He is here!

 Leo was delivered this morning! I had the foal pen all prepped for him, and put Tuffy in with him at first. 

They got along ok at first, but Leo was a bit much for Tuffy: he was pacing non stop and calling out. Disturbed Tuffy's peace! So I put Tuffy back with the mares until Leo eventually calmed down. 

Pacing... that square on his shoulder is where the breeders freeze branded him

Calling...

Pacing....

I put hay for the mares close to the foal pen and locked them out of the pasture so they would be close to the boys.  This afternoon, Tuffy went back in with Leo and they got along much better since Leo calmed down. 

Leo is not halter broke yet so that will be where I will start with him. One day at a time, with day one being to see if I can touch him. 

Ah that's the spot! 

Butt scratches are always a good place to start.

He let me move up his back and eventually around his head and poll.

Good boy, Leo!

They got along much better. 

There is quite a size difference! 

Tuffy is 5 weeks older than Leo. They are both growing in their winter fur. They will have access to the barn, foal ration twice a day and and all the hay they can eat. Leo hasn't quite figured out the foal ration but he will. 

Dally is quite attentive to him, she seems to love foals so I hope when she has her own she will be a good mama.

Here is hoping they have a good night!

Weaned and another update

 I made the decision to wean Tuffy at 3 months, a full month earlier than I normally do. He was so independent and more bonded to Velvet than his mama, and was rarely nursing so I figured it would work. Also, Happy was pretty much not concerned about him. I think she was glad to hand him over to Velvet. Happy is now at Shayla's, with the herd that Gussie is in. Not having a foal at side over there will help her to gain weight for the winter while there is still lots of lush grass. 

Tuffy and his step moms

I have him on Purina Maternity feed, twice a day. He loves it!

He is holding his weight well. I took the opportunity of feeding time to start working on his feet .  He wasn't sure about it so I had Ted come and hold him while I nipped and rasped.

After the first foot, he was much better with the second one; in true Tuffy fashion he had to figure out what I wanted, then he was ok with it. I started the back feet today, got one done, no halter, while he ate, and will do the second one tomorrow. 

His shedding pattern is interesting. 

Black areas and pale areas but cute all over!

I plan to get his hernia dealt with in early October. This is my first foal with a hernia that needs intervention; it means hauling him to the vet for sedation and stitching  I hope at 5 months old he will be able to handle that; I want to get it done before it tries to close on its own and pinches off his intestines. 

Easily visible in this photo

Found a post the other day on Dally's full brother, we called him Boe but they changed it to Willy. They had him helping to sort bulls out of the  cow herd recently and put this photo on Fb. 

Always nice to get good reports on horses we bred!

The weanlings

 Today was the day for the weanlings to arrive. They are Shiner, Jayne's red dun colt, and Gemma, the palomino filly out of Shayla's buckskin Driftwood mare. They are both sired by Rex (Major's Pistol) her junior stallion. This was his test foal crop and her turned out to sire some very nice foals. 

Gemma is heading to the Yukon in a couple of weeks, so we need to get her leading and loading.

The mares came up for a look, but soon lost interest and wandered off. The foals wandered around their pen for a bit- Shiner called out a bit, but not a peep out of Gemma. 

They both seem pretty chill in their new environment. I plan to feed them in the barn, so it was nice that they went in on their own in short order and seem to like being in there. 

Shiner sure has Jayne's beautiful eye. He may end up being here a bit longer as the focus will be more on Gemma at first as she will be picked up by her owner in 17 days. 

Let the fun begin!

Foal spam

 Got some updated photos of Shayla's foals. Enjoy!

Bear- this is the one that we think will be a black buckskin. Color testing is planned. 

Bear and his mama Concho and yes that is smoke- more on that in a bit.

Belle's foal. The owner called him Nero but that is such an awful name because Nero was such an evil man- kinda like calling a foal Hitler. So I call him Hero! He is still unfolding those long legs- he's very tall! and only a week old whereas Bear is 5 weeks old. 

He's adorable!

Jayne's foal, as yet unnamed. I didn't get a lot of photos of him because, well... 

my attention was diverted by this little sweety! Dolly had a filly! Only a day old. 

