Please help with "necessary to wean" argument

[ToTheNines]

I heard today about a person whose mare died. The teller of the story also mentioned a baby, and I asked if it had ever been weaned. Apparently the owner does not believe in weaning and said they do it "naturally". I said not weaning probably weakened the mare. Not weaning sounds a little nutty to me.

[jaimebaker]

I had a foal on a mare for two years. Her next one was on her for a year. This mare did NOT wean naturally. This first one she had quite literally tried to kill himself when we tried to wean him. Life was easier for all involved if I just left him on her. Bad decisions on my part but all is fine now and I have no plans to ever breed in the future:) Oh, the mare was fine, fat and never 'weakened' or pulled down by nursing that long either. However, I've seen mares go way WAY down with a foal on them for just 6 months so it really depends on the mare.

[JB]

Not weaning doesn't kill mares. Wild mares often have a yearling still nursing as they are getting ready to foal the next one, and that's what promotes the weaning process.

Weaning as we tend to think of it is a man-made situation, because we need to sell the mare, or the foal, or put the mare back in work, or something of that nature.

What did the mare die from? She could have died even if she'd never foaled. If she died of starvation because she couldn't eat enough to take care of herself and the nursing kidlet (how old was he anyway?) then that is a factor of the owner not feeding enough, or of not taking the foal off her so that she could use the calories for herself.

[Austins Mom]

We bought a mare, who's 2-year-old was still nursing off of her. They basically got weaned by being put on seperate trailers and to their new homes ... Not nice :-S It took a lot longer for the mare to come around.

[LuvMyTB]

I used to board with someone who had a mare & "filly" who had NEVER been weaned, never even been separated. The "filly" was 5 years old and still occasionally attempted to nurse off the mare. Bleck.

[Blue Eyed Tovero]

I've got that beat. A boarder came in a few years ago with 3 mares and insisted that 2 of them be kept stalled side by side, turned out together, led in and out of the barn together, etc. Come to find out that they were mare and foal who had NEVER been separated. Mare was 27 years old and "foal" was 15 years old! Biggest pain we've ever had to deal with.

[Melyni]

I heard today about a person whose mare died. The teller of the story also mentioned a baby, and I asked if it had ever been weaned. Apparently the owner does not believe in weaning and said they do it "naturally". I said not weaning probably weakened the mare. Not weaning sounds a little nutty to me.

Foal might have had nothing to do with it. Mares in the wild don't 'wean' their foals the milk tapers off and the foal finds other food, over time,like mostly over the winter.
With the new foal in the spring the mare does not let the previous foal nurse, usually!
But no-one removes the previous foals.

So it might or might not have been the problem.
MW

[naturalequus]

As others have already noted, it might or might not have had anything to do with the foal; it was entirely dependant upon the mare and the situation. Not weaning a foal does not "weaken" a mare, however of course there are situations where weaning a foal is beneficial, if the mare cannot seem to get sufficient nutrition to support both her and the foal. Personally I think that type of situation is rare though (not based on my own experiences though, just based upon what I've heard and seen with others). Mares in the wild wean their foals naturally and so can ours, though in the right situation; if they don't, it can be helpful to wean a foal, but it is not necessarily absolutely iron-clad necessary.