Out to Pasture

It has been three weeks since the great flood. We have lost 1 chick, the peacocks are officially living at the neighbors (they are great friends and have conversations) three rabbits died and I have evacuated my horses to a neighbor that is 15+ miles away. Belle was not doing well(she has lost weight even with an increase in grain, hay, and oil) in the corral and a friend from church offered her pasture. We led Belle, Foxy and Lady over the condemned bridge, Lady was nervous until Foxy went over it. We loaded Foxy first. Lady was nervous, but after a few treats and a butt rope, she climbed in. Belle jumped right in, too. I stopped to check everybody when I got off the bumpy dirt road. Lady was no longer slant loaded. She was straight loaded under Belle's neck. Belle was nuzzling her. It was kind of cute. I missed the house (I had never been to the house before, but I THOUGHT that I new where it was) I had to turn around on a narrow road. Thank goodness for gooseneck trailers!! Belle, Lady, and Foxy immediately fell upon the tall green grass (they had been having exposure to grass so that they wouldn't founder) The grass is almost waist high! They were ecstatic!! I can only visit once a day. This really bothers me since i am now so used to them on my property. The next day, I noticed that they were getting eaten alive so I tried out a spot fly repellent. 5 ml from poll to tail, 1 ml under the forelock, 1 ml each on the legs. It works!! Foxy was in such a hurry to get her's that she nailed me on the head right on the button of my ball cap. OUCH!!! After she was sufficiently debugged, she was all snuggly again. The flies were really bad, so I forgave her. Lady sunburnt her nose, so now she wears sunscreen. Belle always comes immediately, Foxy and Lady do now, too, but the first day, I had to track them down. Foxy did not move from her ten foot diameter circle the first day. Lady cut her leg during the flood, but now it is starting to heal. She kept pulling the scab off. I am hoping to bring them home in another week or so. There is still too much water for all 8 horses. This way, they get time to unwind at the pasture while I am out of town (family reunion) and they get time off from the flood and my sister's horses. Belle and Sergeant were getting ugly in the evac corral. The vacation should be good.

The Flood of 2010

The Flood of 2010. Sounds ominous. Well, it is. We have an old river bed running through the property. This spring, with the late snow and heavy moisture, it has had a fair bit of water in it. With the warm (not hot, merely warm) temperatures that we have had lately (high 60s and 70s) the snow pack has been melting. The ground was already saturated, this means that the water has nowhere to go. Well, actually, it went to my pasture, barn, and animal pens.

Friday. The ravine in the pasture has stagnant water. We are starting to get mosquitoes. Ok, lets get some anti mosquito larvae pellets for the water. Got grain, forgot about the pellets. We worked Lady on walking, trotting, and standing. Foxy at ground driving.

Saturday. Let’s get the garden planted. Let’s go on a trail ride. Ok, Belle still won’t go through the mud hole of a road that gets out to the trails. One of these days, she will go over it. Foxy was great. Well behaved. Got mosquito pellets. Got a bunch of garden planted. The water has increased and is a flowing stream from one side of the property to another. Time to put the scientific method into place.
Identify Problem. Belle won’t cross water, we have excess water.
Form Hypothesis. If I turn Belle, Foxy, and Lady out in pasture with water running through it, then Belle will be forced to cross water to get to Foxy and Lady.
Test Hypothesis. Out the ponies go.
Results. Foxy, Lady, AND Belle run across the water to get to the pasture.
Conclusion. Belle doesn’t really have a problem crossing water. She has a problem crossing mud holes. The water is creeping up the stock water tank that we keep in the ravine. Critter had just put 10 feeder fish in it to eat the algae. We hope that the water won’t reach the top by morning.

