'Bored' horse climbed on top of family's roof

A couple in New Brunswick, Canada were baffled after a family member sent them a photo of their horse perched on the roof of a garage. Stephen Downey and his wife Pat raise racing horses in Hampton N.B. But despite their experience with the four-legged beasts, they say they were baffled after seeing a photo, taken by Stephen's brother Archie, of a young colt on the garage roof.

"It looked like Archie had done a joke on Stephen and Photoshopped the horse on the roof because that just doesn't happen" Pat Downey said. "You would never get a horse to do something like that." After snapping the photo, Archie, who lives on the farm with the horse, coaxed the uninjured horse down. The horse was able to climb a small knoll at the back of the garage to get up onto the roof.



Stephen Downey says the colt was alone on the farm at the time because several of his horses had been sent to Saint John for training. "I think he was just bored," Downey said. "He's like a two or three-year-old kid and he was just looking for some excitement and he got into trouble like a regular kid would do." Downey says he sent the photo to several people who also thought the photo was a fake. "They think it's not real," he said. "They think you've Photoshopped it, but it's real and it really happened."

There was a hole in the roof where were the colt had put a hoof through. Pat Downey says it would have been a drop of more than 3.5 metres if the colt had plunged through. "I don't think he would have recovered from it because we couldn't have gotten him out," she said. The family has since put up a fence to block any horses from up getting up on the roof again. "In the 15 years we've had horses, I can honestly saying nothing like this has ever happened," Pat Downey said.

With news video.