Facebook and CRS Gold DFM

To all of my Blogger friends and followers, I have taken the plunge.

Alright, I wanted to promote CRS Gold DFM Equine Probiotics on Facebook, so I signed up for a Facebook page. There isn't a way to promote a product page without having a personal account with friends and all of that stuff. So I have given in to temptation and started a personal Facebook page as well.

The good thing is that I can continue to blog here at Spinning Yarns from the Farm and it automatically posts onto my Facebook page. Thanks, Tonya, over at The Simple Life, for that tip.

This means that I won't have to spend all of my time posting on both sites. I also removed email addresses from my blog so you won't be getting my blog emailed to you anymore.

I may eventually add a Rope Halter page but not right now because I have all of the orders that I want to deal with.

Here is the CRS Gold DFM page.

Ridin' Ranger

We went riding on Monday, swallowed our pride and paid the $10 for a one day ride at Blackwell Horseman's Camp in the Hoosier National Forest, otherwise known as the Charles C. Deam Wilderness area. We have been riding there since we were kids and now we have to pay to use the trails, it just isn't right. I was riding there before it was even a horseman's camp.

I took Ranger and my DH took Darth, they both did well but Ranger was awesome. He doesn't shy from anything. He walks through horse swallowing mud holes and didn't even notice any of the horse eating stumps or fallen trees.

He doesn't scrape your knees against trees unless there is gravel in the trail, he hates gravel, we will have to shoe him for the next ride. Who puts gravel on horse trails anyway? The thing that really grates me is that we are paying for the stupid gravel with our $10 per day.

The thing that I really love about Ranger is he puts his nose to the ground and he doesn't stumble, he is super careful on rough and steep ground. Flies don't bother him either, even horse flies. I don't mean that he doesn't mind them (which he doesn't) but they don't like his color. They did land on the saddle and pad though. Darth got the bites but the flies really weren't that bad.

Darth had to go twice as far as Ranger went, because he kept having to turn around and come back down the trail to make sure we were still coming. Ranger is very slow and does not mind being left behind, there is not a buddy sour bone in his body. All in all he is a perfect horse, just needs to learn some neck reining and maybe to speed up his walk.

 

 

We only rode for about 3 to 3 1/2 hours. I didn't get too sore but my back was demanding that I get off and walk awhile. We had ridden a few weeks ago down the road to check on some young horses that we are pasturing at a friend's place. I rode Leroy that day and my Husband rode Heath.

We were about halfway to our destination when the sky cut loose and engulfed us in a ferocious thunderstorm. We had heard the sound of distant thunder but we didn't think that it would find its way to us. All of the sudden there was lightening flashing all around us. The flashes were scary enough without the sound of the ground shaking thunder. We were all ducking.

When the rain came it was large stinging drops that were being blown horizontally. My DH tried to turn back but I talked him into going on in search of shelter. We finally found a barn with easy horse access. We rode into it and waited and waited for the rain to stop.

The hard rain on the tin roof made it hard to even talk, so we waited some more. I tried to clean the water off of my glasses but neither of us could find anything dry to wipe them with.

Here are some more pictures of poor Ranger after our little ride at Blackwell. We met some other riders on the trail, three ladies on cell phones (you get a strong cell phone signal in the Deam Wilderness), they called my horse fat. They didn't say that I had a nice looking horse or a pretty horse, they just said that I had a fat horse. Here are some pictures of my fat horse and his saddle sores after a three and a half hour trail ride.

 

 

It's a Filly!

I had a plan, was looking forward to working the plan but Jetta didn't want to cooperate. I stayed up with her all night on Tuesday night. I had the new Mary Higgins Clark book, so I sat in my lounge chair out in the barn with my headlamp on, reading. She was anxious and nervous all night. This is just not her character, so I thought that she might be in early labor. We had tasted her milk, it had turned white and was just slightly sweet, so it was possible.

She had calmed down by morning and by around 10:00 a.m., she had waxed.When my DH got home from work he put her back out in the dry lot, so he could clean out her stall. I decided to take a nap to prepare myself for a long night. Before I laid down I took her picture eating some hay.While I was napping, my DH came in to get something to eat and the next thing that I know he is waking me up saying that it is a filly and she is already dry. I jumped up feeling cheated and mad. I wait all year for this and then miss it because I take a little nap!

If this had been twins we would not have been there to get the second one out quickly and since we knew this one was going to be really big, she probably could have used a little help. It helps to get the baby out as quickly as possible because they just get up faster and learn to nurse easier. With slow, hard labors the foals can have dumb foal syndrome and just have a little more of a struggle in the beginning.

