Out

 Now that we are getting more spring like weather, and the ground has thawed some, it was time to fix fence on the 15 acres  so I could let the mares out for grazing. 

The winter winds and possibly wildlife had broken the top strand of the white electrical tape, so we patched that and totally replaced the bottom strand which had been patched too many times. I also added pickets to help with wind resistance, as the fence posts there are 30 feet apart. 

I was a bit concerned about that 4 ft. gate, 

hoping Dallas wouldn't get trapped there- but they are all good.

One must fly when one can!

The mares were sure happy to get out! They did their exploratory gallop before settling down to find the green grass hidden below all the dead grass. 

Since then, I have been turning them out during the day, and keeping them off it at night, giving them hay instead; it's a bit too early for full time grazing, but I want them to have some to get their systems accustomed to it as the grass comes in, to avoid spring grass colic. 

I did see Gussie laying down again the day after her episode- she did lay flat out for a short while, and wasn't as worried once she got up. I think something flipped a switch for her, but I continue to keep watch to see if she continues to get that REM sleep, or if she regresses. 

I have an excuse...

 for not posting in a week. I have been busy fencing. We have so much grass here and if I don't get it grazed down it just dries up and becomes a fire hazard. So we fenced off a few acres for the mare's next pen as their original one that they have been grazing since winter is getting short. 

I had a supervisor doing QA and QC. 

Better turn that insulator a couple more times!

We put in 30 posts and 3 strands of hot wire rope. The heat is brutal  so I could only work in the mornings, and 1 evening. But we got it finished today!

That board fence in the back is where their first pen was. We only had to fence 2 sides of this pen. 

Happy mares!

They only grazed for a short while then went and hid out in the shade of their shelter to get away from the biting flies. They have lots of distance to go for shelter and water, so they won't just be filling their faces 24/7. I may lock them out of the new pen and just have them in their shelter pen at night if they get looking too... fluffy. 

Velvet is 29 days post breeding and hasn't come back in heat. I will keep checking her for a few more days just to be sure. I will start checking Ruby back around the 17th. For inquiring minds, I just lead the mare to a safe spot over the fence from Beamer and let him holler at them. If they aren't in heat they let him know- pinned ears, striking etc. If they are in heat, they squat and pee a little bit. 

We have a heat warning for the next few days. I want to get back to working Ruby so it will either be early morning or evening for that. I did take her out for another ride, but she was nervous so I kept it short. Not having someone to ride with makes me more cautious with a mare I don't know really well yet. I found a good post by Martin Black on ways to work from the ground to get her more focused on me that I can do in the round pen, so that will be the next step. I think a horse that is worried on the trail or riding out alone isn't connected with and trusting in the rider, so it looks like I have a lot of work to do with her before we get to that point. 

I found a guy locally who does feet/teeth/bodywork as a combined way of assessing the horse so I may haul over to him. Ruby is very stiff laterally in her neck, which may be from the years of needing her teeth done. I think my next step with her will be to do a lot of the Masterson Method on her first before I spend the money on anything else. See what I can do myself first. 

She had become much more friendly and wanting to interact with me. Even lets me touch her face - I attribute that to  having her teeth done and a bit of hand feeding a bit of grain. I want them to come to me, even if I have to treat to make it happen. Build the desired behavior and  let it become a habit. 

We have a bunch of new birds around here. We have seen Baltimore Orioles, blue Herons, Gold finches, several birds I can't identify yet and of course baby birds like these starlings. 

It may be difficult to keep the cats from getting them when they start to fly. May have to lock them up in the barn for a couple of days. 

Mr. Innocent.

Foal watch

Belle is at 339 days today.

Her udder isn't quite full yet, but her milk veins are large and she could easily fill in a matter of hours.

Tonight I start foal watch. I always start well beforehand so that she gets used to me popping in and out of the trailer and shining the flashlight at her. I have been putting her in the foaling pen in the evening and letting her out with the mares during the day, but starting tomorrow she will be staying in the foaling pen. She seems happy and relaxed in there; she knows the routine. Gussie always keeps an eye on her, hanging out at the fenceline and visiting with her bff.

I strung electric fence all along the top of Drifter's pen as Mesa has been coming up to the fence and bugging  visiting him. They both got a little zap today so hopefully she will back off. And I need Drifter to learn to respect fences. So far he has been really good but a little jolt will make him more respectful. 

His training is coming along really well, here's a little video of the end of a short session on the longe line.

Working with what I have

Haven't ridden since my last post, got a few things going on that are taking up my attention. First, I spent a lot of time rearranging the corral panels to give the mares higher ground, especially the foaling pen. This also allows the mares to use the west side of the foaling shelter as a windbreak from the east and north-east winds; they didn't have anything before for that direction.

Rosalee is getting the large marge look, starting to build a good bag and starting to soften in the tailhead area. She is at 315 days today.... I follow Mare Match Up page on Facebook and so many people are posting about their mares going to extremes this year: several going 370 plus days, and several going right around 320 and even less. I feel that she is on track for mid May- but she is a maiden , so there is no telling what she will do with no history on her. Tomorrow, I will open up the foaling contest! Guesses will be for Date, time, colour and sex, and I will give all the colour options in that post.
I put Gussie in the round pen this evening, wanted to see how she is using herself now that she is feeling better. I'm still not too happy with it but she is getting fitter.

