Brego meets Chaos

Brego is my sweet but odd little horse. He came back from starvation pretty well. I was worried at first that he would never stand correctly. At first he stood at an odd angle and I was worried it was a mix of no muscle mass and poor hooves. I’ve now had Brego and Maverick for six months.

Yesterday when we loaded Maverick into the trailer, Brego went nuts. I believe this is the first time Maverick and Brego have ever been separated in their four years of life. I hope that it does them both some good to be separated.

However, Brego is so attached to Maverick I was afraid that when we loaded Maverick up that Brego would smash through the fence and try to come with. Brego does not respect fences. We hauled Maverick to the trainers and came back right away to see how Brego was doing. I’d thrown some extra hay in to try and distract Brego. It seemed to do the trick. When Brego saw us pull in with the truck and trailer he whinnied. I felt bad. He was looking for Maverick.

I figured now is the best time to start introducing Brego to the rest of the herd. My initial plan was to pull Rain out and put him in with Brego. Usually Rain is my “Walmart Greeter” but since Rain is at the bottom of the pecking order in the current herd, I figured he’d probably take after Brego. Brego will most definitely be at the bottom of the pecking oder. But Rain wasn’t going to have any of that type of switching. Rain saw the halter and lead rope and bolted to the other side of the pen.

I didn’t want to mess with trying to catch him so I pulled Chaos out instead. Why not have my two 4-year olds standing together. Chaos might give Brego a bit of self confidence. Brego was NOT thrilled and wanted to stay as far away from Chaos as possible. Chaos on the other hand (once he ate all the hay) went over to harass Brego. Poor Brego, he can’t ever seem to get a break. Maverick beats Brego up all the time. Chaos did his notorious tail grabbing method to see what Brego would do. Brego just kept walking away. I sort of wish Brego would have let a hoof fly but he’s too gentle for that. The only thing Brego did was give me the "stink eye" for putting someone in "his" pen.

I’m hoping to put Rain in with Brego tonight and see how it goes. I have 30 days to get Brego adjusted into the herd before Maverick comes back and I have to introduce him into the herd. It may be that I need to create two separate herds, one passive and one more dominant. I’d prefer they all get along but I’m afraid the less aggressive horses will get pushed around. I don’t tolerate anyone getting pushed around. I expect manners. I know, they are horses and that’s their way of working things out but I don’t have to tolerate it. That’s why I’m the BOSS MARE around Borderlands.

We’ll see how tonight goes. Hopefully Brego can adjust and will stop giving me the stink eye for putting someone in with him. He’s definitely a people horse and not a horse's horse. He’d much prefer to be surrounded by people rather than horses. I’m not sure if he even knows what he’s supposed to do around other horses. Chaos will hopefully teach him. I’d also like to see how Bob is going to react to him. I’m not worried about anyone but Dude harassing Brego. But I think I might have a plan for that. Dude is down right mean when it comes to figuring out the pecking order.

It’ll be a slow process of introductions but I want to make it as painless for Brego as possible (and for me for that matter). I really want to see Brego bloom into a self confident little guy. Keep your fingers crossed that tonight’s pen switching goes as well as I hope.

New Brego pics coming this evening.