Playin' around

I'm calling this Day 20 of the 100 day challenge, even though I didn't ride. I took Rosalee over to the maze and tires and worked her in hand.
First the maze- she did everything I asked including sidepassing over the boards, turns on the haunches and on the forehand and backing. She looked bored!
Then it was on to the tires. She spent some time looking at them....

and contemplating licking them....

and then off she went through them. Slooooowly, like "do I really hafta? Is this all you got?"

She was pretty ho-hum about it all as you can see in this video. 

Definitely not challenging to her! But this is the mare who can tip toe her way through panels laying on the ground, and tools and construction stuff while Ted was building the shelter- she was into everything! Had to lock her up to keep her nosy self out!
I am going to have to get busy with building stuff. I need some plastic barrels, so I can set them up for things like backing around them and sidepassing over them while they are laying on the ground; some ground poles that I can set in different configurations etc.

I took her down to the pond too, and "loaded" her into it.

The water has really dropped. I thought she would splash more but she was more interested in eating that swamp grass. Poor starving thing.....

Yeah. This is the mare that wouldn't go near the pond while under saddle a month ago, without me insisting. Silly thing.

Today is dentist day for Beamer, it has been quite a while since he was done. He has been having trouble chewing, so I think we are going to find lots of issues in his mouth.

Belle is hanging in there- is it just me or does her belly not look as dropped as it was?

Her bag is finally getting bigger too,

but still a ways from being as full as I have seen it before. But that can change in a very short time. I will be keeping a very close eye on her now.

I have some sad news to share, Sarah-one of my friends in Tennessee- lost her foal this morning, a paint colt. It is just heartbreaking to lose a foal as some of us know, so please feel free to send her some love in the comments.

Too hot! and still no foal.

A lot of places are stuck in the heat wave- at least we aren't as hot as they are in Arizona, but this is Canada fer cryin' out loud, and 34C (93F) is August weather, not June!  We get up to about 30% humidity with that and it's just stifling.
It's been too hot to do much with the horses other than mucking and feeding. I did manage to trim Rosalee's front feet the other day, she has some separation between her hoof wall and white line and had gravel packed in there, so I got that dealt with; an hour of dripping sweat pouring into my eyes wasn't much fun.
Today while filling the water trough, I tried spraying Rosalee off when she came up to investigate, turns out she loves it. So then Mesa came up to see what was going on so I discreetly managed to get a bit of spray on her too. She wasn't sure what to make of that!
Then she started to get itchy when it was drying off, must have tickled. It always amazes me how flexible horses are.

She is doing well, comes up to investigate me when I'm in the pen and I finally got her to stop presenting her butt first by refusing to scratch it and going to her shoulder and neck for rubs and skritches instead, and now she approaches me nose first.

Thea is really good with her, Mesa comes up to check her out and Thea just ignores her- which is mostly because she is focused on Rosalee all the time, but it's good that Thea doesn't snap at her like some other dogs I've had.

Beamer isn't quite as flexible as his daughter. No, Beamer, flies don't move when you just look at them!

The horse flies are here now, and Belle just hates them These are the big black ones with the white streak on top.They are nasty! I've killed a couple of them on her as I dodged her efforts to get away from them. She still does not have a full milk bag, so she probably has at minimum a few days to anywhere up to a couple of weeks or more before she foals, so those of you whose guess has passed, feel free to enter again with an updated guess.  Go to this post to enter another guess, or just amend it here in the comments if you remember all the info- and new people guessing are welcome!

Ride 20 and Mesa gets a trim

Shayla was in town so she popped by for a ride on Rosalee and I took Beamer out again. It turned out to be a ride/walk for me, Beamer was pretty ouchy on the hard ground so I only rode where it was soft for him. Rosalee was full of herself again, and not much fun to ride.

We found a way to get right to the river, which is behaving itself lately; not high and muddy like I expected with this heat melting the remaining snow pack.
I had a chat with the lady who owned Rosalee in her show years and told her about the issues I'm having, and the gist of it is that Rosalee needs to work, loves to work, and can take a lot of riding. I guess the semi retired life is not for her! So I have to step up my game. Today I built a maze out of slabs, and will put some tires  down too, and work on building a narrow bridge and some other obstacles - all this is in the turn out paddock, so I can ride her right at home and give her mind a workout. As well I really do have to start hauling her to the arena at least twice a week, and do my best to ride every day. We'll see how that works out!

Mesa needed her left hind foot balanced, so Shayla helped out and rasped the flare off and balanced the heels, and touched up the right hind. Mesa did really well!

She stood quietly; mama Coulee was right in front of her and that kept her quiet, and the panel helped to contain her. A good first experience.  Later in the afternoon I took her away from mama- out of the pen- and just visited with her, led her around a bit, tried to get her to eat foal ration (she was having none of that!). Coulee didn't seem to care, until Mesa got out of sight for a minute and then she came hollering to the gate.

She is leading pretty good now, not to the point where she will walk beside me without mama there but she follows me on a loose lead.

Wordless Wednesday - Ride 19

Zoomies and sillies = zillies

Click here to get the info and enter your guess on Belle's foal

I'll let the pictures tell the story.....