This is what I found when I arrived on the scene...I named this filly "Sky" on the spot because of her unusual eyes that were the first things that I noticed about her. She is very large and didn't want to nurse as quickly as we would have liked but with my Husband's great skill at getting a newborn foal to nurse, she was nursing within a couple of hours.

She is a dark brown or bay with roan mare and tail, blanket with black spots and she has partial blue eyes. This is the first blue eyes that we have ever had here at Pintura Springs other than Grandkids.The above photo was taken as she first found her feet.



There will be no running under Mommy's belly to hide from danger with this big filly.
And last but not least a Family Picture that includes Sky's sire who came to look her over and pass out cigars.
It is dark and rainy here today, so Sky and her Mother are still in the stall and it is too dark to get any new pictures unless the weather changes.

Back in the Saddle

The end of the trail and I was still smiling!

I am so proud of myself and so happy. My DH even congratulated me yesterday evening on our good ride. We started out at 3:00 yesterday afternoon, we would have started out earlier but we ran into the usual sequences. We had mud to scrape off of horses and saddles to scrub, then of course we had to find a headstall that would fit my gelding.

My goal with my new gelding is to ride him with just one of my rope halters with side pulls, so I wanted to start him out with a kind and gentle hackamore. He has only been ridden with my former horse Dan's sweet iron split bit but that is the same bridle and bit that my DH uses on everything. So locating something else was not easy. We have tack located in several different boxes, in several different locations.

I haven't ridden a horse but three short times (less than 15 minutes) since the wreck that messed up my back four and a half years ago. I was determined that I was going to ride again. My Doctor told me that I could try it but only without any medication, so that I would know when to quit.

Since the one bridle was all my DH needed to ride with, my bridle was used for all of the horses. We finally located one of our good aluminum hackamores and then had to find a leather curb strap because I didn't want to use a chain curb on him. My poor DH was getting quite annoyed at the time that it was taking us to get ready. But it was a good lesson in patience for him.

After my heavy Tex Tan saddle was placed on my horse, I had to listen to my wonderful Husband gripe again about having to tighten my saddle. It has one of those square metal girth riggings built into the skirt. I hate them too, we both prefer a round rigging ring that isn't built in and I usually like to tighten my own saddle but I was trying to conserve my energy yesterday.

When Ranger, my new horse (Dan has been semi-retired at 22 yrs. old) was saddled and bridled my DH got on him to take the buck out of him. Ranger has only been ridden a few times at 7 yrs. old and still bucks a little when starting out. He humped up once, then they spun around several times, I got a little dizzy watching them. When they finally started walking out in a nearly straight line, he bucked and got his hind feet a good 6 inches off of the ground. Six inches doesn't bother me because Dan always bucks that high when a fly lands on his rump, even higher if it is a horse fly.

My DH on Ranger after the buck was taken out of him.

Now it was my turn to ride Ranger for the very first time, the problem was that I couldn't get on him. He wasn't suppose to get as big as he is. His Sire is only 14.3 and his Dam is maybe 14.1. Ranger does have a full brother who is over 16 hands and thankfully Ranger only grew to around 15.2. On a side note here, to those who now own Feather, Shadow, Thorn and Shay, Ranger is their full brother.

My first time on Ranger. Had on my back brace.

I decided to keep Ranger when he was first born because he is an Indian Shuffler and I love that gait. He also has a lateral canter that is smooth, if you can hold him at the right speed. My DH isn't good with gaits, so I hope to be able to teach Ranger the speed and gaits that I want now that I can ride him. That will take some time but that is another of my goals for him.

Ranger and Leroy stood pretty still for me before the ride.

I had a horse fall with me several years ago and he stepped on the outside of my left knee when he got up and totally messed it up. After that I always had to mount Dan on the right side, Dan has always been a hot horse but he did always stand perfectly unflinching when I mounted, no matter how long it took me. This is something else Ranger will have to learn.

Tying rope halters has given me good upper body strength and even after our accident and my being overweight, I could easily pull myself up on a tall horse. However, now I am having some problems with my left shoulder and that made mounting difficult for me yesterday.

Once onboard, I couldn't reach the left stirrup, this was strange, maybe I am shrinking on one side. My DH adjusted the left stirrup but not the right, they felt balanced but I didn't feel balanced, after we took off I completely abandoned that left stirrup. We rode off down the road and I was having to fight Ranger all of the way, he doesn't neck rein at all and he didn't respond to plow reining very well either. I was also having to kick him hard to get a turn out of him. This just wasn't working for me.