She has figured out how to scratch her face,

and a very cute face it is!  This one is a keeper for sure. 

I got word from Sylvain that Sophie's filly by Beamer will be for sale. Will try to get photos of her on here soon. 

Anyway, back to that smoke I mentioned. 

We woke up to a very smoke filled world yesterday. The fires are mostly north and west of us, and we have had a strong south wind- well, it switched to a strong north wind overnight and filled the whole province and most of western Canada and the northern US with smoke. 

That is the actual color of the sun in the early morning. 

Morning sun viewed from our house. 

This whole thing is a nightmare. More towns and reserves have been evacuated. Good news is that Ted's family can finally go back to their town. We also have two days of rain in the forecast but not until Monday. And thunderstorms in between that usually mean lightning strike fires. I'm hoping that we get our usual rainy June and that fixes this. 

So anyway, trying for long distance photos of  Shayla's herd was hampered by the smoke, but here are a couple more just for fun. 

Zipper following Concho and Bear- he wasn't at all concerned about where his own mama was. 

Bear has a lot of speed!

So smoky you can barely see the fenceline behind the horses.  Hopefully we will be going back that way in a week or so after the rain. There are a bunch of cute draft foals to see too!

Weaning time

 Yesterday- just after the full moon- it was weaning time. I separated Dally into the foaling pen and left Jayne in the main pen for a while. 

Once Dally realized she couldn't see the mama, she carried on for a bit. 

Once I put Jayne across from her, she settled down considerably. I put their feed right across from each other so they could be as close as possible.

See that gap between the gate and the panel? I didn't like that one little bit as it could be a potential leg/hoof trap if Dally got to pawing.

So I fixed it. Looks kinda hillbilly but it works for the amount of time it will be needed. 

This morning Dally was her normal self, greeting me as she saw me coming and looking for her scratches. Her favourite thing is to interrupt my stall cleaning for this:

All is well!

Weaning time

My plan for weaning is usually the same every year: Remove Belle from the herd, put her in the adjacent foaling pen, and leave the foal in the herd. So that's what I did on Thursday.  It just seemed like the right day to wean and I always try to follow my instincts. 

First day went well, Moondance was not too worried as he could still hang out next to mama and had his bff Gussie  and Jayne to keep him company. 

The next day however, I caught him trying to nurse off Gussie. At first she would squeal and stomp her foot, but then she allowed him. And she was following him around nickering if he got out of her sight. And I'm pretty sure her teats were getting sore from him pulling on them!

Since  I was worried that Gussie would come into milk, which would not be good and would totally defeat the purpose of weaning, I had to switch it so Belle was in the herd and Moondance is isolated. 

I gave him a pile of hay near where the mares come up for water and he can see into their shelter from there, but most of his feed is in the foaling shelter behind him.

He is adjusting. He loves it when I come and hang out with him. As soon as the smoke clears I will take him out and pony him from Gussie. 

What smoke, you ask? 

All this blanket of smoke is from the fires to the south of us in the USA From California all the way up to Washington State. It is heavy upon the land and will be hanging around for a few days as all the winds are from the southwest. So no riding until it abates. 

Speaking of ponying, our last lesson went quite well.

Just a note on Moondance's colour- he is what is known as a sun faded black. I rather like it although I do like the non fading black that Beamer is. Moondance doesn't carry any colour modifiers like the cream gene which his brothers Eli, Kai and Rio have, he is a true black carrying only 2 copies of black. He is the same colour as Nitro. He also has a lot of white hairs scattered throughout his body and especially on his face, which his brothers also have, with the exception of, I believe, Kai. Stella had that too. I think it comes from Beamer's mama who was a black rabicano.

Riding  day 36

Weaning day and howtheheckdoIorganizeeverything?

Sunday was a frosty morning. The horses went on a romp when I went down to feed.



Sassy was just full of herself.... good thing she didn't know that her world was about to change.
Yup, Booncat weaning day because Sassy was headed to Alberta to her new owner.
Normally I wean during the waning of the moon, but I didn't have that choice this time as this was the only day that Sassy could be hauled. And a good thing they didn't wait another day, because Alberta got hit with another early snowstorm.

