A dark time for the rebellion

I am enjoying looking back through my pictures! Here's one that's pretty representative of the trails:


A lot of riders hated the four wheelers, but if they didn't ride back there, we'd lose the trails within a year. Things grow so fast in Memphis! The four wheelers made trails and ruined trails and moved on to make new trails, and we just rode where ever we could.

It was beautiful in the spring and summer.


So for some reason I thought it'd be a good idea to buy my friend's 4 yo Percheron gelding when she put him up for sale. He was unbroke, but very sweet natured. Poppy was a great name for him - I thought he acted like he'd been hitting the opium. I thought that maybe my husband would like to ride a total stoner of a horse, and if G never wanted to ride, I could get Poppy broke and resell him later.


He was an easy fellow to start, even with as little experience as I had. Our first trail rides blew his mind, maaaan. He didn't realize that the world was bigger than the stable, that it just went on and on, with hills and trees and ponds and rivers. And he didn't know how to follow a trail - he'd get all big-eyed and just start walking straight ahead, plunging through weeds and small trees and ditches.

My best friend James was starting a really rank, hateful, insane stud at the same time. We went out together on our green horses pretty often, with good success, til that son of a bitch kicked me and Poppy. Chip was the kind of really dangerous horse who had gone crazy from confinement and hormones, and he calculated ways to hurt humans. His idiot owners loved him and thought he was a sweetheart, even though he regularly hurt everybody who handled him.

Well, not James. James was way too smart and fast to get hurt by Chip, and Chip actually rode pretty well for him. Anyway, we were out in a field, letting the horses graze for a minute on the way back in, when with absolutely no warning or provocation Chip just double-barreled Poppy as hard as he could. He caught Poppy in the ribs and me just behind the knee - another inch forward and he'd have seriously jacked me up. While I was wondering if I'd really just been kicked and if my leg was broken, Poppy wheeled around and tagged Chip right back, and THEN I woke up and got control of my horse. James was just as startled as me, but he probably recovered faster - we got the horses separated and headed back to the barn. I was lame for a week or so, with a huge purple bruise, but nothing seriously got hurt.

So things went along with three horses for a while. Then that summer, about a year after I got Champ, my husband got cut in the third round of layoffs from his job. This was back in the halcyon days of 2007, when we all thought the housing market was a little overpriced but everything else seemed to be ok. Ahhh, innocence. G looked for three months, but everybody in his area had a hiring freeze on, and he had to take a job as a consultant in Ohio. We decided I should stay in Memphis and finish school, so he packed up his car and drove away to Ohio and I packed up our stuff and moved to a cheaper place.

A much cheaper place. It was, in fact, the kind of place where there was no heat. The owner had just picked it up as a foreclosure and rented it promptly to me without really ascertaining that MLGW would hook up the gas again. Turns out the entire gas line had been taken out to the street. It doesn't get really cold in Memphis in the winter, but it gets cold enough. I spent a month fighting with the landlord about getting the damn gas turned on, sleeping on the couch fully clothed, with all the animals draped over me, taking finals, and working 40 hour weeks.

I accidentally got a puppy then, too.


And I bought a revenge-horse. See, G called me talking about getting a TV, and I was all "you don't need a TV you have a computer." Then he called again, a couple of times, while I was riding in a Christmas parade and didn't even have my phone on me. I didn't answer, so he called his best friend and said "If you were Funder and I asked if I should get this sweet TV on sale, what would you say?" His BFF, of course, said "Well if I were Funder I would love you and want you to be happy, so you should get the TV." And lo, G got a really sweet big HD TV at Best Buy for like 50% off, 24 months no interest.

I was pretty annoyed, because I was living in a house with no heat and he just bought a TV. And this big classy slightly crazy mare was for sale, ALSO for no money down no interest, and... well... I bought Dixie. I am a paragon of adult problem-solving skills, yall. Sigh.


Look how dark she was! And her mane actually is longer now than when I bought her. Here's a really horrible cell phone pic:


Her feet were pretty jacked up.


Her brain was completely fried. All she knew how to do was rack - no woah, no other gaits, no slowing down or speeding up, no matter the terrain. She didn't know how to stand to mount - it took someone holding her head for me to vault on. She came from a padded show barn, so she was broke to ride at 18 months, then had a show package put on - her feet had another 6" of hard rubber pads strapped on. She didn't work out there - too diagonal, and no doubt too stubborn - so she was sold to a friend of mine who did the rehab to get her flat-shod again. My friend, who was kind of a low-level horse trader, thought I should have a really nice mare - she thought my two bays were scrubs.

Anyway, I was really over my head with Dixie, but that hadn't stopped me from anything yet, so why should it matter with her?

Looks like the hiatus is almost over

We're one step closer to being officially Ohio bound. Right now we're waiting on a date he needs to be up there and a relo amount - once we know how much money they will give him to relo, we can start really arguing over me packing and driving a borrowed utility trailer versus hiring movers, and me borrowing a trailer and driving the horses up versus hiring shippers. No point in getting our hearts set on doing this one way or the other til we know how much we've got to spend, though.

We are definitely getting some Valium for the cats. I already called the vet about that and she said she just needs to know their weights. I am so not looking forward to 10 hours in a truck with three squalling miserable cats.

Mmmm, horse stuff.

I've been in a bit of a slump. Waiting to find out if/when/how we're moving has taken a lot of fun out of life (for both of us, truth be told!) Cersei, as always, keeps me honest. Yesterday I took Champ and went trail riding. Today I just didn't even feel like riding, so I took Cersei out and threw The Ball for an hour.

Poppy found us and was the most adorable pest until I gave in and played with him. He hovered near me, running through all of his tricks (head down, head up, paw, stretch left, stretch right, back up) like some equine Tourette's sufferer. Eventually I couldn't help but give in. Went to Walgreens for a box of Frosted Mini Wheats and back out to pay him some attention.

After we clickered our way through half the box, I kicked him out of the round pen and let Dixie come in. I'd never done clicker work with her before (and I'm not entirely sure why not?) but she did well. I started off charging the clicker - just click stuff a treat in her mouth repeat. Then I waited til she got frustrated and nosed the ground, then started clicking for head down.

She's funny. When things don't go quite like she thinks they should, she gets very frustrated and obviously furious. She didn't paw or pin her ears at me, but you could just see her temper rising as she tried to figure out how to make me give her a mini-wheat again. She eventually stumbled on the right answer, and repeated it, and we had a pretty solid head-down (no cue yet) by the end of our session.

I don't know if this is "correct" or not but I don't like doing the same one command over and over for an entire session, so we broke it up with backing up and the beginnings of carrot stretches. I'd just put my hand on her heart girth and wait til she swiveled her head back to see why I was touching her, then click and treat.

It was good fun for everybody! Oh, and I trimmed Silky and checked Champ's feet. No pictures cause I was feeling like an uninspired slacker. Then I came home and found out we're' like 95% go on Ohio.

Dressage, guns, trails, fishing, and MORE!

Yep, I had a super busy day. It's very springlike here right now - we'll probably get one more nasty cold snap before "winter" (as we know it) is over, but I'm perfectly happy wearing a tank top again!

Dressage

Had a cool lesson today. Let's see - Michelle asked if I'd changed saddles, and no, I haven't. I've always ridden Dixie in this saddle. The change I recently made was to tie the fenders back a couple inches, so that my legs naturally hang in a more balanced position. Instead of fighting constantly to keep them back, they "want" to hang with my heels under my hips. And after watching her yesterday, I'm pretty sure she was just in heat. Why do the highstrung mares always have the worst heats? I may try Andrea's raspberry leaf stuff and see if it helps Dixie too.

Anyway, we trailered over and had a productive lesson. Dixie did ok at a slow walk and a flatwalk, but we kept really falling apart at a rack. She'd go hollow, with her nose up and out, whenever I asked her for more speed. I know that if I grab the curb reins and pull her nose in, she'll gait more smoothly, but that seems an awful lot like riding "front to back" and it's not what I want to explore with her.