I felt thrown forward in the saddle, I did have a back brace on and I thought that it might be causing the problem. After riding my boy for 15 minutes I was done. My back was killing me and I was very upset. The combination of kicking hard, pulling hard on the rein for every turn and feeling thrown forward, I told my poor DH who had worked so hard to get me going in the first place for only a 15 minute ride that I was done and wanted to go home.

When we got home, he asked me if I wanted to try changing horses. I took my back brace off and got on Leroy, another of our young horses in training. The difference in saddles shocked me and I realized that I have a saddle problem. My DH said that my saddle throws you forward because he could feel it too. This saddle had always been comfortable for me before, but with the back injury that I have, it just won't work. So now I am on a saddle hunt.

We ended up riding for three hours and it was great, Leroy is a perfect horse and his price is going up. We had a inquiry on him the other day and they wanted to know if he had ever been trail ridden, I had to say, no. He had only been ridden in an arena and on the road in traffic.

Well, Leroy has been trail ridden now and it was a new experience for him. But I was able to negotiate trees and brush on him without one skinned knee and we accidentally got off the trail once and it was rough going but he and Ranger both did great. We did a little mountain climbing and they were exhausted when we reached the peak. Then we did some mud hole wading that neither of them liked but with encouragement they learned that deep mud holes aren't always quicksand.

Here is a list of things that Ranger and Leroy learned yesterday, some of which they had experience before so it was just a refresher course.

• The hollow sounds of hoofbeats on a long and tall bridge can be soothing.
• Stepping on solid ground again at the end of the bridge is startling but not life threatening.
• Muddy waterways will not suck you in deeper than knee height.
• You can trust your rider to guide you through the woods and brush even without a clear pathway.
• Ranger learned that you can't stop and eat just because you are hungry or there is something new on the menu that you have never tried before.
• Large hay bales wrapped in tarps are not meat eating dinosaurs.
• Stumps are not hungry wolves.
• Large camping trailers in the middle of nowhere do not contain vampires
• Abandoned tires and brightly colored plastic jugs in roadside ditches are harmless.
• Walking through junkyards on a windy day is very interesting, there is so much to see and do.
• Cadillac Eldorado's look very different when standing up on one side, the bottom is just not as pretty as the top, it in no way resembles a rogue elephant even if it does have a trunk.
  
• Junkyard dogs can be ignored, their bark is much worse than their bite even in packs. Though these Pit Bull and Pit Bull mixes look much more intimidating than the neighbor's little Jack Russell Terriers, they aren't nearly as dangerous.
• Diesel trucks make a lot of noise when coming up behind you but not as much noise as a big well drilling rig coming up from behind.
• Discarded tires, roofing shingles and other unwanted household items in a quarry hole are not environmentally friendly but are not an immediate danger to a passing horse and rider.
  
• When riding South to North in the evening hours your shadow will not give you much trouble, but when turning eastward you will suddenly have the setting sun behind you, you must not be alarmed at your own shadow.

This list is just to let you know what we and our two horses experienced on our three hour ride yesterday. They didn't, however, have a problem with most of this stuff. The only slight problems that we did have were with the knee deep muddy waterway, Leroy had a slight problem with stepping on the solid ground again after being on the bridge for awhile. Ranger did spook at his own shadow. For the most part these boys did excellent with all of the scary things we exposed them to.

The end of the ride, I was flexing Leroy to the left.

Then to the right. Who is that fat Granny?

I did great too. It took me a little while to get my land legs back after the ride was over and I did take some pain medicine to get me through the rest of the evening but I surprisingly felt really well this morning and am looking forward to our next ride and getting a new saddle for Ranger.

I reached some personal goals yesterday and I look forward to reaching some more this summer. We have several young horses that need some wet saddle blankets, this is something that I used to be able to help out with and these horses deserve a chance to become the excellent horses that they were bred to be.

Wet saddle blankets are good for white horses,

But look better on Leopards.

Mare Waxing

This is for Kyfarmlife. I tried to leave you a comment, Rae, but I couldn't again, it may be a Firefox thing. But anyway, Georgia's udder doesn't look quite ready to me, in the picture that you posted. Mares are not as predictable as other animals. Before last year we were foaling out about 10 mares each spring. This year we only have two and then another in the fall. With the price of horses being what they are and the price of feed being what it is, we only bred two old mares that we would like to keep the bloodlines on.

We very rarely miss a foaling but we taste the milk, it goes from salty, to oily to sweet. When it turns sweet they will foal within 12 hours. I don't think that your mare will let you milk her, she sounds and looks like my TW mare. Is your mare gaited?

Here is a not-so-good picture of a waxed teat. The waxing will build up and get quite long but then fall off. Some mares never wax at all and one of our mares waxes for a full seven days before she foals.