"Didya get all that?"

Colour

For those of you who guessed Woodrow as the stallion in the post below this one, I just realized that he also carries a copy of the cream dilute gene, so that adds smokey cream dun and perlino dun into the mix. If any of you would like to change your colour choice, leave your comment here and I will amend it.

Oh all right already, lets guess!!!!

Since a few folks have asked, we will do a foal poll for Belle's baby.
Here is the story:
 Belle foaled on June 5th last year.  She was AI'd on her 1 month heat, sometime in early July. Ultrasounded as not in foal: This is the stallion:

His barn name is Woodrow, here is his pedigree :http://www.allbreedpedigree.com/dun+it+ok.He is homozygous for black and dun. Here are his accomplishments:
47 ABRA points, ABRA ROM Dun Factor, 6 ABRA Halter points
AQHA Open Reining Point Earner
NRHA money earner
RHANW Year End High Points & money earner

After that, she was put in the harem of another stallion for pasture breeding. His barn name is Winston and this is his pedigree: http://www.allbreedpedigree.com/rollin+in+my+dually

She was with him from July 27 to August 31. He was unshown due to an eye injury, but his sire CD O lena was a well known champion cutting horse.
 Here is a link to the web page of the farm that owns these great stallions: Fleetwood Farms 

So- here is the deal. Belle started bagging up on June 5th. I checked and her bag is not quite fully distended as of today- but she has milk. Here are today's photos:

Belle carries the cream dilution gene, and she is homozygous for black and heterozygous for bay. For those who are not familiar with equine coat colour genetics, that means that she can throw black, brown or bay foals, with the possibility of a dilution of those 3 colours: smokey black, smokey brown, or buckskin.
IF she is in foal to the Dun stallion, you can add in the fact that he is homozygous for dun and black: all his foals are dun and black based. So you can add in grulla, smokey grulla, classic dun (bay dun) or dunskin. Due to the fact that Woodrow's colts will all be dun, that rules out buckskin, straight black or brown.

IF she is bred to the sorrel stallion, she could have a smokey black, buckskin, bay, brown or black foal.

Here is how the poll works:
You can guess which stallion, which colour, and colt or filly.

To simplify things, here is a chart.

Stallion: Woodrow 
Colour choices:  grulla, smokey grulla, bay dun, or dunskin. EDITED: Just found out that Woodrow also carries one copy of the cream dilute gene, so that adds some other choices: Smokey cream dun and smokey perlino.
Choose colt or filly

Stallion: Winston
Colour choices: Smokey black, buckskin, bay, brown, or black.
Choose colt or filly.

For the sake of simplicity, we are lumping smokey black and smokey brown together.


As for time frame, if it's the first one she was bred to, she would be 11 months and a week. If it's the second stallion, she would be 10 months and a week. (roughly)
Her history is 11 months and from 10 to 20 days before foaling.
So take a look at those photos, and give it your best guess! Do you trust the vet's ultrasound? Do you think she is bred to the second stallion with the possibility of foaling early?  You can include the day and time in your guess.

I will round up some local products sure to please whoever has closest to the winning guess!

Baby training and Belle is big

Today I started on my Mesa kindergarten program. I've pretty much been leaving her alone since she had so much handling while she had scours- bum washing twice a day, and sticking a syringe tube in her mouth a couple of times a day with pepto or yogurt. So I gave her a break, but now we are back at it. Catching, leading and picking up her feet are on the agenda.

She leads well when I am leading her beside mama, so now it is all about leading her away from mama. A little at a time!  She did good, and let me pick up all 4 feet. I hold by the toe and circle the leg in little circles before I set it down.
I also picked up a mare/foal ration to start her on. It will probably take a while before she acquires a taste for it.
Meanwhile..... Belle is really looking close to foaling. I am pretty sure it will be this month, not next month. So it's foal watch time again! I'm not going to run a foaling contest for her because there are too many variables, not knowing if she caught to the stud she was AI'd to (vet said no) or the one she was kicked out to pasture with. We will know by the colour!!!!

She is really heavy and has lots of swelling in her milk veins. I trimmed her hind feet the other day, and she could barely hold them up; I trim her with the foot almost resting on the ground.

Please be a filly!!!!!

Sunday Silence

Ride 18 Rosalee

Last night was Mesa's first night of living in the mare pen; I took her and Coulee out of the foaling pen and now they are living in the bigger mare pen with Rosalee. Coyote Belle gets the foaling pen to live in, except during turn out. I am not going to put her and Coulee together at all while they have foals, Coulee is too aggressive and I don't want her kicking Belle, or once Belle foals, don't want to risk her kicking Belle's foal. I saw her kick Mesa the other day; Mesa was goofing around like foals do and kicked out in play and nicked her mama's butt, and Coulee fired with both feet at her, I think she nailed her in the butt but could easily have broken a leg on her filly- good thing she didn't! Hopefully Mesa has learned not to play like that around her mama. So since I have 2 separate turn out grazing pens, I can keep them separate until weaning time. 

