How could you not love Curly? She looks like a cuddly stuffed toy with her long eyelashes and Bashkir Curly coat. My daughter loved Curly when she was younger because Curly was so gentle.
Horse love Curly, too — she is the “go to” horse for all our newcomers, making them feel at home. Curly is not an alpha horse. She’s a peace maker.
Sheldon loved Curly right from the beginning. He bonded to her right away. And Zelda? Zelda and Curly have become fast friends.
Zelda’s owner tells me that Zelda is largely indifferent to other horses. For the most part, that’s true. She doesn’t race to the fence line to touch noses with Willow and Freedom and she and Fortune appear to exist in parallel universes even when turned out together.
But Curly is her friend. Almost immediately after they were turned out together we found them mutually grooming each other. How nice to have a friend that will scratch your back!
You think of horses being part of a herd and certainly enjoying the company of others but sometimes you forget that sometimes a horse will meet another horse and have that instant connection, that feeling that they have a lot in common and are going to be “besties”.
My horse Rose was like that. When I first got Stacy, her former owner (who lived across the street) saw me heading out for a trail ride on Stacy with Rose pacing the gate squeeling. Former owner said, “I can’t beleive that mare actually has a friend! We had her for 5 years and she never buddied up to anyone!” When I moved to another farm where other mares came and went, Stacy was llike the Welcome Wagon. A friend suggested she learned her new sociao skills from Rose.
That’s really sweet.