Welcome To This Farm

There are several canine residents on the horse retirement farm. Over the years between my parents and I we have taken in a large number of wayward animals. I've already mentioned the stray goats, we have the stray flock of chickens, the cat that I cat-napped, as well as our assortment of dogs. Today I would like to introduce you to Bush the coon hound.

Jason and I have determined that Bush speaks slowly with a strong southern drawl. Anytime a new visitor comes he is happy to greet you with a smiling face and a wagging tail. Jason always says that Bush is saying "Welcome, welcome to this farm" in his slow, southern drawl as he stands there wagging his tail.

Bush always has a happy and friendly expression

I think he is trying to look regal or noble here; it really isn't him
Happy with a wagging tail is typically his look

There are two things in the world of Bush that are without equal as far as bringing him joy. Riding in the back of the Gator is sheer bliss for Bush. If the Gator moves out of my parents' garage for any reason, Bush expects to be standing in the back, catching the breeze and touring the farm. In fact, he often sleeps in the back of the Gator waiting for someone to come drive him around. On some occasions he refuses to get out of the Gator even to eat and we have to put his food bowl in the Gator with him.

A typical scene around the farm; Bush in the back of the Gator, Bugle in the passenger seat, Dad driving

Jason with a few passengers; Bear is looking over one shoulder and Bush over his other shoulder; as always Bugle has claimed the passenger seat

The other great joy in the world of Bush the coon hound is riding in my Dad's truck. Dad's truck is strictly a farm vehicle and is used to haul stuff around, pull trailers, buy stuff at the co-op, etc. Thus, Bush does not get a daily truck ride which is unfortunate for him. Bush loves to ride in the truck so much he actually recognizes the different set of keys that my dad uses when he drives the truck. When he sees those keys in my dad's hands he bolts over to the truck and waits for the door to open. If the truck is moving Bush expects to be a passenger!

Bush with Jason and my niece Caroline; Dad's truck in the background

One of the funniest memories I have of Bush involves my dad's truck. For some reason Jason and I had switched trucks for the day with my dad. I can't remember why but for some reason we were driving his truck. We were only a couple of miles from the farm when the serpentine belt broke. We managed to make it back to the farm and I called a tow truck. The tow truck came, loaded the truck onto the back, and started to drive down the driveway. Bush is not the brightest bulb in the box but he knows that if the truck is moving he gets to ride. Bush took off running after the tow truck, trying to get into "his" truck. He simply could not comprehend that the truck was moving and he wasn't in it, and he was determined to rectify the situation! Unfortunately I don't have a picture of that but I wish I did.

Bush in the back seat of my mom's car; he had followed Jason & I down to the road while we were repairing a fence board so we called my mom to come pick him up. I didn't think I would ever see Bush in the Mercedes so I had to take a picture to commemorate the occasion.

Although Bush doesn't know this he is quite lucky to be a resident of this farm. His life could have been very different. My dad was driving on I-65 several years ago and stopped to fill his car up with gas. He saw an extremely skinny dog at the gas station and inquired about the dog. They told him she had just showed up a couple of days ago. Dad put the dog in his car and brought her home with him.

He named her Dolly, and Dolly was the thinnest dog I have ever seen. Her backbone was raised up and prominent, her ribs stuck out, and she was basically a walking skeleton. She gained weight quickly as my parents stuffed food into her. My dad was quite proud at how quickly she was packing on the pounds. As it turned out she was pregnant and she had thirteen puppies. We were able to find homes for most of the puppies but Bush stayed at the farm.

He has no idea how different his life could be today as he yawns lazily

Followed by a nice streeeetch

Napping in my house with Bear

Hanging out by the fence with Jason

Bush is always a very happy dog

I hope you have enjoyed meeting Bush. If you ever happen to visit the farm he will greet you with a smile and a friendly wag of his tail while saying "Welcome, welcome to this farm."

How I Spent My Saturday

If only running a horse retirement farm was all about playing with the horses. It would make life absolutely perfect! Unfortunately there is a lot of other stuff that is involved in maintaining a farm that has nothing to do with horses. About a week ago I was feeding the horses one morning and I noticed this huge tree limb was down. It also happened to be over a fence line. Thankfully it was not touching the fence and hadn't damaged the fence at all when it fell. I don't have any idea why it fell either. We hadn't had any wind, rain or other type of weather and the tree is (was?) healthy.

I was NOT happy when I saw this one morning

I knew it would mean a lot of work cleaning it up, and this job would be especially hard since there was fence involved. I didn't say anything to Jason about it and he never said anything to me about it. Apparently we were both operating under the theory that if you don't discuss a problem and pretend it isn't there, then the problem doesn't actually exist.

