Mystery at Grumpy Old Horse Ranch

My name is Splash...Cactus Jack Splash and I am a horse detective. I have been on assignment at Grumpy Old Horse Ranch. My job-help the DOR find a hay thief.
The DOR came out to feed us and discovered this....
Some critter had made a meal out of the corner of two bails of hay. Her first thought was it was the llamas stretching their long skinny necks into the hay paddock and stealing hay. I knew better, you see I am not going to share my hay with any stinky llamas. When they come into the pasture I chase them back to where they came from.
The DOR checked for llama poop and didn't find any, I could have told her that. So she looked for another answer. I followed her closely, trying to steer her in the right direction.

Here is the crime scene from a distance. You can see it would take one skinny neck to get to the hay. Not only did the perpetrator reach through the panel, they also moved the large feed tub to do so. Another reason that it wasn't the llamas. Hmmm, what to think. The only horses that have been caught moving the feed tubs are me and Harley. I was using the small ones for soccer balls, moving the big ones is just too much work. Really why would I do it when the tubs are always full of hay? So I am thinking it is Harley, now to get the DOR to come to the same conclusion.

Well here is a photo of Harley eating his hay in his feed tub. Notice how good he is at looking innocent. Yep, he even has the DOR almost buying his act. I went over and gave him a well place nip on his neck and when the DOR saw me do that she also saw this....

Yep, you guessed it paint from the panels!

Well the gig was up Pretty Boy Harley was busted. The DOR doesn't know why he decided to steal hay. We all have our own big tub of hay. I can tell her why, because Harley is a mischief maker, that is why. He does stuff and then stands around innocently while the rest of us get blamed...well his true colors (or rather the panel colors) were showing this time.

The DOR added extra tie-downs to the tarp so Harley can't work it up. She also wagged her finger at him and told him he was naughty, like that is going to do a lot of good. Nice thing is now that the DOR knows that Harley is naughty the rest of us can pull a few stunts and he will get blamed. We won't be stealing hay though because our necks are too darn fat or short.

The DOR was telling her friend how much she enjoys us. Not only are we relaxing to be around, but we always find a way to make her smile. Hmmmm, do you think she will smile if we all broke into the hay paddock and helped ourselves? Maybe we need to plan the great hay eating festival...of course we all know if we eat too much we will get sick. We will need to come up with something else to do.

Enjoy your day and don't forget to hug your DOR