She doesn't understand inside leg yet. Obviously this is my problem, and in my defense, I've spent almost a year desensitizing her to leg pressure. She used to think any leg at all in any position meant "go as fast as possible." I've finally convinced her that I don't wear spurs (right now) and I'm not going to beat her with a whip if she doesn't explode into motion when I move my leg. Now it's time to teach her what I want when I move a leg. Anyway, when I bend her into a circle, she sets the diameter of the circle because she doesn't move out away from my inside leg - I can't do spirals with her. We worked on that a bit, got a couple of slightly larger circles, and called it good progress.

And Dixie doesn't bend! Well, she bends ok sometimes on circles or spirals, and she's flexible as all get out at liberty, but she hasn't ever been asked to stretch her neck at a standstill. We did a bit of that too; it's something I should continue working on.

Finally, somewhat against my better judgment, we switched bits. Hardy wanted me to try her in a Tom Thumb. I generally hate tom thumbs, because of the whole broken mouth double twisted wire curb balance on the reins to get them to gait thing. And there's a whole lot of dressage-y sites that hate on the Tom Thumb - apparently it gives conflicting information to the horse cause of the combination of shanks and a broken mouthpiece.

But... if I was doing a perfect job training Dixie, I wouldn't be taking lessons. I didn't think a smooth mouth Tom Thumb was going to actually hurt my horse. Maybe confuse her? Maybe jab the roof of her mouth if I was too heavy handed? But not hurt her or make her scared, any worse than we've done to each other in the past. So I tried it.

She loved it. We'd gone up to the barn to look for one, then over to the round pen to try it out. She didn't fuss with it at all, not one bit, and she seemed to bend very well to it. I'm pretty sure I have a copper roller TT in my giant collection of bits at my parents' and tomorrow I'm gonna go pick it up and try again with her.

I was hoping to get some pictures of Dixie stretching out and down for DiJ's Long and Low post but my husband (aka the Official Funder Photographer) wasn't able to come out. He feels appropriately guilty though so hopefully I can get some pictures this week.


Guns!

After Dixie and I got back to the field, K came running up. "Did you bring your gun? B's got his rifle and I've got my pistol and let's go shoot!" So I headed back home and picked up my gun and then we went and killed the hell out of some inanimate objects.

I love rifle shooting it's the best and yall need to try it!

B has a .22 target rifle with a scope and a bipod. (Little legs that fold out from the front of the rifle, so you can lay down and get it perfectly steady.) He's spent the last week getting it perfectly sighted in. We shot our "targets" from about 10 yards, which is not very far at all for a rifle but fun for us newbies. I laid down and shot the UPC code on a Mt. Dew bottle with no problem, then spent my next two turns with it trying to nail the cap to the bottle. Never quite managed it. It's some combination of my breathing and me jerking (instead of slowly squeezing) the trigger. I did a round shooting from the shoulder, which is surprisingly hard. And I tried propping the rifle in a convenient tree branch and shooting at a snag in the lake, about 50 yards out - never quite hit the snag, but I was maybe 6" off from it. Pretty cool.

Everybody liked my .40 again, and we all plinked away with the terrible .22 revolver. I don't mean to hate on the revolver, but... I don't particularly like the grip, the sights are a bit off, it's louder and harder to hit with than the rifle, and it makes teeny weeny holes in cans. My .40 is incredibly loud and not nearly as accurate as a long gun, but at least it makes satisfying holes!

Trails

After we'd shot up all the ammo, we headed back to the horse field. K immediately jumped me again and insisted that we needed to go trail riding! She and T had gone yesterday, on Poppy and Goblin, and had a great time. They wanted to go again! So we all caught our reluctant horses and headed out. I took them on the "easy" trail, the one that has a bunch of short steep ravines. (The hard trail, by comparison, has one VERY STEEP ravine that's twice as long.) They are kinda wussy and I took pity on them and we walked the horses up and down the ravines, but I did assure them that I do regularly ride Champ up and down those slopes. You've gotta believe that your horse can do it, and trust your horse, but you can in fact ride any hill back there.

Poppy did so well. K is not ready to take Poppy trail riding alone, but she knows it. If you and your horse are going out alone, at least one of you needs to be totally confident for it to work out. When I first got Champ, he had the confidence for both of us. Later on, I got more ballsy and now I can ride a green horse alone... but I don't think K can yet, and she doesn't think she can yet either. But she's got her daughter T and Goblin, so the four of them will be fine together. And in a couple months, when Poppy knows every inch of the trails, K and Poppy can go alone if they want.

She's really doing well with him. I'm so very happy. I do think they'll be perfect together - neither of them wants to go anywhere fast, and he's naturally unflappable, and she's neither googly-eyed or scared of him right now. I am pulling for them. :)

Fishing!

We got back to the field AGAIN about 4:30. But it's February and it was warm and I'd been itching to fish all day. I put a silly artificial minnow thing on my line and fished for about an hour. I hooked one decent-sized fish but it slipped off my hook a foot from the bank. Sigh. Then I hooked a willow tree and had to cut my line, double sigh. By that time it was getting dark and chilly, so I packed it up for the night.

I am bound and determined to catch at least one fish with a completely artificial lure. I've only ever caught fish with live bait. I will figure out this lure nonsense. Also I will figure out a really kickass fish recipe, other than "bread in cornmeal and fry."

Cersei accompanied me everywhere today. After dinner (neckbones, if you're curious) she collapsed on her bed by my chair and has not moved since. If she had a blog, she'd tell an entirely different story... but I bet she's just as content as I am.

Not loading, and loading

So yesterday I had a cruddy non-horse day, then I went to the field. I was going to take Dixie over to the main barn and ride in the arena and try to get that elusive floaty connection one more time.


BZZZZT.


She wouldn't load. I tried a few aimless things. I almost burst into tears, and I was momentarily overwhelmed by the urge to beat the snot out of my horse. (Note: I didn't, and I wouldn't have, but I did have that horrible shake-the-baby-til-it- stops-crying feeling.) I realized that I wasn't mentally ready to deal with that stupid willful wanton lovely highspirited intelligent mare.

I stayed cool. I put her in crossties, brushed her down well, picked out all four feet. Well, I picked out three feet but she would not stop trying to kick me with her back left foot long enough for me to clean it out, so I settled on just holding the leg up til she quit flailing for half a second, then releasing it. It was important to me that she did not completely win the day.

Then I went home, drank a lot of beer, and played Guitar Hero III with my husband til I felt better.


After a good night's sleep, I felt much more centered and quietly determined to load. that. horse. I followed mugwump's method and it worked absolutely perfectly. Long rope run through the front of the trailer. Very calm body language, lunge whip tap-tap-tap-tapping her hocks whenever she quit trying to load. Took all of 90 seconds. I highly recommend it, if you're in the correct frame of mind.

Anyway, I loaded her head-on into the trailer. I've been loading her, letting her turn around (it's 2-horse with no center divider), and tying her facing backwards. I wanted to see how she'd do facing forward. Dixie, uh, she can't ride in that trailer facing forward.

She immediately started pawing, which is her default behavior for when she's annoyed. But she's a Walking Horse and she paws a good two feet off the ground when she gets going. I stood on the side of the trailer, watching her paw, wondering if this was really safe or would she actually no surely she wouldn't surely she has the good sense not to OH FUCK NO! (Anybody know where this is going?)

She put her left foot in the feed manger. The feed manger is more than waist high, with a 3" lip. This was completely horrible and almost panic-inducing because it was actually a real crisis. I stayed cool, and my friend Mark helped me un-fuck her. I reached in through one window and lifted her leg UP as high as I could to clear the lip and he reached in beside me and pulled BACK as hard as he could. Then I unclipped her head, let her turn her happy ass around, and tied her facing backwards.

