Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Elk Hunting an other horse accident

I grew up on horses, and did green saddle breaking, for spending money, when I was a teenager.

I got bucked off sometimes, but always did a week or so of ground work(handling, saddling, sacking, driving) before ever mounting.

And yes, I've been part of a few horse wrecks outside the corral. One where I broke some ribs. It happens.





I'm wondering exactly what is an 'other' horse wreck? My mind is foul, and wanders to some type of South American porn venture....???

If my google-fu were better I'd find and post that pic of you from your embassy days with a smartass reply. I believe that was a spanish speaking country?

Just like anything else, shoot at enough deer you'll miss one or have a less than perfect hit eventually. Ride enough ponies you'll come off. eventually.

I was forced to accept a Zen sort of realization on a hunting horse on a pitch black night in the San Juan mountains.

I was moving between camps and foolishly got started way too late. When it got dark it got REALLY dark. This segment of trail was a shelf trail, real steep, I could take a boot out of a stirrup and touch the uphill side in places. A fall here had consequences. I couldn't see the trail.

At a certain point I released my white-knuckle grip on the reins and threw an overhand knot in the ends. I was no longer guiding or controlling the horse. I had to give up the idea that I was in control. The horse was the only one that could see and feel the trail. I had become just a piece of cargo. I had liked this horse and trusted it, but I liked it a lot more after arriving safely that night.

ain't it Steelhead that says "next time he's horseback, he'll have a cocked revolver pointing between the horses ears"?


anyhoo, I've been bucked off a fair bit. but by far the worst was a lady that was "newly rich" and had decided to get into horses for her and her teenage daughter.

she'd been paying some horse women I know around here to train her horse (and her of course) but her teenage daughter was not interested in doing anything with mom at that period of her life including going riding.

so the lady's complaining that no one in her family will go riding with her. And she's really worried about the horse she got for her daughter as it's just not getting ridden.

I don't know what came over me, I hadn't even been drinking, when I said "heck I'll go riding with ya!"


hadn't been horseback in a good while at that point.


so I meet her one Sunday out at the barn, both pretty dang good lookin mares, good tack, heck this oughta be fun.


well she wasn't kiddin that mare she'd bought for the daughter hadn't been ridden in some time and she was not inclined to be ridden that day, by some guy that was 60 lb.s heavier at least than her teenage daughter.

we did a lil dido getting blanket and saddle on, went thru the minor drama of her puffing up so I couldn't get a tight cinch on the saddle till she finally decided she couldn't hold her breath any longer, but at long last we were atop these splendid animals.


now old Smokey the horse of my youth was a lot the same way, he didn't get ridden as often as needed cause he was kept at my dad's farm and I lived on my grandpaps farm with my ma and her kin. So he was often frisky, intelligent and just a royal PITA, until you got him lathered up and got the edge off of him.


she was prancing and fighting the bit, so I put the heels to her to run her a bit so she'd work up a sweat and settle down.

"oh no, let's not run them" the lady screamed WTF I thought, how the heck am I gonna ride her if we don't take this rough edge off her.

well the lady didn't even want to trot them leave alone gallop.

so I sawed on reins, cajoled, sweet talked, cursed and somehow got this lil mare pointed down the trail

she settled some after a bit, never really bucked, just always tossing and twisting and exhibiting her displeasure by having some fatazz redneck deposited upon her slender and muscled back. I might have twisted an ear a time or two when the lady wasn't looking.

but that horse never did get happy about me being up on her.

we made it pretty uneventful, the ladie's horse just sauntering along and mine dancing and twisting and able to keep pointed in the correct direction with me providing a lil encouragement.


all went pretty well, until we turned around and headed back.


she did fine until we rode past her barn and then she decided she'd had enough.

but the lady that owned them was having a grand leisurely stroll and didn't want it to end just yet.

so even though my lil mare tried desperately to make a left turn into their home place, a few judicious yanks on the reins kept her goin in our new direction.

we were riding along the right of way on a road, my horse with her head twisted to the left as I kept constant pressure on the reins to keep her from bolting back to the barn.

when all of a sudden she swerves her head to the right carries us up right on the roadway (where there was some sporadic car traffic) and startled the chit outa me, and kinda skeered me too as I don't like dodging cars while horseback as a general rule.

so I whip her head to the left, to get her back on the right of way and damned if we didn't about run over the poor lady on her mare!


and that ladies and gentlemen is when that mare owned me for a sec.

as I turned in the saddle to apologize to the lady for the near miss. the mare I was riding her front end dropped to the ground.