PayPal Chargeback

It had to happen sooner or later, because I use PayPal a lot. I got an order for CRS Gold DFM, a horse probiotic, $60 for a 10 lb. pail. The order was paid by charge card and it was an instant payment, so we shipped out immediately. Four or five days later I got a notice from PayPal that the funds were being held because the issuing Bank had denied the charge.

The email from PayPal included a warning not to ship the item but it was already long gone. They asked for detailed information about the transaction, a description of the item, the name and address of the buyer, any emails that we had exchanged, a phone number where I could be reached and all of the shipping information if the item had already been shipped.

It was shipped out by UPS and we did have a tracking number, that is what saved us. After around five days I received a notice that it had been an unauthorized purchase but that it was covered under PayPal's Seller Protection Policy and that because I provided a tracking number and it was valid, my funds had been released from the hold.

The moral of this story is: If you sell online and use PayPal, make sure that you have a tracking number for each shipment.

The Faithful

To my faithful blog follower and friend; I am so sorry that you lost your mare to EPM so quickly after you learned what was wrong with her. I know it hurts and I know that it isn't fair, because no one takes better care of their horses than you do. I knew when the phone rang on Sunday morning that it was you and my heart sank.

To my faithful blog follower, cousin and friend; I missed you this weekend, sorry to hear that you were under the weather and I hope you are feeling much better.

To my other faithful blog follower and friend; I owe you an apology, I have new pictures of Buddy, Bullseye and Fancy from this Spring and Summer that I have never taken the time to send to you, maybe after Thanksgiving.

To my other faithful blog follower and friend; I see that you signed up at Goatbeat.net, now introduce yourself and join the conversation.

To my other faithful blog followers, who are also family members; We hope to see you on Wednesday night or Thursday afternoon.

To my other faithful blog followers who don't fit in any of the above categories; Thank you for reading my blog and just in case I forget to tell you, have a wonderful Thankgiving!

Corneal Ulcer

While showing a horse to someone on Sunday afternoon, I noticed that several of the horses eyes were watering. One of them had quite a bit a pus in his eyes so I meandered down into the herd for a closer look. His eyes were fine but I started looking at other eyes and was shocked to find Naylor, our two year old, AQHA, solid bay gelding with a painful, runny and milky eye.

This looked very serious and we tried to get him in to see the Veterinarian on Monday but he wasn't available. On Tuesday morning we tried again to get him in to see our Vet and failed. So we called the new Vet who just opened a practice very close to where we live, she is just a young girl starting out and when we had called her once before her prices were too steep for us but we were desperate this time. She said that she could see him at 2:00.

She did a very thorough exam of his eye and diagnosed him with a corneal ulcer caused by an injury of some type, which she wanted to treat very aggressively. Very aggressively means that we have to keep him out of the sun or keep a fly mask on him and give him a shot every day plus put three different ointments in his eye twice per day and two of those ointments 4 to 6 times per day.

It wouldn't have been so hard if we could have put him in a stall and kept him here at the house but he had never been stalled and he wasn't having any part of it. He nearly tore the barn down. Naylor is a very quiet and gentle boy, my DH just got on him and rode off the very first time he was ridden but he didn't like being confined at all.

Since my Husband was going to be working all week, I didn't want to have to deal with him getting himself in trouble or hurt in the stall, so we stuck a fly mask on him and turned him back out with his herd. His herd doesn't want anything to do with him and treats him like he has cooties or worse.

They are savage, vicious and down right nasty to him. They bite him, kick him and chase him. He is totally confused and so pitiful, these were his best friends. We take the mask off of him at night and they are all happy to see him. Then the next day it's the same old battle.

This has been difficult for us, having to walk so far to get him in the dark and bring him back to the house. We have to twitch him to get him to hold his head still to put all that stuff in his eye. Tonight it was raining and cold, we drove to the top pasture and my DH had to walk out into the herd to find him, which isn't easy in the dark, he went right past him to another bay horse. Then he had to bring him back to me and the Blazer headlights to do the dirty deed.

What is shocking about the whole thing is that he never tries to get away from us when we come after him with a halter and lead rope. Sometimes he even sees us coming and walks to meet us. I don't understand why except that he loves to be petted and loved on, he doesn't exactly like having his eye messed with or getting a shot though. We have tried giving him some grain as a reward for his good behavior but he won't eat it, he just wants to get back to the herd after the loving and petting is over.

