For the past few days Prize has been methodically dismantling her stall. It started with the far wall. She removed the top 3 feet – all the better to see over and all. We left that alone. It wasn’t hurting anything. Today I go out and the wall between her and Rosie was decidedly wiggly. Unlike the far wall the boards in this wall were all bolted together so instead of taking out one board at a time this wall was about to come down in one fell swoop. I went to get the husband.

It didn’t take long to figure out the problem. The boards fit snuggly in brackets running vertically on the big posts in each corner of the stall. Then there are screws run through the brackets to hold the boards in place. The stability of the boards in turn holds the big posts straight up and down. All in all it is a neat little system. That is unless you’ve hired my contractors who neglected to put any screws anywhere in the entire system of stalls. The whole thing was being held up just by force of habit.

I think it held as long as it did because Spirit and Rosie are little. Prize has about 200 lbs on them so when she leans on the stall it puts more force on it. Rosie rearing up and looking over the stall wall at Prize couldn’t be helping either.

We had to use a sledgehammer to put the big posts back up vertical and then screw in the boards. We never noticed that there was no screws because you have to really be looking at the brackets to see the screws. Besides, who would think that the builders wouldn’t use a single screw?????