Then we trailered down the road to my parents. I unloaded her and let her snort and stare and walk in circles around me and eat grass, while I talked to my parents for a while. Then I loaded her again - same system, but it took maybe 30 seconds this time - and we calmly trailered back to the field.

Other notes: K TOOK POPPY ON A TRAIL RIDE! I rode Champ, her daughter T rode Goblin, and Poppy was perfectly content to walk in the middle. More importantly, K was perfectly comfortable on him. She's getting there!

And Cersei got a deer leg to play with - at the field only thank you! My dad's friend got another deer for him, and Dad (upon request) had the processors save the lower legs for dog toys. It's soooo gross and she loves it.

Poppy

I rode the big guy today. We did about an hour of walk-trot stuff. This time I carried the real dressage whip. I think Daun was right, long ago, when she said some horses just need to know you have the whip - he is definitely more responsive to my leg when he knows I've got a whip to back it up.

Mainly I concentrated on me. Keeping my hands still, following him with my seat, keeping my legs still and giving aids correctly. This shit is hard! Worthwhile, but hard.

My dressage book said to use the whip as an aid for yourself - that if your hands are correct and your legs are correct, the whip will "lie close behind and nearly parallel to the rider's lower leg, resting lightly across the thigh." This seemed like great advice, and it kept part of my brain constantly checking in with my hands.

My legs are, amazingly, improving. They don't flop around like they used to, and my toes point forward most of the time. The bad habit I'm concentrating on right now is giving aids with the inside of my legs, not my calves. I'm getting better at that. And I have a tendency to ask for a trot with a squeeze, properly, and then if I don't get a response I turn my toes out and boot the horse with my heels. Heels are a good attention-getter but I need to work on delivering the same energy with a proper squeeze, I suppose.

I found a new (unapproved) use for the whip, too. There's a long straight flat stretch in the back part of their pasture - I trot Poppy away from his buddies, turn, and walk back. There are two little paths that turn left, eventually circling back toward his buddies, so he tries to dart down them whenever we trot away. I kinda remember I could use the whip for more than a hand-position-checking-device, so I started whapping him in the shoulder when he'd try to veer down the little paths. They weren't even hard whacks, just a "hey I mean it don't do that" reminder, and it worked great.

My elbows at the trot are improving too. Most of the time, anyway :)

After our ride I fed Poppy a half-scoop of his grain. The light was right and I got a good picture of a Happy (Dirty) Percheron. (I know, I'm too lazy to be a real dressage rider - I brushed where the saddle went and left the rest of him muddy.)

A study in contrasts

Today was Dixie Dressage #2 and Poppy Solo Trail #1. I want to get these rides written down then I swear I'm gonna go catch up on yall's blogs and my comments!

Dixie
I trailered her over to the main barn and rode for about an hour in the covered arena. The first part of the ride went quite well - she relaxed into it and worked well for me, mostly at a walk working on bending. About every ten minutes I'd squeeze with both legs and kiss for a rack and we'd do a lap or two around the arena, just so I could work on staying loose and keeping her attention on me. She'd always break up into a couple of strides of odd canter around the turns, but she also came back to me and settled back into a rack very quickly.

Then a Horse Eating Lion (or possibly a chipmunk) rustled in the woods on the north side. We were just walking very calmly along, in a gentle bend, with me thinking about giving the right kind of leg pressure and keeping light contact and feeling her bend when KABLAM the leaves rustled and Dixie exploded into a full spook. Jumped straight up, came back down with her legs splayed, spun 90 degrees and bolted three or four steps away. I stayed completely centered in the saddle, which was kinda cool, and she stopped on her own, which was very cool! Somehow I completely lost the reins on the left side, but I had the other set still held perfectly still. Yay us.

After that I decided to see if I could get her attention back on working with me. She was, I think, a lot more distracted. I'm not positive because I did not look at her ears once. How am I supposed to know what she's thinking if I can't focus on her ears? Yes, I could see them in my peripheral vision, but it's harder for me to tell!

Anyway, she was distracted but she still tried hard for me. She was pretty spooky about that corner of the arena, so I worked on driving her into that corner with more leg and really directing her turns out of it. Her new boyfriend came up to the other corner of the arena, and I worked on keeping her moving at the same pace past him every time.

Her new boyfriend is (IIRC?) a spotted ASB named Perry Como. He fell in love with her the first day I brought her out to the place and he's made googly eyes at her from over the fence every time since. It's kinda cute :3

Anyway, it was a good ride. I finished out with a few minutes of loose rein walk with just the snaffle rein, then fed her a couple scoops of grain, then managed to get her loaded and take her home. She's loaded like a dream every time til the last time, when she decided she'd rather stay and live with Perry than get on the damn trailer and go back to her field. Of course I completely blanked out on any horse loading theories, so I thought about it for a minute and decided to make the right thing waaay easier than the wrong thing. I'd walk her up to the trailer (me standing to one side inside) and she'd balk. I'd back her up for about 20 feet, praise, and walk her back to the trailer. If she balked again, we'd back some more. Took about 4 tries before she decided she'd rather make that big step up into the trailer than back up again.

I am so wordy.

Poppy
So I got Dixie back home and decided that Poppy was ready to go trail riding solo and I should put up or shut up. I tacked him up with his bridle, my saddle, and a dinky little whip, dragged a broken chair out past the gate, and we were off! My dressage whip, which actually reaches his butt easier, doesn't have a handle so I have to hold it at all times. The dinky little whip has a wrist loop, so I clipped it to the front D rings on my saddle to have it handy.

We immediately had a disagreement about whether he was out there to eat grass or listen to me. This annoyed him. Then we disagreed about whether he could take the first turn to head back home, and he got more annoyed. We went through a gate, down a narrow bit of trail, up a hill, and he decided he was going to trot. I said fine, trot then, and he trotted a bit then stopped and did something odd. At first I couldn't figure out what he was doing - it felt a little like a canter. But we weren't actually moving and his head was down and OH HELL HE'S BUCKING! I was completely shocked and amused that he was bucking, so it took me another buck or two to figure out what to do. In an attempt to do something I growled "Knock that off!" and booted him in the ribs and he headed out again in a Real Big Working Draft Trot.

Wow. I was seriously impressed. I've seen him do the Big Trot from the ground, of course, but I've never ridden it. I loved it! It was awesome!

I am also very very annoyed with myself and with Poppy. He might not be ripped like Brego or Klein, but he's got plenty of muscle under that fluff. How could I have been fooled by his stumbling WP jog-trots previously? He has outsmarted himself and raised the bar for future work.

We trotted a little further on, past the Skeet Lake, and I came to my senses. He might in fact run us into a tree or off a cliff just to prove that he doesn't have to listen. I decided I could pick my battles and we headed for home - with a twist.

We'd walk, CALMLY YOU BASTARD!, towards home. Then we'd turn and I'd have him trot away again. Then we'd walk, turn, repeat. It was pretty nerve-racking. Apparently I'm not over my irrational fear of Poppy. I have to respond to the very early stages of his unwanted behavior as quickly as possible or he just goes ahead and does what he wants.

We had one more big blow up in the paddock nearest his field. I asked for a nice trot away from the gate, and he trotted then wanted to veer left onto a different trail pointing back to the gate. I pulled his head back around right, booted him in the right places, and he wrenched his head left, did a promising cowhorse spin, and cantered for home. I got really fucking pissed and wrapped the reins around my hands - TWICE, I was not going to lose him if I fell off - and did a YANK-release til he slowed down again. Not pretty. As soon as I got him back to a walk, I spun him around and asked for a trot away from home again and pretended like nothing had happened. We walked one more lap of the paddock, with exceptionally nice behavior, and we were done!

Quite a day. I'm glad I worked both of them today; tomorrow it's going to rain all day and we might have an ICE STORM tomorrow night and we could all die.

