Buddy and Roger

I had gotten to know Buddy in the year since we moved here because he and his pasture mate Sissy often came to watch me prepare feed buckets for my ponies. They also often could be found standing at their fence across the lane from my stallion Asi. I felt Asi and Buddy were friends of sorts.

When Sissy and Buddy first began appearing while I was doing feed buckets, I decided I would make up a feed bucket for each of them, too. I told my friend Linda, whom Sissy and Buddy belonged to, that I was going to offer Buddy a special feed to see if it would help him calm down a little. A few days later we agreed that it did seem to help him, but then Linda also admitted she had quit feeding him grain, so maybe that’s what helped most.

Buddy has Spanish mustang ancestry and was a marvel to watch move across the pasture. Linda said she’d been told that he had had a saddle on him once but that was before she got him; his only job here in his seven years of residence was to be a pasture mate for Sissy. When Sissy went off to her previous owner after Linda’s death, Buddy’s breeder was due to come get him. I think Linda said she’d never had a halter on Buddy. She just used a feed bucket when she needed to move her horses. I wondered how it would go to get Buddy into a trailer. His head had been several feet in the air ever since Sissy left. Over the fence when offering a feed bucket, I had been able to touch his head and neck without him leaving. I concluded that if I needed to, I could eventually halter him, so I agreed to be present when Roger arrived just in case my assistance was needed. It most definitely was not.

Roger entered the paddock with a halter and lead rope over his shoulder, and I watched Buddy notice him. Then I witnessed the most beautiful dance between a horseman and a horse. Roger didn’t walk quickly up to Buddy. Instead, he slowly and respectfully gained Buddy’s trust. Roger let Buddy approach before he did then retreat and then approach again. It was quickly clear that Buddy recognized his former friend. Roger extended his hand then his hand with the lead rope then his hand with the halter. Buddy smelled each in turn. Roger then slowly draped the rope over Buddy’s neck, respecting Buddy’s concerned reaction with patience and finesse. In less than five minutes this horse, whom I had watched for a year and had rarely seen with all four of his feet on the ground at one time, be haltered, led, and loaded into the trailer where he stood tied reasonably quietly while we talked outside.

After Roger had haltered Buddy and was walking him to the trailer, I told Roger how beautiful what he had just done was. Then after he put Buddy in the trailer, I told him the same thing again. He gave me a big hug of thanks. I knew that Roger had been working with and breeding Spanish mustangs and horses for many decades. When I heard that he was coming to get Buddy, I figured there would either be a major rodeo or that I would see something very different. I wondered if all those years of experience would have created in Roger what my two decades with Fell Ponies has created in me: a desire to treat them with great respect in order to win their trust and partnership.

I wish I had thought to videotape the dance that Roger performed with Buddy, but I was so captivated that I didn’t want to take my eyes off what was happening. Buddy is a very lucky horse, and it was a privilege to see him reunite with Roger.

You can find more stories like this one in my book The Partnered Pony, available internationally by clicking here or on the book cover.

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