My new horse!?!

Isn't he adorable!? He is a 2yr old (14h) BLM Mustang gelding (#6537) from the Cedar Mountains HMA (UT) and was captured 12/12/08.

My new horse?! Only in my dreams, unfortunately. To try and get him trailered from UT to MN and then to get him gentled before winter would be a huge challenge. More so with my current 3 young (green) horses that I'm trying to get going under saddle... then again what's one more? ; )

I love the expression on his face, along with his unique blaze (looks kind of like a yin yang to me).

Interested in adoption? Call the BLM facility at (877)224-3956 or Jared Redington at (801)712-3186. Email: Jared_Redington@blm.gov.

A Beautiful Weekend

Last weekend was absolutely beautiful. We have been gradually letting the horses graze in the big field for the last couple of weeks. On Sunday Mom opened the gate and let Pebbles, Sweeite, and Sundance out to graze for their morning meal. They stayed out there for 3 hours and after that they willingly went back into their pen to take a nap. Grazing is hard work ya know!

Then it was Tabasco and Shoni's turn. I put their halters on and Tabasco (aka pest) tried to lead Shoni around by hers (poor girl). I finally had to shoo him away then we opened the gate and just let them find their way to the big field. They were nervous at first and stuck together like glue. Once in the big field one turned right and the other went left but they stayed in site of each other and the big horses.

Tabasco had to investigate the building right away. He peaked in the door and sniffed the concrete, then decided that was enough and walked away.

Finally they realized the grass is taller on the other side of the building and mosied that way.

They walked.

They grazed.

They snorted.

AND..... they were startled when Shoni stirred up a duck!

Maybe it is safer to stand on that mowed path that runs down the center of the field?

And then Tabasco spotted....

THE HAYRAKE!

Hey walked right up to it...

...and sniffed the metal seat.

No big deal, time to eat!

"Am I in heaven?"

Now it's time to head back towards home.

But not before playing "King of the Mountain!" or maybe it was "Peek Aboo!"?

The big horses woke up from their naps and wished they could go back out and play with the babies.

Maybe next time we will be brave and put all five together for the first time. *insert nail biting here*

Results

The vet was here and took out Sweeties stitches. He liked the way it healed up but thinks one of the sarcoids will come back. He asked if we still have the Xterra cream and told me to watch the area and to use the cream if the sarcoid starts to come back. Does anyone else have any experience with Xterra? It makes me nervous to use it because it is supposed to be so strong and may leave a hole where the sarcoid was.

He had to sedate Sweetie in order to remove the stitches and the poor thing was pretty out of it. She weebled... and then she wobbled... but she stood strong and slept it off. It was pretty funny listening to her snoring but I was glad when she started waking up and wanting to graze.

Once he was done with Sweetie I asked if he wouldn't mind taking a look at Shoni since he was here. I explained the sores and we went into the pen. He took a look at a couple of the spots and suggested getting some Betadine from the store and cleaning them with that (Shoni now has 4 different sores). He thinks they might be a reaction to a sting from a yellow jacket. So I will try the Betadine and see if that makes a difference. At least it is nothing bad or contagious. Whew.

In the picture above you can see one of the newer sores below the BLM brand

The vet was asking me how I was liking my current job. I told him that it pays the bills but that I don't see myself there long term. He asked me what I thought about veterinary medicine and told me that I should go to school for a couple of years so that I can take over when he retires. His comment made my day! That was my dream job growing up but now that I'm older I think I would have a hard time with some of the things a vet has to do. Too bad he wouldn't have offered me a job as a vet tech so I could go on farm calls with him and work in the office. It would be much closer to home and I would LOVE my job.

Always something

The vet is coming out on Monday to remove the stitches from Sweetie's surgery. I'm going to have him look at Shoni right away too. She has been acting kind of mopey and usually she is an attention hog but the last couple of days she's been keeping to herself.

I thought maybe a good grooming session would perk her up a bit (she loves the attention) and while brushing her I noticed a dime sized sore along her jaw bone. Upon further investigating I noticed another sore underneath her jaw (right in the center between her nose and her neck). They're kind of red sores with dried up yellow waxy build up around them, like they were oozing. A day after I discovered those two she developed a small lump by her BLM brand. I'm pretty sure it's the same thing. She hasn't been coughing and hasn't had a runny nose until yesterday so I don't know what it can be. I only hope it's nothing serious or contagious.

Tabasco was being bad and was "climbing the walls".

We're probably going to have to let the babies out with the big horses sometime soon so we can get rid of the panels. Then about our luck they'll be jumping fences or picking on each other.

Who lil 'ol me?!

Dad was tilling up the garden so Mom and Grandma could plant some vegetables and the horses got hyper with the noise and all five of them started running around.

If you look closely at the picture above you'll notice that Tabasco is completely off of the ground. I hope he never does that when I ride him lol

Then I got some really neat pictures of my "wild" mustangs.

Frustration

Sunday was a nice day so I decided to work with Sundance. I brought him in the round pen and groomed him for a while. Then I went and grabbed a feed bucket and flipped it over to see if I could get on him bareback. He didn't want to stand still for that and he's too spooky (and tall) for me to jump so I brought in the saddle. He got tacked up and I led him into the center of the pen to climb on. I sat on him for a minute then asked him to walk. He took maybe three steps then decided to throw a hissy fit.

He tucked his head into his chest and started bucking. I was trying to hang on and pull his head up to no avail (it didn't help that he was only wearing a rope halter). Lucky for me it wasn't rodeo horse bucking but more like crow hopping and he was staying in place. He finally started to calm down but I was pretty mad that he did it in the first place and I wasn't thinking. While still sitting on him, I made the mistake of yelling at him about his tantrum and that threw him into another fit.

Sundance finally calmed down again and I was able to climb down. He has never done anything like that before so I started thinking that maybe something with the saddle or the pad was bothering him so I removed the saddle before he could go off again. I asked him to run around the round pen a couple of laps, switch directions, then we worked on hooking on. He did great with that and was following me around and paying attention. I brought the saddle back in and put it back on him and lead him around a few times. He did fine no buck or anything. I was talking to mom about it and ran my hand along the back end of the saddle and he acted like he was going to go off again (maybe I bumped it?). He calmed down and we stood there for a couple of minutes before I took off the saddle again.

He's worn this saddle and pad many times before and has never had this problem. I don't know what to do at this point. I'm beyond frustrated and I keep asking myself what the heck I am doing with three green horses. I am not a trainer and I like nice, relaxing, uneventful rides- not run away horses or broncs! I am so frustrated and am about ready to start thinking about finding one or more of them new homes and just getting an old broke "been there done that" type horse... but I love my three too much to do that and I guess we are just doomed until we get it worked out. *sigh*

The day didn't end all bad though, we let the horses out in the field to graze for an hour and I got a cute 35 second video of Shoni that cracks me up. :)