Decision made

So- I've been giving Rosalee some thought. 

I am so not into searching for another horse, so I am going to give her a chance. 

It will mean that I might have to take clinics, haul her lots and ride her lots. I think this winter I can just ride her around here even if it is just on the property. I can pony Mesa and even Belle. I can haul her to the indoor- she does great in arenas. 

I'll have to give her maternity leave from Feb. to July and start her again. She is really broke, I just need to get past her issues. Once her foal is weaned- if she isn't bred back- I can do more and hopefully will get to the point where I enjoy riding her. If not- well- once Mesa is old enough to ride, then I can sell her. I'm hoping that being pregnant has settled her a bit and she will be less emotional.

She has so many redeeming qualities. She is a great babysitter.

I can teach children on her as long as it's in the round pen or under close supervision. Hopefully she will become a great kids horse when she is a little older.

 And she is just so darn good looking....

and has a pretty good personality. Everybody loves her. And she is super athletic too.

If it doesn't work to the point that I really enjoy riding her again, she will at least make some very marketable babies for me and will earn her keep that way.

Meanwhile, I will do what I can to progress with her.

In other news.....

 

My little Thea has moved on to her new home with one of the top trials trainers/breeders. Not gonna lie, it was hard to let her go.

I'll miss that goofy face and her snickers and doggy kisses. But she is with a half a dozen other dogs and an excellent trainer, so it's all good.

Mares

A couple of weeks ago I posted a pic of a mare and said there's always something going on. So, here's the story.
This is a mare that I am trying to make a deal on. Here's her pedigree. From what they said about her , she is the type of horse I like and need. 14.1hh, been ridden out on trails and had kids riding her, can ride her bareback in a halter, no drama to her. The kind you can get on after not being ridden in a long time and she is just the same. Perfect, huh?
Only problem is, she is in southern Montana and they got over 2 ft. of snow dumped on them. So the deal is on hold, I told them if they still have her in April we can try to work something out. Bad timing. 
😣
Anyway, I have been giving Rosalee a lot of thought.

There are a couple of things about her that I don't like and don't have the patience to work through. #1, she doesn't really like being ridden out alone or away from her herd.

Doing her half spin evasion

And it isn't just me she does this to as I had Shayla ride her last summer and she was pulling her stunts with her too. Yes, it's fixable, but no I don't want to spend the time and energy to do it.

#2 is that when another horse dominates her she won't hesitate to go right through me to get out of the way of the other horse. About  month ago she flattened me as I was going through a gate. Coyote Belle had just glared at her and maybe flipped her head at her and she bolted right through me. I don't need that. And it's sad really because in every other aspect she is a sweetheart. So I have to decide if she stays or leaves. Do I put effort into a horse that I don't enjoy riding and who might make a dirt dart out of me, let alone walk all over me?

Do I keep her until she is foaled out, keep the foal and sell the mare?
Keep her as a broodmare and wait until Mesa is old enough to ride?
Sell her in foal and try to buy a good riding horse? (the one in Montana maybe?)

Decisions, decisions.

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. 

Take a tour

I invite you to the grand tour of my hideout, unfinished but as done as it's going to get until next year.

Future plans include getting power to the barn, more shelves and organizing the rest of the barn.

Fall to winter.

Well dang. It looks like we have an early winter, unless we get another warm spell but I'm not holding my breath on that one.

Fall was too short. I still have trees with green leaves, although most of them had turned. This next photo was a week ago....

 and this is now:

We are having a tough start to winter; our well went dry and the landlord got another one drilled but it isn't hooked up yet; so no showers, laundry, and (yay) no mopping floors until they get an electrician in to hook the new well up to the old system. Fortunately, the horses are on a separate well so I don't have to haul water for them. Meanwhile, the guys are trying to charge the system with hoses hooked to the horse's well and are battling the hoses freezing up. There are two houses on the well that went dry, fortunately we are all good friends and are working together to keep things working. A little ingenuity goes a long way!
 The other thing that is happening here is that I have retired Beamer from riding. His arthritis is to the point where he is permanently lame. Since it's a front leg, even if the joint fuses he will still have awkward movement so I am just doing what I can to keep him as comfortable as possible. He will get regular bodywork and I'll keep up his herbal supplements and do my best for him. It's breakin' my heart. We shall have to see how breeding season goes, if he is even able to cover a mare. He'll let me know if he can't.

