Post by Tessa on Oct 9, 2011 11:22:53 GMT -5
Okay, before I get started on the actual evens of the last 24 hours, I want to give you a little background on where we live.
We live just off of Fort Leonard Wood, in the "boondocks". Our house is just down the road from the Mark Twain National Forest and it sits a ways down from the Big Piney River. Our house is also situated between two highways. A fairly busy highway runs along the backside of our property and an even busier (the only road that goes directly onto the post from the south side) runs right in front of our house.
Now it's on to the events of the last 24 hours. We're getting ready to start building our barn and have company up, so I was in the house cleaning and Steven was on the backhoe leveling the spot where the barn is going to be. He starts to hear the dogs barking over something, so he assumes that someone has pulled into the driveway. He looks to the driveway and sees no one, so he looks to the opposite end of the property and he sees this horse coming up from the highway at the bottom side of our property. By the time he gets off the backhoe and starts to head toward the horse, the horse spooks at the dogs barking and takes off. He heads across our property and behind the storage units that are beside our house. He comes up the far end of the units and onto the even busier highway in front of our house. He starts to head up on post where a gate guard catches him and Steven lets him know that I own horses so he'll bring him back to me and we'll figure out what to do with him. He did this because it's free for us to keep, where it would have been $1000+ to pick him up on post because they would have had to call the MPs, the MPs would have had to go get a trailer from the MWR and find the MP truck and come pick the horse up and then find a private barn to keep him at until his owners were found. Or they would have had to pick him up, get his vaccines and coggins done, find a private barn to keep him at until they could have gotten him into the quarantine barn on post and wait until his owners were found.
Steven & I got a pen set up for him (if he would have given us another two weeks or so we would have had a nice big pasture and an 11 x 12 stall for him lol). After we got him set up, Steven went door to door to see if anyone knew the horse or who he belonged to. I took to the internet and started posting up found ads for him.
Well, one of our neighbors did some calling around too and they got a hold of a couple of farriers who handle all of the horses in this area. The farriers called me this morning and said they knew the owners of the horse and where he belonged and that they were going to try and get a hold of them and he'd either be over to pick him up or he'd be sending the horses owners over to pick him up.
An hour or so went by and I called the guy back and he said he'd be on his way over to pick him up. When he gets here, he tells me that the horse is actually from Indiana. He was brought down here for a trail ride and when they went to load him up yesterday to head home he got loose and took off. Apparently the owners never bothered to go after him and he ended up crossing the river. After he crossed the river a couple of deer hunters on the highway behind our house caught him and they either let him go or the tied him up and he got loose again. He ends up at our house and the guy that picked him up said the owners had already headed home to Indiana (instead of going to look for their horse). He's going to keep him until they can get back to pick him up.
I think this whole thing is crazy! If that were my horse, I would have been scouring the state looking for him before we left. I wouldn't have just left without looking for him. If we wouldn't have thought that he was from the area and had just wandered off, we would have kept him because people like that do not need to have a horse.
On the plus side, I did find some farriers for when I bring Sebastian home lol.
We live just off of Fort Leonard Wood, in the "boondocks". Our house is just down the road from the Mark Twain National Forest and it sits a ways down from the Big Piney River. Our house is also situated between two highways. A fairly busy highway runs along the backside of our property and an even busier (the only road that goes directly onto the post from the south side) runs right in front of our house.
Now it's on to the events of the last 24 hours. We're getting ready to start building our barn and have company up, so I was in the house cleaning and Steven was on the backhoe leveling the spot where the barn is going to be. He starts to hear the dogs barking over something, so he assumes that someone has pulled into the driveway. He looks to the driveway and sees no one, so he looks to the opposite end of the property and he sees this horse coming up from the highway at the bottom side of our property. By the time he gets off the backhoe and starts to head toward the horse, the horse spooks at the dogs barking and takes off. He heads across our property and behind the storage units that are beside our house. He comes up the far end of the units and onto the even busier highway in front of our house. He starts to head up on post where a gate guard catches him and Steven lets him know that I own horses so he'll bring him back to me and we'll figure out what to do with him. He did this because it's free for us to keep, where it would have been $1000+ to pick him up on post because they would have had to call the MPs, the MPs would have had to go get a trailer from the MWR and find the MP truck and come pick the horse up and then find a private barn to keep him at until his owners were found. Or they would have had to pick him up, get his vaccines and coggins done, find a private barn to keep him at until they could have gotten him into the quarantine barn on post and wait until his owners were found.
Steven & I got a pen set up for him (if he would have given us another two weeks or so we would have had a nice big pasture and an 11 x 12 stall for him lol). After we got him set up, Steven went door to door to see if anyone knew the horse or who he belonged to. I took to the internet and started posting up found ads for him.
Well, one of our neighbors did some calling around too and they got a hold of a couple of farriers who handle all of the horses in this area. The farriers called me this morning and said they knew the owners of the horse and where he belonged and that they were going to try and get a hold of them and he'd either be over to pick him up or he'd be sending the horses owners over to pick him up.
An hour or so went by and I called the guy back and he said he'd be on his way over to pick him up. When he gets here, he tells me that the horse is actually from Indiana. He was brought down here for a trail ride and when they went to load him up yesterday to head home he got loose and took off. Apparently the owners never bothered to go after him and he ended up crossing the river. After he crossed the river a couple of deer hunters on the highway behind our house caught him and they either let him go or the tied him up and he got loose again. He ends up at our house and the guy that picked him up said the owners had already headed home to Indiana (instead of going to look for their horse). He's going to keep him until they can get back to pick him up.
I think this whole thing is crazy! If that were my horse, I would have been scouring the state looking for him before we left. I wouldn't have just left without looking for him. If we wouldn't have thought that he was from the area and had just wandered off, we would have kept him because people like that do not need to have a horse.
On the plus side, I did find some farriers for when I bring Sebastian home lol.