Personality Swap

There have been extreme herd changes that I have yet to expand upon, here.

Liquid Gold is gone, replaced by this interesting trio:

The mare is in the lead, a dominant girl in hiding. The shetland is a little shit-disturbing gelding. Very nice riding mount, but I suppose you just can't shake all of the pony obstinance outta them. He's been enjoying pushing Bill's buttons. And the old man bringing up the rear is a sweetheart I used to look after at another barn 13 years ago! His pony has been getting him into a lot of trouble with our herd leader. Poor Sailor just isn't as wiley as his shorter counterpart and often gets the brunt of Bill's rebukes.

In fact, it was 7 hairy days during the nastiest fall weather that Bill was making me wish him 6 feet under. He's a phenomenal herd leader, offering protection second to none, but integrating males to his harem is tricky business. Once a horse is in, though, he's their valiant protector for life. I'm glad he's not a horse to corner or constantly pick at anyone. I guess he makes his point clearly enough that all is required to continue his assertion and maintain order is some serious Ugly Face. He's great about protecting herd members from bullies within, too. Yes, he redeems himself a zillion times over once the dust settles.

Poor old Sailor has bald patch gashes head to tail and was chased through our electric fence twice. Thankfully, it was internal cross-fencing (rather than perimeter fence) and we use electric rope, which offers plenty of give and avoids serious injuries. In fact, other than his surface trophies, he has suffered no other ill effects from the altercations. Checkers the pony sustains not a mark, of course. The little shit would go into Bill's buffer zone and stir him up. Sailor, like a good protector himself, would try to protect his little scamp. And Sailor's mare (Minuet) just flirted back and forth with everyone.

At miday on the 7th day, everything changed. Liquid Gold had left the day before and we had pulled Bill's #2 mare into a seperate corral to complete a weaning process and allow her bag to dry up.

Mini went into heat, barrelled into the middle of Bill's herd and let both cannons fly. "Hey bitches. I'm here - MOVE OVER". I'm thinking a smaller hullo may have won her more friends, but she did catch Bill's eye. After some clear rule-setting such as "Don't pick on the babies!", he's seperated her from her Old Man and her Mini-Me. He continues to keep those two on the perimeter of the herd, though they are now allowed to eat in the same hemisphere. Minuet still comes visiting every time I feed Sailor his seniors feed, the little piggy.

I'm glad Patrick talked me out of removing Bill from the herd. It likely would have increased his frustration and subsequently his aggression when we would have been eventually forced to put them together again. Better to remove the alpha's motivation for defensiveness. One happy herd is so much emotionally healthier.

We have a full house. Full of wonderful personalities!

Ladies' Wednesday!

Well, I've officially entered the world of saddle fitting woes. Max has outgrown my favourite yummy synthetic dressage saddle that I will blissfully ride in anytime, anywhere. I phoned to order one in a wider tree and there is no such beast. CRAP.

Tooling around in a bareback pad on an unschooled horse is tricky business and I'm far too inept to tackle much. Instead, we worked on such intricacies as leading (!lazy!ass!), side-passing from the ground (!champ!) and climbing over and around all kinds of obstacles. A few hissy fits occured on both our parts, but we made some serious progress, I think and had tons of fun doing it.

So I'm searching hi and low, trying on anything resembling a saddle that we stumble across. I'm aiming for either another dressage or a trail saddle. Must be comfy for both of us. Ticker is, whatever is wide enough for his shoulders is too low for his withers. GRRRR. And of course, current financial circumstances being what they are, I'm ridiculously limited... which kind of suits me fine, as I'm sure we'll be transitioning again before Max is finished growing & changing.

We will prevail!!

Winter Riding..?!

Trailered a friend's horse to her new home and brought The Beast along for the journey. For once he was the trailering babysitter! He does so well loading, now. Just marches right into the Sardine Can. I LOVE it. Was a little concerned when friend's mare shot out in reverse a few times loading. Max tried backing out with her each time, but didn't fight the buttbar. Just a "I'mcomintoo-whoops. No I'm not." My worry was that it might make him anxious to load again, but coming home he could barely wait for me to secure the lead around his neck before getting to that yummy low-starch complete feed, lol! The lower starch is meant to reduce the sugar spikes for his irregular loading-only treat. Not that his behaviour requires it, but I'm a believer that, just like us, it's greater benefit to their health to avoid such things. But who really knows?

Anyhow, puttered around in the arena while I was there, borrowing another friend's Wintec Isabel. Fit Max very well. It was an extra-wide. No wonder my medium ain't cuttin' it!

Here's the fuzzy chunk monkey... and Max, too.

Finally!

Missed last week's ladies' Wednesday on account of some serious stomach flu... yelch.

