Vets blames mountain lion; rangers say wild dogs
A Chandler area girl’s horse is recovering after it was attacked recently, possibly by a mountain lion, or wild dogs.
Kenzie Cowden, 17-year-old daughter of Kristie and Charles Cowden and a Chandler High School senior, said she went out to feed the four horses as she usually does around 8 or 9 a.m. Monday morning, July 19.
“I saw the cuts on Peaches’ legs and ran inside and told my mom. We called the Meeker Animal Hospital and took her there,” Kenzie said earlier this week.
“They felt the injuries were too severe and they sent us to the Oakridge Equine Hospital in Edmond,” Kenzie added.
“The vet at the Meeker Hospital told us she thought the injuries were caused by a big cat, a cougar, maybe a big bobcat, but was leaning towards a cougar,” Kenzie related.
“The Edmond vets agreed with the Meeker vets, a cougar or a big bobcat.”
Game Warden Mike France, who is assigned to Pottawatomie County but also assists in Lincoln County as needed, said he didn’t learn about the attack until Monday evening when a friend of Kenzie’s family called him.
“I called the horse owner when I found out,” France stated, noting, “The owner said the vets had told her it was a mountain lion.”
France explained the photos of the horse were sent to him and he forwarded those to the furbearer biologist.
“That’s who we send those reports to,” France said. “I talked with the biologist and he didn’t think the attack was by a mountain lion due to the injuries being so low on the horse. It could have been a pack of wild dogs. They like to run the animal for the fun of it, for some reason,” he added.
Jacob Harriett, game warden assigned to Lincoln County, said he was on vacation when the attack occurred, but after seeing the photos he concurred with the biologist and France.
Kenzie said the vets at the Edmond hospital told her and her family, “the horse is very lucky that the lacerations didn’t get into the joints of the right knee. They were able to stitch both lacerations, one on the right front knee and the other on the right front cannon bone.”
She said Peaches’ right knee was too swollen to stitch the first day at the Edmond facility, so it was the second day before they could do that.
Peaches had to remain at Edmond a third day so the vet could keep an eye on her and an IV could be kept in her.
Kenzie said Peaches, who is nine years old, also had some scratches on her chest and her neck, but neither of those needed anything done.
She said after Peaches spent three days at the Edmond facility, she and her family were able to bring the horse home. But Peaches wasn’t having anything to do with the stall they tried to put her in near the pasture where she had been attacked.
“She kicked three holes in the wall and let us know she didn’t want to be there,” Kenzie said.
“We took her to my great uncle’s ranch east of Chandler. She’ll be there three more weeks because she has to be on stall rest. She has to spend two weeks strictly in the stall, then I can walk her one time a day for 10-15 minutes for two weeks,” Kenzie continued.
She said she goes at least twice daily, sometimes three times a day, to visit Peaches.
It will be mid-August before Kenzie can bring Peaches home. She is hopeful the horse can stay in the same pasture.
“But if she resists like she did previously, we will have to move her to a different pasture,” Kenzie pointed out.
Kenzie and her family are planning to put up game cameras in their pastures. Kenzie said she was going this week to purchase those cameras.
“We spotted a cougar in our woods about two years ago,” she said. “Our friend spotted one about six months ago around the river that is one or two miles away.”
After she gets Peaches home, Kenzie said, she can start lightly exercising her again.
“It will be at least three months before she can compete,” she explained.
Kenzie said she’s had Peaches three years and has had horses since she was four years old.
Kenzie had competed on Peaches just a few days before in barrel racing and pole bending in the International Finals Youth Rodeo in Shawnee.
“I bought Peaches as a barrel racing horse and I trained her to be on poles as well. I compete in both events with her. We’ve done very well recently, we work very well together,” Kenzie concluded.