Turn out

Yesterday we discussed applying herbicide to the East Pen (my turn out pen for grazing) since it has been taken over once again by weeds. So I figured I had better let mama and baby in there to forage for what grazing they can before I have to keep them off it. 

Jayne was delighted of course and barely raised her head from grazing while Dally explored the field. 

It didn't take long for Dally to explore.

She wasn't overly interested in eating.....

because she found out it's fun to zoom the fence line!

That green tent shaped thing in the background  is fishing net covering the neighbours chicken run to keep predators out and chickens in.

 

Sunday Stills- Leading Lines

For today's challenge my immediate thought was, well, lead lines!

Little Dally Darlin' is starting to lead away from mama- but not too far yet!

The leading lines in this next photo draw your eye to the towering poplar tree, but when I downloaded it I noticed another leading line- the little rainbow that leads your eye to Beamer!

Not my best photo, but it is unique!

More Sunday Stills links here

Legs and noisy neighbours

The discerning among you may have noticed that Dally didn't have perfectly straight front legs when she was born, especially her left front. One of the things I do for that is give a vitamin E/selenium shot asap, which I did when she was 2 days old. 

3 days old

You can see that she looks knock kneed and toed out- and also that her chest is very narrow. That will change a lot over the next couple of weeks, especially the width of her chest- remember you don't want wide chested babies when they are passing through the birth canal!

Here is her updated leg photo at 10 days old:

Much better! Speaking of legs, we gotta have that straddle-legged grazing photo ya know!

I'm pretty sure she could have found a blade of grass instead of weeds! But it's all part of exploring her new world.

Today we caught her and pulled a hair sample for her DNA test- I test all the Beamer babies. 

And then we move to the  the noisy neighbours part of this post....

The morning Dally was born, the morning bird choir was in full voice, even a robin singing it's heart out in the Elderberry tree in the foaling pen. But then there's this fellow, who has such a discordant voice I'm sure the Choir Director made sure to exclude him!

He is quite the character; he hangs around the barnyard strutting his stuff and in no hurry for anyone. Even the cats leave him alone. 

Speaking of cats.... they too are noisy, but only when the cat belonging to the nearest neighbour tries to invade the Kingdom of Foose and Thumper, aka the barn yard. His name is Jeffrey, and he often squares off with the big boyz and they have a howl fest, often accompanied by skirmishes. 

The 3 way stink eye

Foose comes running when Thumper and Jeffrey start their battle, and he always has Thumper's back- although Thumper can handle his own battles, as he outweighs the other cats by several pounds. 

You tell 'im Thumper!

The big day

Things have been going well with Dally. She lets me scratch her butt and if I bend down she comes and sniffs noses with me. 

She is getting easier to catch too, so today was moving day. Ted led mama and I led Dally in behind and we easily transferred them to the main pen. 

I expected a lot of running around, but Jayne was just on the hunt for grass so there wasn't much drama.

That hip! 

Of course, the most grass is under the fence line so that's where Jayne headed. I watched as Dally reached under to grab some grass, and knowing that the bottom wire is hot, I waited and watched. At first she twitched,  and then it pulsed again and she kinda shook her head and the third time.... she was outta there!

I'm sure mama was laughing at her in this next photo....

Dally was pretty respectful of the fence after that. 

Mostly they just wandered around, but she did have a couple of bursts that I managed to capture.

She is so light on her feet. I missed a really good one- there is a big compost/manure pile in the middle of the pen; she lined out and went full speed at it and jumped it- I swear she was about 3 feet off the ground and her leap covered about 10 ft. She turned around and made another run at it, this time jumping it on a lower spot.  My jaw about dropped!

She's getting all muscled up and looking good now  💖 

The flies were pestiferous, and I think she liked that it's easier to scratch your nose when you are lying down!

She has become a classy little lady!

Goin' walkin'

What is it about wheelbarrows....

Every foal has to check them out!

I have to be careful with this wheelbarrow because of that loop in front of the tire; just enough space for a foal to catch a foot if they paw at it, which she was doing. 