Sunday. I wake up at 2 AM. I can’t sleep. I toss and turn until I think it is 5 AM. Fortunately, I did not have my glasses on. It was closer to 4:30 AM.
I get up, throw on some handy walk outside my bedroom door clothes (one of Mr. BPA’s Flannel shirts, pair of shorts. I poke my head out of the front door. In the dark, there is a glistening around the barn. WATER!!! I run through the house pounding on bedroom doors, “GET UP, THE BARN IS UNDER WATER!!!!!” I throw on my work boots and run out to the barn. The ravine is full and water is surrounding the barn. The stock tank is floating. Fred, the peacock is on his perch in the adult chicken coop, but I don’t see any other birds, just stuff in the water. There are sounds in the Easter chicken coop(the chicks that we got at Easter), I keep going to the barn. I throw open the barn door. The barn floor is not under water, but getting wet. The new chicks, turkeys, and duck are not in the water, yet. The horses are nervous, but ok. Their stalls are flooding. I run back out to the Easter chicks, of the ten chicks, half are hiding in the dog house with the water only 2 inches from the top of the door. The other half are trying to keep their heads above water. I put all ten on the roof of the dog house. By then, Critter is out and in the chicken coop. I run out there to get Fred, but I see the nephew’s Silver Wyandotte hen with just her beak and part of her head above water. I scoop her up and take her to dry land. Fred is next. The mangy Peacock knocks my glasses off. I turn him loose on dry land, too. All 10 adult chickens are alive and out of the coop. The guys and kids have gathered up the little chicks from the barn and put them in empty water troughs that are now floating in the barn. The kittens are hauled to the house. Tigris, the cat is yoweling, so I take him across, (although he will play in the water with Shooter, its generally just his legs that get wet. This was already too deep for him to walk from the barn to the house on higher ground) Gizmo has already been carried across. Mr. BPA grabs Rascal, the mama cat. She has a mouse in her mouth. She must save the mouse! (Half way across the water, she ended up dropping it) The cats all get put in the house to keep them away from the birds. I grab another water trough and float the Easter chicks to dry land. We then float the 4-H chicks, as well. The rabbits are two feet above the floor, they can wait. Water is still rushing up. The decision is made. Close the gate. Put halters on and turn the horses loose from their stalls, they’ll run to the house and dry ground. Barnaby, Princess, and Sassy are the first to go. Do they run to higher ground and the house? NO!!! They run across the ravine of water and out to pasture. Ok, tie up Shooter, he is busy trying to herd horses across the ravine. Sergeant and Mystique are lead out, the floorboards are popping up and floating. Mr. BPA, Kid #2, and I head in to get the girls. Is Belle going to walk out of her flooding stall, into the barn that is flooding and out of the barn through 2-2 ½ feet of water to the higher ground? No real hesitation. We avoid the trailer of hay, the floating boards, the holes where the boards used to be and lead them to the fence. Out come the rabbits. We finally shut all power to the barn. Feed bins, bags come next. The kids are now just at the dry end of the cycle. The adults run stuff up to dry ground. The kids move it up to the yard or the kids are trying to dry off bunnies, chicks and chickens. Fred is yelling on the fence post and then runs off at some point. Critter’s inlaws that were visiting for the weekend are helping with the kids. The nephew is trying to warm up his Silver Wyandotte that I saved. She was just laying there, not moving when he found her. The neighbors are now alerted. They start making the phone calls and alerting the Elder’s Quorum for help. I drive up to the neighbors to get their shallow boat and drive up to the bridge. The construction equipment is getting water now, too. Back to the house. The water is still rising. They’ve had to move the horses, again. Critter takes two of her horses over to the neighbors. We start waking up other neighbors to let them know that the water is still rising. I ride Belle, lead Foxy, and tie Lady to Foxy’s tail. Drop off at neighbor’s. Now the water is over the driveway. The guys from town arrive and manage to save the hay and trailer from the barn. I drive the hay to the neighbors and feed the horses. They empty the tack room of saddles, grain, and the upright freezer! The train modules are wet. A total loss. The storage silo is only a little bit wet. Most of the storage is in plastic totes and can stay there. Anything else, we just don’t have time to move to try and save. The water is still rising. Barnaby runs across the ravine. Critter takes him to the neighbors. Sassy and Princess are trying to find a shallow way across, but the water is daunting. Should we try to lead them across with the boat. I don’t think so! They will be trying to climb in the boat. Mr. Critter and I paddle across the ravine with lead ropes. The Plan: I will swim Sassy across with Princess following. Good theory. Sassy and I swim across. I tried to guide her, but then she would drop her head into the water. We make it. At one point, only are heads are above the water and she is swimming with me hanging on to her mane, yelling encouragement (I have never swam with a horse before, with practice, it might be fun, but I just wanted to get them out) When we hit land, even before we were out, poor Sassy needed a break. She stood for a minute, calling Princess, who DID NOT follow. We got out of the water. Princess was running up and down the remaining coastline. Get out of there Mr. Critter and drag the stock tank with you (we were just kidding about the stock tank. It had floated to the opposite side of the ravine from where it had started) Princess and Sassy call back and forth for a while and then Princess finally takes the plunge and swims across to the back of the barn where she is caught and led through the barn to safety. Off they go to the neighbors. Fresh food and water is brought to give to the, now, dry chicks and rabbits. All six bunnies and three adults are ok. All 17 4-H chicks, 6 turkeys and 1 duck are ok (we were down due to deadloss from the snow storms) All 10 Easter Chicks are ok. All 9 hens and 1 rooster are ok. Fortunately, the pigs that we were supposed to get this weekend were not here yet. So now loss there (their pen was under enough water at the beginning that we would have already lost them) I finally go and get dressed (I was soaked from the head down, but my hair was still dry) and off to the neighbor’s for breakfast. The absolute BEST biscuits and gravy I have EVER eaten. (1- She is a great cook, and 2- I was tired and hungry.) Unload the saddles from the truck. Empty feed bags to check for moisture. Very little loss. Most was already in plastic bins. Back to the house to give the animals shelter from the sun. Find out that our well is still safe. Pack up Kid #2 for week long summer college camp. Upload pics to Facebook and sit. Incoming phone call.