now alla y'all that been horseback know what it feels like when a horse steps in a hole, even though I was lookin to the rear, I knew this was bad, this damned filly was gonna break a leg whilst I was astride her and I'd be on the hook for the damages.

so I did what any gentleman cowboy would do ( or so I thought) as I felt her stumble I took my right foot outa the stirrup and started to swing my leg over to step right off as the ground was very close now, so that the mare could right herself without my additional weight and then hopefully with no injury to the mare resaddle.


heh, heh, heh, sure that's the ticket.


as soon as my right foot came out of that stirrup and I lifted my leg the azz end of that mare exploded with more force than most space shuttle launches.

yep that's right I went azz over teakettle, full 360 in the air and came down hard.

it knocked the wind outa me, and as I lay there lookin at the beautiful blue sky with a few white puffy clouds, not feeling in anything in my body, I thought I justa mighta made it into the kingdom of heaven, courtesy of a stubborn lil bitch of a mare.

but then I noticed a prickly feeling???

I'd gotten deposited in a bed of wild rose bushes that often grow up around stumps. Landed on the stump via the kidney area and that seems to have been what was hurting so bad.

I crawled to my knees, regained my feet, looked up at the lady I was with (whom was white as a sheet btw) only to hear her say "OMG, OMG, we'll never catch her now"

hitting that stump had effectively wiped the nice right offa me it seems.

it was a new dawn, when I told the lady "I'll either catch her and ride her home or I'll kill her"

I'm not sure exactly what happens when I get hurt, but my good manners seem to go into hiding when it happens.

somehow I managed to limp towards the lil bitch of a horse (really think she let me get close enough to do so, just so she could get a lil better horse laugh over how she outsmarted me) and grabbed a rein. We danced a lil while I struggled to catch the other rein and deposit my azz upon her back again.

horses can be ornery, dumb etc. but they ain't all stupid.

I did a lil rein yankin, a lil cursing and put that horse through some rider induced pirourettes before we headed em back to the barn.

surprisingly she was pretty well behaved on the ride back to the barn.

but you boys that have been horseback know what I'm talking about that it takes a lil time for the real hurt to creep in when you've been throwed.

by the time we got back and got them unsaddled, rubbed down etc. not only was my back killin me, but turns out I'd twisted an ankle pretty danged good either getting throwed or in the ensuing waltz the horse and I performed when the bloodlust came over me and I was determined I'd catch that mare up and ride her back or kill the auld bitch.


but now we get to add the insult to the injury.

the lady told me, that it was a first that when the mare got rid of a rider that "we'd" been able to catch her

would you like to see our house. nice house btw and her husband had gotten home, they gave me a tour of this sprawling place and I'd developed a considerable limp by this time from my ankle.

these folks are very well off btw, as her (now late husband) was one of the shrewdest biz men I've ever known.

I could see the wheels turning and the worry on his face as we related the events, as he kept asking me if we should go to the dr. it finally hit me (slow as I can be) that while he might have some concern for my well being, his real concern was that I might sue them.

when that light bulb fired off in my head, it was a similar emotion like when I got throwed in the first damn place.

I remember telling him, "if you think I'm the kinda guy that would stand in front of 12 complete strangers, tell em I got throwed from a hoss and now I want the folks that own that hoss to give me money, then you're either loco or you don't know who I am."


I passed blood in my urine for two or 3 days IIRC, as I gimped around and I so bad wished I'da been the kind of guy that coulda sued those bastids for my misery. : (


funny thing is, I never got invited back to ride and I'm certain that lady didn't paint me in a very pretty light, either my horsemanship or my temper when she related that story to her friends.


damned old hosses anyway, kinda like women, can't figure out a good reason why we love em as they're very dangerous.

but yet we do.

I don't know that I agree with that, some are a_holes from the start. I have spent a good portion of my life working cattle and showing cutters, and 'bad' is not always a product of training, environment etc. Some are just head shy, bit fighting, contrary POS. That is how the old saying started about a good horse not eating any more feed than a knucklehead. There are millions of genetic knotheads in the horse world. If you get one that never wants to give its head, sticks its nose out when you give it a touch, time to sell, or even give it away.

Jstevens usually if a horse is bad at birth it is because of genetics. I have worked cows, rode cutters, roped for money, started colts, rode a few saddle broncs, made a few bridle horses, showed working cow horses and I have seen damn few colts that were complete garbage from the getgo. I have cut the heads off a few( chickened) when you could sill do that. Hell even made pepper sticks out of a mule, lol was pretty good. So there is a use for every horse or mule, even the bad ones. They make good bear bait where legal.