www.trackincats.com

[Cougardaville]

We first heard of this horse attack from another bolg running about the horse attacked in Chautauqua Co. I wrote and asked this person contact me. She has, I wil tell you her story. First this is a copy of her post and request for help.
______________________________

Hello, I just visited your site and would like your input on something.

I have 2 horses boarded at a stable in the Town of Western which is in Oneida County in New York State just south of the Adirondack State Park. This morning at 9:30, the horses were turned out as usual and brought back in at 4:00 pm for feeding. My 17 year old 15-3 hand Thoroughbred mare that is in foal was attacked by something. It was large enough to take her down as she was full of mud. She has over 25 wounds on her body that range from small puncture wounds to large scrapes of skin and fur missing. She has severe swelling across one side of her body and puncture wounds on one lower hind leg. She also had what looked to be claw marks in the mud down her back several times. The veterinarian says that it look like something was actually on her back attacking her. The other horse with her in that paddock had a few scratches and fur missing but nothing compared to what my mare looked like. My 1 1/2 year old 15-2 hand Dutch Warmblood filly had half of the skin on one of her lower hind legs literally ripped off. It almost looks like she was kicking at something and it grabbed her and tore the skin off. She was in an adjoining paddock. None of the other horses that were out seemed to be touched.

I spoke to the local Environmental Conservation officer who will be out to the farm tomorrow morning to check the area. We did a quick check of the fencing to see if that was what tore my filly's leg to no avail. There does appear to be areas where it looks like a struggle took place with some fur and blood in the middle of the paddocks. The fencing is 5 feet tall, high tensile wire - I think about 5 or 6 strands with every other strand electrified. The encon officer advised it may have been coy dogs which are in the area but they are nocturnal and I can't imagine them being able to take down such a large horse. He also mentioned domestic dogs which I highly doubt. He brought up that a bear could be at fault but I have a hard time thinking that a bear would be able to get underneath the wire fencing. Plus, I do not believe that bears would go after horses - don't they mostly eat berries and vegetation? It's not like it's winter out and there aren't other food supplies available. The DEC did check the paddocks today and only found one footprint that looks like a dog or coyote but no other prints.

There have been "sightings" in the area a few towns away of a cougar killing local residents' dogs and cats but the encon officer said that when he investigated, the tracks appeared to be bear tracks. I don't know how an observer could mistake a bear for a cougar but that's what was told to me by encon.

From your experience, does this sound like it could have been a cougar attack? I'm just curious as I have a HUGE vet bill right now and would like to know what caused it and how I can prevent this from happening again. A neighboring hunter came to see my mare and believes it was something in the cat family. Could and would a bobcat take down a large horse?

Any information you can provide me would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you,
Amy
____________________


I had the pleasure of talking with Amy tonight. She was very good in giving me details and answering all my questions.

She had two horses attacked. Her Gray mare which is heavy with foal and her filly that is 1 1/2 years old. Ironically these horse were in separate pastures. These horses live on a beautiful well manicured farm. There are 15 horses total on the farm. They have 6 separate fenced pastured areas. Four are being used at this time.

This is a picture of the pasture area.



and this


As you see there is no brush and the pastures are clear of any hazards to hurt the animals. The fence is done very neat and safe, it is wire, four stands with every other running hot with electric current. This is very safe and no horse will try to test a fence like this. There is NO BARBED wire on this farm.

On October 30 at about 4:00 p.m. Amy received a call her horses were injured, she rushed to them. They were already in the hands of the barn managers.
_________________
Seven years of dedication Studying "Cougars" taking sighting reports, Tracking & Filming the wild! Then ...enjoying Horses!

[Cougardaville]

When Amy arrived to the barn, she could not believe her eyes or understand how her horses got hurt the way they did . The vet was called. When the vet arrived he took the 1 1/2 year old filly first. Her name is PJ..she had sever injury's to the front of her hind legs. The doctor had to cut flapping skin and suture her in many places to stop the bleeding. She was treated for pain and placed on antibiotics, which she is still taking. She also received routine vaccinations. Her leg needs to be wrapped and cleaned daily keeping this clean and free of infection.

These are a pictures taken of her legs.




PJ was in a pasture with a miniature horse, that is very feisty. PJ is the youngest horse on the farm.

_________________
Seven years of dedication Studying "Cougars" taking sighting reports, Tracking & Filming the wild! Then ...enjoying Horses!

[Cougardaville]

I know what you are looking at is very hard to digest

Now I will tell you about Katie.She was in the back corner pasture with another horse. He is a gelding and they are good buddies. He lost two front shoes and had a few claw marks on him. From a distance the neighbor heard and saw the horses running crazy, but thought they were just kicking up their heels. They heard no dogs barking or other animal noises so he did not think it was a problem.

The barn manager arrived to bring the horses into the barn as she does every night, this was about 4:00 p.m. She immediately noticed Katie was not where she would be coming into the barn ready for dinner and bed. She went to get her, to find her covered in mud and lathered in sweat. She got her to a stall waiting for Amy and the vet.

The vet finished with the Filly PJ, and then they brought out Katie. His reaction was Oh my God.

This is Katie.





The vet said she suffered severe bruising on her back, like she was beat. She was in so much pain every where. She was shaking with pain and fear. As you see she has many claw marks and puncture wounds. he said the animal was on her back, and Katie possible rolled to try to get it off. He went through three sets of clippers trying to remove hair to dress wounds. She is also still being treated.

