Posted on 03/29/2014 9:57:50 AM PDT by Olog-hai
Owners of horses and other domestic animals must try to prevent their animals from causing foreseeable injuries, the state’s highest court ruled Wednesday in a decision that avoided the larger issue of whether horses are inherently vicious while siding with a family whose child was bitten by one.
The Connecticut Supreme Court ruled 6-0 to uphold an Appellate Court decision that said a horse belongs to “a species naturally inclined to do mischief or be vicious.” But four of the justices said that the question of whether an animal is naturally dangerous must be considered individually by lower courts. […]
Connecticut’s sizable horse industry has warned that classifying the animals as vicious could make owning a horse uninsurable. Legislation is moving through the General Assembly proposing to reduce liability exposure for the owner or keeper of a horse, pony, donkey or mule in civil actions for personal injury damages caused by the animal. …
(Excerpt) Read more at bigstory.ap.org ...
Only an educated idiot would say horses are vicious.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t a horse’s temperament largely a product of how it was reared?
Or someone who has seen mustangs on the range in the west.
Yes, they are vicious. Just watch a couple of studs fight it out over a water hole.
I’ve had mustangs take more than a little interest in me when I’d approach their favorite water holes. They’ll zoom in straight at you and veer off at the last moment, trying to haze you off.
Largely, perhaps. But it’s debatable how much.
For some odd reason horses always hated my late Brother-In-Law (BIL). Even when he was a little kid and he was placed on a pony for a picture. The beast bit him on the leg and dragged him off of its back. Any time he went anywhere near a horse it reacted aggressively.
That’s why it is said, wild horses can’t drag it out of him or her.
Approaching any wild animal has its dangers. But the Connecticut SC is ruling that even domesticated horses hold this danger.
horsies are weird
that’s kind of like blaming chihuahuas because of pitbulls?
Stallions CAN be dangerous
Mustangs aren’t “wild” animals. They’re domesticated animals that have been allowed to run feral.
There’s a difference.
Take the dog vs. the wolf.
You can adopt feral dogs and domesticate them again. You can do this especially well with puppies. Likewise, you can train up mustangs from foals to do what domestic horses do - just as you’d train any horse.
Where you have a truly wild animal (eg, the wolf), no matter how you care for an adopted pup, there comes that day when the pup realizes it is a wild animal and it starts to tear your house apart, eat the cat and start looking at humans as food. That’s a wild animal.
There haven’t been any “wild” horses in North America for about 8,000 years or so.
What was the age of the vicious horse? If it was less than 2 years old, there’s no venom in the fangs yet so the bites aren’t that bad.
Back story: 20+ years ago when my older boys were still little, my best friend and I took them to the town agro fair (we’re still one of the towns in Connecticut that has one) There was a petting area with a calf and other critters.
All of the kids were feeding the calf grass and, of course, getting calf slobber all over their hands. Son #3 didn’t want to feed the calf grass because he didn’t want to get slobbered on. My friend says - totally straight face - “Oh, there’s nothing to worry about, the venom hasn’t come into the calf’s fangs yet.”
A woman standing on the other side of my friend says, “Oh, I didn’t realize that cows had fangs.” She totally believed my friend was telling the truth. I thought I would choke trying to hold back my laughter. It’s been a big joke ever since.
So how do the leading zoologists trace the horse into North America? Perhaps they came over a land bridge?
FMCDH(BITS)
Poison horses haw!
My FIL had a mule that was as crazy as a loon, when you were in the pasture you ALWAYS kept an eye on him and never let him get in your blind spot.
Never could break it from wanting to hurt you if it could, it went to the great glue factory in the sky via the local auction house after it bit my MIL one too many times.
I forgot to mention it was a miniature mule as well.
Goodness gracious...I guess Connecticut has gotten so citified they don’t encounter animals any more (unless they roam in gangs and beat the heck out of anyone in their way)
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