The Vet called to check on him yesterday evening and I didn't get her called back until this evening. I told her that we weren't seeing much improvement except that he doesn't act like it is hurting as much. She said that we wouldn't see much yet but that he should start keeping it open more, even if it does continue to water and look white. She said that it might even take a couple of months before all of the milkiness goes away.

I have to say that she impressed me, she is a very empathetic Doctor, her eye watered the whole time that she worked on Naylor's watery eye, plus she didn't charge us too much and that earns her a lot of points.

Darth

He finally did it. My DH finally named a horse, he says it is his first. I usually do all of the naming around here and had been throwing several names at him for the new Tennessee Walker, who is totally black. Then my Husband took the horse for a ride out on the road and when he came back he had come up with the perfect name, Darth.

This horse is pretty awesome, we don't think that he has ever lived outside of a stall or been ridden outside an arena or round pen. He is just acting like he is seeing the world for the first time. My DH said that he did great out on the road, he wasn't flighty or spooky but he looked at everything with interest.

When we turned him out in the main pasture yesterday with the rest of the herd, he was more interested in sight-seeing than in the other horses. He just wondered around everywhere and looked at everything like he was seeing nature for the first time. He is a loner, he wasn't really interested in socializing.

We are very impressed with this gelding, he really seems to have the right stuff. We were told that he is a 3 yr. old but in comparing his teeth with one of our 2 yr. olds, we think that he probably just turned two this past Spring. He will probably be a tall boy when he stops growing. I have taken some pictures of him but haven't transferred them to the computer yet.

My Quiet Day

This day started out normally with me waking up while still in bed. From there things went a little haywire, which is somewhat normal also. I am not upset or disturbed because for the most part I have enjoyed most of the day.

My morning was marred by my goats being out, I chased them around for a little while before finally catching them and putting the two yearling does in a dog kennel where they couldn't get out. Then turned around to the sound of a stallion screaming and kicks being administered. One of the broodmares and a two year old filly had knocked a gate off of it's hinges to get in with Badger our Grullo Stallion.

He was just trying to be friendly, after all they had come into his pen. They were kicking the daylights out of him. I managed to get him out of his pen and into the mare and foal pasture, then managed to get the mare, 3 weanlings and pony out of their pasture and into the dry holding lot. I left the offending mare and filly in Badger's pen. Then tied up the gate as well as I could. I felt like we were playing musical chairs.

I was scheduled to watch my three Granddaughters in the afternoon and as is always the case when they are here, my phone rings off the hook. The girls are very young and needy, they are especially needy when you are on an important call. There were a few times that I felt like jerking the phone line out of the wall and pitching the phone out the door, when the calls weren't important. It is odd to me that the older girls can be calling for my assistance over and over, the baby can be crying loud enough to wake the dead and the person on the other end of an unimportant call cannot tell that I am busy and don't have time to talk.

Two calls were important, one was letting me know that they had decided to buy a nice little AQHA Palomino gelding named Midas from us. They came to look at him yesterday.

The other important call was from a man who bought a horse from us several weeks ago. He has been riding his legs off, his daughter and Grandkids have been riding him as well. But after loading him in his trailer many, many times and even taking him away on a camping trip, the horse has decided not to get into the trailer anymore, not even for food. I gave him my suggestion, it involved pressure and a stick.

I chose today to try out a new recipe, since I didn't already have enough to do. My new recipe turned out well, but not worth the time invested. Somehow I managed to get my goat milked and my buck put up before dark, after the kids left. The DH and I even stole a couple of minutes to sit down outside and talk after he got all of the horses put back where they belong and got the gate repaired.

Unofficial

The unofficial word is that our trainer, Mark Burnette took 4th place in the 2008 Extreme Mustang Makeover in Fort Worth, Texas. No word on how much money his horse, Hoof Hearted brought at auction. I will post it here when I hear from Mark.

As a side note, we currently have three horses left that were trained by Mark, so you had better buy them while they are hot. Leroy, a bay ApHC leopard gelding, Zana, a sorrel AQHA mare and Heath, a red dun AQHA gelding have all had 30 days training with Mark Burnette. Joe, a Palomino gelding was also trained by Mark during the winter months and was not touched all Spring or Summer, he recently sold for $2500, he had not forgotten any of his training after sitting idle all of those months.

Update On Garnet

After the crisis seemed to be over for Garnet and he was on the road to recovery, something new cropped up. He had three large whelps the size of hot dogs come up on the back of his right hind leg above the hock. They finally busted open and produced a lot of yellow pus. He had been on Penicillin at the time this happened, so I switched him to SMZ Tablets.