Last night when we were driving home he mentioned out of the blue that we really needed to take care of the tree tomorrow. Remember, we hadn't discussed this problem yet, however he knew that I would know exactly what he was referring to. Unfortunately I did know exactly what he was referring to. And he was right, we couldn't just leave it there and wait for it to collapse on the fence. This is a huge limb and it would wipe the fence out. So when I got out of bed this morning I knew this task was waiting for us. Ugh.


We wanted to tackle this job with all of the tools at our disposal. We decided to use the old Kubota tractor. That way if we managed to squash the tractor with this tree limb it would be the old tractor. We loaded up our trusty Kubota utility vehicle with our chainsaws, a logging chain, and the other assorted things we thought we might need and drove the two Kubotas over to the tree. Bear checked with his union rep and he was cleared to work on Saturday and was our supervisor for this job.

Bear was the only one who was excited about this

First we put the bucket under the limb on the east side of the fence where it was touching the ground. Jason removed some of the bigger limbs with his chain saw.

Then we had to relocate both Kubotas and our assorted equipment to the OTHER side of the fence to tackle the hard part of the job. Holding the limb up off the fence while removing it from the tree. Jason climbed the fence and went back to the other side to remove some more of the branch while I was on the tractor manning the hydraulics. I'm sure he is thrilled to know that I was holding the camera with one hand and running the hydraulics with my other hand.

Jason removed as much of the limb as he could and then climbed back over to my side of the fence. The front loader of the Kubota is the only thing keeping our fence from being destroyed at this point.

It was time to bring out the logging chain. There are so many uses for a logging chain on this farm it is amazing.

Jason was able to successfully pull the limb away from the fence. Yes! We thought things would all be an easy downhill slide from here.

He repositioned the logging chain to pull the rest of the limb off of the tree. But the limb had other ideas and really wanted to stay attached to the tree.

Bear was transferred to "jail" in the back of the trusty Kubota utility vehicle to keep him out of harm's way. We wouldn't want him to have to file a workman's comp claim against us.

Jason continued trying to remove the tree limb from the tree. He decided to try and push it off with the front end loader. It did fall away a bit more but it was still hanging on.

It is amazing how little bark it takes to hold this huge branch onto this tree. If the bark is still so darn strong why did the stupid thing fall to begin with??

We decided to cut off part of the branch and then try pulling it off with the logging chain again. We were hoping with a shorter section of branch we could have the chain higher on the log and get more leverage to pull it off. It worked and we finally had the branch all the way off the tree!

Then we had to continue with the chainsaw work, cutting everything up into pieces and making a huge burn pile. As much as Jason makes fun of my chainsaw it does get the job done!

Jason's chainsaw decided to give up the ghost just before we finished. One of the hydraulic lines also snapped on the front end loader as we were using it to dump the large logs onto the burn pile. Thus, as I type this Jason is at Tractor Supply getting replacement parts for the hydraulic line. We will also be purchasing yet another chainsaw to add to our collection. Apparently you can't just use one of the other four chainsaws because they are all for specific uses.

Our huge burn pile

So how did you spend your Saturday? I am hoping you did something far more enjoyable than remove huge tree branches from a fence line, break the hydraulic line on your tractor and kill your $500 chainsaw!!

New Chicks And Other Pictures

I'm not exactly sure when these chicks hatched. I know they weren't there last night, and I noticed them today about mid-morning. They hatched on one of the workbenches.

Newly hatched chicks

Following mom

Exploring this big, new world Running to keep up with mom
And of course we still have the retired horses living on the farm. I haven't had any pictures of them the last few days.

Poco never gives up; he rotates between Faune and Ogie. I could take this picture almost every day, just substitute which horse Poco has chosen to victimize.

We All Need Good Help

I think I have mentioned a few times that Cloudy is the Best Barn Cat Ever. We actually had a wonderful predecessor to Cloudy named Barney. Yes, Barney the barn cat. My dad came up with that name and I'm pretty sure he must have pulled an all-nighter to produce a name as creative as Barney for the barn cat. By the way, Barney turned out to be a girl and she had a nice, long life with us.

Cloudy has been with us on the farm for about ten years. He is wonderful about keeping a close eye on the new arrivals for a couple of days. He naps on the ledge in their stall, or sits in front of the quarantine paddock when they are turned out and is generally a constant presence around a new horse for the first couple of days. His attention is short lived though as he moves on to other things after a new retiree has been here for a day or two.

I actually cat-napped Cloudy from another barn. I was traveling back from an out of state horse show and laid over for the night at a barn about halfway between home and the horse show. Cloudy was the cutest little kitten and would attack my wraps as I was rolling/unrolling them and climb up my jeans and generally demanded attention. I was asking one of the guys who worked at the barn about him and they had gotten him from someone in a free to a good home type of deal.

Their idea of a good home was different than mine as they didn't plan to neuter him, vaccinate him or feed him. I hardly slept that night fretting over this adorable kitten's fate. I got to the barn really early the next morning to wrap and load my horse and drive the few hours home. No one was at the barn yet so I made the executive decision to take the kitten with me. Since he was climbing all over me I didn't have to look very hard for him! I seriously doubt they ever noticed he was gone. So I am publicly admitting that a) I stole the cat and b) he did not just show up at the barn.

We have another barn cat named Olivia. You have never seen a picture of Olivia and that probably is not going to change. Olivia is quite shy and somewhat elusive. She and Cloudy are great friends but Olivia is not in to having her picture taken. I mostly see Olivia when I am up in the hay loft during the day or when I am in the barn to do my last check at night before going to bed. She is often in the aisle of the barn at night but not during the day. Olivia is definitely nocturnal.

These are pictures of Cloudy from today. I took these as Cloudy "helped" me unload some feed and shavings from the truck.

Who is that strange cat looking at me?

Walking on the shavings

Good thing the truck has a bed liner

Is he cute or what?

Videos

Some recent videos from around the retirement farm. We have quite the cast of characters. Of course there are the retired horses, as well as the donkey, the two stray goats, the flock of stray chickens, Poco the evil shetland pony, Cloudy the barn cat and all of the dogs. I don't think I left anyone off of that list!

Cloudy, Number One Barn Cat


Feed me NOW!


The goats and the rooster


More of the goats (and a brief glimpse of how they destroy the trees)


Ogie, Trillion, Sebastian, Faune and Poco wandering through the pasture


Sparky the donkey on the run with Ogie bringing up the rear

Pictures

Some of the pictures I have taken of the various equines around the farm in the last couple of weeks. I don't think our residents could ask for a better retirement home.

Grazing on a beautiful day

Sparky loves to roll, or maybe it is more accurate to say he lives to roll

Two bays, Elfin in the front with Apollo behind him

This one wasn't taken at the farm. Me on Bonnie playing in the water jump at a cross country course. On our way home we had a trailer accident thanks to some idiot slamming on their brakes to do a u-turn on a narrow, two lane road with no shoulder on a blind curve going down hill!!! It is probably best they left their scene of mass destruction as I would have had to hurt them if I knew where to find them. They would also be paying my vet bills. So this is a lovely photo reminder of the last ride I had on Bonnie and probably will have for awhile, and unfortunately Lexi was in the trailer as well. Life isn't fair sometimes. Hopefully they will both be fully recovered sooner rather than later.

Everybody Say Hello To Chance

I'm sure any family members reading that will do a doubletake since Chance is also the name of my brother-in-law! Chance also happens to be the name of the most recent horse to join us for retirement. Chance is a thoroughbred who joined us over the weekend from Connecticut. He walked off the trailer and looked around for a moment, and then realized he was surrounded by grass and immediately put his head down and began grazing. He's rarely lifted his head up since then!

About to pull into the driveway

Where am I?
Unfortunately for Chance he isn't used to having so much grazing so his turnout time is limited for now. He has grazing sessions in the mornings and in the afternoons as we slowly build up his exposure to grass.

Grabbing a huge mouthfull of hay

This approach is standard for new arrivals. We take our time introducing them, and more importantly their digestive system, to the grass for a couple of weeks. Even the horses that are going to continue to be stall boarded have to go through this transition phase onto the grass because they are out on excellent pasture either all day or all night. Most of the horses are out 24/7 but there are some that are not.

His favorite activity

Stretching his legs

We also use these first couple of weeks to allow the horses to get to know us and for us to get to know them. We learn about their personalities, their quirks, and use this time to determine the best turnout buddies for them. Once they are ready to be out 24/7 or to be out all day or all night we introduce them to their new roommates. Once they settle in with their new "family" they are quite content to stay with them permanently and don't seem to care if they ever see the inside of the barn again. We've found this to be true even for the fence runners and those that had never really been turned out before.

I want to sniff this strange creature

He lost interest in the chickens quickly

Cloudy always stays near the new arrivals for a day or two

We've had fun as we've begun the "get to know you" process with Chance this week. He has excellent ground manners and a very laid back and friendly personality. His owners told me they thought he had dropped weight in the last few weeks and he does somewhat have that "ribby" look, so we will be looking forward to putting some more weight on him and returning the shine to his coat. He will be having his teeth done in the next week or so as I've seen him quid his food several times, and I will be paste worming him tomorrow.


