We see the strangest things sometimes… This time it was during our search for horses for a Monty Roberts demonstration. 

We were looking for a horse that had challenges with the trailer. We received an urgent request for help from the owner of a Haflinger named Fancy. This beauty would walk straight onto the trailer, but absolutely did not want to stand still and could not be closed off at all. The story was that the horse would completely panic, and had already caused two accidents. The animal had run off the trailer after loading and jumped onto the hood of a car. The owner was so shocked by this that she no longer dared to load her horse. 

So there we went, heading up to the far north, because of course Fancy did not live close by. After a long journey and a cup of coffee, I started preparing the trailer and the panels full of hope. After five minutes, Karel came to ask if I could please come with him. He had found the source of the problem! Somewhat surprised, I walked into the barn with him, because I thought he wanted to show me the owner’s trailer. But no… When we arrived at the stable of the Haflinger we found an electric fencing wire running all around the inside of his box… Of course we asked the horse’s owner for an explanation: “You know, Fancy has such a beautiful tail. And if he is in the stable without that wire, I run the risk that he will rub and his tail will become thinner… But I only turn it on once a week, not every day!” It is hard to even imagine: you lie in your bed, turn around and then…  BENG!… An electric shock! 

And then you would ask the animal to stand confidently against the sides of a trailer. Hard to explain, right? We removed the dividers from the trailer to give the horse more space. Slowly but surely we taught the horse to stand on the trailer calmly again. Fortunately, the owner has pledged to remove the electric wire from the stable…