Yesterday I caught mama and baby without Ted's help, but waited for him to get in the pen to lead the mama as we worked again on getting her to follow her mama. It actually worked fairly well this time, she did less protesting and more keeping with mama. We went into the adjacent larger pen- I don't turn them out in there as I planted grass seed in there and it currently is overrun by weeds; the grass seed hasn't taken yet. It was a good opportunity to start asking her to move her hip over.

We lined the mare out and started walking; I gave Dally lots of room, I think I was about 5 or 6 ft. away from her so she had the freedom to follow mama.

She caught on quickly.

Good girl, Dally! A couple more times and they will be ready to move to the big pen.

She is also learning to sneak bits of mama's grain, which will make it easy when I put her on foal ration when she's about 2 months old. I like to prepare them for weaning about 2 months ahead of time by introducing them to whatever feed I will give them when I take them off the mare.

Today it rained hard, so no more dust, thank goodness. 

Sunday Stills- Roads

It isn't necessarily about the road itself, but what it goes through that makes them interesting. 

This is a little road on the farm that winds through the bush.

We have high water now and portions of the road are under water.

I always like to use this as a riding trail to teach horses to go through water. 

This water is actually an overflow of our pond. The water hasn't peaked yet. When it does most of this road will be under water. 

Friendlier

Dally is getting more curious and adventurous every day. 

 

Now that the skin around her eye has darkened you can see that she has Beamer's shape of eye and her mama's big soft eye.

Yesterday's lesson on leading was more like trying to reel in a fish on the line than actually leading, but we did make progress. We handled her whole body including that tickly belly, and Ted lifted her feet on her left side. I think today she will be better as we could see that she was mulling things over in her mind by the end of the lesson. 

She's getting friendlier too; proving that she isn't too mad about being handled so much yesterday.  This morning at chore time she checked me out:

She sniffed my hand, and let me touch her muzzle before walking calmly away. 

Maybe humans aren't so bad after all! I'll close out this post with a video of her cute and very athletic antics- I think she may have to eventually be a reining horse. 

First halter

Dally has found her speed and agility!

Just after this video she did the same thing but wiped out in a cloud of dust.

Don't be talkin', Beamer!

Later on I had Ted come and help for her first halter session.

I closed the stall doors to give me a better space to work in. I caught her easily, then let her figure out what the heck this funny thing on her head was all about.

She put the pressure on herself, I wasn't pulling- just standing there. She did try to get away a couple of times and ended up on her butt from backing up fast, and on her side from trying to leap up and away. A deep bedded stall is the best place for those kind of wipe outs! The key is to not try to pull them around on their first time, just let them figure it out . 

I stopped the lesson when she just stood there and licked and chewed.

This is the way I do it, and I know there are lots of other ways, but I find that working with them for about 5 minutes in a confined space when they are just a few days old is what works for my program. 

Today will be lesson 2, in which she will be introduced to following her mama around the pen, which is the easiest way to teach them to lead.

This morning, she was coming up to me and sniffing my hand. Progress!

New things

I do intend to breed Jayne back to Beamer in her next full heat, so I thought it was time to let him get a little closer to them. I put him in the pen next to the foaling pen (I call it the main pen) . 

As expected, he hollered and Jayne herded baby away.

Things got a little western...

If Jayne could frown, that would be a big frown!

Poor Beamer! She wants no part of you at the moment.... but wait a couple of weeks! 😉 I only left him in there for about 10 minutes, as Jayne was Not Happy. But with daily visits she should relax more.

Dally is letting me touch her more, and is exploring her mama's feed and water.

It is so dry here their pen is a dust bowl . There is rain in the forecast, of course with a long weekend coming up. Today I hosed down their dust, I am worried about Dally breathing that but I have to get a halter on her before I change them into the main pen. She let me touch her a bunch this morning so hopefully this afternoon I can do more work with getting her used to the feel of the halter. It doesn't help that Jayne doesn't let me handle her baby the way mama Belle does.