Back to the horses

I've got some catching up to do!

Sunday I rode Valentine, and stayed all zen, and got her to trot. It was pretty cool!

Then, back to the field, where I rode Poppy. He did amazingly well! We just rode around the two open paddocks, working on listening to me. Mainly walk, a little whoa, and a few strides of trot. When I got done, I unsaddled him and he wandered about 10 yards away and laid down and took a nap. Poor guy, he's so out of shape and paying attention is such hard work.

Then I loaded Dixie and took her to the main barn and rode her in the covered arena. She was perfect. I mean, absolutely perfect. She was absolutely alert, cause she was in a strange new-ish place, but she was listening to me and perfectly responsive. We rode around for about 30 minutes, working on bending and stopping with just the snaffle rein. Then I walked her back to the truck, untacked her, and led her all around the property hand-grazing the patches of green grass. I was on Cloud 9!

Yesterday I rode Poppy again. T took Goblin and I took Poppy and we went on a super short trail ride. Down the two biggest trails, to both sides of the Skeet Shooting Lake, then back. He remained a very good very calm fellow. All the spooky things he saw - a big tractor tire, a dead washing machine - he'd pop his head up, snort, and want to go sniff them. He's going to be a great trail horse for K :)

I'm really pleasantly surprised at how he's emotionally matured over the years. He was what, a 3 year old when I got him? Very much a big spooky baby with no attention span. That's how he got labeled in my head, and I've just started to notice how he's steadied down, filled out, just matured mentally and physically.

Anyway, after I'd tuckered Poppy out again (he fell asleep sunbathing right in front of me while I talked to B), I snagged Champ and cruelly forced him to carry me to my parents' house. Champ made his displeasure completely known and tried to halfheartedly spook at everything. I insisted we soldier on, at a trot most of the way. I let him graze in my dad's garden, talked with my parents for a bit, then allowed him to carry me home at a brisk trot. One or two more visits and he'll stop thinking there's wolves in their backyard ;)

Today, of course, it SNOWED. It stopped snowing about noon, and it never really got cold, so almost all of the snow had melted by the time I got out to the horses.

I took Dixie on a fairly short trail ride. I got on and she was off like a rocket, and I reminded myself to not lean forward, not lean back, not yank on her mouth, and not try to rate her speed at all. She slowed down after a couple hundred yards and started listening again. Yay! I've noticed that if I try to make her do what I want when I first get on, she gets scared and kind of shuts down mentally for the rest of the ride. But if I let her have that little bit of total freedom at the very beginning, she'll listen and work with me for the rest of the ride. Silly mares! We rode down by the big fishing lake, where two Terror Birds (a pair of mallards) made her spook hard and half spin, but she came right back to me mentally and didn't actually run. We rode for another couple of miles in the woods, then headed for home. She wanted to bolt for home, but I asked her to slow back down and she did. I was really impressed with her again!

I finished up with a trail-trimming ride on Champ. I took a pair of trimming shears, which worked ok on the small branches, but I need to go back with a hatchet or a hacksaw and take out a few little trees. Did a lot from the saddle, but when we got in the really overgrown trails in the woods I got off and led him along, trimming as I went. I got most of the way through our normal woods trail, then veered off onto an old overgrown trail, then hiked down an honest-to-god deer trail, then ended up behind the dam of the Skeet Lake.

This is not good!


The lakes back there are all manmade, and pretty old. Big trees have grown up on the dams, and some time not too long ago one of those big trees fell and took out a chunk of the dam. I think that lake is not long for this world!

Anyway, if you look closely at that picture, you can see the remains of THE SNOW. Perhaps the world won't end tonight. We've got another 6 weeks of the threat of WHITE DEATH hanging over our heads, though.

Oh, pictures!

I stole these from K's facebook. She won't mind.

Here's Promise. Yes, she's still thin, but she's gained a lot of weight and has a much improved (read: bitchier) disposition now! Also her right ear is permanently bent sideways. I don't know the story behind that.



Here's a few of me on Poppy. See the stupid wide muck boots? Also I know I'm leaning forward a bit :( but in my defense the ground slopes and I overcompensate.






Cersei is rather reckless. She knows Poppy will squash her and keeps a sharp eye on him, but she just has to run with us.

Funder, the polo star

... or something!

So I'd promised K that if she brought Poppy's saddle today, I'd ride him for her. He was a good boy, of course. He tried to slither sideways toward trees a few times, but I stopped him. The earlier you notice he's up to something, the easier it is to dissuade him, but that's true for any horse.

Anyway, I did some very basic work: turn, stop, walk, trot. I got everything I wanted - no major hissyfits, fairly prompt speed changes - and got off. K loves him and takes good care of him... but he's actually getting worked LESS by her than he was by me. I offered to ride him for her when I have time, and I will. I feel kinda bad that he's not working toward any potential.

After I set Poppy free, I got to talking to a friend of mine who was visiting us. A few minutes later, K led Promise up and said "So you gonna ride her?"

I have a problem with ever saying no to anything that's remotely like a challenge. Ride a 23 year old ex polo pony who hasn't had a rider for several years? Well, hell, Poppy didn't kill me so she couldn't possibly!

K got Promise for free a couple months ago. Promise's former owner was behind in board and surrendered her to the barn owner, who gave her to K. (I assume there's a contract involved; I don't know the details.) Anyway, Promise was really thin when K got her, but K has been religiously graining her twice a day and the old mare is coming back really nicely! K and her friend B have been longeing her lightly to help build her muscles back up, and the old bat thinks she's the queen of the field these days.

So Kelly led up a skinny (but fatter!) lop eared old Thoroughbred and asked if I was going to ride her. Of course I couldn't say no! I jammed my foot in a stirrup (bad sign), swung up, collected my reins, noticed she was in Goblin's goofy rope halter/hackamore (BAD! SIGN!), and she was off. She perked up both of her ears as high as she could and pranced away, just pleased as pie that a human was finally back on her back! She picked up a soft slow trot and I realized that my steering was really "mushy." Sat back and asked for a halt and she completely ignored me (more likely, didn't understand me.)

Stupid Funder, she's never been ridden in a stupid little rope halter fffffffff

I calmly trotted a big circle back toward the merrily chatting group of people and asked for someone to please grab her. They were all "Whaaaaat?" I very calmly repeated myself and explained that she HAD NO BRAKES, and somebody grabbed her halter as we walked past, and WHEW.


But of course that wasn't much of a ride, and Promise's eyes were sparkling, and I happened to have a bunch of snaffle bits in my truck... so I bitted her up (5" single jointed copper snaffle) and we took off again. As soon as I stuck my foot in the stirrup I remembered that thing that had been bugging me before I realized she had no steering and no brakes - my feet were stuck. I was riding in T's saddle, which has those stupid narrow Western stirrups, and I was wearing my muck boots, and my feet were stuck.

Oh well! Promise was just overjoyed that I was riding her again. I am not exaggerating, and I'm not mistaking exhausted or terrified for overjoyed. That mare was happy to have a rider. She didn't want to buck, and she didn't (quite) want to canter off with me, but she really wanted to trot super gracefully around and impress me. And she DID impress me!

The bit made all the difference in the world. The lightest contact would steer her, just like it ought to, and she listened when I asked her to stop. We did a couple laps around the front part of the field and I asked her to stop and she did, just a little reluctantly. I really enjoyed her (although feeling like my feet are stuck makes me pretty panicky) and I'm definitely going to ride her again - but I don't want to overdo it!

And just to note it, I took Dixie on a nice trail ride ALONE yesterday. She did fine; I'm planning on taking her again tomorrow and I'll have more to say about her then!

Belated weekend update

I felt kinda guilty posting this last night, because it was just such a lovely day yesterday. The northeast is buried in ice, Hawaii is buried in mud, and it was 60 here.