DEC arrived the next day, they found coyote tracks. As I said before you will always find coyote tracks NY is saturated with them, over 30,000 and rising. He thought maybe a coyote attacked her.
I asked Amy what would Katie do to a 35# pound coyote, she said kick the **** out of it. That is exactly what any horse would do. And we all know coyotes do not have the ability to ride a bucking horse. I am so tired of hearing this rubbish!!

I am so sad to see a horse in this much pain due to a wild animal coming in to pastured space. Amy says the deer population is big there. No reason to attack a horse.

Her horse do not want to go out of the barn, they are still very afraid.

I will talk to Amy tomorrow after her vet appointment.

Thank you Amy for sharing your story with us. Prayers will be sent to you and your beautiful horses.

Cougardaville
_________________
Seven years of dedication Studying "Cougars" taking sighting reports, Tracking & Filming the wild! Then ...enjoying Horses!

[Cougardaville]

This is a close up picture of the fence. As you see no attacking barbed wire on this farm



Cougardaville
_________________
Seven years of dedication Studying "Cougars" taking sighting reports, Tracking & Filming the wild! Then ...enjoying Horses!

[Eagle]

Hi Amy we are very sorry about your horse & we know what it is like to have Gypsie in the family & I know how it feels to speak with the DEC and veiw their animal attack book & then they take a walk of the property and they cover a 97 acre farm round trip in 15 minutes flat.The APHIS will veiw everything you have as evidence.Please keep copies of everything specially times & dates.
Your pasture is envied by allot of horses & owners as well you should be proud & luckly you do not have any mature trees in your pasture & by the looks of your pictures that feild is far away from your pasture. You are in our prayers.
_________________
Eagle

[Cougardaville]

When looking at this picture, please notice the power tower in the back ground. Many, many of our sightings take place on power lines. They are cleared trails that the cats seem to like to travel.

Cougardaville
_________________
Seven years of dedication Studying "Cougars" taking sighting reports, Tracking & Filming the wild! Then ...enjoying Horses!

[sherlt]

Hi, this is my first post but I have been watching this forum for over a year. I did not want to here that about the power lines! I live right next to one! And it runs through two of my neighbors horse pastures. I have heard that one of my neighbors seen a ML about a year ago. And my son and his friend also seen one while they were riding 4 wheelers. They said it had a cat like head and long tail. And by the looks on their faces I believe that is what they saw. They wouldn't even ride 4 wheeler in the woods after that! And they went night fishing the next night for about 5 minutes and called to have someone pick them up because they heard something walking in the woods behind them. My son was still stuttering and shaking when he got to the house.
After reading all these stories about the horses getting attacked made me think. Right after I moved in this place (2000) there was a horse attacked about 4 miles from my house. They said someone went in the pasture and stabbed this work horse with a bar or something. I only heard from other people, not the owner. So I am not sure on the whole story. But now I am wondering was it really a person that did that or an animal?

[Cougardaville]

[sherlt]

The last I heard they put alot of money in the horse and saved it. But I don't ever remember of it being in the media. All I heard was from hear say. I never heard to much about MLs back then so I never thought anything about it. I had horses of my own at the time and kept them in my back pasture at night so they weren't near the road. I was devastated when my horse went blind. I could not even imagine going out and finding them attacked by something!
There is rotten people that would do that to a horse though. A couple years ago there was a horse shot right in the pasture not to far from me

[Ninthwheeler]

Great, now I'll have to be brave enough to go check the trails under the power lines! That's where we used to trail ride a lot but since Katie is in foal, I haven't trail ridden her because the brush is deep and I didn't want to stress her. Now I'll have to take a walk and see what I can find. Definately with somebody else and armed w/something. I love the stable that I am at and I hate having it be "the talk of the town" in a negative way so I would really like to get to the bottom of this.

Again, thanks to all that have posted and just to update you all, I believe my horses will definately be fine - just need a lot of TLC - which I'm glad to give!!!

[bbones]

So glad to hear that they will be alright.

You have such a beautiful farm. I hope you will have nothing but peace on it from now on.
_________________
"Those who hear not the music,
Think the dancers mad."

[Ninthwheeler]

Well, just heard from the stable owner that another horse about 3 miles away was attacked by something recently - a few days after my horses were attacked. Hopefully, we'll be going up there to "investigate" and see if it was a similar incident. I did speak to a state trooper who owns some horses in the area and she stated she's been on the lookout for quite some time due to the sitings in Camden and Taberg. They're also in Oneida County. She doesn't walk into the woods w/out a firearm and she refuses to let her children outside to play alone. I just hope whatever it is, we get it before it does more damage or even goes after a human.

[Cougardaville]

[skippy]

Thank goodness the horses are alright. I know where this farm is. If you look at the pictures just where the tree line crosses the power line there is a very deep ravine(canyon). It goes north and from there it's just a lot of wilderness. My son told me last night about this and I went looking on the interntet today.
One of the things that Amy's husband had told him was there may have been tracks one big set and one smaller. Amy will know better.

We have a farm that borders Fish Creek in Annsville and my son has seen a track that he is still trying to figure out what it belongs to. He is hoping to set up a trail cam in the near future to see what is out and about.

Hi to all

Skippy

[Eagle]

Hello to all! Has anyone heard a update about Amy's horses? If people think that the cat problem was bad before,now someone is trying breed a new house cat & that gone way to far playing with nature.Please chech out
http://video.ap.org/v/Legacy.aspx?partner=en-ap&g=a3a5cf16-6ee5-4d2c-bf6d-2da10278950f&t=s63&p=ENAPoffbeat_ENAPoffbeat&&f=1133603

And tell me what they think about the video & please leave a on.

God Bless the USA
_________________
Eagle