Ponies at Lor-El Farm Open House!! Join Us to Welcome Penn Vet's Retiring Semi-feral Pony Herd To Northeastern Pennsylvania's LOR-EL FARM
Sunday Afternoon, September 1st - 2 to 4 pm
2400 Milwaukee Road, Clarks Summit PA 18411
Light Refreshments
RSVP by August 15 to suemcd@vet.upenn.edu or TEXT 610-220-4203
EXCITING NEW PROJECT:
Semi-feral Herd Guardianship
After 30 years, the Penn Vet New Bolton Center Semi-feral Herd is retiring from the University of Pennsylvania to be re-homed under HHH guardianship. Their new home is a property in beautiful hillside preserve with pasture and woodlands beneath Bald Mountain in Northeastern Pennsylvania. There they will continue to serve as an educational and community service resource, carrying on the goal of education of the equine community and public on natural animal/horse behavior and the relevance to health and welfare of domestically managed animals.
PROJECT UPDATE: THE SEMI-FERAL HERD HAS ARRIVED SAFE AND SOUND!
Mission accomplished!!!
All went well with moving the herd from the University of Pennsylvania New Bolton Center in Southeastern Pennsylvania to Lor-EL Farm. Their new site is 130 miles away, up to the end of the Northeast Extension of the Pennsylvania Turnpike. The 72 juveniles and adults along with 8 young foals arrived unscathed, with band affiliations and overall social structure exactly remaining as it had been! What an amazing fete, with these essentially wild animals! We are certainly relieved!
In this picture the ponies check out a mountain spring in their new home.
How did we do that?
Using a rented 16-foot 2-stall stock trailer and our one-stall horse trailer, HHH Directors Jaime Miller and Sue McDonnell together did the loading and transport, one family band at a time. The first trip was April 27 and the last was May 25.
The rigs were backed into their familiar catch pen system, so that the family could be inside the pen, free to explore and enter the rig at will. With the goal of low-stress loading, the stalls were bedded with the tastiest and greenest alfalfa we could find. The ramp and the edge of the step-up were sprinkled with Equine Senior. The stock trailer was padded with the gate mats from the catch pen system. These light colored mats brightened up the inside of the rig, dampened the sound, and provided a familiar visual. Rubber flooring made for good non-slip and quiet footing.
Keeping families together for the big move was important…
Social facilitation and family social support were wonderfully helpful. Typically, curious juveniles or food urgent moms were the first of the family to make their way into the rig and the alfalfa. As they quickly settled into munching hay, the remaining family members tended to follow.
Harem stallions, as the family protectors, tended to be the most worried, and were purposely loaded last. In order to reduce stress and danger to them, to their family, and to us, we elected to lightly sedate some of the most anxious stallions for the loading process.
For most trips, it took an hour or two to sort out the family of the day and load the two rigs (up to 13 individuals). Once we got moving, the 2 ½ hour rides were completely uneventful. We drove right into their new enclosure, where we simply opened the doors to let them unload at will. A couple adults had to be encouraged away from the alfalfa! On visual inspection during and after unloading, there were no signs of injuries, and the rigs had no stress feces. Pleasant surprise!
Please consider helping to support this important project.
Get access to all 8 of the recorded Humane Horse Handling’s Spring 2020 Webinars!
Did you miss the live broadcast of Humane Horse Handling’s Spring Webinars? Anyone can access recordings of all 8 of our fun and educational webinar series focusing on behavior and welfare of wild and feral horses hosted by Sue McDonnell PhD and Sarah Low DVM. Topics include natural behavior, population control, gathering techniques and training of formerly free-roaming equids when in private care. All donations fund our research into low-stress gathers and handling of wild and domestic horses. Bring your curiosity and view the webinars here.
Bringing state-of-the-art welfare to wild and domestic horses.
Founded by leading researcher and professor of equine behavior, Sue McDonnell PhD CAAB, veterinarian, Sarah Low DVM, and veterinary technician, Jamie Miller CVT, Humane Horse Handling is a 501c3 organization. We work to improve the care and handling of wild and domestic horses through research, education, and application of equine behavior and welfare science. Our team is made up of leading researchers, veterinarians and teachers in equine behavior, health, handling and welfare.