Life on an Arabian breeding farm in Capitan, NM.

Wednesday, December 17, 2014

Wind, wind, go away…


 
The last few days were miserable with wind. The day before yesterday in fact (while the wind was howling) I spent most of the day with either a hot or cold compress on my eye. I guess I start wearing my safety sunglasses more. My eyes are still a little raw, but not bad. Yesterday I was a good girl, and wore my glasses all the time I was working outside, well at least until I started cutting wood.  Rudy, and I got Sere moved back to the pasture, and Star into Espree’s old stall. He was a little skeptical with three horses running around, but I told him it wouldn’t be a problem, and it wasn’t. Once in her stall Star carried on like a little idiot (she misses her buds) until feeding time. Tomorrow we’ll see how she does with the rest of the girls. I’m sure there will be lots of screaming, as the boys will be clamoring to see the new girl. It’s bad enough that Lizzie is in (again), and I’m sure that Star will come in shortly after she gets to visit the boys whenever she wants.
 
I know some people will probably have apoplexy over my just letting the girls run loose when I have three stallions in stalls. Rudy was even skeptical, but it is working out well. It takes about a week for the newness to wear off, but once it does the girls are fine. The one issue I have is that Lizzie seems to be constantly coming in season, and since Jeri thinks he’s still a 3 year old he’s lost a little weight running back, and forth all the time. One advantage I can see is that if I can train while horses are out, and about doing their thing, whoever I’m training will learn that above all else they need to pay attention to the person on their back. We’ll see how it works out, especially when I start working more with LBM. One thing he needs to learn about is behaving himself when there are mares around. Ibn used to be real good about it. We could take him to a show, and never worry about other horses either stallions or mares. He knew there was a time, and a place for nookie, and the rest of the time (especially when someone was on his back) there were rules to obey. Nowadays I’m not so sure. The last time I took him down Laughing Horse he bellowed at every horse along the way. I have yet to work with LBM on just about anything, including stallion manners beyond going back, and forth to the round pen. That’s one of the disadvantages of not having Rudy around all the time. He is the trainer after all, and I just don’t have the time to do all the things I need to do.
 
Meanwhile I didn’t get anything done at all today, not even wood. While I was feeding I hurt so bad I couldn’t even clean stalls. It wasn’t that windy, just cold. I came in took a nerve pill, and a muscle relaxer, and that was all she wrote. There are days when my body simply refuses to do what I tell it to do, and today was one of those. I did manage to let Star out with the rest of the girls before I bailed. I opened the stall gate, and out she trotted happy as a clam. She went to see her buds, and barely paid any attention at all to the boys. Of course she’s not in season so that helps big time. I assume things were quiet, but since I slept all day I really have no clue other than when I went to put everyone back in their respective stalls things were quiet. Even though she wasn’t Johnny on the spot ready to go back to her stall (this was her first day after all), she came right to me when I called. She’s such a good girl. I give it about a week, and then just like the others when she hears the gator she will start moseying back to her stall. Lets face it local grasses are great, but alfalfa is better.
 
Yes I’m back to feeding alfalfa at night, and grass in the morning. There’s no more Alfalfa mix for a while. Why is it that it’s mostly mares that are picky about their feed? The boys seem to inhale it no matter what it is, in fact sometimes it seems as though Ibn prefers grass. I’ve thrown him a flake each (when I can get small grass flakes), and he will go after the grass first then the alfalfa. Other times he wants the candy first, but whatever I give him (save for oat hay) he eats it all. At any rate this morning for the most part the girls turned their noses up at the grass until they realized that that’s all they were getting. Of course tonight as soon as I threw them their alfalfa they barely came up for air, not even for their goodies (those that got goodies that is), and trust me Marina always screams for her goodies.
 
So that’s it for today, no real excitement, which is a good thing. Hopefully tomorrow will be better, and I can actually get some work done. It better be since I will have twice the poop to deal with (after all what goes in must come out, and a lot goes in). I also have to cut wood tomorrow or we won’t have anything to keep us warm. Luckily it’s not supposed to rain or snow tomorrow, at least I hope not. You know those weather people there’s always one reason or another for the weather not turning out to be quite what they said it would be.
 
Later…
 

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