BPA?(Not really, she does call me by my actual name)

Yeah, (neighbor) what can I help you with?

Are you busy?

Not really? (whatever she wants, she can have after giving shelter to the horses and making biscuits and gravy)

Can you come help another neighbor? The other river is kagihioertklrkkljk(I heard nothing really after that, I just started yelling for the kids and passed out adults to head back out to there)

So off we go to get everything off the floor and up at least 18 inches or more in the garage of another neighbor. The river behind the garage and house is almost over the dyke. Their horses are moved to the same neighbor that ours are (just different corral). All trailers, campers, animals are moved. They try to build up the dyke. We have to leave for Casper. We take the Dodge Durango (Better gas mileage and more comfortable for the passengers than my truck. The driveway is 1-2 feet under water in spots. The road to the bridge is 2-3 feet under water in spots (we avoid the 3 foot areas)
Some houses are surrounded by water. We trade off for naps. Kid #2 arrives at College and is excited to be able to sleep in for a week (breakfast is not served until 8 AM!!!) Head back home.

Phone call

“You can’t come back over the bridge. I will tell you the back way to get home. (giggle, giggle)”

me- “ok”


giggle, giggle, “hey, somebody tell me how to tell her to get here.”
much discussion in background. Hey, your Durango is light enough and has the 4 wheel drive, you can make it over the bridge, but . . .” lost call.

