What Happy Looks like

we have worked our tails off all weekend--and that is no exaggeration. In the middle of it today, we took a little break for play time, and I am glad we did, because this reminded me why we do all the work we do.

Bree had never ridden Hawk before, and did not really mean to this time--she just fetched someone, anyone, out of the pasture to play with this afternoon. She cleaned up his sitting spot and climbed on and started playing. I suspect Hawk has never been ridden bareback--I know I have not, because I suck at it and my legs are too dang short, and Barry does not play. Hawk was happy about the whole arrangement though.

We get so caught up in the business end of horses, and the competitive angles, and the sales goals--and it is so easy to forget that they are supposed to be fun. They are supposed to make us happy and take us away from real life, if even just for a minute.

Bree had fun, Hawk had fun, and I had fun--it was fun to watch, and satisfying to know that a 12 year old could drag him out of the pasture after months since his last ride, and he would be just fine for play time.

Thanks Bree for making me remember why we bother, and what the point of all this is---and I will get the rest of the jillion pics edited and posted soon. Can't wait til you come back!

From this to that

Can you believe that this baby boy above--Foxy's son at 4 days old--

will turn into this, before we know it? This is Hawkeye. He is 4 (and for sale, by the way, if anyone needs a do anything sort of horse). Not a full brother to Foxy's baby boy ( as he is at the trainer) but a half brother, as Sly is the daddy of both. I realize this is a crappy picture with all that tape wadded up there, but he was standing so pretty in the corner where the temporary fence hooks into the regular fence line that I took the picture anyway.


This is Foxy's baby boy on the day he was born. I am posting this picture--which shows how rough Foxy looked on the day she foaled--last Wednesday--to illustrate a point. Someone commented in the comments on a previous post that she had often wondered about mares looking a little ribby after foaling, and I had explained that sometimes that happens when they just get a little sprung from carrying all that baby around in there. So this is my second "from This to That". You can also see how much babies can change in the space of a couple of days--they fill out and don't look so awkward.

Poor Scrawny Foxy on Wednesday. Not only is she ribby as hell, her butt is all caved in from foaling. You can kind of see that she still has a belly
.
This is Foxy on Saturday. Three days after foaling, and two days after going outside of the barn get some exercise and some fresh air.

In case you think I am hiding something--here she is in a different view. Clearly this is not a mare who needs to gain weight--if anything she needs to lose 100 pounds or more.



This is Foxy on day 4 post-foaling. It gives you a better shot of her side, so you can see that she is not only not thin, but is pretty round. She could look better on her top line, and she will as she gets more exercise chasing baby around, and she is 15 years old, so not a really young horse.

When I was choosing photos to post, I had to cull out some cute ones of babies, because mama was in the background looking rough. I know that is normal--not every mare does it, but a lot do-- but not everyone knows that. So instead of hiding it, I decided to use it and explain it.

It also serves as a reminder that pictures are just a split second in time. They can make anything look good or bad but that does not mean that is reality--it just means that at that split second in time, that was happening. I think of the blogs where people are shredded on the basis of one picture, and while many times it is warranted, we cannot possibly know as much as we think we do from looking at one picture. Or even ten pictures. I hope this "From This to That" about Foxy demonstrates that. She went from looking like death warmed over to way too fat in the space of THREE days. Someone looking in from the outside could see the pics of her looking awful and think I was starving her. I know I am not. She knows I am not. God knows the elevator that sells me grain knows I am not. On the other hand, I can think of some people who would lecture me over her being too fat--and they are probably more accurate than anyone.

Perspective and context can change the whole story, can't it?

Boys will be boys--and more school

Today started out a typical way for me--we had a nice brunch at a friend's restaurant, and I made sure to make a fool of myself on the way out. I got through the whole meal, and after I paid, I knocked over the specials board. Leave it to me--it made a huge clatter and evidently, I said "oh shit". Imagine that. So Billy, the owner tells me--"hey, this is a f%$&n family restaurant". Which of course made me laugh even harder, so anyone who missed it that I had knocked everything over knew then.


Oy. Next step was to get some odds and ends done at the farm. While Barry was teaching Mojo how to get in the BIG trailer, instead of the three horse which is much lower to the ground than the Mack Daddy trailer, I watched the 3 year old geldings play. Note: It was doing some sort of weird precipitation thing out there that I will not call snow, because that is blasphemous, but there was a certain dampness that could not be ignored. Especially by me, in tshirt and Crocs like every other day.

This is my precious Radar aggravating Boogie--Radar is almost always the instigator of Playtime. Biting, nipping, rearing and kicking and striking are how colts play, and how they provoke each other to play back--no damage is done in these episodes, but it is a miracle sometimes, as they can get really rough with each other.

Young horses like this, especially geldings, play hard but have short memories--they are kind of like a pack of first graders. They can have it out in a game, and be cuddled up together the next minute. I do not know if that is because of short attention span, or just an unwillingness to hold a grudge.

However, there is always one in the pack who is more sensitive, and here it is Boogie--he is more timid, and gets his feelings hurt---I know he would rather be pounded on than ignored, so I know he enjoyed this. It cracks me up to realize how much I liked watching him get in the fray with the others

Boogie was quick to jump in and play hard with Radar. I have not seen that a lot as he is normally standing off the side like a wall flower, hoping to get picked.
He played awhile but he was also quick to call it off--after he got his licks in, of course. Lest you feel sorry for Radar in that he got popped early on, don't--he starts it and Boogie was not his first victim of the day. Most of the time, they do not even make contact when playing like this.
And see, they made up. Ignore that doofy line of fence--we were moving horses all over and did not put it back correctly until we were done.


