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We have had horses lost several times at the LBJ Grasslands in Decatur 
Tx. Several years ago two were lost for 3 days and found in the woods 
close to where they lost their rider about 50 feet off trail.  Lots of 
people and horses past these two but they never made a sound.  Another 
time 4 horses escaped their hot pen during the night and hit the gravel  
road and ended up at a lake about 4 miles from camp. They had to jump 2 
cattle guards to get to lake and we would  never have looked  for them 
there. Some nice lady that was camping at lake came to our ride camp.  
At the FEI ride in March about 2 miles out on first loop, 2 horses lost 
their riders. It took one rider about 1 hour to find her horse and the 
other one was missing for 7 hours. In the snow and slush we tracked the 
horse about 2 miles off the ride trail, across a open area and into 
woods on an old trail, where we lost the hoof prints. We walked several 
miles in this area. We were on a gator and we came back to the place 
where the horse went into the woods three times. We decided the horse 
wasn't in this area and was turning the gator around the third time.  
The owner of the horse was sitting in back of the gator and when the 
back of gator was facing the woods the girl shouted " There he is!"  The 
horse was 10 feet in the woods hung up in briars. The horse never made a 
sound and the three of us walked within 50 ft. of him several times. It 
was just really luck that we found him. If we had not turned the gator 
around the way we did or the girl was not looking in the woods at that 
time, he may not have been found, as this section is not ridden much.
Do not count on your horse making noise or calling out to another horse 
as they are in hiding, being safe.
Dolly

> ----------------------------------------------------------
>
> From: "Laurie Durgin" <ladurgin@xxxxxxx>
> Subject: [RC]   Lost horse 'tendencies"?????
>
>
>   As sad as this makes us. Are there any Lost horse tendencies" we 
> could learn from?
>  Is there any kind of compiling of horse behavior when lost (maybe 
> more out west?)
>      For instance: will thery tend to find other horses? or stay 
> within so many yards, miles, how long before they locate back to the 
> area they were lost from, etc.  Maybe people who found their horses 
> could give tips as to wher, how far, andy behavior and we could put 
> this into a training section of the manuel.  Laurie




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