But today it's hovered near freezing and we could possibly have up to an inch of ice overnight. Aaaaand as a direct result, our schools all let out at noon today. (Please remember to breathe in between bouts of hysterical laughter, Northeasters.)

Anyway. Yesterday.

I had another frustrating ride on Valentine. Progress is slow with me getting all my parts coordinated, but I am getting there.

I did decide to entirely stop looking at my reins, even when Hardy mentioned them - I realized that whenever he'd say, for instance, "outside rein!" I'd look down. I don't need to see it wiggling to know it's loose. I really need to feel it wiggling, or better yet feel the lack of contact and do something about it on my own.

I also had this happen a few times:
Decide to trot.
Squeeze for trot.
Nothing happens so squeeze again and suddenly, Val throws her head up and inside and pins her ears.

Hardy said I was yanking, and I protested mightily that I was not in fact yanking, and then I realized that perhaps I was tensing up when Val ignored my first cue. Hrmm.

She's fun, but she's really frustrating. You must give the cues perfectly or she either ignores you or pins her ears and gets angry.


After that lesson - which didn't feel like a stellar advancement of my skills, but I know I'm just on one of those plateaus and one day soon it'll come together again - I went trail riding.

With James!

Yay for James!

K and T were out there - T wanted to go with us, and K just wanted to take a nap but she was quite eager for one of us to ride Poppy. I really wanted to ride Dixie, so I stuck fearless James on Poppy, K rode her bastard Goblin, and we headed out.

Dixie and I led the way, and she was completely relaxed and fearless and swingy. Such a great horse. Poppy was a bit stumbly, but he was very well mannered for James. And T was really alert with Goblin, so he didn't try to bite/kick any other horses, yay.

It was a short ride, just over an hour, but that's a very long ride for T. And a fairly long ride for Poppy! He's not out of shape, but he's not muscled up like he could be (I'm looking at Klein here!) After we got back, we made K ride Poppy. Poppy was an angel for her, cause he was a) a little tired and b) in the habit of listening to his rider. Then we stuck T on Poppy and he did well for her too. Then I let James ride Dixie, and she gaited beautifully for him.

Next weekend I'm gonna go up to the old barn and go riding with James again. Now those are some technical trails! I will get pix for those (i.e. all) of you who have not slogged through a full year of my blathering, so you can see what I think a "hard" trail is. Anyway, we're going to try to alternate visiting each other. My new trails are beautiful; his are longer and tougher.

Today we purchased Guitar Hero World Tour. I took a break from ROCKING to post this, and I'm off to ROCK again!

Look who's back!

Poppy!


So the Poppy Training Saga Update:

I've gotten to be friends with K, who's buying Poppy. In October (IIRC?) she sent him over to the main barn to have him trained by the barn owner. The BO worked with him for one day then said he was a little off in one of his back legs? K agreed. Probably a stifle injury from getting kicked in the field. Poppy went on a week of stall rest. That turned into two weeks. Then they decided it wasn't stifle injury and it was probably something chiropractic. The chiropractor was coming in to town Real Soon Now. Real Soon Now turned into the weekend before Thanksgiving, then the weekend AFTER Thanksgiving, then, finally, Monday.

Apparently, the chiro has come and fixed Poppy.

Poppy is not a stall queen. Poppy, in fact, HATES being in stalls. He spent a month straight in a (very nice, clean, well appointed) stall and he got super pissy and super depressed. He wouldn't look at K, he wouldn't walk nice for her or the BO, he wouldn't look at me. Sad boy. So K had him moved back to the field as soon as he was pronounced well.

I feel bad for K. She's buying Goblin, the horse she's leasing for her daughter, for Christmas. Her hours at work have gotten cut (yay economy!) and she can't really afford to buy Goblin AND get Poppy trained so he's back being a hayburner.

I kinda sympathize with the BO, too. She obviously wants to do right by the horses in her care. There aren't any reputable equine chiros based out of Memphis, so she waited for her preferred guy to come back through town.

Mainly I'm a little bummed that Poppy isn't being utilized any more than he was with me. I'll probably end up riding him, if K wants me to. He's a big sweet lazy boy :)

(And I would take him back, if she asked - but she adores him and I hope she doesn't feel like that's necessary.)


I did 3 miles, round trip, on Champ today. Road work for a change of scenery, plus I think light work on asphalt is good for their hooves.

Some days it's really hard to win, part 1

I was going to say "some days I just can't win," but you know, I did snatch a minor victory from the jaws of defeat at the last moment.

First, Poppy.

Poppy treed me. Like a total fucking noob I let him sidestep close to a tree and then he just charged right the fuck under it and I had to grab branches and slide off. ARRRRGH!

But let's start at the beginning. I found my horses, slipped a halter on Poppy, and walked him over to my truck. He was not enthused at the get-go and kept trying to lock up on me and refuse to move. I was undeterred and insisted he come with me. Got him to the truck, tied him loosely to a cleat on the side of the truck, gave him some alfalfa pellets, and got the tack out. Went to toss the blanket on his back and he EXPLODED like I was attacking him with a wolverine. Somehow he charged around me, STEPPED ON MY SADDLE, and ended up on the other side of me rolling his eyes and snorting. I cussed him, moved the saddle way the hell out of the way where it should've been to begin with, let him smell the blanket, and eased it toward his back again. Another exploding snorting dancing crazy act. I'm kind of stupid so I tried AGAIN and you know what? He did it again.

It was obviously an act and he just didn't want to work. He was oozing resistance out of every pore of his body. Just as fake as when he pretends to switch his brains off and acts like he doesn't know what leg pressure means anymore.

I thought about it for a minute. Untied my horse (at least he didn't break the truck, thank god) and walked him over to the round pen. Picked up all my tack and took it over there. Lunged the big bastard.

I don't think that you have to lunge a horse til it's tired or even til you "took the edge off." I think lunging is really about showing the horse that you are in fact the lead mare and you can and will make him move his feet. My lunge whip (or lead rope, or big stick, whatever I have) is just an extension of my "teeth," and my arms and body language are my "ears." I'm showing the horse that I control his feet, so I don't do a lot of lunging or even a lot of full circles. I do more half-circles than anything else, mostly trotting but sometimes I'll try to tone down my energy and get a walk. If the horse kicks at me while turning he gets to canter for a while. Poppy didn't have to canter much. He kept one ear on me the whole time, and as soon as his turns got really snappy and he started licking and chewing a bit I let him come in to me. I snapped the lead rope on, picked up the saddle pad right there in the middle of the arena, and pitched it right on his back. He didn't even TWITCH. The saddle went on just as easy. Then I picked up the bridle and he tossed his head straight (about 8') up in the air, so he got to go trot around a little more. Called him back in, offered the bridle again, and he left his head at the right height and opened his teeth for me. He's not actually stupid, just lazy.

Then we walked very calmly out of the round pen, over to the chair, I climbed on board, and off we went.

Unsurprisingly, Poppy was pretty responsive. We'd already gotten most of the fightin' out of the way. I had to whop him once with the whip, but it was more like a dance than an actual conflict. We were walking in a direction he didn't particularly want to go, and he stopped. I squeezed, he flopped an ear at me. I thumped, he ignored me. I reached back and gently whacked him with the whip - didn't even use my wrist and flip it so it stung, just kinda whacked him like I was holding a stick. He swiveled his ears at me and took off at a fast walk.

Then we wandered down by the pond so Cersei could jump in and get a drink of water. The other horse were on the far shore. Cersei had just jumped in, and I wanted Poppy to stand still facing the lake for maybe 15 seconds. He hollered for his friends (which should've been my first warning) then spun around and I squeezed the reins and reminded him to woah. He stood still for a second, sidestepped two steps to the left (that was my HUGE RED FLAG) and then started walking. Straight towards the tree. I tried to haul him off to the right but he sensed victory and ignored me for the two crucial steps he needed. I grabbed a handful of branches and swung (gracefully, believe it or not) down to the ground. Even landed on my feet. But Poppy was 10 feet away, hollering for his herd and trotting into the trees.

