In August of this year, I was privileged to be part of the Help Alberta Wildies Society (HAWS) team who rescued a month-old foal from the Cutoff Creek area, deep in Alberta’s backcountry (see story here). Hunter the foal, named after my grandson who participated in the rescue, was the subject of an incredible wilderness survival story. He was discovered by campers, Samantha Besler, Maddison and Sadie; all alone, abandoned by his band, standing vigil over his dead mother’s body and chasing predators away.
We estimated the mare had been deceased for six days, a long time for an abandoned foal to remain alive in the wilderness. However, Samantha later informed us that when they discovered Hunter on the first day of their four-day holiday, the mare’s body was already in a significant state of decomposition. This new information meant the mare may have been dead for closer to nine days before we rescued Hunter – an astonishing amount of time.
At one-month-old, Hunter still required milk for nourishment. Although he could eat small amounts of grass, he didn’t have enough enzymes in his stomach to digest the larger portions needed to replace the nutrition provided by mother’s milk. He also refused to leave his mother’s side and was hydrating himself by drinking the putrid puddle water where his decomposing mother lay. Hunter ignored the creek, a five-minute walk away, in order to stand guard and prevent the crows from pecking at her. On the day we rescued him, the puddles around his mother had completely dried up; there was no more water left for him to drink.
As a team we were surprised that the pungent odour from the mare’s carcass had not yet attracted the apex predators such as mountain lions, wolves and bears. A grizzly can smell a dead animal from up to 20 miles away, so the fact that after almost nine days no apex predators had arrived, was miraculous in and of itself. Hunter certainly had an angel on his shoulder.
We’ve received many inquiries as to what may have caused the mare’s death. In the aftermath of the rescue, we received a video and photos of the mare and foal two weeks prior when she was still alive. In the photos its clear to see that this mare had multiple sarcoid tumours growing on her neck. These tumours are locally invasive but do not spread to other organs. We don’t know if they had anything to do with her demise.
Another plausible theory is that Hunter’s mom died from an untreated episode of post-foaling colic. Large colon torsion is a common cause of colic in the first 100 days after foaling. Hunter was approximately a month old; therefore, this timeline would apply. This type of colic occurs when the large colon becomes displaced or twisted due to the increased room in the abdomen after the birth of a foal. It is a medical emergency, requiring surgical intervention and even in domestic horses who are treated for this condition, the mortality rate can be as high as 72%. A wild mare living in the wilderness wouldn’t stand a chance. This type of colic is known to be extremely painful. Mares will often roll and thrash violently from side to side, scraping the skin on the sides of their face. Hunter’s mother was found lying on her back as though she’d passed away while rolling.
This little Wildie foal’s survival for over a week in the wilderness, with nothing but his deceased mother for company, was nothing short of a miracle. He did put up a fight when we caught him and walked him back to the trailers, but once we reached the North 40 Ranch owned by HAWS president Darrell Glover, he settled in quickly.
It took Hunter a second or two to get his bearings when the trailer door opened and he stood staring out at a new and unfamiliar place. As soon as he spotted the other horses in the paddocks, he nickered in greeting and was answered by a chorus of whinnies from the welcoming committee.
Ken Shulko, one of the rescuers, led him off the trailer and into a small, private paddock with hay, water and a shelter. He was greeted by a lineup of curious equines along the fence line, including the resident donkey Eeyore and another rescued Wildie foal named Timber. He settled in for the night, safe and secure on the North 40 Ranch among equine and human friends alike. With round-the-clock bottles of milk – as much as he desired – and a warm bed to sleep on, Hunter’s ordeal was finally over. He was safe.
The next challenge was finding him a nurse mare. Due to his young age he still needed milk, and although bottled formula served that immediate need, he also required the nurturing and guidance that only an equine mother could provide.
In short order, HAWS was offered a surrogate mare named Lily. She is an experienced horse mom who hadn’t had a foal this year and was dry. A few doses of domperidone brought her into milk and three days later she arrived at the ranch. Here she received an injection of the ‘love drug’ oxytocin, which mimicked the hormones at birth, fooling her into thinking Hunter was hers. He now has a new mom, a new lease on life, and has met, up close and personal, the family of campers who first spotted him and alerted us to his situation, essentially saving his life..