SPIDERSWEB: Safe and sound

Ok I have been majorly slacking on this blog. Just call me lazy bones but I can't help it! It is so beautiful, peaceful, and relaxing here!

Ok so on Friday March 7th, the horse hauling company Nationwide Horse Transport showed up at the house to pick up the horses. They drove the truck and trailer out to the field so that we could load the horses. The two drivers/cowboys decided that we should load the most difficult horse first.

That would be Shoshoni.

So I grab her and lead her over to the trailer. She is excited of course, one because there are strangers and two because it is windy (which didn't help at all). We get her to the door of the trailer and she sniffs around, gets her front feet on the trailer and the cowboys try and swing the door closed to encourage her forward instead of back off. Nah uh, not happening. She pulls back off the trailer (thank goodness for long lead ropes) and now she is more excited. We try this a few more times and even dad came over to see if she would follow him into the trailer. I talked to the cowboys a little bit and explained that we would have to go a little slower with her because we had a bad trainer. The one immediately took off his cowboy hat and hid it behind his back and asked, "Did he wear a cowboy hat?" He then walked up to Shoni and scratched on her and talked to her for a little while. This really REALLY impressed me and Shoni warmed to him immediately! She still refused to load though so we decided to try some of the other horses to see if she would follow one of them on.

In comes Sweetie.

We walk her to the trailer and she gets her front feet in and is getting ready to walk the rest of the way in and then her halter broke. The cowboy that talked to Shoni wrapped his arms around her neck in a hug while we ran and grabbed another halter. With that halter on we try it again and she loads right up.

Above: Sweetie and "The Cowboy". She looks like
she is looking for another hug. :)

At this point Pebbles (who is attached to Sweetie at the hip) is having a holy hissy fit and is running around like a mad woman in her pen. Sundance of course is running around and carrying on as well but not as bad as Pebbles.

We decide that it is Pebbles' turn next.

She happily loads in the trailer to be with her buddy Sweetie. No fuss. Whew that worked for me!!!

Above: Pebbles and Sweetie (Quarter horses) on the trailer.

After she was loaded here comes Sundance running. Of course we forgot to close the gate in his pen before we started loading the other horses. I am holding Shoni on the lead still waiting for her turn when he came over. She's still excited and more so when he came running up. The cowboy held her for me while mom and I grabbed a halter and went and got Sundance. Then they wanted to load Tabasco.

Que Tabasco.

I get his halter on no biggie. He is kind of excited but he is super calm compared to the other horses. I walk him over to the trailer and he sniffed a little bit then in he went. He's such a good boy!

Now for Shoshoni again.

We try bribing her with goodies and that didn't work. Then we tried getting her on and closing the door again. That didn't work. So they put a rope around her butt when she was halfway in. She tried to back up and when she didn't get any where with that she hopped right into the trailer with me. Whew. Thank goodness she is finally on. We were told that they will leave horses behind if they refuse to load so that was a huge relief when she got on.

Last but not least, Sundance.

He is the biggest horse so he gets to go on the back side. Lucky for us he is easy to load since it is harder to load that last horse. He got his front feet on and was trying to face the opposite way that he was supposed to. One person pulled his face the way it needed to go, and another one was pushing on his butt to get his back feet up there. He did awesome. He was very comical to watch being loaded tho. I think it was just because of the guy pushing on his butt. :)

Now all five of them are on the trailer and Pebbles, Sweetie, and Sundance all have their heads sticking out the windows. Shoshoni and Tabasco were to short to stick their heads out but you could see parts of them.

Above and below:

Sundance (Fox Trotter), Shoshoni, Tabasco (mustangs), Pebbles, and Sweetie.

Ever feel like you are being stared at?

We filled out the rest of the paper work and then they were on there way.

Now it was time for the mad dash of trying to pack our vehicles with the rest of our stuff then race the horses to Minnesota. Of course we run into problems and end up not getting on the road until 8:30/9:00ish. We did pretty good considering and when we were around Thedford, NE we got a voicemail from the hauling company saying their rig had broken down around midnight and they were waiting for a place to open up to repair the truck. They had unloaded the horses at a boarding facility or the fairgrounds so they could rest while they waited. I'm so glad that I got to talk to these guys and ended up feeling like they were great guys who cared about the horses and knew what they were doing otherwise I might have had a cow at that point.

We got to Minnesota after dark the next night. We unpacked our vehicles and waited for the horses to show up. They got there a couple hours later. The horses unloaded and settled into their pens beautifully. A couple of them rolled then we fed them and let them settle in for the night.

All five of our horses were safe and sound and if anyone is looking for a great company to haul their horses I would highly recommend Nationwide Horse Transport.