 He has entered into the winter of his life. My beautiful boy.

November already....

I guess I can't complain, after such a brutally hot and dry year the cooler weather suits me fine, just not looking forward to the snow that we are supposed to get over the next few days. But it's going to be warm enough that it should melt.

These colours aren't going to last much longer, the leaves were flying today.
November always reminds me of something I read in the book, Little Women, when I was a kid. One of the girls in the book (it was Jo) had a November birthday and she was always sad because it was such a dreary month, always rainy and grey.

 Let's see what the horses have to say about it......

Mama Belle?

Beamer?

Awww it won't be that bad! We had a few frosty mornings and the horses were performing as they waited for their hay. They had to wait a little longer because of course I had to video them!

Mama Belle still has some spectacular moves!

Boo.... just in time for howl -o-ween.

Just this....

I has a happy, Boo came back after being on the prowl for a week.

Of dogs and cats.

My dog Tess turned 11 yesterday, here is her official 11th birthday portrait.

I have been doing some serious thinking about Thea, and her strong desire to work, which you can see in this video:

I feel that it isn't fair for me to keep suppressing her desire to work, and my horses are starting to take after her; she got kicked by Pistol the other day, and Mesa was striking at her today. So I mentioned to one of my Saskatchewan friends that I would consider letting her go to a working home.... and she got a hold of her friend Wendy Schmaltz, who happens to be the breeder of Thea's sire and owner of her grandsire. Wendy is the breeder of several of the top trials dogs in Canada, and after seeing this video, called and we made a deal on her. Thea will be leaving in November, hopefully for a life of working to her heart's content. Although I will really miss her, I feel that it's in her best interests to move on.

Beamer got in a bit of a wreck the other day, when I went down to feed he was moving funny and I saw that he had a swollen left front leg and a swollen sheath. (He was walking like a kid with a full soggy diaper!)

He also had dirt all over his back. To be on the safe side, he got a shot of fast acting penicillin, and a tetanus shot. I did find some scrapes on his sheath, one is visible in the photo. So after some CSI work, I found a spot where he had rolled and I figure he had gotten himself cast up against a fencepost and probably had a hind leg on each side of it, hence the trauma to his sheath, and I figure he banged his front leg with a hind or even with his other front. Cold hosing the leg really helped, by the next day it was fine. The sheath swelling is going down, it's about half the size now. I did watch to make sure he could pee properly.

I lost my kitty Pearl the other day too. She lived upstairs and never came down to socialize, and if you went upstairs she would hide. I found her laying partly under the bed, so I picked her up. She was clearly dying, too weak to move more than her eyes and very faint meows. I held her for the next hour and she died in my arms. No idea why she died, she was just 7 years old. 

Pretty Pearl, shortly after we got her

Speaking of cats, kitty Boo has been gone for nearly a week, I sure hope he comes back.

There is always something going on

Who can this be?

Well I'm gonna keep you hangin' 😄

You'll find out in a couple of weeks.

Sneak peek

Today my husband helped me on some of my hideout projects. And Hideout is exactly what it is to me. It's a place to sit peacefully while I wait for the weanlings to finish their ration and get a head start on one of the hay piles before letting the mares in with them; a place to just sit in front of that nice open barn door and look at the fall colours and the snow that is creeping ever lower down the mountainside.

 A lovely peaceful place with no TV or internet, and I often don't take my phone with me.

Today we got the bin finished and my roadside find of a Stampede banner put up.

I still have several things to do in there, but it is functional now, and racoon proof!

Shayla was back out today and trimmed Pistol's feet. He was pretty good considering that he is a fidgety fellow, and what we found that worked best for him was letting him fiddle with his lead rope. He stood quietly when it was in his mouth.

I wanted her to see how nicely he loads- remember I had been loading him and feeding him in the trailer for about a week? That was around 2 weeks ago and he hadn't been loaded since then.
One small hesitation while he thought about it and in he went.

He was backed out, reloaded, and then unloaded by stepping out forwards to make sure he is comfortable with either way. He was a little rock star!
We can't send him home with her for a while as the majority of horses at the barn where she lives and works are sick right now, so it'll likely be December before he leaves.

The view and a visit

So Crystal was asking if I could see my horses out the window of my hideout in the barn....

A little heart shaped rock that I found, for my heart horse!