When the red flag went up, I should've immediately distracted him by asking him to move off, either straight ahead, to the right, or spinning to the left. Anything to take his mind off of "oh god my herd" and get him thinking about me again. At least that's my postgame analysis. Anybody disagree?

Anyway, as soon as my feet hit the ground I thought "god dammit he's gonna step on the reins and hurt his mouth." Then, "aaaaand he's gonna break my reins!" Oh well, that's why I have leather reins, I'd rather the reins break than the horse. So I sighed and followed Poppy back over to the other horses. I took the long (i.e. not forested) way, and when I got there he was back near Dixie. With a loop of reins running between his legs and back up to the saddle. Poor guy.

I called him over and untangled him. (At least they didn't break!) Then I looked at his mouth, but it wasn't cut, but I wasn't sure if it was hurt. I was torn - do I get back on, so he doesn't think rides are supposed to end that way? Or do I call it quits, rather than getting back on and yanking on his (possibly? probably?) bruised mouth? In the end I erred on the side of caution - he almost certainly stepped on the reins for them to end up between his legs like that, and I really don't want to HURT him.

Any thoughts on today?

I feel like this post is a giant wall of text already, so I'm gonna make it a two-parter. Stay tuned for part two, which details how my spotted mare makes me want to give up horses entirely... until I switch bits again.

Poppy!

Lots of stuff to post today, but we'll start with Poppy.

So after my dressage lesson, I went to TSC. I tried to be good, really I did, but the most direct route to the horse stuff took me past the $5 clearance summer clothes. Thank god there wasn't much left in my size and I only bought a (warning: I am a redneck) John Deere girlie t-shirt. It has sequins! And a purple dressage whip, and a bone for Cersei who was patiently waiting in the truck. Total damage was under $20.

Then out to the field! I took a bunch of pictures - I'll link them in a post later, but the set is here for those of you who are curious about horses in a house.

Poppy was not thrilled about being ridden again. He was somewhat confused, actually, that we were doing the silly thing where I sit on him yet again! But he's a sweetheart so he went along with it. Stood nicely while I got mounted, stood nicely til I asked him to walk, and walked off like a gentleman. We went over near the house, then I asked him to walk away and he was all "what no way." I asked him again, thumping him a little harder with my heels. Then I smacked him with the dressage whip and his ears swiveled straight back to me like "HOLY SHIT" and he trotted off in the direction I wanted him to go. I wasn't asking for a trot, but I didn't correct him for it.

We circled around down by the pond, then walked back to the house and stood for a minute. Then I asked and squeezed and he ignored me. I asked and thumped and he ignored me. I asked and whacked and he got really pissy and bucked away from the house.

Poppy bucking is pretty hysterical. He never bucks more than two or three inches off the ground, and he never bucks with his front legs too - just little kicks with the rear legs. Bucking scares the piss out of me, but I just keep telling myself that if I get bucked off of Poppy I really don't have any business riding at all. I have ridden more jarring trots than his bucks.

Anyway, Poppy was clearly very annoyed that I was telling him what to do and he bucked away from the house. When he quit bucking I told him to keep walking and squeezed and he kept walking.

We made a bunch of little circles around trees and stuff near the house. I just wanted to work on "go where I want you to go, when I tell you to do it." He has that amazing green-horse ability to walk or trot in the direction he wants to go regardless of where his neck is pointed, but I persevered. He bucked once more, but I only had to whack him the first two times. He's not stupid and he obviously figured out that I only ask nicely twice before I whack. After I got two nice circles going where I wanted him to go, I called it quits.

I'm pretty sure it was the right point to quit. I was all jazzed up that he was figuring it out and started thinking of a nice clearing a couple hundred yards away we could go ride in and then I thought "why push it?" and decided to stop. He had done well and I think as long as I keep riding, I can't take it too slow. Ignoring him is taking it too slow, and doing nothing but groundwork is taking it too slow, but if I'm actually riding him, we'll get where we need to be eventually. So I quit while we were ahead.

Poppy huffed off as soon as I took off his tack, but within 5 minutes he'd forgiven me and was back in my face begging for attention. I scrithed him for a bit and told him I'd be back later and took off.

I'm still very interested to hear yall's comments about him. Am I doing right? What do I do to fix the gumby-neck trotting sideways thing? Just ignore it? Sara, what does Leeandra think?

Anyway, there is an equine chiro coming tonight and I'm going to get him to look at Dixie. There's nothing obviously wrong with her, but I would be surprised if she's not a little messed up from all the bad riding she's endured and the pads she wore for a year. So I'm headed back out to the field later this evening.

Help??

I rode Poppy and did not even come CLOSE to dying.

Poppy's new bit came and it fits, BARELY. It's a 6" hanging cheek french link. (Can't remember if I said that last week or not.) If his stupid head gets any bigger he is going to need a 6.5", ugh. His lips barely touch the edges of the rings. I will probably get him some bit guards to make sure the rings don't start pinching him. He has a lovely soft mouth and I don't want to mess that up.

And I started riding him in my western-ish saddle. I rode him a couple times last year in that saddle, then I decided he was getting too big so I started riding him in a draft-sized Aussie. You know what? I HATE THAT SADDLE. That saddle is the source of a lot of my fear about riding Poppy. Stupid fucking Aussie.

The Aussie has like 4" of padding, which means Poppy is effectively a hand taller when I'm riding him in it. And the Aussie has a slick seat - a really deep bear-trappy slick seat, but a VERY slick seat nonetheless. And the Aussie is extremely wide and makes Poppy feel a lot broader than he really is.

So I've been looking really closely at Poppy and Champ. Poppy's back is slightly broader than Champ's, but not too bad. I threw the usual saddle on Poppy last week and it fits ok - not perfect, but good enough to walk/trot around in.

So. Normal saddle, bit and bridle that fits. I dragged a chair over to him and climbed aboard. We did a little bending - very soft responsive mouth. We did a little ambling - so far so good. We made one calm circuit around the run-in-house and ambled back over to the other horses. Then we stopped.

Here's the "HELP??" part of the post. Where the hell is the gas pedal? How do you motivate a horse to go?

Poppy has always been the opposite of my other horses. I don't know whether it's just him or if it's a drafty trait, but he just plants his feet and will not move sometimes. He's UNSPOOKY. Incredibly UNSPOOKY. Nothing I can do on his back will startle him into movement if he's decided to stop. He won't even lunge right unless I have the lunge whip in my hand and I'm close enough to him to pop him with it.

I worked around this in the past by getting him out on the trail with one other horse to follow. Even Poppy doesn't like to get left alone on the trail. But there's nobody to ride with me here - my only choices are to work it out in the pasture with the other horses or lead him to the trails and work it out there.

But how do I work it out? I don't want to fuck this up and end up with dead-sided horse, or a horse that's scared of me. And I don't want to keep letting HIM decide when to stop. I've got the tack I need, and I think I've got my mind ready, but I'm not sure what to DO now. Any suggestions?

Picture time

Oh, first, before I forget - I de-wormed everything today. Cats, dog, horses. Ivermectin for the horses.

Here's some Poppy Pictures. He's starting to grow in his winter coat, so he's an odd brindle - burned yellowish-brown summer hairs mingled with jet-black winter hairs. He doesn't fade quite as dramatically as Brego, but he definitely looks more bay than black by August.



I got out the tape. He's a shorty - 16 hands, give or take an inch. But he sure is broad! I am really surprised that he hasn't gotten taller. Well, it's probably for the best - he is plenty large.



Look at that pretty face!

Champ and Poppy

Well, I almost rode two horses today.

