‘Not a dry eye’ as much-loved mare takes on orphaned foal to love alongside her own colt

There was “not a dry eye in the house” when a nursing mare whom vets had said might need to be put down a few years earlier took on a colt orphaned when his dam died from colic.

Grand prix dressage rider and trainer Johanne Dykes’ Irish draught Gertie had been living in a herd with Johanne’s dressage mare Britannia, each with a foal. Britannia suffered a displaced bowel three weeks ago and could not be saved, so her son Nelson was orphaned.

“It was so sad; that’s where the scenes from Black Beauty come from,” Alice Fyson, who works for Johanne, told H&H. “It was absolutely awful, I couldn’t even string a sentence together. He was suckling from her, nudging her, and it was so bad.

“We left them together for two hours, and then the guy came to collect Britannia. The vet said all along to leave Nelson with Gertie and Rico, because he knows them, he’s grown up with them, and it’s the herd. But he was beside himself all night, calling and calling, it was terrible.

“But the very next day, they were all waiting at the gate and Gertie had both foals suckling from her, and she was grooming Nelson. There wasn’t a dry eye in the house.”

Alice explained that Johanne bought Gertie at the tail end of the Covid lockdown, unseen, “one of those things you should never do!”

“We bought her off two photos and a video, and she didn’t turn up looking like any of it,” she said. “She fell off the lorry, had terrible feet and was thin as a rake and covered in lice.

“The vet said she wasn’t strong enough for herself, let alone to carry a foal; she needed a year out, she was going to cost a lot of money to get back and it might be kinder to let her go, because her feet were really sore.”

But thanks to a huge amount of work and effort, Gertie recovered fully.

“She wears Scootboots, hoof boots that look like jelly shoes, which is quite cute!” Alice said. “My boss said ‘I’ve never heard of jelly shoes for horses’ but Gertie bounced right back.”

Gertie gave birth to Rico this year and is carrying a foal by Hallslake Nimrod, for Alice.

“My boss said ‘I don’t want to breed any more sports horses, but I know you’d like to have one’, and Gertie’s Irish, which is more my type,” Alice said. “She paid for the vets; I’ve been with my boss 13 years so it was a present, I’m still pinching myself.”

Alice paid tribute to vets Ed Lyall and Matt Waterhouse from Focused Equine for everything they have done, including supporting Britannia in her last moments, and for the other horses including Gertie.

“We love her so much; she touched our hearts when she fell off that transport lorry,” she said. “Now, to take Nelson on after the sad loss of Britannia is just so humbling.

“He seems really attached to her as well. I thought maybe he was going to be the oddball, a little black sheep, but they’re all together, and they all sleep together, which I think is really cute. They come into the field shelter and lie down together, which is lovely. After such a devastating 48 hours, Gertie made us so relieved that little Nelson was going to be ok, fed and loved by his Aunty Gertie.”

“I’m so proud of her”

Johanne told H&H that after the “sheer heartbreak” of seeing Gertie’s condition when she arrived, having then seen her carry foals, allow Johanne to give Alice a foal of her own and now adopt Nelson is “the ultimate story of love, care and never giving up”.

“Gertie owes us nothing and she has a home here with us for life,” she said. “The devastating loss of my beautiful mare Britannia has honestly broken us all; thankfully she’s left a legacy of two outstanding young horses and as a team we are all very excited for their futures.

“I can’t thank Gertie enough for taking Britannia’s foal Nelson under her wing. even allowing him to suckle off her. It has just been truly incredible to witness and it’s more humbling than I can put into words. What a special mare Gertie is, I’m so so proud of her.”

• To stay up to date with all the breaking news from major shows throughout 2025, subscribe to the Horse & Hound website

You may also be interested in: