I don't even need to explain the title of this post to the horse people, but for the non horse people it means we all survived another 4th of July. It is a stressful day of the year for us, as well as many other pet owners. We have actually never had any issues with any of the horses being badly spooked (or honestly even mildly spooked) on the fourth but every year is a new year and you just never know.
I think a few of our residents could get really worked up in the right situation, but being out with their groups and with most of their friends paying the fireworks no attention, it calms the potentially frantic ones down and they just graze and hang out as usual. Plus, with everyone relocated to the new farm (that hasn't been new for quite awhile I guess!) there are a LOT less fireworks to deal with. All of our neighbors have large tracts of land so even if they choose to set off fireworks they aren't right beside the farm. A bonus is none of them typically bother with fireworks anyway so the fourth is a much easier day to deal with overall.
This year was brought an extra worry in regards to fireworks simply because it is so dry. I know it looks green in the pictures but if you really look at them you will notice that you see plenty of brown in them as well. It is SO dry here right now and sparking a grass fire with a stray firework would be ridiculously easy to accomplish. A lot of the counties in middle Tennessee have burn bans in place but most of them did not explicitly ban fireworks this year. Our county did "strongly recommend against their use." That made me laugh out loud. My comment to Jason was "yeah right, like THAT is going to stop some idiot from setting off their beloved fireworks."
I'm not one of those horse owners that thinks the world should modify itself to make it an easy place for horses to live. I realize horses (and dogs, cats, etc.) have to adapt and deal with life. However I would not complain if everyone with a couple of miles of my farm never had another fireworks display again.
I hope everyone else had a trouble free 4th as well.
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Levendi, Trigger, Hemi and Thomas
Leo and Chance
Slinky and Snappy
Lucky and O'Reilly grooming
Gus and Lotus grooming
Gus and George having a "normal" grooming session
then they switched things up and George decided to groom a front leg for Gus
Murphy, Chili, Wiz and Sebastian meandering to the gate for breakfast
Homer and Moe
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5 comments:
We survived the Fourth as well. We're in a severe drought . . . and the heat is horrible . . . but wait - Melissa loves the heat!
I do love the heat, ran three miles at noon today!
I wish I could handle the heat half as well as you, Melissa! But then again, living where I do, I guess I'm glad I can handle the cold better!
It's so true that every year is different. A few years ago, an earthquake sparked Hazel's fear of fireworks and thunderstorms. This year, I decided it would be kinder to give her a little diazepam before the fireworks to help her cope. It's very safe and leaves the body quickly.
We are in the Nation's capital and the fireworks can be very loud, even far from downtown. Plus there are the community parks, neighbours, and teens lighting those banger thingys. Of course, this year, we heard them for all of 30 minutes and the local area was quiet!
Our neighbors 1/4 mile up the road had their own firework party. Because we are in a valley the noise was deafening. They had something that sounded like an anti-aircraft gun! It would make a low WHUMPH sound and then BANG! Horrible. The horses and we goats were upset but got very scared when they had a barrage that lasted more than a minute, complete with fizzle-things. The whole thing went on for an hour and a half. My lady had just gotten ready to go up the road to ask them to stop when they stopped. Phew. She doesn't like to be the neighborhood meanie but she thought an hour and a half of illegal fireworks was quite enough. These kids had also been practising all month. Sigh. I hope they used up all their noise sticks.
Our neighborhood explosives freak got foreclosed on and is gone. A relief, as it is dry dry dry here as well.
Years ago this guy set the roof of his own housre on fire with his illegal fireworks. Touche!
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