What I’ve been up to….

As usual, left to my own devices I manage to get myself into trouble!!  Nothing too serious this time so let me recap what’s happened since my last post!

We now have a boarder.  Snowflake came to us “temporarily” at the beginning of September.  There were some issues at the place she was at before and I was able to help out.  Snowflake had a gorgeous pinto foal earlier this summer, I got the pleasure of meeting her when she was about 2 months old.  Sadly, she injured herself seriously and had to be laid to rest.  This was understandably upsetting for Snowflake and the poor sad mommy was on the thin side when she got here.  Snowflake also has cancer in the skin around her eyes.  She’s ok but wears a fly mask to protect her eyes and has a couple spots that need to be removed.  She is such an easy mare to care for that having her here isn’t an issue and she’ll be staying with us indefinitely now.

Louie has been an awful pasture bully.  He was picking on Snowflake and then decided to pick on Zandy.  Zandy came in from the pasture pretty lame one Sunday afternoon.  She had a lump on her shoulder that was warm to the touch and she was VERY sore.  I put a call in to the vet and we decided a dose of banamine initially and then bute as needed and hot packs as many times a day as possible – if she wasn’t showing marked improvement within a few days we’d reevaluate.  2 days later she was almost falling over lame.  We decided to have Dr T out.  Dr Tanja came out on Wednesday and the best we could figure out was that she’d injured her shoulder – probably kicked or ran into the hay rack in her stall when she was being stupid a couple nights before.  Basically a wait and see approach, cold hosing for her left foot because Dr T was worried about that foot from taking up the slack from  her right side.  But just basically wait and see how things go – probably a long recovery but we were hoping for a full recovery.  A couple days later Zandy blew an abscess!!  WHAT?!  Yep, after all that apparently the bump on the shoulder was just coincidence.  Go figure huh? 

Louie’s owner has come to the decision that she can not keep him anymore and has asked me to keep him.  I’m very torn on this issue – I love Louie, but we aren’t the best match, I’m admittedly high strung and he is too and we feed into each other and cause a huge mess!!  I’m working on it – I think I may have a plan in the works but we’ll see!!

Buddy has GROWN!!  He now measures a level 14.3!!  HOW did that happen??  He has hardly grown since I got him and then BAM he shot up seemingly overnight!!  Last night while I was cleaning stalls I had to do a double take standing next to him his hip was at my shoulder – HUH?  So I went and got my handy dandy tape and measured – yes I know the tape isn’t as accurate as a stick but I don’t have one of those and I didn’t need either to tell me that he’s taller than he was when I bought him!

Now for the most exciting news.  Vince has a horse of his very own!!  A friend bred her Percheron mare to her QH stallion and in May 08 this “little” guy was born.  They are thinning their numbers and while I definitely wasn’t looking for another horse, this cross is one that Vince and I had talked about as a good compromise for him and the price was most definitely right.  He has always said he wanted a draft horse but our barn is short and there is just no way one of the giants that we’ve casually looked at in the past would have fit.  Vince has renamed him “Rocky” – he was “Blaze” with his former owners but that just didn’t fit him.  He has been here less than a week but is fast becoming a part of the family.  He is a LOT pushy at meal times – we’re working on it.  Vince only got a couple days with him before he had to go back to work but he spent some time with Rocky and although we agree he’s a project, he seems quite smitten with him.  The plan is to get Vince riding on Zandy and come next fall I’ll get both colts started under saddle.  Both of course will have ground work and have been saddled etc but I won’t get on either of them until next fall.  Both of them will also be gelded very soon.  Rocky string tests to 16 hands but right now he’s not much taller than Rowdy.  Where Rowdster is smooth and flowing in his gaits out across the pasture, Rocky has that “doop de doop de do” about him.  I’ll try to get some pictures up soon!

That’s it on the horse front, kids have settled into school, I’m using my quiet time during the day to make jewelry and I am hoping that I can get my butt in gear and get on a schedule to start working some of these lazy ponies on a regular basis!!

Stay tuned…..