I am grinding the tablets with the bute and putting the powder in pancake syrup then syringing it into his mouth. He is still taking his medicine very well and is still tolerating the fly spray but he doesn't like it when I treat his sores. He did let me treat him this morning without any problems because I caught him when he was lying down and he didn't want to bother with getting up. I treated the sores on his body then lifted each leg and treated them on both sides. I just couldn't get to the other side of his body, so it will have to wait until later.

Colic

I looked out the bedroom window this morning and saw my old gelding Dan lying down. He was all by himself, the rest of his herd were pretty far away from him. Since he is the alpha male of the herd, I knew something had to be wrong, so I went out to check on him.

When I got close to him, I wasn't even sure it was him. He looked almost sorrel instead of very dark brown. He was covered in mud and dust, probably from a rough night of colic. But I wasn't sure what was wrong with him yet, he wouldn't get up for me, he was groaning, but he wasn't rolling or looking at his belly. I could hear loud bowel sounds.

I felt of all of his hooves, they were all cold, his face and even his nose were cold to touch. I looked at his gums and they were a nice pink. So off to the house I went to get a shot of banamine. I estimated that he weighed about 1200 lbs, so I pulled up 12 mL.

I don't like giving shots, that is what I married my DH for, but he was at work, so I would have to do it. Dan has very sensitive skin and hates shots. Since he wouldn't get up for me, I didn't think that it would be hard to do. I would give it to him IM in the rump. I didn't even take a lead rope.

I got him stuck and was pushing the banamine in, when he jumped to his feet. I did manage to get the needle pulled out. I had only gotten 4 mL in him, so I would have to stick him again.

He just stood there looking at me and my syringe. He didn't act like he could move. So I stuck him again in the neck, well, he could move and off he went with the syringe flopping, it finally fell out.

Now he won't let me get close to him, so I guess that I did get something accomplished. I at least got him on his feet and running, which didn't hurt him at all if it was colic. He hasn't laid down again, so I guess he is better. I will just have to watch him today.

Busy Again

Busy, busy, busy, I have so much to do that I am actually looking forward to winter. My Husband will be very upset by this comment. I don't have time to blog but I will use it as an organization tool.

I finally got most of my Spring surge of rope halter orders finished. I currently only have two outstanding orders that total 6 halters. Then this morning I got an order for 17 more halters.

I am in the process of building a large website for a Barrel Racer and Trainer. I have all of the information and pictures that I need to finish it, I just need to pull it all together.

I also have been asked to do a local website for our community that I would really like to do a nice job on, it will be complicated with a lot of information, I am donating the entire site and my time. At this point, I am trying to figure out how I want to do it. I will post a link to it here when it is finished.

We have sold a horse and possibly another one, this requires some major attention this week because someone will be here to pick one of them up on August 4th, she will have to have all of her paperwork and Vet exam done this week.

I really need to update our website but it always gets pushed to the bottom of my "to do" list. I don't even have the new foals on there yet.

Dishes and laundry are an unending problem for me. As is Cooter who has to be moved from location to location throughout the day. Plus goats and chickens to be fed and cared for.

I spent most of the morning this morning looking for one of my Mille Fleur D'Uccle hens, she has totally disappeared orphaning her three chicks, this is the same hen that was picked up by the hawk a week or so ago. I really hate that I am loosing my broody hens but especially my Millies. I haven't been able to find any feathers anywhere, so it must have been a hawk that got her.

I am thinking about renaming our place to The Fox and Hawk Food Farm or Predator's Ranch.

Changing Colors

Sapphire, our little black twin filly that survived, changed from black to brown and is now changing to blue roan. So, her name will fit her now.

Garnet, our sorrel blanketed colt is changing to either blue roan or gray, so his name will not fit him anymore.

Zircon, our little crooked legged sorrel leopard isn't changing colors but he is growing and his legs look much better, he also thinks that he is king of the world.

Perfect Horses and Kids

What has happened to horses? They have changed, they really have changed. Most horses used to be perfect horses, today very few horses are perfect. Horses have changed because people's attitudes about horses have changed. People's attitudes about a lot of things have changed. I remember as a young person when older folks would say, "What is this world coming to?". I am the one who is saying that now.

Our attitudes about our pets and even our children have changed, that is the reason there are so many experts out there getting rich telling you how to train your dogs, horses, birds, children, etc...

Magazines, Books, TV Shows, Classes, Clinics and even experts who will come to your home and teach you how to train your children and pets now exist. Our Grandparents didn't need this type of training, why do we? The answer to this question is that our attitudes are different than our Grandparent's attitudes. We have become a nation of softies, too gentle natured, too much anger management. We hate conflict and avoid it at all costs. We also hate taking responsibility and want to push all accountability off on someone else. We aren't leaders, we are followers.

