Visiting the WV horses

 It is getting close to weaning time for the foals; Theo and Shayla's palomino filly will be 4 months old in a few days. Because Theo's person is picking him up on the 31st, I was going to wean him on schedule, but changed my mind ( I can do that, right?) and will leave him in the herd until that time. 

I had a great day visiting Shayla and giving her a hand with a few projects, including getting photos for their AQHA registration papers. But I kinda got side tracked by a bunch of cuteness... imagine that....

First we visited the two pleasure bred colts, Chex (sired by Rex) and Oscar, who is sired by a show horse and was in utero when Shayla bought his mama, Sally. 

Although Oscar looks black, we think he will end up being a dark bay roan. Chex is red dun. 

The cutest little face!

We turned out Rex with a yearling Percheron stallion prospect... he does make Rex look small! 

He is appropriately named Biggy

Next up was a visit to the pasture with all the mares and foals-  Rex is no longer with them, having done his studly duties. 

This palomino filly was the first to sell. She will be heading to the north country. The Yukon!

This is Johnny,  who is out of the same dam as the next horse, but Johnny is sired by Rex. Whatcha chewing on, Johnny?

This is Jolene, she is a long yearling and has the same dam as Johnny (out of the palomino mare) and sired by the late Givemathrashin, the black stud Shayla had. She is the last horse available from that sire. 

I love the unison in this photo of Jolene and her bff, a draft cross mare. 

And last but not least, this is Shiner, Jayne's last foal. He too is red dun like his sire. 

All these foals except the palomino filly are available.

It's a bit of a tough market right now, there are a ton of foals for sale on all the media pages, a lot for buyers to choose from. People tend to be really specific in what they want- as well they should be. It is much easier to sell a foal with a unique color than a so-called plain sorrel or bay and often quality gets overlooked for a flashy color. A good horse is never a bad color. as Mark Rashid said in the title of one of his books. The one horse that I raised that literally took my breath away when I looked at her was Josie, a solid sorrel. She is probably the one Beamer daughter that I should have kept. 

All about those foals

 Another visit to Shayla, another photo drop for you guys! We started with the two yearlings she has for sale, Zipper (paint horse) and Fire (Jayne son).

EDITED: Fire just sold, he has a future as a barrel horse for a young lady!

Zipper is very tall and will likely end up around that 15.3 to 16 hh mark. He is laid back and friendly!

They are both going to be tall boys, I figure Fire will end up around 15. 2 to 15. 3.

He's in that gangly yearling growth spurt, he likely won't come into himself until he's about 3 or 4 years old. 

His pedigree is a cross between run and cow, so he should be a very versatile horse. 

Moving on to Jayne's foal from this year, whose barn name is Shiner. 

Yes he does have an owwy on his hip, it's healing. 

This colt is very quick on his feet- and with his feet, as I could see when he was kicking at the horse flies that were driving them nuts. 

This next filly is the one Shayla named Gemma, who is sold and has been renamed Trudy. 

She's sweet!

Last but not least of the foals was Johnny- he sure has filled out since the last time I was there!

 

We are still not sure if he is dun or sorrel. And likely won't know until he sheds out. 

Dun stripe or counter shading?

Either way, he is a handsome dude! Another one that is bred to be versatile, with bloodlines of great cow horses, reiners and ranch horses he should be able to do it all. 

All those foals sure do have a nice place to grow up in. This is Rex and his band of mares which includes 4 outside mares as well as some of Shayla's. She is still waiting for 2 more Rex babies. 

Next post will be a Theo post! And maybe some kittens. 😁

Some horse updates

 Well that 10 days went by fast! Since I last posted we had major temperature swings in the weather-  cold nights, warm days, then cold days, then warm days- gah! But we are on the upswing now. 

Beamer and Belle got their blankets off a few days ago; I'm sure they appreciated that!

The short portion of her mane is how much it has grown since September, that was all rubbed out. I love all the colours she has in her mane. 

Yes Velvet, you also have a beautiful mane. 

One of the reasons for my delay in posting is that I planned a trip up to see Shayla and take photos of a couple horses she is selling. First up is her paint colt, Zipper. 

Speaking of manes, his is sure colourful!

Zipper is a really good minded colt who is going to be really, I mean really, big. 