I got out to the field pretty early, around 8 am. I walked back to the run-in, whistling and calling softly. My horses were in the (large) run in, along with the other horses. My four were off in their own little section, but sure enough, they'd settled in well enough to want to nap in the run in. Anyway, all the horses were in that half-asleep horse trance. I walked in quietly, gave everybody a scritch, and headed back out. All four came trailing out after me.

I got Champ saddled and bridled, then spent a good hour working with him. He was all jittery - in a new place, with me asking him to leave his beloved Silky? He kept trying to circle around and calling for his buddies and generally being a pitiful nervous wreck. It was pretty uncharacteristic behavior, but moving fields has to be a huge upheaval in a horse's life. I worked him through it, I think - we'd explore out from the run-in, then stop for a few minutes, then go back. I'd let him stand near Silky til he calmed down, then we'd turn around and head out again. The first few trips out were the worst, of course, with nonstop whinnying and jiggling and trying to wheel around and run "home," but he calmed down more on every trip. By 8:45 or so, I was just running Champ through his gaits and thinking more about my riding than his state of mind. We finished up with some slow calm walking to cool down, then I untacked him and hung out with all the horses for a while.

I killed all the big horseflies I could find. Must've squashed five or six of those cicada-sized monster horseflies. I worked my way from horse to horse, scratching itchy spots and whacking flies. Again, I was impressed with how calm Dixie has become. She lets me walk right up to her with "normal" body language, scratch most anywhere, and even smash horseflies. Anyway, once I felt like I'd given them enough "hanging-out" time, Cersei and I left.

We drove across the county to Tractor Supply. I needed a helmet and Centered Riding for lessons, and I wanted to get a bag of oats as a treat for whichever horse got ridden. I found a helmet, and settled on alfalfa pellets for treats, and... well... there was a clearance sale on some English tack. I ended up getting another Collegiate bridle, exactly the same as Dixie's, for $24 instead of $99. And a spare pair of reins for $14, instead of $40. I usually manage to resist the temptation to buy stuff just because it's on sale - but that was seriously too cheap to pass up!

TSC didn't have the book. I headed north into Memphis and hit the closest bookstore, which actually DID have the book. Looped back south and back to Olive Branch. It was only noon, and it wasn't all that hot and I was tired of making excuses about Poppy.

He's not actually going to flip out and kill me. He's not even that tall - maybe 16.1? I don't know why I'm so vaguely intimidated by Poppy - he is one of the sweetest and most honest horses I've ever met. And he loves attention. Yes, I don't have a saddle for him, but he's not such a sensitive little darling that being ridden in my normal western-ish saddle would scar him for life.

First, a bit and bridle. I have a 5.5" full cheek single jointed snaffle and a 5.5" low port pelham, and I figured either would work. (And Poppy came with a 6" mullen mouth snaffle, but he absolutely detests that bit, so it's just gathering dust in a box.) I noticed that the new Collegiate bridle was actually a "full" size, but the almost-too-large bridle I'd been using on Dixie was an "xtra full." Hmmm. I fiddled around with bits and buckles for a few minutes and cobbled together a rig for Pops.

Turns out the bridle fits just fine, but Poppy has outgrown the damn bit. Sigh.

Next, I tried my saddle on him. It fits ok, but looks somewhat ridiculous. Like a toy saddle. He's at least 12" larger in the girth than Champ. Anyway, unsurprisingly, Poppy didn't mind the saddle at ALL. I gave him lots of brushing and scritching as a thank-you for putting up with saddle fitting and a too-small bit, then packed everything back up and went to my parents' for the afternoon.

I ordered a 6" hanging cheek french link snaffle from drafttack.com. Poppy seems to like jointed snaffles better than solid ones. Hopefully it'll show up soon, fit my horse, and help me communicate with the big lug. I'm actually really excited about riding him! (Yeah, nervous too, but definitely excited as well!)

Move completed!

Sometimes they're just angel horses.

I got to my uncle's around 7:30. Drove around their field til I found the horses, then slipped a halter on each one just in case. I saddled up Champ, hooked a lead rope to Dixie (cause she was the closest), and ponied over to the gate. Champ was not thrilled but he didn't kick Dixie's head in. Dixie was not thrilled but she didn't try to bolt. We got to the gate and I noticed that both Poppy and Silky had followed us, curious about this new bizarre game.

I opened the gate, walked both horses through, and left the gate open while I remounted. I got the horses moving again, then leaned over and unclipped the lead from Dixie. Dixie and Poppy were both wide-eyed at being in a different field and were too busy staying as close as possible the Great Leader Champ to even notice ropes or the lack thereof. Silky was shadowing along about 25 yards behind us. We uneventfully made our way through that field and into the corral field.

I called the two young dingbat horses as I turned Champ into the corral. But they are dingbats, so they missed the gate and got confused and ran up and down the outside of the corral fence. Then Silky appeared, like an old and dignified matriarch, and walked right through the gate into the corral with me and Champ. The two dingbats bolted in right behind her, just bubbling over with excitement about how this amazing day had progressed so far. I hopped off Champ, untacked him, and slipped out of the corral and shut the gate.

Then I walked back to my truck.

It really is a long way. And you know what? I haven't tromped around meadows early in the morning for a very long time, so I forgot about the dew. My feet got soaked. Worn out wet boots, soaked holey socks, and soaked-to-the-knees jeans. Yuck. Cersei and I eventually got back to the truck, though, and we drove over, picked up the tack where I'd left it outside of the corral, and drove to the house.

We checked in with my uncle, set up a game plan, and drove out to the highway to wait for Bill. He showed up, right on time. My cousin (the second hauler, for Poppy) was also on time. We all convoyed back to the corral, I started grabbing horses, and we got them loaded like we were just walking them into stalls. It was picture-perfect loading. (No credit to me, my horses came to me loading well and I've just never traumatized them about trailers.) Everybody convoyed on over to the new field.

My feet, snugly wrapped in sodden cotton and soaked leather, felt like I'd dipped them in pure poison ivy juice. Seriously, yall, waterboarding is probably horrible and most definitely torture. But wet booted feet? I'd tell an interrogator all my deepest darkest secrets AND spit on a picture of my momma if he'd just dry my poor soaked feet off. :(

I tried to ignore my tortured feet as we got the horses unloaded into the round pen in the middle of the pasture. My guys got to get reunited with Poppy and get their legs back on terra firma. Champ didn't like the looks of the already resident horses, so there was a bit of fence-charging and squealing. Champ, of course, looked really truly angry and hateful - ears back, every bit of his body language warning the other mares that he was about to go postal and KILL them. The mares squealed and pawed and generally looked just as evil right back at him. Then Poppy wanted some of that action, so he charged at the mares on the other side of the fence. It was a spectacular threat display - he had the arched neck, the impulsion, the sliding stop at the fence - but he'd forgotten to pin his ears. He looked like an intensely curious retard-horse instead of an intensely dominant wild herd stallion. Sigh. I've been watching Poppy for what, over a year now? and I'm quite certain that there is not a dominant bone in his body. He started off being pretty socially awkward, and he's slowly learned how to boss other horses around by watching and copying Champ's movements. But he's copying, so sometimes he forgets things. Like pinning his ears. Sigh.

Then I realized that my feet STILL ITCHED. Enough is enough. I drove into town and went to the dollar store. I purchased a pair of super-cheap hiking shoes and a bag of socks, peeled off the ruins of my boots and socks, and carefully dried my pale white prunefeet before wrapping them in new footwear.

With happy feet, I went back out and let my guys out of the round pen. They stuck together as a herd, exploring near the round pen for a bit. They pranced up to the other horses, Champ and a mare squealed and pawed at each other, then my horses spun away and trotted off. It was breathtaking. I hope they enjoy exploring :)

Tomorrow I'm going to do some exploring of my own - Champ or Dixie on the trails, then maybe I'll see how Poppy feels about the Aussie and actual WORK. I'll post tomorrow night, unless Poppy kills me or I'm too tired.