The thing that really got me to thinking about all of this was a sign in a neighbor's yard. It is next to the road and hard to miss. It has a colorful picture of a child running and it says, "Kids dart, drive smart!". They are putting the responsibility of their children squarely on the shoulders of every driver who passes their house. Their house doesn't even sit close to the road. I am just having a hard time with that sign.

I am all for protecting kids even if they aren't related to me but why can't we take responsibility for our own children. They should teach their children about the dangers of the road, stay with their kids if they are in the yard or put up a fence to protect their children. Do we really have to be careful every time we drive past a house for fear that a child might run into the road in front of us? The sad truth is, if you do hit that child who runs into the road, it will be your fault and not the parents, whether you are being careful or not.

I recently saw a picture of a roofless horse trailer, it just had side walls and the horse inside was facing forward watching the world go by. Everyone on the website where the picture was posted was going on and on about how horrible this was and what in the world was the person thinking who was hauling a horse that way. They should be arrested for cruelty to an animal.

In the first place, were any of our Grandparents ever in danger of being arrested for cruelty to an animal? I don't think so, this way of thinking has just come about in the last several years. In the second place, how do you think that your Grandparents would have hauled a horse? I suppose that all depends on how old you are. My Grandparents would have hauled a horse in an open bed of a truck and though I hate to give my age away, so did my parents and so did my Husband and I when we were younger.

That's right, though it seems barbaric now, we trail rode every weekend in the national forest, to get there we trucked our horses several miles in the bed of our pick-up truck with only wooden stock racks. Those racks would not have held a horses weight if they would have fallen over against them.

We would haul two and sometimes three horses in the bed of the truck. They most always faced forward with there heads over the roof and I cannot remember even once having an eye injury or even a runny eye. We didn't have a horse trailer because they just weren't available then and when they did become more popular and more available, it took a while before we could afford one.

It is almost comical now when you hear so much talk about whether a horse will load or not. All horses loaded back then. I don't remember any clinics, books or trainers that taught you how to teach your horse to load, you just taught them.

Teaching a horse to jump up into the back of a pickup wasn't even hard. We expected them to do it and they did it. They learned early on that what we asked them to do, they had to do. So they already knew from the very beginning that they could never answer, "No!", they must always answer, "Yes!".

The really funny thing about that time period is that when someone was wanting to buy a horse, they never asked if it would load or not, and they never asked how they hauled. If you were trying to sell a horse, you didn't advertise using "loads and hauls" as a selling point.

All of our horses were perfect, all of our friend's horses were perfect. They were perfect because they were ridden hard all weekend long and weren't pampered or babied. We took good care of them but we didn't treat them with kid gloves, they always recognized us as alpha in the pecking order. We were the leaders in their herd mentality and they felt secure in our leadership, they trusted us. They knew as long as they answered, "Yes!", that we would not mistreat them in anyway and would protect them.

Many perfect horses crossed my path in my youth, some were perfect when they came into my life and some were perfect after we came to an understanding. I never minded a high spirited horse and in fact preferred one. Spooking every now and then was not what I considered a fault, but running off after spooking was. I get startled every once in a while, so why should I expect my horse to remain calm in every situation.

In order to have a perfect horse, dog or child, you have to take the responsibility to do the training and that includes discipline and teaching the meaning of the word, "NO!". You can't be afraid of conflict. If you want your horse, dog or child to feel safe with you, you have to be the leader, they have to know that you are strong enough to keep them safe by having confidence and not being fearful yourself.

I may have told this story before but here it is again, we had a horse who was always calm and didn't spook at all until someone who was looking to buy him walked up to him. All of the sudden he was looking all around for the monster that was getting ready to pounce on him. The lady was so scared of horses that he picked up on her fear immediately. He was only used to being around confident people. He trusted humans and so he just knew that there had to be a monster somewhere that had this lady so scared, he didn't know that he was the monster. As soon as she stepped away from him and someone confident stepped back to him, he calmed right down.

I know people who have never been around horses in their lives but they are not afraid of them and they can interact with horses without any problems at all. Then I know people who have been around horses all of their lives that horses just react negatively to because they are so fearful.

I plan to write about some of the perfect individual horses that have come into my life in coming blogs, so stay tuned...

Perfect Horses

We currently have a large herd of horses, and have had many horses pass through our gates in the last several years. We have not had very many perfect horses, some have gotten close but just didn't reach the level of what I would consider a perfect horse.

Several years ago we purchased an appaloosa mare and an ugly sorrel gelding along with everything that went with them, even the trailer. The family just didn't have time to mess with them anymore and had lost interest. They did a lot of trail riding and camping with friends but they weren't really horse people.

