Not Something You See Every Day: Wild Mare Wearing a Ladder

A mare with a foal at her side on the Outer Banks of North Carolina found herself in a heap of bother after somehow getting her head stuck through the rungs of a ladder. The strange sight became a local spectacle and the folks from the Corolla Wild Horse Fund jumped into action.

On their Facebook page, the group posted an account of what happened :

“Well, we had another exciting morning. Let us preface all of this by saying the ladder is no longer around her neck and the mare and foal are both completely fine.

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“At about 10:30 this morning we received a call that there was a horse with a ladder around her neck. Three of our staff were very close by and found her immediately (she was pretty hard to miss), and several residents had also seen her and came to help. At first we thought maybe if she dropped her head down the ladder would slide off, but every time it hit the back of her ears, she would understandably fling her head back up. Luckily, she wasn’t all that bothered by it so at least we didn’t have to worry about her panicking and hurting herself or her foal. One of the characteristics of this breed is that they are very level-headed and not reactionary, and this mare was a good example of that today.

“We spent about an hour trying to get her into a position where we could get close enough to pull it off but didn’t have any luck with that plan – she was too fast and there is just too much wide-open space (this was one of the few times when that is a bad thing!). But we got lucky when she dropped her head to graze at one point and the ladder slipped down over one ear. We all held our breath and thank goodness it fell the rest of the way off. Everyone in the surrounding houses who had been watching from their decks cheered, and so did we. The ladder was retrieved, and both the mare and the foal are just fine.”

Horse lovers, local and otherwise, could breathe a sigh of relief when the news was posted. The Outer Banks in North Carolina are home to a wild horse herd that some experts and historians think can be traced back to 16th century Spanish explorers. The Corolla Wild Horse Fund is a local non-profit whose mandate is to protect, conserve, and responsibly manage the herd of Corolla wild horses (Bankers) roaming freely on the northernmost Currituck Outer Banks, and to promote the continued preservation of this land as a permanent sanctuary for horses designated as the State Horse and defined as a cultural treasure by the state of North Carolina.

The herd of Colonial Spanish Mustangs roam 7,544 acres that they share with human neighbours who live in the 700 or so houses in the area. The humans who run Corolla are on call 24/7; in the case of the mare and ladder, fortunately intervention wasn’t needed and the horse and her foal continued on safe and happy.