This was after I had worked her for a while, she still was having trouble with her right hind at first.

Also she seems to have forgotten what whoa means. She also puts her head to the outside as she goes around, makes me wonder just what the heck they were doing with her over the last 4 years. I have a long way to go before I get her mind in the right place, let alone her body.

 I  want her to start carrying her neck level, it looks upside down when she travels with it that high.

This is an old photo from 2013 that shows her natural movement.

We'll get back to that with some work!

Fencing fun

Yesterday was fencing day. This was the view as I got to the barnyard....

However, once we got started on the fencing project..... 

We had lots of help! Especially from Miss Mesa, she appointed herself as job supervisor.

We are cross fencing the mare's pasture to allow grass to grow and to keep them from eating too much spring grass. Last year I had this cross fenced with hot wire, this year we put in double strand twist (barbless). Today Ted is refurbishing an old gate and we have to put in one more post for a cross brace to finish the project.

Such a helpful filly! Rosalee inspected the bucket of tools too. And then at feeding time, of course they had to goof off and it was great to see them all feeling good and enjoying the day.

New dynamics

The last few days have been focused on getting the pens built - enlarging the pen for Kai, Josie and Nitro so that we could give Beamer his full pen back instead of having it divided for Nitro. Kai is pretty bossy, so to put Nitro in with him and Josie we needed plenty of space. We borrowed a little gas powered Stihl auger, that thing is the cat's pyjamas! The guys had to bar the frost off the surface, then the auger made short work of the holes, perfect size too.

With the ground frozen solid now, I won't need my round pen until next spring, so we took it down and used it to set up a fence between the horses and cows. The landlords do have farm fence to put up, but I can't wait until next year, so we put up our own fence line to be replaced by the wire at a later date.

I ended up having to run some electric tape between Beamer and the kidz; they share a common fence line now and I don't want Beamer to be trying to get to Josie when she eventually comes into heat.

I know it isn't huge, but it is the best I can do living here, it's all the space that my landlords will allow us to have.

That's not snow in Beamer's pen, it's white gravel that we put in to combat the mud that happens in the spring.

It's interesting watching the new herd dynamics. After a day, it is clear that Kai has taken the role of herd boss. When I first turned them out in this pen, Kai was just beside himself, trying to do two things at once- herding Josie away from Beamer, and keeping Nitro away from the hay feeder. He was a busy boy for a while! Once I put up the hot wire and Beamer backed off to mind his own business, Kai settled into just being a brat- pinning his ears and charging at Nitro- just enough to get Nitro to move- and getting after Josie for hanging out with Nitro.

I found out that Kai was not the boss in his last herd, but he was best buds with the herd boss. Guess he was studying up for the top position! Josie pretty much ignores him, or gives him both barrels when he gets too pesky, but Nitro is quick to get out of his way. Nitro might be bigger, but he is only a long 2 year old, where as Kai is 2 years older than him.
So it looks like we are set up for winter, the water tubs with heaters are in place, the pens are as good as they are going to get, the horses all have shelter and it's lookin' good. Time to get back to working with Kai now!

Despite the rain

Even though I had to dodge rain showers all weekend, I did manage to get quite a bit done- but alas, no riding. Saturday I set up the electric fence around Rio's pasture- after tearing out the offending small section of barbwire!- and even managed to get the lawn mowed in between showers, and get some of the housework done. Sunday is a day of rest around here, and it was too wet to do much anyway. Today we got the electric fencer hooked up, and Rio got to go back on his modified pasture.

The panels are where the barbwire was, and I split the field in half, and ran the electric tape along the barbwire that separates his pen from the cow pasture. Ya I know, kinda like shutting the barn door after the horse is stolen.
Chickory is improving, I've been using my oils on her as well as the poultices. Even though I can't see any place where an abscess may have broken through, she is walking way better. Today I pruned some willow branches ( a good source of salicylic acid) and threw some in each of the horse pens, guess who was busy munching?

Belle gave up quickly, but Chickory just loved them. At first, Nitro though they were horse-eating branches, but then he became a horse, eating branches.
I got a lot of digging done today, moved a blackberry bush and developed the spot it was in for transplanting the new roses. Got a few "brown" shots for the next Sunday Stills- no, not dirt! And managed to get a really cool video of mama Raven feeding her getting-really-big-baby- Raven.

Tomorrow I'm going to get a photo from up the hill that shows the amount of water down here on the flats. I think there is some flooding just south of us, and I sure hope the diking system holds, or we'll be in trouble. It could quit raining any time now.