They told us that the mare was wonderful and that the gelding was good too as long as you didn't separate him from the mare. He would follow her on the trail but that was about all he was capable of. Well, the gelding was just impossible and we were lucky to find him a home but the mare was nice, she just didn't seem to have any flaws. We advertised her as a great trail horse because that is all that these people did with her.

We only had her for about one month. A lady contacted us from a therapy riding facility and we talked about her a few times by phone but she was being careful and we ended up selling her to a young local girl to show in 4-H, just in time for the season to begin. Her 4-H leader was just overwhelmed by this mare and called to tell us so.

The lady from the therapy place called me back when she seen that the mare had been sold to ask me is she was as good as we had said that she was. I told her, "No, she is much better than we thought she was." She asked me how much we sold her for and I told her $1200, which was fairly good at the time for an unregistered horse. She wanted us to call the girl who had purchased her and offer her $2400 for her. We did and she refused.

This girl went on to win every class that the mare was entered in that year and every year after. She was passed down to other girls after her owner was too old for 4-H and got interested in cars and boys. She is an old mare now and is owned by the 4-H leader's timid daughter.

I am going to talk some more about perfect horses that have passed through my life in coming blogs, so stay tuned...

Zircon Update

For those who are concerned, Zirc is doing fine, his legs will straighten up within a few days. We have never had one with legs quite like this before but we have had foals that were "over in the knees" and one who just flat had crooked legs due to a thyroid problem, who went on to become a winning show horse. So crooked legs in new foals aren't a great concern to us.

Zirc is doing a lot of sleeping and we are keeping him stalled and confined until those legs gain strength. I know that there are horse experts out there who would say that he needs exercise and room to run for his legs to straighten up but that has not been our experience, foals "over in the knees" need exercise and room to run but this guy needs to stay off of his feet as much as possible. I have argued this point with a know-it-all elitist horse expert before and the owner of the foal listened to the other person and ruined the foal's legs.

I don't know why horse people are always horse experts with nothing more to learn but they do tend to be that way. Goat owners aren't like that at all, there aren't many Goat Snobs out there but there seems to be a whole lot of Horse Snobs.

To those who think that he is ugly and that includes me. I can assure you that he will be a beautiful animal in no time. His dam has never produced an ugly baby, no matter what we have bred her to. To those who think that he is beautiful or cute, thank you for your love of horses. We have taken horses in before who were just plain ugly but with the right personality they are gorgeous horses no matter what they look like. We have also taken in beautiful horses who have attitudes that can completely overwhelm their good looks.

Tattooing Eyes

When blogging about horses with sunburn yesterday, I meant to mention our stallion, Jazz. He is Ranger's sire and is also a few spot. But he does not have the dark pigmentation that Ranger has. He has a continual problem with the unlined pink area around his eyes. He suffers from swelling, tearing, burning, fly and gnat irritation, this can also lead to cancers and cataracts.

We have talked to our Vet about tattooing eyeliner around his eyes but he doesn't know anyone who does that in our area. So since applying sunscreen around the eyes isn't possible, the only thing that we can do for him is keep a fly mask on him during the hot summer months.

We have talked to one tattoo artist in our area who is willing to try it but we would rather find someone with experience in equine eyelining tattoos.

Sunscreen

After reading my blog about Ranger, someone asked;

"I have a question that is a off the subject, but I was wondering if you use any sunscreen on his nose? I have a palomino mare that has white skin on her nose, and every year it sunburns and blisters, I am trying a different sunscreen this year and I was wondering if and what you use?"

We have several horses that do sunburn or get what is called dew poisoning on their noses. Strangely enough Ranger isn't one of them, he has a lot of black pigment and he doesn't burn.

Ranger's mother however is a roan and though she doesn't burn on her face, she does occasionally burn on her back which is very painful for her. I do not know why she does this some years and not others, unless it is her diet or hormones. It isn't rain rot it is sunburn, her skin turns evenly bright pink along her back and she doesn't want to be touched.

We also have another roan mare that has a wide blaze and at times her entire blaze will burn but normally it is just her nose that burns. She hates lotion and we have a time treating her. I have found for some reason that any lotion will help almost immediately but I always try to treat them with something that has sunscreen in it. You don't have to buy the most expensive sunscreen or even something specifically for horses, we have had good luck with everything we have tried.

I used an Aloe Vera pump spray with sunscreen on my hard to treat mare last year and found that she would tolerate a spray much better than having anything rubbed on her tender nose. It did a great job and by the next day we saw amazing results.