyone with a toddler can attest.
Since Rip was named for his tendency to go from zero to ninety in a heartbeat and run like a maniac whenever the mood struck him, this newfound level of restraint has been a hard pill to swallow. Growing up is not always easy!
Back to Square One
By the end of Annie’s month in exile, Rip and the geldings were settled into a new routine and Rip was sleeping alone in his stall at night, sporting an enthusiastic appetite. He had learned better handling skills and was much more manageable.
Annie was fully integrated into her new herd, so when I came to take her home after a month at the neighbor’s, she was sad to leave Cathy Brown behind. As she jumped into the trailer, she called out to her new friends.
Arriving back home, we unloaded Annie, who received a very enthusiastic welcome home from the herd. The geldings and Rip ran to the fence to say hello. Annie seemed more worried about getting bowled over by the geldings (she’s lowest in the hierarchy) than she was eager to see Rip. I kept the fence between us for a few minutes, until the ruckus settled.