Chillin' out

The title reflects both the weather and Jayne!

Yesterday was 27 C and way too hot! Today it's 11C and windy. 

I continue to work on Jayne accepting me around her baby and there was definite improvement today. This morning she let me walk up to her and pet her, but still herded Dally away. 

I had Ted help me , and while he held Jayne I caught baby and rubbed her with the halter and my hands. Once she relaxed we let them go.

Then this evening at chore time, while mama was busy chomping her hay, I played peekaboo with Dally as she used mama to hide from me. But it wasn't long before her curiosity took hold. 

In this video my timing was off- I should have removed my hand when she was looking at it the second time. 

I tried one more time, this time with correct timing, and then on the third attempt-

Success! I think the next few days she will really come around. As soon as I can get a halter on her and lead her, I will take Jayne and Dally into the bigger pen during the day so Jayne can have some grazing. I'm sure she's tired of being cooped up in the smaller foaling pen.

Getting cuter by the minute

It will be fun watching this little one learn about grazing!

Named and handled

I can't let the first day go by without naming a foal. I had several ideas which I rolled around in my mind to see what stuck. The registered name was fairly easy; all Beamer babies get either Midnight or Peppy in their names, and since she is red and was born in the morning, it would be a Peppy name. Then I wanted to pay homage to her pedigree. Jayne is registered as Zanits Miss Diamond, the Diamond refers to the female side of the great Shining Spark who is her grandsire- his mama,the equally great Diamonds Sparkle.

So meet DLH Peppys Diamond!

She does have a kind of diamond shaped star. (Foose on guard in the background!)

Her barn name took a lot more figuring. I wanted a name that started with D, to go with Derby's name of course. 

I originally thought Daisy, but it didn't suit. 

She agrees!

So- final choice.....

My name is Dally!

Dally inherited her mama's longer face and Beamer's shorter back. Overall she is a well balanced filly who will get cuter as she grows. Sorrel babies are tougher to call cute than black based babies because of the light skin around their eyes, but that will change as time goes by.

Whaaaaat? I think I'm cute!

She causes her mama some consternation when she gets to exploring her gears!

Jayne is a very protective mama. We have to halter her to handle her baby, which we did yesterday.

We also caught her last evening to give her an enema as she was straining to pass her first pooh once her meconium had passed. That actually went well, although Jayne still is standoffish at least she isn't threatening me anymore. She just herds her baby away from us if she can.

Really momma? I'm a big girl!

Sister

Yesterday morning- Jayne had wax. Halleluiah!

I watched her closely during the day and slept with my ears open. I did a few checks throughout the night but Jayne had that innocent "Nuthin' to see here!" look.

I checked about 10 minutes to 4 am, - nothing- and when I lay down I could hear her lay down, and some suspicious other sounds, so I got up again and shone my flashlight in the pen and sure nuff there was a second set of eyes glinting at me!

Well now that was quick miss Jayne! I watched for a bit, but Jayne was not happy with me being close and threatened me with her butt, so I wisely backed off. Not used to that, Belle was always happy to have me right in there. But I guess that's the difference with a mare that is used to foaling out in a pasture with other mares- she has to claim her foal right away.

It took a little while for the filly- yes FILLYYYYYYY.......... to find her feet but once she was up it didn't take much longer for her to latch on for her first colostrum. And yes, she is a sorrel- so that means Linda wins the contest, very fitting because it's Tumbleweed's birthday too!

The birds were serenading shortly before she was born, so it was a rather beautiful start to the day. You should have seen Beamer when he spotted his daughter- he was so excited, leaping and rearing and galloping along his fenceline. Silly boy! He does love the babies. 

Once daylight hit I brought out the Nikon for a photo shoot, while I watched to make sure mama cleaned and baby had her first poop. Both of which went like clockwork. 

Her only white is that little star- Beamer sure didn't hand out the white this year!

Yes, those are your legs!

Jayne takes a well deserved rest....

but she's not happy when she doesn't have eyes on her baby!

I have to get ready for church, but will post more later today!