The best laid plans...

of mice and men, oft go awry....
I have good intentions of riding Gussie, but things just keep happening that put my riding on hold. For example, this morning when I went to put the mares out to pasture, I was surprised to see that Rio wasn't in the stall with his mama- he was with Gussie and Chickory in the rest of the mare pen. Huh? The only way he could have got out was if he was laying down next to the panels (the foaling stall is 20 X 20, made out of 2W corral panels, five feet high, and covered with plywood on three sides) and managed to get underneath. So that stepped up my plan of removing the foaling stall, as Rio is now big enough that he doesn't need to be kept separate any more, and the mares have their herd dynamics all worked out from being in the big pasture together during the day.

So my plan to ride was put on hold while I dismantled the pen, and baby-proofed the rest of the pen. That meant going through the shelter that is in the middle of the pen, taking down one front wall that was a little rickety, patching a hole in the back wall that Velvet excavated, removing or pounding in any errant nails, and removing the empty bale feeder that I had stacked against one side of the fenceline.

You can see in the background of this photo Beamer's rickety shelter and part of the cattle handling equipment

Then I got looking at Beamer's pen, and planning how I'm going to make some changes in there: he has a rickety shelter too, if you remember the wind actually moved it off its skids, and it's too low; it's actually a cattle shelter. So the plan is to remove it, and make Beamer a shelter off part of the overhang that houses the foaling pen area. Which means moving the remainder of the cattle handling equipment that forms part of Beamers pen, and bringing in the extra panels from the pasture....and that means that I probably won't get to ride tomorrow either.

The dotted lines show where the panels will go to make the new fenceline; the yellow outline shows the roof of the overhang.

It'll probably take two days to do the changes to Beamer's pen, so hopefully  Friday I can saddle up her red roan self and have some fun; Saturday we cut and wrap the beef.

The girls get to expand their horizon

Ted and I finally got the posts pounded to support the back fence which is made of panels. So I was able to take down the electric fence which I've been using to keep the fillies from pushing on the fence- which means that I was finally able to let them out into the adjoining paddock. Ted cleaned their corral too, so things are finally starting to shape up around here.

This pen hasn't been cleaned for years, that is some seriously good dirt piled up there; want some, Janice?

Didn't take Chickory long to spot the new opening. This is the pen that she was in with Coyote Belle when I weaned Sparkle.

Wasn't long till all three of them were rippin' around...

havin' fun.....

lookin' pretty....

Check out the extended trot on Velvet, another year and a half before I get to ride that lovely gait! Her mama was one of the smoothest horses I've ever ridden. Meanwhile Beamer was ripping around in his pen, wanting to get out there with them and have some fun too. He'll get to have his fun this weekend when I go to my first team sorting with him- that is, if I don't have to work!

Sunday Stills- fences

OK, Ed, this one I'm blaming on you! Fences, huh? Well, I have a little story to go with today's chosen subject. Every horse owner knows, or should know, the importance of safe fences for their equine partners. And we are also well versed in Murphy's Law: If something can go wrong, it will go wrong. I have always thought of corral panels as one of the sturdiest, safest fences available for horses. It took Chickory to bring my attention to the fact that all panel fences are not created equal. The existing fence here is built of panels, as it is a gathering and sorting pen for a herd of cattle. Beamer had no problems with it. However, Miss Chickory decided that she could stick her head through it for those lovely tempting weeds on the other side, only to find that getting her head back in was not so easy! I use Two W panels, which are built for horses, and the panels here are narrower in their spacing as you can see in the above photo- the grey ones are mine.

Sparkle demonstrates the proper way for a girl to reach through a panel:

Chickory ended up panicking and pulling back so hard that she brought two panels back and they came apart- probably a good thing. This, of course, allowed them to get into the hayfield. We were alerted by the dogs barking and Beamer hollering as his girls went out of sight onto the gravel road. I quickly got dressed- this was about 7 AM! -and grabbed a halter and a pail of grain; the mares were just passing the driveway when Coyote Belle homed in on the rattling grain and made a bee-line for me, followed by the other two hooligans. So it ended well, but I was sure thinking of Lisa's story about Rojo!

I brought out the solar fencer and up went the electric fence- the surest way I know of to keep horses from pushing on a fence.

Chickory really needs a visit from the horse Chiropractor now, but I'll have to wait till the swelling goes down .

Swellings above her eyes;

and just in front of the halter her axis is visibly swollen- you can see her forehead swelling in this shot too.

Her lovely profile now is marred by the swelling above her nostrils. This should all go away soon, with the help of my essential oils, but I bet it's a long time before Chickory sticks her head through panels again! The moral of this story is, never assume that fences are safe just because they look safe! Horses will find ways of getting in wrecks in just about any environment. I am just fortunate that there was no vet bills, or worse yet, a horse getting hit on the road.

Finished Project

As promised, here is the picture of the completed fencing project. On the left is the large paddock where the mares will winter. In the middle is a pen that has access to the box stalls. Then there is a 17 ft. alley that leads to summer pasture, and at the top, behind the barn, is Beamer's winter pen. To the left of the barn will be an extension of the building that will serve as shelter for the mares. I think the guys did a great job!

The new stud pen

The new pen that Beamer will winter in is finished, so he got to try it out yesterday.

It passed the test for being big enough to gallop around in;

Big enough to play in, with high sides that I put a hot wire on to discourage chewing.

Yup, it passed the Beamer approval test!