This is what first got my attention---Radar and Hawk, who are two peas in a pod and best friends, were circling each other. I know were that leads, so I just kept clicking away.


Round and round they went for a while, like boxers waiting for the other to take the first poke.


I do not know if Hawk did not really want to play, or what his deal was, but he threw a kick in early.
Which did not even slow Radar down--he upped the ante by popping up on him and the game was on.
They crack me up how they carry on.
After this, I started wondering about Radar's sexual orientation, so I will stop this line of photos right here. Note how Hawk's ears are forward like he is fine with this behavior. He is an odd one as well.
Poor Target tried to get in the game and BAM--see what he got for his trouble? Poor fool. I think he feels left out sometimes too, since Hawk and Radar are attached at the hip. He did not play much in this game today, but instead stood around and posed for me. Everyone knows someone like that, don't they? He is the one that would rather look pretty than get dirty in the game.


Much more went on after the games were over. Hawk was on the schedule to be one with the trailer this week. He was going to get the 24/7 trailer experience this week, as he knows full well how to get in the trailer, but may not choose to do so on any given day. And when Hawk decides he is not going to do something, he is NOT going to do it.

But as you see, he ruined my plan by getting in and out of the trailer four or five times so easily that it seemed kind of silly. I wondered in the back of my mind whether something had scared him on a trip and lead him to his refusals to load--but evidently not. He did so well loading and unloading repeatedly, he got to go back to the pasture.As I said, Mojo learned how to get in the big trailer. He was so cute. It really is a much bigger step than he is used to. No problem though---look at his big effort trying to get out. Isn't that funny?
He had some other milestones today--he HATES having his mane brushed and I had not messed with his tail much. Today he got a good grooming, and his tail braided just because I could not think of anything more we could be doing with him, and he leaves on Friday. He also got his vaccines and more loading practice. He did so well, he too was chucked back out in the pasture.
Next, we did baby booster shots and gave them all a hit of ivermectin---and I noticed that Tango's hind fetlocks are goofy looking. They are much bigger than anyone else's. There is no heat, she is not off. It does not feel squishy like it is swollen, but it is also not just hair making them look puffy. They feel like normal joints, but are clearly larger than everyone else's.
Does anyone have any thoughts on what in the world might be going on there?


All in all, a productive day. Trailers are all moved around so that the transport company can get in and out at the farm on Friday. That means that there are SIX trailers of some sort in my yard at my house--two horse trailers, the boat on its trailer, the red flatbed trailer, the small trailer for the lawnmower, etc, and Barry's work trailer. We look like hillbilly heaven.

Getting closer!

We are making progress with the playing in the pond that I want to take pictures of. Again tonight, I went out to the back to see if I could lure them in. As usual, they got distracted by the good grass and I have no idea why as it is the same dang grass they have in the other 2o acres they are in, but there is no understanding young horses.

You cannot tell it from this angle, but probably the first foot of that grass is actually standing in the water, so that is how close we are getting.

Haida Girl did not come to the party, and I bet she will be the first one in. If Cash was in that pasture she would be. Hey that reminds me, there is a pond in their pasture too! I kind of forget since it is super shallow and dried up last year, but with the rain we have had, I bet there is water in there now--maybe not swimming depth water, but water. I will check that out Saturday.

CC was the first to get her nose wet--I could hear her feet sucking out of the mud when she backed out. Cricket did it too. Hawk made the most of it though, trying every angle possible to get a drink and eat the grass furthest out in the water---he did not get any further than this though. I thought for a second he was going to go ass over tea kettle and end up in the drink, but no go on that either.

Communique from a trainer

Lorna asked me last week how Hawk was doing at the Secret Weapon's barn. I did not know, as I had not asked in a bit, so I sent off an email to them and went on with my life.

He called Friday nite, and started with "I have to be honest with you". If you knew him, you would know that he is always straight up, he is just that way

I almost had a stroke. You know nothing good can come of that kind of start. I had horrid thoughts running through my mind--was he going to say Hawk was not worth shooting? Or that he had gotten hurt? Or hurt someone else?

I could barely hear him talk for my heart pounding so loudly.

Guess what he had to be honest about? He had been too busy to ride him! That is IT! The corn needed dealt with and those are long days in the fields that leave him with no extra time or energy, and he just had not had time to ride. So Hawk has been chilling in the pasture, happy as a clam I am sure.

I almost cried with relief. What do I care about that? I am not on a schedule with him, so it does not make a bit of difference to me if he gets home in 10 more days or 20 more days or 40 more days. God knows I have plenty of horses to ride that I do not have time for, and am so glad to even be able to get into the Weapon since his waiting list can be six months or more-- I think I scheduled my two boys last fall.

I have to mark this down as a time when things were WAY better than I though they would be when I heard those first words out of him, and heard his tone of voice---

You sure cannot miss it now!

Look at that big ol honking abcess on poor Hawkeye! I had to lance it to get things rolling, but once I did, it took off like a streak.

His days of being pain free are over, that is for sure. He took the lancing very well but was sick of me poking and prodding on him after a while. He got two sessions of it, and will have another in the morning.

I get a disturbingly peculiar satisfaction of getting goo out of abcesses. I cannot wait to have this goo cultured to see what in sam hill we have here, but things are looking up!