I say this with 100% bias, but I think Chance is a very lucky horse, as are all of the horses here. He has been retired fairly young due to arthritis and thankfully for him the people in his life feel he has earned his spot with us. There is always so much emotion and stress when the decision to retire a horse has to be made, and it is even harder when the horse is a younger horse. I think if Chance could talk he would say he didn't know what he did so right to wind up here, but he is really appreciative that the trailer happened to stop and let him off at this farm!

Rain = Mud

Last year we experienced a record breaking drought here in the southeast. I hope to never have that experience again, especially since it was our third year in a row of drought. The two previous years had been manageable, we were drier than normal but hay production was decent and it wasn't awful. 2007 was a nightmare from a farming perspective. We watched hay prices more than triple thanks to the drought and other factors.


This year our rainfall had been normal, in fact even slightly above normal in my local area, and all was right in our world again as far as rainfall. Sometime in mid or late July we had a couple of weeks where it didn't rain. No one thought too much about it as dry spells in the summer here are normal. After a couple of weeks we were starting to get antsy, and by mid-August we were all having flashbacks and nightmares about last year.

We ended up catching two days of a good, steady rain from the remnants of Tropical Storm Fay which was just what the doctor ordered after a few weeks of no rain at all, and the rainfall has continued to be ok since then. We all hope it stays that way, especially the horses. They need to be able to get their mudbaths in!

Of course the gray horse has to be the dirtiest of them all!

Pictures Around the Water Trough

Who knew you could take so many pictures of horses around water troughs??

Harmony always sticks her tongue out while she holds water in her mouth. She loves to drool it all over unsuspecting people who don't realize what her game is.

Teddy isn't impressed by it thoughIt looks like Apollo and Leo both had a nice roll in the dirt before taking a drink
Buffy and Teddy share a drink
Elfin takes a drink while Apollo dribbles water back into the trough
Homer and Finn share a drink
Finn and Apollo share a drink with their feedbags still on. I have about a two second window between when they finish eating and they take a drink. This is why I use feedbags with a solid bottom and mesh sides.Ivan, Homer and Elfin

And then Apollo managed to squeeze in there as well! I did't think 4 horse heads would fit in there.

What Would Happen?

I was talking with one of our clients the other day about some pretty serious health problems she is facing. As often happens we form a friendship with our clients as we become e-mail and/or phone buddies as we keep in contact about the horses. I knew something was going on in her life as I had left her a couple of messages about needing some things ordered for her horse.

Like any true horse person, even though she didn't have the energy to phone or e-mail back, she did make sure the things her horse needed made it here. But the fact that I hadn't heard back from her, just received the requested items, told me something out of the ordinary was happening in her life. I connected with her on Friday and she filled me in on the very serious health issues she has been dealing with, as well as the upcoming procedures and treatments she will be dealing with.

I'm not going to discuss her health issues publicly except to say that they are of a very serious nature and that she had no warning that there was such trouble brewing with her health until all hell broke loose. I wish there was something more that I could do for her aside from saying "oh my gosh, I am so sorry, please let me know if there is anything I can do to help." Realistically there isn't anything that I can do to help since she lives several states away. So we will give continue to give her horse the best care we can and include her in our thoughts and prayers. It isn't much but it is the best we can do.

During our conversation she said "I know this will sound morbid but I've updated my will so that will be taken care of and his board will continue to be paid should something happen to me. " Quite frankly I did not find that to be morbid at all and appreciated her candor with me.

We are contacted a few times a year by people who are doing estate planning and including their horses and other pets in their planning. I know we have been written into a few wills and trusts and that should these people die before their horses do that their horses will come here and there is a trust to pay their board. Of course if your horses are sound and rideable then your estate could easily sell them and/or place them into good homes. On the flip side if your horse is unsound, older, or has health issues that need daily management there really needs to be a plan in place for them.

I realize this post is a bit of a downer and not much fun, but I feel this is an important topic and one we all need to think about.

On a lighter note, this little guy was hanging out behind the barn today. He was chowing down on a bunch of leaves.

Stretching for a leaf

He wolfed this leaf down in about 2 seconds; then he realized I was interested in him and hopped away

Cloudy, our fearless barn cat, was only a few feet away and falling down on the job. He never even noticed the rabbit.

Stupid Girl

I had somewhat of a frustrating, aggravating day today. The good parts of my day was the time spent with the horses. They were all in wonderful moods and put a smile on my face. The irritating parts of my day involved all of the other stuff involved in running a retirement farm. The stuff that isn't as fun as playing with the horses.