We decide to go to the bridge and see. We make it over the bridge. We joke that if it does start to go, then we will gun the engine and make the jump like in the movies. The road past the bridge is washed out. The river is flowing over it. We see that there are a bunch of vehicles on the other side. We go for it, we can’t really turn around anyway and at that point, are surrounded by water. The water goes up to the middle/top of the grill on the vehicle, Mr. BPA rolls down his window and puts on a show for the now recognizable neighbors. They only give him a 82 for his 8 second ride. They are exhausted/slap happy. They tried to build up the dyke, but the water ended up finding another way to the property (just not through the house). Fortunately, the water has not risen on our property, just spread to other’s. The fire/emergency personnel shut down the bridge. The local police officer warned that only for emergencies can we cross that bridge. We are all scheduled to work on Monday. It’s the first day of my new summer school job. To relieve stress, the neighbor kids want to try out Belle, then the other horses. We just use the halters and lead ropes. It’s crazy. We finally get home and it starts to rain. Now we need to find rain shelter for all of the displaced chicks, rabbits and dog(Shooter is afraid of storms and we found him across the river and in the next town last time he wasn’t locked in the barn during a storm) Rabbits and Shooter to the Yurt (which is still dry) and the 4-H chicks to the well house. The older, Easter Chicks get water troughs on their sides and the top of a dog crate. The adult chickens have already taken over the intact dog crates. Tigris is left outside (where he really wants to be after being locked up until a secure coop for the little chicks was built while we were in Casper) Gizmo and Puma are locked in the girls’ room. Guido is locked in the boys’ room. Bandit in Critter’s room and the kittens and Rascal in the laundry room. We will take shifts to watch the water level and condition of the animals. I am a morning person, so Mr. BPA and I take the morning shift. At 2:30 AM, Monday morning, I get out of bed to check on Shooter and let him out since the storm has passed. The water has gone down a foot or two. The chicks and rabbits are ok. I let cats out. Rascal takes the opportunity to capture a mouse and give the kittens a hunting lesson. I finally took the mouse away after coming inside after my 4:30 walk around the coastline. All is well (or at least unchanged) I heard Fred, but did not see him. I have been typing this during my off time during my watch. I am on less than 3 hours of sleep, so although I know that there are probably many grammar errors in this accounting, I really don’t care right now. All of the animals are alive. The house is still safe. The water is safe. The people are safe. We have plenty of food and friends (and my sister’s inlaws make it home safely, too.) All is well.

The Paint in Painting

I have paints. Really, I do. I just have not discussed them in a while. I have been out playing with them, being busy, and just not blogging about them. Lady is still growing like a weed. Kid #1 has been working with her on 4-H Showmanship, where she leads Lady around, demonstrating Lady's training at leading at a walk, trot, and standing. Yep, that is Lady's tongue sticking out.Lady was not really impressed with the lining up and standing. Foxy was really great at following kid #3 around, but not so good at the standing in a line, waiting for their turn to demonstrate a straight line at a trot, stopping, turning and trotting back.


Critter was giving the showmanship lesson with 4 kids and horses.

I had Belle in the arena, too.
Shooter was helping. His eye is so much better now. I still think that his vision is compromised, but he doesn't seem to be too affected. He just runs into things a little more than he used to.

The next day we had a riding lesson. With 4 kids. And 4 horses. Belle and Lady were not in attendance, which worried Foxy, so Kid #2 discussed the pythagorean theorem with her as they worked on control, gaits, and being calm. (I couldn't get him to just talk to her, so I made him tell her stuff)



It snowed 10 inches last week, so Lady has not had a bath recently. It is supposed to get to 72-76 degrees Farenheit today, so maybe the lake will disappear and it will be warm enough for baths. Belle and Lady really need them. We also need to get a Bobcat in an scrape the outdoor stalls. Yesterday, there was still some snow in the outdoor runs. Which means that the mud and muck is not so great right now. So in my brilliance yesterday, Critter and I decided to go on a trail ride. Without kids. Belle did not like this and threw a temper tantrum. During her tantrum, she slipped in the mud. I expected her to catch herself and lunge forward. (Anyone that has driven her knows that she can drop her butt pretty far and then lunge forward like she is in the horse pulls) In anticipation of the lunge, I kept my feet in the stirrups. 1800 lbs falling on the human body hurts. As soon as my right foot hit the ground, I had my left foot out of the saddle. It happened pretty fast, but I think that the soft footing actually saved both my leg and Belle. She caught my forearm with the horn (I think, its the only thing that I can think would have caught it)but she didn't roll all the way over. She scrambled to her feet and I rolled out of the way. Mr. BPA was fixing the barn door and came running. He made me demonstrate walking before he let me get back on. He also said that if I couldn't pull myself into the saddle, I couldn't get back on. We went for a very short ride then worked for a little while in the arena. By then, the adrenaline had worn off. My foot is broken. The 1st and third metatarsals. I might also have a hairline fracture in my radius (forearm). My knee is sore. Heck, the whole right side of my body hurts. Belle is good, she never limped or even felt too bad about the whole thing. Sometimes horses can tell if they messed up and stay with you when you come off, not Belle, she took off to find the herd.

