Friend of mine had a mini donkey attacked. Blame is being put on the gelded jack she lives with. Thoughts? To begin, the wound is pretty graphic. Also, the picture was taken after the vet had cut away inviable tissue, so the original wound pattern is probably not present. NSFL : https://imgur.com/xIiObjS.jpg
There are three mini donkeys in the 3-5 acre field. The ~10y/o jenny who was attacked, her 2 year old daughter, and an ~7y/o gelding. The gelding was a jack until the age of four or so, and has sired a few foals. There are two gelding horses in the field, one is a maybe 15y/o cowpony, and a 12 y/o qh, both quite laid back, usually leaving the donkeys to herd by themselves. Ample shelter space, nowhere to get cornered in it.
The gelded jack has been in this field with the jenny a year before her foal was born, so about three years. He acted studdish at first, but he was only gelded perhaps a month before he was put in with her. Mounted her a lot, but that kind of dwindled. Was never aggressive to the foal and the jenny has surely gone into heat many times since she foaled, so I doubt that would be a trigger.
The field is pretty remote, coyotes are definitely in the area. However, there are eight big dogs on the farm, who do not mess with the donkeys. They have, like my dogs and donkeys, a very healthy respect for them. Momma donkeys are very quick to remind a dog he's getting too close for her comfort. The dogs are usually around the field, which makes coyotes or foreign dogs less likely of a culprit.
List of suspects I can think of, ranked by likeliness (my opinion):
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Coyote(s). They are pretty numerous, and the bite is from behind, like she was being chased. See also: dog. What makes this unlikely is the fact donkeys usually attack coyotes, but these guys are minis. Also, the dogs always near the field should have made the coyote wary? Don't know.
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Foreign dog(s). About as likely as coyotes. Maybe more so because the donkeys are used to dogs? Also unlikely for the same reason as coyote, all the farm dogs around.
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Gelded jack. He still acts a tad studdish, but the size of this wound means he would have had to keep going back, right? And why would he do that? One bite shouldn't have destroyed all that tissue? Again, we have to take in to account the wound had already been cleaned up by the vet before the picture was taken, so, perhaps it was more obvious?
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Farm dogs. I've seen the majority of these babies cower to the donkeys, but they do like to run in a pack, maybe they suddenly got brave?
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Hurt herself on something sharp. Who knows on this one, half of the field is wooded, it's a guessing game.
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The horses
Usually with wounds on horses/equines, I don't worry about the cause. I just don't want the gelded jack unnecessarily sold or destroyed for no reason. Thoughts? Opinions?
Momma donkey is doing ok, she's getting stalled until it all scabs over.
Submitted October 03, 2018 at 04:15PM by BirdLadySadie
via reddit https://www.reddit.com/r/Horses/comments/9l5xxn/friend_of_mine_had_a_mini_donkey_attacked_blame/?utm_source=ifttt
