Tribute to a Friend

Love you buddy

Today, in a word, sucked.  Pardon the language, but sometimes the word fits.  My friend to pay tribute to?  Tuff, a 20+ year old grade gelding, exited this world and went to the heavenly pastures.  Over a month ago while on a trail ride, Tuff's right hind leg appeared to lock up and he could no longer move on the ride.  The rider dismounted and, after some encouraging, I finally got Tuff back up to the barn.  He was in obvious discomfort and we had the vet out a few days later.  He said that Tuff had probably incurred a chip to either his hip or knee cap and that chip was floating around, causing his pain.  A week of banamine to see if there was a chance for the chip to move out and be reabsorbed was our only real course of action.  I crossed my fingers, but I knew that there wasn't much of a chance that this would work.  I knew that he would never be ridden again.  While he could still walk around (with some difficulty), it was becoming obvious that life would only become more difficult for him.  After much deliberation and heartache, the gut wrenching decision was made to put Tuff down.  While it was the right decision, it was extremely hard.

Tuff and Cupid-Best Friends

What made Tuff different?  Tuff came to us in August of 2005 from a Wyoming ranch along with 4 other horses. He was the last Wyoming horse left at camp.  One became extremely lame and had to go, one died of colic, another of a rare liver disease, and the other grew too tired of camp life and had to find a new home.  He was the last of his friends.  Tuff fit right into the routine of camp right away.  He was an equestrian camp horse by summer and trail ride horse the rest of the year.  He even led out the 2nd string rides on 30 horse weekends.  I never saw anything ruffle this guy's feathers.  He never did anything silly or stupid with a camper or guest on him.  While he had his annoying little quirks at times (deworming wasn't easy and he was a slow eater), he never did anything stupid period.  What will always stand out to me was an incident a few years back.  I was holding onto the gate hook of the electric fence trying to let part of the herd out into the pasture as Tuff was standing close to the opening drinking out of the trough.  A particularly stupid horse was running around and got a little too close to me and caught his back foot on part of the electro-braid.  To keep myself from getting tangled up, I threw the gate rope away from me and as the horse ran into the pasture, the gate rope got kicked up from the horse and wrapped itself completely around Tuff's neck.  What do you think Tuff did?  Nothing.  He stood there at the water trough and looked at me to come help him.  Any other horse would have freaked out and ran off, damaging the fence and hurting themselves.  He didn't.  He was unflappable. Amazing in my book.  From then on, he had me.  He had my heart.  I knew I could put anybody on him and nothing bad would happen to them.  As close to bomb proof as I would ever call a horse.  From the way he and Cupid demonstrated a relationship that most humans would be jealous of to his slow and patient way with beginners, he was a horse with no price tag.  Earth lost a horse, heaven gained an angel.    RIP 12/5/2011