Do I Have A Future Show Jumper, Eventer?

Continuing my streak of bad luck, my crazy, little 2 yr old Mustang decided to jump an almost 6 foot fence and do a sliding stop on the other side, literally on her side. Now I don't know why these things have to happen to me, and I really don't know why someone is testing my sanity, but I am really running out of patience.

This is what we think happened. We just missed seeing the actual event by a mere second or two. Chance had been hanging out in her shed most the day because, again, it is raining extremely hard (you will see in photos how bad it is here). My arena is behind Chance's pasture, and the deer have been hanging out there for awhile. Now I don't know if this is what happened, but this is what we are pretty sure did happen. Chance became spooked by the deer, which in turn caused her to run out of her shed and as she was running toward the fence, she decided at the last minute that she could not stop in time, so she decided to just go over the top. Once on the other side of the fence, due to excessive slipperiness and mud, she fell over on her left side and slid quite a distance. We caught the action right after she got up and ran down to Brandy and Fritzy. My OH just happened to look out the window and then screamed "OMG, Chance is in the other pasture!" My first thought was she ran through the fence, and I looked through the binoculars to see what I was dealing with before I ran out there. The fence was standing, but the strand of electric wire on top the fencing was down.

View of Chance's pasture looking into Brandy and Fritzy's pasture. This is exactly where she jumped, she had to jump over the trench of water, over the fence and land on other side.

I immediately grabbed my coat, a halter and I ran outside. The horses were running and bucking all over the place. I knew we had a serious problem. Not only had Fritzy and Chance never been in a pasture together, but with everything that just happened, I knew I was going to have a problem catching her. It had rained so hard in the last 24 hours, that it was so slippery and dangerous for this kind of commotion to be happening in the pasture. If Chance wasn't already hurt, she would be by the time I was able to get her caught.

Chance back on her side. This kind of gives you an idea of how high the fence is from the side she had jumped over.

All 3 horses were running, bucking and sliding all over. Kicking wars started between all 3 horses. I'm in a panic. The damn goats had to come out and get involved. Edgar is lucky he still has a head. I was tempted to get my TCP .380 out and just end it with the goat right there. (At this point, I had never been more angry at any animal in my entire life). Because at this moment I still did not know if my baby was injured, and the whole situation was just plain out of control. I then thought that we could somehow get Chance through the gate into the long paddock without haltering her, but once the gate was opened all the horses wanted to go through. We just let Fritzy and Edgar into the long paddock and left Brandy and Chance in the pasture so we could try and get her to calm down. Chance was just dripping in mud from head to tail on her left side. I couldn't see any injuries, but it was hard to tell with all the mud.

This is where Chance landed. So where you see Chance now, she jumped that fence from that side, and landed at the flattened mud that's at the bottom of this picture. She could have landed on her feet then fell on her side, but we will never know. All I know is her whole left side was covered in mud so she did fall at some point.

For what seemed an eternity and after trying to trick Chance with grass, and her getting in trouble for not letting me catch her, I finally got her calmed down enough to get a halter on her. I looked at her as best as I could through all the mud to make sure she didn't have any cuts. I couldn't see anything and could not hose her off due to her not having had hosing lessons yet and didn't want to traumatize her anymore then she was already traumatized.

Chance's face, about 45 minutes after her ordeal, still drenched in mud.

I led her into the long paddock and waited for my OH to get the gate open so I could get her back into her own pasture.

Chance's side. She looks just wet, but it is actually all mud.

This could have turned out so much worse. Chance could have ran through the fence, which would have caused multiple injuries, so thankfully she decided the attempt at jumping it. But by doing that she could have broken a leg, her neck, or something. I don't know if she has an injury that I can't see, like a tendon or ligament. But am hoping that for once something will go my way. She has never tried jumping the fence before, so I know it was a last minute decision in the heat of a scary moment.

This shows you how much water we have on our property right now. We have never seen anything like this in the 11 yrs that we have lived here. This is literally a river that has been flowing through the pastures, for months.

We had a couple days of decent weather, sun and around 65 degrees, but it does not last for more then 1 or 2 days. We need at least 2 weeks of dry, warm weather to dry this place out. It started raining hard last night, and it has not stopped. I am so lucky I don't have more serious injuries to my horses due to the mud.

We can't put horses in the pasture above anymore. That's Brandy and Fritzy's old pasture and it is literally a foot deep of mud, if not more. It is bad, so bad. The entire pasture is like that.

I am out of patience. I do not know how much more of this I can take. I am at my wit's end, literally. I have never seen anything like it. This is May 15th! The pasture's are usually dried up, the stream is usually flowing at a trickle and the pond is halfway to being drained this time of year!

At least the horses aren't up to their knees in mud like in the other pasture. But you can see how much it has rained because it is now flowing into their one dry spot, their shed!

This is the new Painted Creek. We have had a constant flow of water through the pasture's, down the gravel road and into the pond. It does not stop flowing. It is probably about 6 inches deep.

I am hoping that Chance did not get any injuries, it is hard to tell. I think she is okay. It could have been a lot worse, so much worse. Just thinking about what happened, and what could have easily been another huge vet bill, or worse. We are also very lucky (the only luck to this whole day) that this happened on our day off and we caught it when we did. It probably is even a good thing she jumped into Brandy and Fritzy's pasture, and not outside of it to where she could run wherever she wanted! I hope Chance has learned her lesson and does not jump anymore fences! I ride western, for gosh sake! Doesn't she know that?!?