Enough Pity party, I am still going to work and I have to practice not limping before my job interview later this week.

We are getting a new paint. She is a light sorrel tobiano. She was given to a coworker of Mr. BPA and all of his kids are gone now and they took their horses this week and he did not want to keep one horse all by herself. So she is coming to our house for Kid #1 to practice on until Lady is old enough. She is really friendly and let us pick up her feet and move around her without problems. We will have to see how she is under saddle. We are thinking of calling her Rose (as in Briar Rose, Sleeping Beauty's alter ego. With Belle and Lady, I like to keep with the Disney names. Ok, Lady was a dog, but it really fits her better than TinkerBelle)The new mare has another name, but it is the same as a girl at church and that would just be weird. So now, we will have 3 paints and the one Clydesdale, at least until Bart comes home.

Dumb Dog!

Saturday, Shooter got kicked in the head. This is nothing new for him. He gets kicked daily. His job, as he sees it, is to help move horses. He loves to chase the horses from the barn out to pasture. I was out of town(of course, I was, everything has to happen when I am out of town). I was in the middle of a presentation of trains, when I got a call. It was on vibrate. I hit the ignore button and texted, wxplaining that I was in a presentation and couldn't get out of my seat until the presentation was over. The reply was, "Shooter kicked. eye bloody. Don't know how bad."
I showed this to Mr. BPA (sitting next to me). Somehow neither one of us was too worried. When the presentation was over, I slipped outside to call. It was PANDALERIUM!(word stolen from Jeff Foxworthy) The kids were freaking out, Shooter's whole head was swelling. Blood was everywhere. The only view of the actual eyeball made my brother-in-law think that the eyeball was ruptured. Lovely. Somehow, I did not feel panic, I made a few comments on facebook, but since he was running around and actually tried to herd the horses back to the barn, I wasn't too concerned.

I stayed in Casper(hey, we went to the BIG city!) and finished my stuff. When I got home, Shooter looked like something out of a horror film. His eye was so swollen that I couldn't pry it open. There was a cut right above the eye. He was pretty out of it from the painkillers, but he was thumping his stump of a tail and was happy to see me. I gave him a shot of antibiotics, and put some antibiotics on his open wound. I still did not get too worked up about it. ---side note---- I get worked up over everything. Rascal having her kittens made me crazy. Foxy having lady put me over the edge. One of the reasons why we haven't looked too hard at breeding Belle is that I would be living in the barn for the entire gestation period. By the end, I would be institutionalized. I babied Tigris when Sergeant stepped on him. When Shooter got kicked in the fall, I let him recuperate in the house. I get really worked up, hysterical about EVERYTHING, so I really am not sure why I was so relaxed about this.

Sunday, he still looked bad. I got him all doctored up and went to church. He started looking better that afternoon. He even tried jumping into the water troughs to cool off.

Monday, the swelling went way down. He had muscle control over his eye brows and around the eye. I could see that the eyeball was not punctured. The lens was not intact. The cut above the eye is looking better.

Tuesday, he is out and about helping with chores, stealing Belle's grain, annoying the cats. He even came out to the gate to guide me in when I came home that night -- he really likes to have the vehicle follow him to its parking spot. It makes me worried that he is going to get run over. He also could not settle down that night, he was jumping up, hitting the windows, trying to get his nemesis, the evil black and white cat from down the road. The cat was taunting him and eating the cat food on the porch. There was a cat fight in the girls' room, he had to get involved with that.

Wednesday, today, he opened up his eye wound again, but other than that, he is acting fairly normal. He is no longer hitting into my leg as we walk so that I can protect his bad side. He can see light and dark, but I am fairly certain that it is blurry. Its hard to tell with him because he is not real bright, anyway.

So, he is going to be fine. Heavy sigh. Good, I don't want to lose my dog. Then we would only have Harley. Not the best trail dog.

Rain, Rain, go AWAY!!!