This week's event was no less rewarding and exciting than any other. After practicing our loading with Bill all weekend at the park, Max loaded in less than 30 seconds ALL BY HIMSELF both to leave and to come home. I was SO excited!! We may have just conquered our need for a babysitter.

The arena was at beautiful capacity, with 6 lovely riders. There was just enough distraction to really work on Max's focus. We did some serious trotting and even a couple of our hairy canter departures. A friend brought up a great idea I'm going to try next week - trot his drafty tukuss off then as for the canter. It's great rhythm-building, anyhow. I just love being so in tune to a horse and am excited for the day Max & I click. He is such a fun and engaging personality, I just know this will be my most rewarding horsey relationship yet! For myself, 3rd time definitely is the charm!

As soon as our new little pony boy can reliably tie calmly and without pawing, he'll be coming on our weekly excursions. Never too early to learn the ropes! I think he'll LOVE it!

I'm so at home with all three of our horsey personalities... like wearing a favourite sweater. They compliment each other so well and fit us and our needs so well.

Horse-wise, life is absolute bliss.

Bird's Hill!!!

We may have only made it out there once this year, but we made it count! We spent the night at friends', nearby and rode twice in two days for a total of about 4 hours.

Both days were windy and cool in the open, glorious in the bush. The sun almost made things too warm, bundled in fall-time layers as we were.

We put the horses through all their paces. Patrick is particularly proud of some serious trotting half-passing, including through corners. Unfortunately, this maneuvre seemed to anounce an impending race to poor Max. While his trotting remained calm and consistent beside Bill's fancy feet, the barest whisper for a canter had him instantly shooting off at top speed. The first time required some interesting tactics to get him under control but after that, we were back to our reliable canter in-hand.

Max does feel this need to break warp effort in his transition from trot to canter, which can be unsettling, but he's back under me before the second stride. We'll have to figure out some kind of exercises for that. I'm not sure if arena or open road would be the best approach for this boy.

And now for the good stuff:


Finally got myself a pair of nippers. Time to take my hoof care to the next level. Amazingly, it was the newest pony I tried them out on first, during his supplimental feeding. Scout (we finally named him) was better than Max at the entire process!

Another of my favourite Wednesdays tomorrow! I'll have to let you know if I can get him in the trailer without a buddy.

Equine Exploits Abound!

While we wait patiently for our next outing with the boys (Bird's Hill in 2 weeks!!!), we have not been completely idle.

Patrick competed in an awsome local Cowboy Challenge Race. It was a excellent obstacle course that put all 12 riders and their mounts through their paces. From ground work to bareback, these riders gave their all! Patrick was quite proud of his 7th placement among peers and was ecstatic to make some connections with fellow MALE riders. It was too dark to snap any shots by the time things started rolling, but I did get some shots during set-up:

And now for the latest addition to our little herd!!! I'm very excited to present our new little Gotland Pony boy, 5 months old:

Gotlands are known for their attraction to children and steady demeanours. Already today, this boy has traveled to a knew home (effectively completing his weaning process), met new herd members and learned how to lead consistently. He's extremely smart! We've sectioned off the herd of 7 behind our trusty electric rope, which is at a height that he can march right under if he feels threatened at all. It took him not two minutes to figure this out. The herd is thus kept close by, being contained at the front of the pasture and he is free to seek out his new relationships at will. He's a very sweet personality, content to graze around you while you lounge on the grass beside him. He's very interested in Kaleb, even came for a bush walk with the three of us, all by himself! The hope is that he'll grow into the perfect match for our son. If the little we've come to know of him is anything to tell by, I think their respective soft but eager seeking of adventure will tie together beautifully. And now, just cause who can resist baby pics, especially of a pre-historic-looking mohawk-sporting baby:

And finally, cause this blog is supposed to be about him, anyhow... Maximus. We're really looking forward to our first ladies' ride tomorrow! Well, I am. He's blissfully unaware of anything but dinner, right now. I did goof around with some groundwork tonight and he embraced the interaction whole-heartedly. I'm almost thinking he kinda likes me...

Trooper

We had our first teeth floating appointment yesterday. I have to say, I was quite impressed with the boy. We opted to tranq him to reduce stress and keep things happy. He was content to be left to his happy snooze after we were done. It took all of 3 minutes, total. There was nothing serious going on - he never has trouble gaining weight or accepting the bit at all, but some uncomfy points were brought down. I'm very happy to have done it before winter sets in, to put my mind at ease if nothing else.

No riding since we've been back, unfortunately. Been busy focussing on the business of dogs and the weather has NOT been cooperating with my limited schedule. We are hopefully looking forward to a Bird's Hill ride & sleep over for the middle of October, if we can pawn the spawn off. We shall see!

Hope all of you are enjoying all good things horse. We can't afford not to take in their wholesome therapy!

Love seeing the fuzzy beast in the pasture every day. He's such a delightful ham. I've got to remember the camera on my pasture walks one of these days...