First I went ten rounds with my laptop as I wrestled with QuickBooks Pro while I was eating lunch. I was trying to generate a custom report and was driving myself insane modifying, changing filters, etc. I could. not. produce the report I wanted. After refraining myself from beating my computer to smithereens while in a frustrated frenzy, trying the help feature, searching the help section of the Intuit website and generally living the definition of insanity (you know, trying to do the same thing over and over again with different results), I called Intuit and payed the forty nine bucks to have them tell me exactly what buttons to click. They did, I got my report (and I was oh so close to puzzling it out on my own as it turned out) and the world was beautiful again.

I made a quick run to the feed store which is conveniently located about 7 miles away and was back out with the horses for the rest of the day. I was winding things down at about 5:30, had fed everyone dinner, the stalled horses were turned out and stalls cleaned, troughs and buckets washed and filled and everything ready for tomorrow. The only thing left to do was to unload the truck from my earlier trip to the feed store.

I had parked the truck over by the house as I had also stopped at the local produce stand and bought a few veggies, had my mail on the front seat and stuff like that. So I go get the truck and begin the simple task of backing it up and driving the very short distance to the barn. The truck is long and I had parked in the spot closest to the house since the other spot was occupied. I guess I didn't leave enough room between cars because I had to put the two back tires in the grass to avoid side swiping the Tahoe while backing up and turning around.

Except when I went to go forward again I was stuck. No problem, that is why we have four wheel drive, right? So I put it in 4WD and still no forward movement. I think about this for a second and decide that probably I just need to back up a little farther and give the tires a chance to get some traction and a little forward movement going before the little bump up onto the asphalt. By the way, there is pretty good slope right behind our driveway that gets steeper the farther back you go.

So I back up farther and have the truck all the way off the driveway, have it in 4WD and still the stupid thing isn't moving forward. But every time I ease off the clutch I do go backwards a little bit. I'm really trying not to just pop off the clutch and gun the truck and tear up the grass. We've had a good bit of rain in the last couple of weeks even though the last few days have been dry. After a minute I realize I have crept closer and closer to the fence and gotten myself onto an even steeper incline than where I started. Great.

Jason and Bear in front of the truck. The best part is we just traded trucks and have only had this one for four weeks. Yet another reason why I wasn't anxious to seek help and listen to the rhetoric. Bear is licking Jason's chin in the picture.

I sit there for a minute pondering my options. Jason is out of town. Maybe I should call Jason and seek counsel from him. Definitely not a good idea!

I can call my dad and ask him to help me. A worse idea! If I knew how to code the html to have about 20 slash marks through that along with a few big, black x's I would have done so.

These options are absolutely unacceptable. I will be six feet under pushing up flowers and Jason and my Dad will be saying "remember that time she got the truck stuck in your back yard?" Because as much as I love both of them there is still a bit of chauvenism left on this farm. If one of them had gotten the truck stuck they would be commiserating, "yeah, you know it can get really slick in that shady area, plus that incline, and there just isn't enough room to turn that truck around on this driveway." However, the only reason this would happen to me would be because I'm a girl.

As I'm sitting there in my non-moving truck and looking at the fence in the rear view mirror while pondering my apparently limited options, I realize the song "Stupid Girl" by Garbage is playing on the radio. It happens to be near the end where they are repeating the words Stupid Girl over and over again. And some people say the universe is totally random. Yeah, right.

I did a quick Google search to remind myself who sang this song. You remember this song:



I continue to ponder my options. Call a friend to get some assistance. I'm not going to ask someone to drive over here for this. Take my mom up on her offer of a dinner I don't have to prepare and ponder other options for a while. DING DING DING, we have a winner!!

I leave the truck and drive the trusty Kubota(TM) to my parents' house and am eating some yummy, homemade vegetable soup when my mom mentions that dad is leaving for a meeting. I perk up at this immediately. Dad breezes through the kitchen, asks me how my day was, (I answered with the generic "fine") and leaves. As I hear his car backing out of the garage I explain my dilemma to my mother.

Mom: "Do you want to wait for dad to come home and maybe he can help?"

Me: "Ummmm, absolutely not."

Mom: "Are you just going to wait until tomorrow?"

Me: "No, why don't you help me. I'll get the logging chain, you drive dad's truck and pull me out."

Mom: With a somewhat horrified look "uh, well, um, ok"

To give my poor mom some time to get in her comfort zone with this we drive the trusty Kubota(TM) back to my house and assess the situation. I finally decide that I will unload the thousand pounds of feed and the dozen bags of shavings to get the weight out of the back. So mom and I (all 5'3" of her!) unload the feed into the back of the trusy Kubota(TM) and leave the bagged shavings on the ground for the next run with the trusty Kubota. Bless my mom, she never was completely into this whole idea of the farm and moving into the country. I guess all these years later, especially in these moments, she is reminded of those doubts!