As she left, Booncat was calling and followed the fence line as the trailer pulled out, calling for his mama. But he had his buddy Eli and lovely calm Gussie to help him through the day.
He called sporadically throughout the day, but by the next day, not at all. Life goes on as normal. I do prefer the over the fence method as I did with Eli and Belle though, less mental stress on both mama and baby.

Drifter got saddled and longed , he took well to being saddled and there was no silliness to him at all. I will continue his training weather permitting, and once I get all the weaning sorted out. I still need one more pen! Not quite ready to turn Drifter in with an unbred mare (Gussie) but I would like to have a place to put Booncat separately- the li'l rascal still won't eat the foal ration so I am supplementing him with alfalfa- which the mares don't need.  Eli will be leaving in a couple of weeks.  I guess it'll all sort itself out soon! I may be able to put Booncat and Drifter together once Eli is gone, then I can put Belle and Gussie together and my 3 pens with shelters will work.

I'm trying to ride more often, yesterday I rode and was wondering how the 2 babies would do without an adult in the pen with them, but they had their hay to keep them busy and didn't seem too worried as I rode away.

Beamer has been getting turnout in the bottom hotwire pen. To do that I have to lock Drifter in the top foaling pen, even though Beamer is good I don't want to push his limit by having another stallion across the fence, even if it is a juvenile. The fenceline of this pen borders both the mare pen and the bottom paddock that adjoins the foaling pen,so you see my dilemma in turnout and weaning. I have logistics problems! But it will all sort out, especially if I can get Booncat eating the foal ration, which I can either pop him in the horse trailer or the barn for the 15 minutes it takes to eat that. Or if I can have Booncat and Drifter together and can just lock them up while Beamer is out. Either way, it will help once Eli is gone and Belle can go back in the main pen.

Riding day 60

Mama mama!

Just this....

It's time...

Weaning time that is. I have never had to wean this late in the year. But Pistol just turned 4 months old, and Belle needs to put some weight on for the winter so I got busy setting up the foaling pen for weaning. I opted to put Belle in there, as I think it will be better for Pistol if he has plenty of room to run and have both Mesa and Rosalee for company. I figured confining him with Mesa would end up with him getting a lickin' from her as she doesn't tolerate his antics any more. He already has an edema just below his right stifle, I am assuming from a kick from her.

I watched them for a while to make sure everything was ok, then found a spot that needed further baby-proofing. The place looks like a homeless shelter! 

Hopefully things will go smoothly, Pistol has become less of a mama's boy over the last month. I took him for a walk the other day and he did really well. Only needed a few minor corrections when he got in a hurry. Also took Mesa for a walk, and I have to brag on her, she was perfect! Led on a loose line, went wherever I took her with no hesitation including fairly close to working machinery. Of course, no camera that time. 

All is well

Weaning is actually going better than I expected. Mesa doesn't call out much at all, and Coulee only calls out when I take Beamer up to his grazing pen- she doesn't call out to Mesa at all. I think that it helps that Mesa can see mama even if she can't touch her, it looks like my ugly tarps are doing the trick.

Mesa gets along with all the others, even Belle, so she is quite comfortable and bonded within the little herd.

I noticed this morning that Rosalee has taken on the role of protector - she put the run on Pistol this morning when I was bringing them their hay.

In that photo you can see how I left an opening, untarped, for Mesa to see mama and that is the section of round bale feeder on mama's side of the panel to keep her from sidling up to the fence for nursing. As for Rosalee's tail- it still isn't growing out very quickly and she needed a fly swatter, so bale strings to the rescue!

Weaning day

So, it's here- weaning day.
I am still not perfectly set up the way I want, so my only option is to put Coulee in the foaling pen and leave Mesa out in the bigger pen with the other horses.
Because it is all corral panels, Mesa was able to stick her head through and try to nurse, so I ended up putting temporary tarps over the rails. I did leave a couple of openings but blocked them with my round bale feeder halves so that Coulee couldn't get close enough to let Mesa nurse.

Belle and Coulee still bitch at each other over the fence...

 so I put a tarp across that area too. Hopefully by tomorrow things will settle down a bit. When I left this evening, Mesa was quietly munching hay with her buddy Rosalee- and I did get her to eat some oats too.

We shall see how things go tomorrow!