This morning it has been raining. It rained all night. I was feeling lazy and did not want to get my work boots muddy. (as in the boots that I wear to go teach in, as opposed to the muck boots for cleaning stalls, and my riding boots.)So, I drove my truck to the barn to feed Belle her Lunch. 1/2 can alfalfa cubes soaked in water, 2 cups oil, 1 quart Senior feed, 1 cup Nutrena Empower (I am not a paid spokesperson. I am trying it out to see if it helps Belle keep her weight while I am increasing her workouts) Not my brightest move. We slid.





It is really nicely stuck. 4-Lo did not even get me out. I had to call Mr. BPA (who told all of his co-workers -- they all laughed) to come and take me to work. We will need to pull it out later since we really can't have both of us miss work today. It is really not much fun slodging around in mud past the ankles with a lap top in one hand, a backpack of text books in the other.

And before anyone says to just hook Belle up to the truck, the harness is still not fixed from the last time I hitched her to something.

Lady, the hairy mud ball -- and cats

With Wyoming weather, the horses don't know if they should be shedding or not, but they are really starting to shed. We are still getting snow (this was last week) but the grass is turning green (Lady's little hoofprint)Foxy never grows much of a winter coat, hates blankets and does just fine. Lady and Belle grew thick, long coats this winter, and only wore blankets when they had sweated (in Belle's case) or I made the mistake of bathing them (Lady's case). Lady is a shedding little monster.
It doesn't help that when the snow melts, the ground turns into a soupy, muddy mess. We are installing a hot water system into the new garage. It's main purpose will be for attempting to keep Lady white. She likes to nap, alot. She likes to find mud puddles to sleep in. Yesterday, when I pulled her out to be trimmed, she had a big lump of mud on her back.
She doesn't like the hoofstand, so I had to play peek-a-boo with her and pull on her tongue, scratch her ears, etc. to attempt to keep her occupied. Brushing her out helped, too. and the lunging before. and tying Belle and Foxy near her. She still tries to lie down on the trimmer. She's still learning. She thinks that trimming should take no longer than the time it takes to pick her hooves.

Isn't she cute in her new Halter? It's a little big, but I think that by summer it will fit perfectly. She was getting fed up with pics by this picture, but with the clouds, the pics kept coming out blurry and the flash washed her out.

Normally, I can lead Belle around by her beard when she is out of her stall to eat her grain, but with the shedding going on, on ended up with a handful of beard. Belle and Shooter share her grain. But if the door is open to the barn, Belle will run outside to Foxy's outdoor run (regardless of the fact that her inner door is RIGHT THERE. You could nigh at her through the door.)Saturday, while adding on to the outdoor arena, Belle was eating her Lunch, but Foxy neighed and Belle left her grain to run back out to pasture.
She is so whipped.

More in furball news (if you don't like cats, Stop here. Move on to the next blog, email, or other internet item, its all about cats) I have updated pics of the cats. We need cats. They keep me from dealing with mice. Mice attract Snakes. I HATE snakes. I was raised on Indiana Jones. It is perfectly fine for him to hate them, so I do to.

This is my cat. The rest are NOT mine. They below to kids, Mr. BPA or my sister. I only claim this cat. This is Tigris as a kitten,
This is Tigris, now. He is a barn cat. He is an excellent mouser. He can find mice in the dead of winter (awesome).






These are Puma, toothless wonder, basking in the sun, and Gizmo, idiotic, loudmouthed barn cat. She is not allowed in the house... except she ripped apart her leg and I had to drain a gallon of pus out of it. Nasty stuff. Right before breakfast. She and Puma rarely see each other, but while Giz was yowelling, Puma came and checked her out, so I put them both on the bed and they have coexisted peacefully.


Guido is a giant furball that is declawed on the front. He loves to claw the furniture, but has no claws. He is a feline version of shooter, but has a brain. Don't pick me up, I'm too big, but I will be petted from the floor, chair, couch, etc. He will soon be getting a Lion cut (he loves it, he is just a big drag queen)















I accidently put this picture in sideways, but it fits this psycho cat with multiple extra toes on each paw. He was spayed and neutered the same day. He is not my cat. I had his brother, Paws (he also had many extra toes, he was fixed, but it never stopped him. I think that he had a spare pair.) He was killed when he was hit by a car. It was the 7th or 8th time that he had attacked a car.
















