Her sire is a son of Doc's Hickory and grandson of Peppy San Badger and Docs Quilchena; her dam goes to Poco Bueno and Johnny Dial.
Meanwhile, I had been chatting with a gentleman who had bought a red dun filly. He owned her full brother , which he had bought at the sale last year. He talked about how much he liked that colt, and what a great mind he had, and how easy it was to train. So when this red dun filly came up at the sale, he started bidding on her, and ended up buying her. Then he says,"I can't believe I bought a mare!" I laughed, 'cause I love my mares, so I told him that if I didn't get the filly I wanted, I'd buy his filly off him, as she is a very nice girl. Well, I got my filly bought, and I was telling Ted this story, and he wanted to see the red dun filly. So I showed him. He took one look at her, and said we should buy her. Now this is my husband, who says we should sell our horses, we don't need that many! But I trust his judgement, so we bought her, which made the gentleman happy, because he lives in Idaho and wouldn't have to deal with all the paperwork of having to ship her across the border.So this is the red dun filly:
Her sire is a grandson of Doc O'Lena, with a little running blood thrown in (Mr. Bar None and Pacific Bailey), and her dam is a granddaughter of Sonny Dee Bar.
Her sire is a grandson of Doc O'Lena, with a little running blood thrown in (Mr. Bar None and Pacific Bailey), and her dam is a granddaughter of Sonny Dee Bar. I hauled them home, and since they were wearing halters from the sale, and aren't halter broke, I decided to take their halters off in the trailer before I turned them loose. I have an open, stock-type trailer, and they were just loose in there. Now, these girls were run in from the pasture, weaned , and run through a sale in the space of 48 hours, so naturally they were a little stressed. I had to put my rope on them and work it so that I could get my hands on them and take their halters off. The red dun, true to the man's word, was fairly easy so I did her first, then the other one, who was a little more worried. They were quite happy to be turned out in this pen (Beamer's winter pen, which is coming in handy!). I left them with hay, grain, water and salt. They really went for the salt! So today, I'll be trying to get my hands on them. I have a little catch pen made of panels inside their pen, so I'll try to run them in there one at a time. This is going to be fun; I love working with the babies! It really makes me appreciate Peppy, who is so quiet that you can do anything with him!
and she willingly dragged it backwards
and forwards. I haven't managed to get the rope under her tail yet; I was thinking that I should put her in the round pen and work on desensitizing her to that; it would beat suprising her and maybe getting in a wreck! I also did some dry work with her on rollbacks and picking up the correct leads. So all in all, she had a good workout, and was happy to stand ground tied for one more picture.
Here's to the heroes who gave their lives
I put Gussie in Beamer's winter pen, which has electric fence around the top rail to discourage visiting over the fence, and corral panels set up around the automatic waterer so that she can't visit at the fence there either- she has a tub for water.
Tess, who is dressed in her Sunday bandana, had to have a drink.....
and so did Peppy. Drink lots, little fella, that's all you get from now on! I will keep them separate for at least a month, to make sure that Gussie's milk completely dries up. Poor girl was looking like a milk cow by last night!
Can't you just see him when he's all grown up with kids swarming all over him?
He is actually fairly well behaved around them; to test this, I rode him over to the fence where the mares were hanging out in the shade; every time he hollered at them, he had to work; I made him spin, then rest with his back to them. His reward was to relax facing them and only a few feet away from them. I only had to spin him twice; he was quite happy to chill out and just hang with the mares! I wish all stallions were as easy to handle as him, and I credit my trainer, Kim Smith, who did all the work on him as a youngster, with making sure he had good manners.
We had to go in the Grand and Reserve Champion class because of our first placing in the weanling class. I never did get him to stand square- he does it perfectly at home; go figure! All in all, it was a good exerience for him, what with trailering for an hour and a half each way both shows; he travelled really well. And he did fairly well with all the commotion of other horses, sights and sounds that were new, even being in the arena with a wagon team warming up. He wasn't too concerned about anything except keeping an eye on Gussie's whereabouts.
Of course, he stood still until the judge came to inspect him and then he fidgeted and hollered for his mama, but overall, he was a good boy. I'm sure the judges don't expect babies to stand still like a seasoned horse, and he did lead and travel well at the trot. He looks ribby right now even though he is on good pasture and getting grain every day; he is in a growth spurt and I think that is why he isn't a little fatter; all the other horses in pasture with him are quite plump.
This is my friend John from Bar Diamond Y Quarter Horses on Peppy's lead shank. I will be featuring his palomino horses in my next post. Those stripes on Peppy just behind his elbow are called poverty stripes; they mimic the ribs but are actually a coloration; his dam has them too. I had a comment asking what Peppy's colour is called; he is a blue roan even though his head is not pure black. A blue roan must have an even mixture of black and white hairs for his body colour, and that is exactly what he has. Remember, at 4 months, he hasn't shed all of his baby hair yet.
Speaking of pictures, do you remember what Peppy looked like a a week old?
And since I won't be around tomorrow, I'm leaving Beamer to keep an eye on things! (Photo credit: Wendy)
I had to be real careful not to poke him when he moved around. These scissors have a fairly blunt tip.
Peppy is really good with his feet, too; he lets me hold his foot between my legs for cleaning just like the big horses do;
and he was quite patient while I filed his hooves. He had to think twice before he stepped onto the concrete pad, though!
He is just as good with his back feet. (Thanks for holding him, Wendy!)
