Horse in Icy Pond Rescue

The words I hate to hear most coming over Jim’s pager are anything to do with horses – barn fires, rider falls, and today… a horse that fell into an icy pond. When I heard it was on Panther Creek Road, I grabbed my coveralls and boots and I yelled to Jim to wait, I was coming with! I couldn’t sit at home and wonder what was going on.

It was at a place called Panther Creek Stables and a 10 year old mare had apparently gone to the pond for a drink and fell in. When we got there the fire deptment’s rescue truck and about 4 or five firefighters were there rigging up a toe.

As coincidence (or not) would have it, I had just spent an hour on-line this week reviewing "horses in ponds" recue videos on-line after seeing a clip on the news, so I actually had some insight into the situation. In hindsite, I should’ve brought my camera, but when it comes to horses in jepordy, all I can think of is helping them… so I ran down to the water and made sure she was strapped up as I’d seen, with a toe rope behind her front legs and around her middle, and she was, with her front feet on land, which was also good. She was shivering and obviously tired. They had no idea how long she’d been in there. She was soaked up to her head and stopped struggling as quietly I talked to her.

As we waited for the firefighters to finish rigging the rope to the truck I asked the owners if they had blankets, if they’d called their vet and if they had some warm water and mash to feed her once she was out… none of which they’d had time to think about being in panic mode.

When they finally had the rope secured on the truck, everyone stood back and I held her lead rope which was secured to a her halter. Slowly and steadily the truck pulled. The rope became taught and as we pulled she began to struggle to her feet. It didn’t take her long at all to get out and up! We wrapped her up in wool blankets and she walked with me quite briskly up to the barn, where her herd mates gathered around her as she knickered to them soflty. We took her into a dry stall and everyone began to towel dry her off and she started to knibble on some hay, which was also good. She had a really thick coat, so they've got their work cut out for them getting her dried off. I’ll be giving them a call later to see how’s she’s doing, but they said she was a tough old bird and would be just fine!

Here is a link to one of the videos I had watched this week... someone upstairs must've known I needed to see it. :) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9hAh3VLNfNY The horse today had it's back legs and belly up to her front legs in the pond, but was not fully submerged, as in this video. Thank goodness for kind people that come to the rescue!