He's a weanling and is already up to Shayla's shoulder! I didn't get a lot of photos of him because we wanted to concentrate on Boe photos. Yes, he was put up for sale. We took him to the round pen for the photo session. 

He's literally the spitting image of Beamer only in red. He carries himself beautifully, and even yawns like his daddy!

We took some video for his sale ad. This was only his second time of being worked in the round pen; he was very good. 

We also worked him in hand a little. Just following the feel of the lead rope, and he was beautifully soft. 

I'm pretty proud of the quality of foals Beamer sires off different mares. They are all good horses!

Anyway, our work paid off; Shayla posted him on FB and he was sold within a day and a half!  He will be going to a working cattle ranch only an hour from here. 

Beautiful boy

He might be leaving but I think we will be able to follow his progress as both his owner and the lady who will be starting him are on FB. The trainer's page is Anchor S Equine.

The 3 weeks photo shoot

DLH Booncat Peppy is 3 weeks old today.This little guy is so entertaining! Because I don't have my Nikon camera anymore, I am only able to use my phone camera, which means the action shots are blurry- he zips around so fast!  So please forgive the ones with focus issues, and just enjoy the show!

All milked up and ready....

Maybe a nibble of something for extra energy.....

And off we go!

Airborne!

Turn and accelerate!

Stretched out and full speed ahead!

Airborne with a kick!

Videos will give you a better idea of the athletic ability of this colt- I call his moves the Booncat Boogie!

Race day

It's Kentucky Derby Day! I am cheering for Roadster!

Anyway, Eli looks like he is practicing for a race himself!

Or maybe it's dance moves?

I think I'll go with dance moves!

Because he sure doesn't need any practice in being cute!

I did get his colour and 5 panel tests back. He is EE aa nCr which means he is a smoky black, as I suspected. He also carries one copy of the herda gene as Beamer does. It seems the cutest ones get that gene mutation- Eli, Tumbleweed, Mesa and Josie all carry it. For those who don't know. it is a recessive disease found in certain lines of Quarter Horses, which means that it needs to have 2 copies of the gene for the disease to actually be present and affect the horse; a horse with one copy is not affected at all. I started testing Beamer's foals once I found out in 2013 that he is a carrier.

Starting Monday, he and Belle will be getting daily turnout, if all goes well they will stay out with Gussie and Sassy. Speaking of Sassy....

she is 301 days today and is starting to bag up. Her 320 day mark for a viable foal is May 23. I have a feeling she won't go until mid June, which is the standard 343 day mark. So I will be closely monitoring her and will start foal watch as soon as she is bagged up a bit more. Stay tuned for foaling contest #2! I am really hoping for a blue roan or a black from her.

Riding with li'l pests

Finally I'm getting time in the saddle again. I rode Gussie the other day, and after the previous ride where she was sure she didn't want to go in the bush, this time- no problem. We waded through the pond and down one of the trails- only to find ourselves swarmed by mosquitoes! ( Li'l pests version 1) That kind of made it unpleasant enough for both of us that I didn't prolong the ride. We did the pond again on the way back.... just because it's fun!

The lady who came up from the coast decided not to buy Rosalee, she was looking for more perfect conformation. No problem, there are very few perfect horses and I'm sure she will find one she likes better. There is another lady coming on Saturday to try her out, so I have been trying to ride her every day. A certain li'l somebody is having to deal with it!

He goes in for a slurp when I stop for a few minutes.

I stepped it up a bit today and rode with T'weed and Mesa loose in the pen. (Li'l pests version 2)

They got a little silly a couple of times! I was pretty happy with how Rosalee handled their antics. She basically ignored them. She is soooo out of shape! So regular riding will really help and by weaning time she should be able to go on and work for whoever ends up with her. Sometime in July I'd like to take her and T'weed to the little local arena to give her a better workout. Maybe I'll even teach him to pony.

Come for a spin or two with me!

I take Rosalee out of the pen by herself to saddle up.

Crappy photo but it shows how unconcerned both of them were about being separated. 

T'weed is starting to shed now, his ears and face and legs are showing some of the colour under that baby fuzz.

That's not dirt on his knee, it's a kind of sooty black; that's the colour his stockings will be.

Buckskin showing on his face.

And those ears! Neat colour and it will look even better when all that whitish hair sheds off.

Riding day 32, 33, and 34