I alternate putting Rosalee in with Belle and next day in with Coulee. Mesa likes to hang out with the other mares instead of staying close to mama.

Coulee doesn't seem to care....

I've been busy trimming horse feet this week; got Beamer and Rosalee done on all 4, and got Belle's fronts done. Man she has thick hoof wall! I'll do her hinds this weekend. Shayla did Coulee for me the other day, so I am about caught up. 

Today I rode Rosalee. 

Started off in the round pen, the headed out to the lease. Once we got past the houses and away from the herd, it was like trying to push a wet noodle. Her attention was not on forward, unless it was to look at something and act like it was scary. Her evasion is to stop, back up a bit and shake her head, which is exactly what she is doing in this photo, hence the rein flying around.

She says no, I say go, and go we did. I had to use a lot of leg and once in a while resort to the spur to convince her to continue.

Even though she was frustrating to ride, it sure was pretty back there. Lots of wildflowers like these daisies.

And those  briar roses are in full bloom and smelling lovely.

I thought she would give me trouble when we came to the water puddles on the road, but it was only a minor glitch.

So I have given it some thought. I think I won't ride Rosalee out by herself any more, at least not until I have a lot more rides on her. I just do not enjoy it, and I'm getting to the point where I just want to have a relaxing ride, not a 7 year old horse that acts like a colt. So with her, any trail riding I do will be in the company of other horses, until she is a lot more solid for me. I'll do more arena work with her, perhaps start patterning her on barrels. She is broke in the body, knows all the reining stuff and gives all her parts, but her mind isn't connecting with what I want to do. So instead of me having a frustrating ride and getting all grumpy about it, I need to do something with her that we will both enjoy and build that up as a foundation to going on and doing other stuff.

Aaaaaand... in other news..... I bred her to Beamer last week.... if she catches she will foal mid May next year. I won't be ultrasounding her, will just wait and see if she shows heat in the next month. I kind of hope she caught, she sure likes to mother and I think she would be a good mama. I'm thinking she will cross really well with Beamer and there is a real variety of colour possibilities. With a side note that colour was not the reason for this breeding!

From Animal Genetics colour calculator:

Offspring Color Probability 

12.50% -	Black
12.50% -	Smoky Grullo
12.50% -	Red (Chestnut/Sorrel)
12.50% -	Dunalino
12.50% -	Smoky Black
12.50% -	Palomino
12.50% -	Grullo
12.50% -	Red Dun

Who's your mama?

I have been turning Rosalee in with Coulee and her filly every day, and today I kept them separate when I put them out to graze. I was quite surprised at how upset Mesa got when Rosalee had to stay on the other side of the fence; it seems that she is really bonding with that yellow mare. And surprised that Coulee totally ignored Mesa while she was running around nickering at Rosalee.

I am starting to work more with Mesa as of this weekend; it's time that she lets me handle her feet and lead her without mama. Gotta get this done before she gets any bigger! 

I love how balanced she is, the angle of her hip matches the angle of her shoulder and she carries herself so level.

Nice deep heart girth and she is muscling up nicely, while still looking feminine.

Mesa at 3 weeks

I am quite happy with my beautiful filly! She is quite elegant and she is nice to be around.

 She is athletic, and really uses her hind end and for a first foal she is developing well.

I love her even socks, and her plain brown wrapper is fine with me.

And I really love that she has Beamer's eyes!

Yesterday Rosalee spent quite a bit of time in with them, and it went well. Rosalee did try herding Mesa around.....

but little miss had something to say about it!

Coulee reminded her a few times to stay away from HER baby, and I have to show the next two photos because it was quite funny and humbling for Rosalee: Mesa went for a gallop and Rosalee though she should join in and did one of her little leap/twists- and wiped out! I didn't get the fall but I got the aftermath:

She's not rolling in those photos, she skidded on her back in the soft wet ground. Oh Rosalee! She was well behaved after that!

Three's company

Last couple of days were kind of a write off with heavy rains, but it did clear off today- got some much needed work done on my flowerbeds and then headed down to the horse pens. I had them all cooped up because the ground water has really come up in their pens, and I didn't want to turn Belle and Rosalee out in all that water, plus they have it chewed down pretty good so it needs a break. I taped off a small grass area and put them out there, and turned Coulee and Mesa in to the regular mare pen. They were pretty happy to get out, and Mesa had to show off a bit.

She will be 3 weeks old tomorrow, so I"ll clean her up and take some portraits of her; I like to do that at 3 weeks and 3 months. So far she is looking like an elegant little lady, but the video shows she can boogie!
I decided it's time to start bringing Rosalee in with them, because Belle is about 6 weeks from foaling, and in her last 4 weeks she will be kept in the foaling pen at night, so I have 2 weeks to get everything changed over so Coulee and Mesa can live with Rosalee in the mare pen. Today was a good day to start.



It pretty much went as I expected. Mesa has been visiting with Rosalee over the fence quite a bit, and Coulee is now more comfortable with Mesa being farther away from her, so it worked out good. I'll give them more time together tomorrow.
Mesa is almost over her poopy bum, she still gets a shot of pepto in the morning.

Pink lips!