Bear in the trusty Kubota top and Jason with the trusty Kubota below

Next I decide that I will get some of the scrap lumber left over from fence repairs and place some behind each of the tires. I get this done and decide to try one more time to gently drive forward. Again I'm trying to ease off the clutch and ease onto the gas pedal. My mom helpfully points out that I've rolled slightly backwards onto the boards. Well that's great mom, but I'm in FIRST GEAR, not reverse!

I try one more time and just let off the clutch and give a little gas, and triumphantly drive slowly up the incline and back onto the driveway. As my mom prepared to leave she smiled and said "I won't tell anybody." I was going to just let it be our little secret, but now that I've rectified the situation I can actually see the humor in it.

Plus, it is 9/11 and I had been thinking about that today, remembering where I was when I heard about the attacks. As I looked back on my day and the fact that my worst problem was my new truck stuck in my back yard my problems were pretty surmountable. I'm not mourning the loss of a loved one today. Life could be so much worse. So with a little bit more of a spring in my step I commenced unloading the feed from the trusty Kubota(TM), went back to pick up the shavings I couldn't fit on the first load and called it a day. Finally.

Me in the entry way of my parents' house a few months before I sold Questar. I'm sure my former clients would be impressed to know that I now spend my time in dirty blue jeans driving a utility vehicle with a logging chain in the back for emergencies!

Deja Vue

First of all I hope I spelled that correctly!

It seems like every time I looked around recently I would see horses grooming each other. I realize that isn't terribly interesting, but I have to say it is cute to watch. It is fun to watch the horses form friendships and interact with each other. A few of the residents here had either never been turned out at all, or only been turned out by themselves prior to retirement, so they had never really had the opportunity to form strong social bonds. All of the horses here are turned out in small groups on several acres, even the horses that are stall boarded. It is so interesting to me to watch the horses learn to just relax and be, well, horses.

One thing I have noticed is that I will regularly see certain horses engaging in mutual grooming with other horses, and some horses I have never seen do this. For example, Elfin is an extremely social horse and has been since the day he arrived. Yet I have never seen him engage in mutual grooming. Teddy is another horse that has been making friends since he walked off the trailer but again I've never seen him grooming or being groomed by another horse, and the same for Harmony, Ogie and Buffy and a couple of other horses. I wonder why? Anybody have any thoughts on that? I guess it is possible that I've just never been in the right place at the right time to see them in the act, but after all this time I find that doubtful.

Here are a few very repetitive pictures I've taken in the last couple of weeks of some of the horses grooming each other. What is scary is I have a lot more pictures that look a lot like these that I could also post, but I won't bore everyone that much!

Sebastian and Faune. Sebastian is a little over 15 hands and Faune is just shy of 18 hands so Sebastian is really having to stretch!

Sebastian and Trillion
Leo and Apollo Leo and Homer

Trillion and Faune, still BFF

Have you had enough for now? Are the horses all starting to look exactly alike?

Meet Elfin

Elfin is a really cute bay thoroughbred who joined us from Florida. He is owned and very much loved by Stacey, and she chose us to have the honor of hosting Elfin in retirement. Elfin was Stacey's first horse, and they worked their way up the ranks in the hunters during their eleven years together.

Top Elfin and Leo; Bottom Elfin, Homer and ApolloI have a lot of respect for Stacey. She has been responsible for almost all of Elfin's bills since she got him, including through high school and college. I think it says a lot about Stacey and her devotion to her horses that she has always found a way to support Elfin. In fact, Stacey told me that one of her criteria when she was looking at universities was there had to be a nice barn nearby. If there wasn't, then she wasn't interested in attending!

Elfin always likes to be part of a crowd When Stacey got Elfin he was a really green thoroughbred fairly recently off the track. They showed in the 2'6" hunters for quite some time as they were both green, and she said Elfin could also be pretty spooky at the jumps. Of course, that probably also contributed to his nice jumping style! I totally believe this about Elfin because he doesn't ever under react to anything! If he thinks something is good he thinks it is really, really good. If he thinks something is bad, then it is really, really bad but all in a very non-threatening, ADHD kind of way. He has quite an endearing personality.

He'll probably be on a truck headed back to Florida after Stacey reads my next comment, but he really reminds me of Franck Eggelhoffer in the Steve Martin movie Father of the Bride. Franck was the very hyper, really outgoing, hilariously funny wedding planner in the Father of the Bride. I'm telling you, Franck and Elfin are kindred spirits!