Only Beamer from the window, but that's ok with me, as I can see all the rest of them just looking out the barn door.

We are finally getting the rain we needed back in the summer. It was preceded by a big windstorm that played hell in Alberta and Saskatchewan - several huge grass fires, people evacuated and 2 deaths that were fire related (vehicle accidents) and several farms were burned up, including cattle burned to death. So very, very sad.

Shayla came over today to meet her colt, and I'm happy to say she liked him as much as I hoped she would.

In the next photo you can really see how much taller he is than Mesa, even though he is 2 months younger. We measured him and he is going to be at least 15.1, most likely 15.2 as we take the final measure after 5 months of age. Mesa will be 14.2hh.

Mesa stuff

I finally got around to trimming Mesa's front feet again yesterday. I usually like to have someone hold a youngster when trimming, but with nobody around to help, I just took her to the hitching rail, looped the lead line 3 times around without tying, and got it done. She did pull back several times as the bot flies were pestering her, and the rope just had enough friction that it released but not so quickly that she was instantly free. Stepped her back up and carried on. She did pretty good. I also measured her leg for her grown-up height, as she is over 5 months old now, and it was right at 14.5 inches, so it looks like she will finish up around 14.2hh, which to me is the perfect height.

She is just so cute!

Then we went on a walkabout. I took her up next door to our buddy's workshop, as I knew Ted was in there visiting.

Don't be shy, c'mon in Mesa!

She walked right in, (doorway is wide enough for a vehicle) and had a nice visit with Ted's buddy Dave ..... and as we left she left her *ahem* calling card, which I quickly shovelled up!

Whaaaat? What goes in must come out ya know!

This 'n' that

I made some progress on my hideout, all the boards are in place now. Now it's all about organizing all my tack and decor.

I have lots of ideas, like a bin to store all the feed to keep the raccoons out and to not have to use all those barrels and tubs.

The window is Thumper approved. The cats like that I moved the table near the window, now they sit there, they didn't do that before.

I start the weaning process with Pistol now. Every day when I give Mesa and him their ration, I leave them locked up in the pen a little longer every day. By the end of the month I'll be weaning him, unless he goes to his new home sooner than that.

I have been watching cutting on internet live streaming, and Thea is watching it with me.

I still have lots of flowers, although we have had some good frost. Tomatoes and onions are harvested, and that's abut the only thing that survived the deer here.

Emily Carr rose

Delta's Sarah, an upright fuschia. I'm really surprised how well it did, it got a lot of sun and heat and has lived through 3 frosts.

Pistol at 3 Months

3 months is a landmark for foals, after that they get into a gawky phase. Pistol is looking pretty good now.

That mark on his neck is showing the colour he is going to shed out to, a darker buckskin. He probably will not shed his foal coat until next May or June.

He has mellowed out quite a bit, he isn't as reactive as he was.

But he still likes to bust a move! I always get a chuckle seeing photos of running horses, how their feet are positioned.

He has beautiful straight legs and is a sturdy boy.

He still has a ways to go to grow into those legs!

Horse language

Can you guess how this conversation played out?

 I'll tell you in the comments after y'all tell me what you think.

The kids

Just a little fun with the weanlings yesterday.

Thea is obsessed with Pistol. It's a wonderment that they just ignore her.

Projects and ponying

Well we have been busy here! Ted finished the sliding barn door, next is for me to paint it.

The cats are using the opening on the right as their cat door. The bat house Ted put up above the door a while ago still doesn't have any residents, but I am hopeful that next year they will figure it out.

I finished trimming Beamer, he is lame right now, I am treating him for thrush and I think his arthritis is bothering him. Still have to do Rosalee's back feet but I should get that done today.
I saddled her up on Saturday and gave Mesa a ponying lesson. I started on the ground, dallying Mesa and leading Rosalee.

Once it looked like Rosalee was cool with that I stepped aboard.



Rosalee was quite patient, although she did pin her ears a couple of times when Mesa got right behind her, which I fixed by moving Rosalee's hip over so that Mesa was t'd up instead of behind. Kept the lesson short for the first time.
Then I went for a little ride and played with my mini obstacle course,

 and then we headed over to the barn to check on Ted's progress.

It passed inspection.

I'm liking this mellow version of Rosalee, it is much like she was when I first bought her. 

Day 33