The herd of Corolla Wild Horses that roam the Currituck Outer Banks has increased by one, as a colt named Bravo was born Saturday afternoon and is doing well.
They gave us quite a scare Sunday morning when we went out to check on them. The adult horses were fine and behaving normally but there was no foal to be found.
Cora Mae, the mother, was not acting stressed at all so we were quite stumped. We scoured the surrounded area (woods, canals, under houses) and couldn’t find any sign of the foal.
After about three hours, Nikki from Corolla Jeep Adventures stopped and mentioned that she had seen the new foal a couple streets and canals south of where the rest of the family was.
We rushed over and there was Bravo standing under a house. Gus and Taka were nearby so everyone who had seen him there understandably assumed they were his parents. Gus deserves a special shoutout for tolerating this foal in his space. Taka, who is a very experienced mother, probably had something to do with keeping him in line.
We scooped Bravo up and put him in the back of the SUV to take him back to his family. Cora Mae accepted him immediately, so it’s unlikely she rejected him and left him behind on purpose.
We were told that there were some stallions fighting in the area late Sunday night, so our best guess is that Nobel (Bravo’s dad) aggressively chased his mares away from the challenging stallion and Bravo got left behind in the scuffle.
He was far enough away from Cora Mae that she wouldn’t have been able to smell or hear him, which was probably why she was behaving as if the foal was dead – as far as she knew, he was.
Either way, all’s well that ends well. Bravo immediately nursed and is doing just fine now. Cora Mae is a great mom and very experienced (she is the dam of Valor and Riptide).
We are keeping a close eye on them, as we do with all new foals, but have no reason to believe Bravo has any lasting issues or injuries. He is big, alert (he was not happy about being picked up and carried on Sunday – always a good sign!), and has fully assimilated back into the rest of the harem.
We are so very grateful to Nikki for letting us know she’d seen him – even though she didn’t realize he was separated from his mom! This is such a good example of how tour drivers help us monitor and track the horses.
And we’d like to say a very special thank-you to Ronda, Heidi, and Barbara for helping us get Bravo back to his mom and also keeping an eye on them throughout the day and night. There were several other people who helped search for him, and while we didn’t get all your names please know that we are SO thankful for your help.
Bravo is the 9th foal born to the herd this year, bringing our herd count to 105.
Our management plan calls for no less than 110, and no more than 130 horses so we still have some growing to do! Maybe one more late season foal will get us into the double digits for 2021 – time will tell!
In the meantime, we will continue to celebrate Bravo’s very exciting birth.