I think they even look alike

In the spirit of Franck, Elfin is also extremely social. He fell madly in love with Grand when he first arrived and they were inseparable for the first couple of months. Over time they both started to branch out though, and Elfin definitely makes the rounds. He likes to be in the middle of a crowd and would be one of those people who never went to the bathroom by themselves. I see him routinely with each of his roommates. He doesn't tend to have just one horse that is his bosom buddy, he is equally attached to ALL of them.

Top Grand and Elfin grazing together, Bottom Grand and Elfin in the sprinklerI'll get back on track to Stacey and Elfin now. Eventually they started working their way up the ranks after spending a few years in the 2'6" hunters, and their last year of showing together, 2006, was a great way to end their showing career. Stacey and Elfin were competing in the 3'6" amateur owner hunters by that point. Some of the highlights of their year include being champion or reserve at almost every show they went to, finishing up 5th in Zone 5 in the younger a/o hunters for the year, reserve champion in the younger a/o hunters at the Zone 4 finals that year, 2nd in the $5000 junior-a/o hunter classic at the Zone 4 finals and year end champion of the younger a/o's for the Central Florida H/J Association. I think we would all be happy to list those on our horse resumes!

Stacey and Elfin showing in the Amateur Owner hunters
I remember when Stacey first contacted us about the possibility of having Elfin retire at our farm. I must say her approach was so typical of how we first meet our new clients. First she grilled me in a very polite way via e-mail. Then we talked on the phone and she filled me in on all of Elfin's nuances and Elfinisms. I could tell that she really wanted to trust us, liked everything I was saying, but Elfin was her baby and there is always that nagging little voice that we all get wondering if you are making a mistake. Stacey has since visited the farm and Elfin a couple of times and has been able to see for herself that the horses really are happy here!

We are thrilled that she did choose us for Elfin's retirement home, as we love having him here. Thanks for the vote of confidence Stacey, we know it was hard for you to make that final decision.

Following in Leo's footsetps; I guess Elfin heard I would be blogging about him this week and wanted to look his best

Pictures

Some of the many pictures I have taken in the last couple of weeks.

Homer Leo

Teddy napping while Harmony grazes

Ogie peeking out of the run-in shed

Harmony grazing

Harmony and Buffy

What a cute face

Friendship and food make for a great day

I see peaceful scenes like these every day

Bella peeking through the grass. She is my shadow around the farm.

A chicken, a donkey and a horse all in the same picture

Trillion was resting his head on Sebastian's back while waiting for breakfast

You Want Them Painted What Color???

When I first decided to start blogging I worried that I would run out of things to write about. Much about our daily life here is pretty routine and how many pictures of grazing horses can you possibly ask people to look at? However I seem to keep coming up with new things to complain, err - I mean blog, about on a regular basis.

My dad has this thing about everything on the farm matching. I'm not suggesting that is a bad thing, in fact I agree with him. But it is easy to suggest all these things when you aren't the one doing the work! My mom, bless her, would never suggest something so insane as painting a bunch of run-in sheds . . . . . WHITE! Could you possibly pick a more impractical color for sheds in the middle of horse fields that get used as scratching posts on a regular basis?? However all the houses, barns and structures on the farm are all white with a red roof. So my dad has been on this kick about getting the sheds painted.

Jason likes to spend as much time messing around with the ladders as he does painting

It is a long way up to the top

Every time he would bring it up I would just do the smile and nod thing and then carry on with my day. But he got to the point where he wasn't letting it go. I complained to Jason at great length about this, and he in turn did the old smile and nod routine right back at me! I'm not suggesting my dad has bad taste, in fact the farm is gorgeous and his vision for the property is mostly why. But I have so many other things that I could spend time and money on then painting a bunch of sheds - especially painting them white!

Fully primed and partially painted

So in all of my spare time (yeah, laugh with me, spare time on a farm??) I have been priming and painting sheds. Yep, every single one of the sheds has to be gone over twice, first with primer and then with paint. The worst part is it all has to be done with a brush. The sheds are all board and batten, so even using a roller with a really heavy nap you still can't get the entire surface covered so it has to be painted on with a brush. I like to pretend I am training for the "Karate Kid" with the whole wax on/wax off thing. There was a part where he had to paint that was part of his karate training, right? Since I haven't seen the movie in 20 years or so I can't remember exactly.

The good news is Carlos has been available to help again. He has done far more of the priming and painting than Jason and I have. If it were up to just us the first shed would still be about half primed.