Movin on up (to the east side)

(Note: I wrote this last weekend, but after I got halfway through I saved it and just came back to it now. Half of what I wrote was not post-worthy so this is the "condensed" version...)

I figured it was about time to make plans to move the horses off of their "summer heaven." After all, my uncle is being amazingly nice by letting them stay there, and now that I'm done with the bar I don't want to overstay my welcome. I figured we'd be talking about it soon, and I was right.

I had every intention of riding Sunday morning. I thought about it the night before and got myself pretty psyched up to RIIIIDE. But then I got out to their field and it was like 95 degrees with about 95% humidity and all my resolve just melted away. I grabbed a brush, stuck a few horse cookies in my pocket, and walked down to the pond so Cersei could avoid heatstroke by swimming. All the horses followed me, kind of halfway greedy and halfway curious. I brushed everybody, even the spotted one - she's definitely more curious and less afraid these days. Yay.

After I was completely out of cookies, and everybody'd been brushed, and Cersei dragged herself out of the water, I started walking back to the truck. They all followed. Awww. I know that they're just hoping for magical cookies, but it's still endearing. Which is good; they definitely need to endear themselves to me now that they're expensive again!

I spent almost two hours visiting with my uncle. It's odd, he's never been particularly friendly to me. But as I got older, I realized that he's just a really taciturn fellow. My dad prodded me into asking him if I could put my horses on his land for the summer, and my dad prodded me to actually talk to him.

I'm pretty confident in saying that my uncle and I quite like each other. We're fairly smart, in slightly different ways, and we have the same core beliefs. I really look forward to talking to him almost as much as I look forward to seeing my cookie monsters! I am going to have to take the time to go visit him like twice a month after the horses leave.

Anyway, he asked when I was thinking about leaving, and I said at the end of the month if that was ok with him? He said that'd be fine; they usually plant that particular pasture in a winter grass crop in September so it'd work out great.

Once I left I decided to start the ball rolling on moving the horses. I'd been considering Hillside Stables for a couple of months - it has field board, a dressage instructor, a covered arena, and it's fairly close to my parents' house. Things like "an instructor" and "a covered arena" are not common in Mississippi - I mean, it's not one-of-a-kind, but "real" instructors aren't lurking everywhere down here.

I talked to the barn manager, who seems like someone I can get along with quite well. Field board, at the place on Polk Lane, is $125/horse/mo, and that's completely reasonable. Full care board at the main stable is - I can't remember - $325 or $350, and that's also reasonable.

Here's my dilemma (and I have a few weeks to settle on a decision):

Do I field board the Walkers and stall board Poppy, while taking a lesson a week to learn dressage? Or do I field board all four for a month or so, while I learn SOMETHING about how to ride dressage, then move Poppy to the arena facility?

Update part
I am going to put all four on field board. It's more affordable, of course. I know it's more risky - what if I just lazy on out again and don't actually ride the two challenging horses? But OTOH, it's pretty dumb for me to pay 3x as much to board a horse on whom I can't actually take effective lessons.*

*I rewrote that sentence twice. It's either "wrong," grammatically, because I dangle a participle ("a horse that I can't take lessons on") or it's "right" ("a horse on whom I cannot take lessons") and clunky. Read it whichever way you prefer, please.

ANYWAY, I am taking a dressage lesson on a school horse on Sunday. We shall see how it goes. If I enjoy lessons, I'll think about putting Poppy in the barn and committing to working with him like 4x a week. If not - well, I still plan to get a good saddle for Pops and working him all fall (October-December). By the end of the year, I should know if I want to keep him or try to sell him as a "prospect" to a good home.

I hate to think of selling him. I hate to think of one day waking up and realizing I have a 15 yo green broke draft gelding, who is generally good for nothing. I love to think about me having a great time riding him, or some other person having a great time riding him. It's very tough. I've got a lot of sympathy, but no magical words of wisdom for Beckz. :(

Another nic patch dream

Jen knows lots of horsey people, and she hooked me up with a place closer to home to board Poppy. Free board, in a lady's backyard, in the beautiful snowy mountains* of West Tennessee, just 20 mins outside of Memphis. I also boarded the cats there, in a water garden. They're water cats. They acted exactly like that damn Russian Fishing Cat. But enough about the cats, this was a Poppy dream.

I rode him all over the mountains, with a bunch of teenagers cowboyin around at top speed on little QHs. He was Poppy, all laid back. Unsurprisingly, he rode like a dream - his trot was as smooth as Champ's, and his canter was like riding a cloud. And he listened.

I woke up reluctantly, desperately wanting to ride my dream-Poppy. I hope he's like that IRL one day soon.

*There is no such thing as snowy mountains in May for hundreds of miles around. Wish there was!

Too many, too much?

I'm broke. Money is *so* tight right now. I'm so broke that if I thought it was going to go on like this I'd sell at least two of my horses. But the thing is, it's not going to go on like this. In less than a month I'll have graduated law school. (Now that's a scary thought - both for the exams that are coming up, and the thought of me as an almost-lawyer!) Anyway, it's a bit of an ethical quandary. Or at least a thought exercise in ethics!

Every horse hoarder you see on FHOTD has thought "I can take better care of my horses than anybody else." Hell, every responsible horse owner has thought the same. (Or maybe that's just me, because I'm surrounded by crazies who feed bread to their horses?) The point is that we all think we're doing the right thing, and sometimes we're not.

I honestly think I'm still ok. Still have to make my April stall rent, but I'm getting there. And the end is in sight, it really is. One more month of stall rent on four horses and hay for four horses, then I'm moving the three dark ones to Como for the summer. They'll have acres of grass to play on, and I'll visit them a couple of times a week. The spotted one stays in Frayser, where Jen will feed her (hay and grain only, no bread thank you) and I'll come up on the weekends and ride her.

Speaking of the spotted one... Yesterday I went out to brush some more winter fuzz off of the beasties. They were playing musical hay piles, so I actually got to brush whichever horse I wanted to brush. (If there's no food to distract him, Poppy will follow me around and beg to be brushed. He's such a hedonist - food, scritches, food, scritches.) I brushed Champ for a long time, then tried to brush Quinn.

I always try to brush her at liberty when I'm brushing the rest of them - I walk up and she's sort of excited but nervous to see me. I touch her neck, then gently swipe her a few times with the brush, then she gets nervous and backs away. I always let her go, because it's not a big deal. If she's not enjoying it, I'm not enjoying it.

So yesterday I brushed Champ, then tried to brush Quinn and she moved away. I went and brushed Silky for a long time, then Poppy for a bit. Quinn was so busy staring at me that she was barely eating. Ears forward, wouldn't stop looking at me, but couldn't come over because I was too near another horse. I went back to her and scritched the crest of her neck, then slowly started brushing her. She dropped her nose and started eating hay again, so I kept brushing! All over! Her shoulders, her back, her flanks, her butt! It was a big breakthrough for us. She's never let me brush anything except her neck and shoulders at liberty. We made a blizzard of white hair.

I need to take new pictures of everybody. Quinn's roaning out a lot. She's mostly white, but the bay parts are very typically roan. Chocolate colored head and chest, some white in her shoulder spots, 50% white on her flank spots. Poppy is a giant black monster. Silky looks great for her age, and Champ is, of course, ribby. (I suspect he is ribby just to piss me off.)

Silky still hates Quinn, and Champ is accepting but ambivalent. But Poppy has decided to be her friend! Last week I turned everybody out in the big pasture. Champ and Silky went off together, and Poppy stuck with Quinn. Buck the proud-cut Icelandic gelding (whose nickname rhymes with "buck") came sniffing up to Quinn, who was in heat. POPPY ALMOST KICKED BUCK IN THE HEAD! I'm so proud! XD If only he were faster...