And last but not least because she woke me up this morning, making bizarre sounds, is Rascal, the amazing riding cat.First as a kitten, then as an adult extra for an Alien movie. She is psycho. She is going to explode. She is due anyday and stays in my bedroom. Shooter may have been the one to mangle Giz and he has been a cat chasing fool (This is why I have no recent pics of Socks. He runs when Shooter chases him.)So we don't want Shooter, Tig, or any other cat to kill the kittens. But since we have no idea when she will pop, she has been living in the house for weeks. The pictures that I have taken of her, just don't demonstrate her hugeness. She is normally tiny. Her belly is four to five times its normal size. She attacks Puma, Bandit, Tig (when she can get to him) the dumb indoor dog. She is cranky.

Happy Easter!!!

Today is Easter. DUH! If you had to read this to find that out, you are a little slow. Or out in the middle of nowhere. Nope, I am in the middle of nowhere and I know that it is Easter. We sold all of our baby bunnies and picked up some chicks.
SIDENOTE -- Never ask a room full of agriculture students where to pick up chicks. They will tell you the local bar. These same students had no problem telling me where to get my piglets, but. . .

When we got our chicks, there were other families getting the dyed chicks and wanted to know what to do with them when they got big. Would the lady buy them back? EAT IT! Or get a pullet and eat the eggs!!! So now we are up to 21 chickens. Mr. BPA read an article that said that the grasshoppers were going to be worse than last year, so now we have 21 hungry predators to devour them. The eggs are good, too.

Today, I decided to throw the harness on Foxy. I checked with her former owner, the one that trained her, to see if she had ever been roped off of. (I did not want her to spin and try to keep the tugs tight when she felt pressure) She was injured before she was roped off of, so we were good. But first, I had to outfit the harness to properly fit Belle, by adding leather to the checkrein, the noseband, and the crupper. We set out to pull a tire around. Unfortunately, Belle was so thrilled to be pulling, she dug in, dropped her butt, and pulled, and pulled, until we broke the tug and the towhooks that were hooked into the tire. Well that sucked. Belle was having so much fun. I need to get her an actual collar harness that is tough.

So then I put the broken harness on Foxy. The tug was the only part that broke, and since I did not have anything that I wanted to hitch her to, I figured that we could at least see how she tolerated the harness. She did not twitch for the crupper, the checkrein, or even the blinders that are plastered to the side of the head. She did object to the 6" liverpool bit. I switched that out for a solid rubber loose ring snaffle that my sister had on the extra bit hook (with 8 horses and since she used to have a boarding business, she has a lot of extra tack) Foxy was standing there, so mellow, that I took the time to take a picture (I rarely remember. I forgot when I was driving Belle earlier, and I even had Kid #1 ground driving her. I need to send the kids out with the Slave driver. I forgot how to train without throwing them off the carriage.)


I left the halter on as a safety feature since I was adjusting the harness from Belle to Foxy. Pulling off copious amounts of leather. The tugs and break straps are just hanging there and the leadrope is in my hand, since Kid #2 is driving. I had to laugh. He was trying to neckrein her butt. That was one of my huge pet peeves when I trained carriage drivers. Or he would shift his weigh and walk in the direction he wanted her to go. Foxy was an angel under harness. Once I get the tug fixed and a cart rigged up (I have some ideas for a light two wheeled cart, just perfect for Foxy, Belle. . . I need a real harness and a heavier duty cart or wagon)

Lady got a new show halter for Easter. While we were in town selling bunnies, we saw a fun raiser with saddles and had to stop. It is really nice. I spent so much time with the big girls, I did not work with Lady today. With the massive snow storm this week, they were all ready to run, so they all got out to run before we did any work. Even the 28 year old and the gimpy appy were galloping around like they were twitterpated. Lady tried to nurse, but Foxy is finally dry. Lady did not like that and kicked out at Foxy. What a stinker.