Carlos hard at work

The other reason we are so lucky that Carlos had time to help with this project is because I don't "do" ladders. In addition to my fear of snakes, I also dislike ladders. I have a little step ladder I use around the barn which is fine, and I'll go a few rungs up a ladder, but I'm not going to be holding a paint can in one hand and a brush in another while the ladder leans against a shed and I'm hanging off the side painting. Nope, not going to happen!

Yes I realize my clothes are disgustingly dirty. I work on a farm every day! Now those clothes are not only dirty but covered in paint.

Trying to look happy, not pulling it off all that well!

I do my share of priming and painting while standing on the ground and I let Carlos and Jason handle all of the work from the ladders. I don't remember exactly how tall the sheds are, but especially at their peaks they are quite tall, and I'm thankful that Carlos and Jason will climb up and down the ladders. I made the offer in more than one post that people are welcome to stop by and put in a day of work with their chain saw. I now extend the offer to put in a day of painting if you are so inclined!

One completely painted run-in shed; and many more to go!

Yes Dad, I am grudgingly saying, in public on the world wide web, that the white shed looks quite nice in the background. I doubt the horses care though. One coat of Thompson's Water Seal would have worked fine for me, and it could have been sprayed on. Apollo and Leo are our horse models for this picture.

Another Week, Another Visit From The Farrier

You've met our wonderful farrier Gwen before in this post. I also subjected you to my mini lecture in that post as well: just because your horse is retired does NOT mean you can slack in the area of farrier care. I live in a very "horsey" area and there are many farriers to choose from. The problem is finding a good one. There are several that will gladly charge you $300 and up for a shoeing job, but I have learned first hand that this still doesn't guarantee you good farrier work on your horse.

I feel like I have a national treasure in Gwen. In the above mentioned post about Gwen, someone commented that I should share the before and after pictures of her horse. At some point in the not too distant future I am going to take her suggestion and do that, although I will show before and after pictures of a few horses. I am routinely amazed at the condition of the hooves when the horses arrive here. And these horses are coming from loving, caring owners, often from top show barns, and I often wonder if their farrier was blind. Gwen does an amazing job with these horses, and when their owners visit they are often amazed at how much better their horse's feet look. Especially since they are barefoot and retired. (please refer to the previous post as well to read about how we use boots and pads to transition painlessly to barefoot. I don't want someone to decide their farrier is bad and pull their horses's shoes because of reading this. I am not suggesting that in any way!).

I could rave on and on about Gwen. She is always on time, she never misses an appointment. The one time she needed to reschedule she let me know with plenty of notice. She genuinely cares about the horses and the horses love her, even the ones whose owners said they were difficult for the farrier. She is very quiet and gentle with them. She is a student of the hoof and constantly looking to learn from new people and expand her skill base and knowledge. I love spending the day talking with her while she works as she is a genuinely nice person. On top of that winning personality she is seriously cute, has a tiny, perfect figure (she just does NOT look she could work under horses all day!), and she just got this fab new short hair cut that looks so chic on her. Really, if she wasn't so freaking nice I would hate her guts!

Without further ado I bring you the pictures from our visit with Gwen last week:

Bonnie looking alert while Gwen works away Gwen with Sparky. Gwen is one of Sparky's most favorite people on the planet. He knows her truck and comes to the gate when he sees her drive down the driveway. Sparky standing patiently with his hoof on the stand

Sparky loves Gwen so much our biggest challenge is getting him OUT of the barn when she is finished working on him. Here he has his feet planted and is refusing to budge.

Poco is every stereotype you can think of when you think pony.

Caught in the act. Biting Gwen on the arm. Yes, I try to work on his ground manners but I never seem to get anywhere! The fan is blowing his mane around.

Harmony is the definition of herd bound, and is never too happy about being in the barn. She likes Gwen though and is good for her.

Since I was already on Harmony's bad list I went ahead and gave her a bath as well. That really made her happy (that was said with much sarcasm). Instead of putting her back out right away I put in her a stall to dry In between screams to her friends she entertained herself. Here she is chewing on the door.

Screaming at me to let her out. (Okay she was actually yawning)

Rubbing her head on the door to entertain herself

Letting me know she would have the last laugh. She rolled as soon as I put her out. By the gate. In the dirt. Leo politely waited his turn. Well, he made a few calls to his friends in between bites of hay.

Leo with his hoof on the stand Homer looking very alert while Gwen works away

Ivan made lots of faces for the camera to entertain himself. He liked to open his mouth when the fan was blowing on him. I have no idea why.

Sticking his tongue out at me.

I don't even know what to say about that. Ogie is another one that is not crazy about being in the barn, although he has good manners once he's in. Ogies manages to rest his hind leg while he has a front hoof on the stand
That's all folks!