Posts Tagged ‘horses’
Taking Advantage
Unlike my usual mode of operation where I dig into a big project that commands the bulk of my day, I set about trying to touch as many little tasks as possible to take advantage of this quick dose of summer-like weather that has shown up. We hit 80°F yesterday!
One technique I employed was to simply jump on whatever popped into view and do a minimum amount of work to achieve satisfactory progress.
The easiest of these is continuing to pick up a winters-worth of fallen branches wherever I turn. I tidied up the barn a bit since it was delivery day for bags of feed. That triggered the moving of Cyndie’s treasured picnic table made from a repurposed door out to her chosen location beneath a giant old tree in the woods by the house –kicking away fallen branches as I went.
I was eager to clean out the flattened ornamental tall grass by the shop garage. Nothing fancy here. I kicked my perfectionistic desires aside and focused on the intention of making short work of it.
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I made a point of getting the horse water fountain cleaned while the herd was out grazing new sprouting blades of grass in the back pasture. Of course, they eventually noticed I was up to something and came running in to check on me. I hustled to replace the stopper so the pans would start filling with water. Light didn’t wait and poked her nose in to drink before I was able to get the cover on that muffles the loud spraying from the water valve.
Then she circled back to get in proper order behind Swings, who politely waited until I had collected my things and headed up to the barn. All four of them looked rather cute lined up nose-to-tail to take turns at the waterer.
The best way to take advantage of a summery day in April is to go for a bike ride, so that was something I intended to fit in with as little extra effort as possible. Having an E-bike made this much easier for me. Gliding along with an electric assist made my first ride of the season on the local hills more of a pleasure cruise than a strenuous workout.
Keeping it short and sweet got me back home in time to feed the horses their evening rations.
Even though it feels like summer, there is still snow to be melted. The pile of snow that slid off the hay shed lands on the shady side of the structure. It might be the last snow to exist on our property this year.
My last task of the day was to do a little light housekeeping so Cyndie wouldn’t return to a complete disaster. It’s only been a week but I feel like I will need to adjust to having a housemate again. I’ve enjoyed being able to leave my things laying around without having them be in someone else’s way.
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Temporary Fix
Sometimes a girl just wants a little alone time. I don’t blame her one bit. Poor Mia holds the dubious position of being last in the herd hierarchy and frequently gets told she is not allowed to stand where she happens to be at a given moment. Constant admonishment has got to get old. I find it annoying to watch.
It makes Mia the jumpiest of the four horses. Yesterday, I spotted her laying down for a mid-morning nap all by herself way out in the front field.
The situation stood out to me because, for a horse, that vulnerability of laying down to sleep usually relies on another member of the herd watching over them. I suppose Mia had just gotten fed up with the rest of the herd and needed a little extra space.
When I got close enough to see around the barn I was relieved to find the herd wasn’t entirely neglecting to keep an eye out for one of their own.
Light was standing guard, just from a distance this time.
I always feel a little bad about interrupting a napping horse and paused for a moment, on my way to put a splint on the broken post, taking pictures while contemplating whether or not to proceed. I hadn’t even finished that pause when I saw the initial movements of the way a horse gets up off the ground. Mia’s nap had ended.
Did she feel the energy of my arrival? It wouldn’t surprise me one bit.
It isn’t pretty, and I doubt it will withstand any additional assault from the weight of a horse, but I’m thoroughly satisfied with the temporary fix of the post that Swings ran into at the gate opening.
I had grabbed the first two saved sections of 2×4 I saw leaning on a wall of the shop before hiking down to the scene of the damage. This band-aid will suffice for now. Being that it is located well out of view from most vantage points, there is a high likelihood I will let this crude “temporary” repair remain in place until a new reason triggers a need to replace it entirely. I’m in no hurry to go through the effort of unscrewing all the boards and pulling up the bottom half of the broken post to install a whole new one.
Temporary is a relative measurement, isn’t it?
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My Reality
Each day when I describe details of my experiences it is a function of a basic tenet of writing: write what you know. One thing I know about is the perceptions I have of the activities of my days. Yesterday, I turned my back on the NCAA Women’s national championship game when it became obvious to me that Iowa would not beat LSU and I went out to tend to the horses.
A glance at the reading from our outdoor thermometer surprised me with the number 51. Looking for a second source, I opened a weather app to see what it offered for a current temperature. The reading from Red Wing, MN –twenty miles to our south– was 57°F! I did not expect this level of warming yesterday. The new snow remaining on the ground from the blizzard Friday night was quickly being transformed into water. Our drainage ditches were flowing like rivers.
I have no idea how this fits into the entanglement of the quantum mechanics of our physical world, but I do know that this quick melt significantly increased the level of mud in the paddocks. At the same time, I cannot describe how I occasionally get a sense of someone in Nepal practicing an endless recitation of the mantra “om mani padme hum” as I breathe our air and take meandering steps half a planet away.
The horses were giving me the impression of being spectacularly patient about the slow melt we’ve been having this spring while they were also slipping into behaviors of being annoyingly impatient about getting served pans of feed after I showed up. The impatience is easily soothed by the arrival of their food and the quartet of munching sounds conveys a new meditative peacefulness that I gladly absorb.
It is April and there is a reason to think we might be gardening soon. Does this image look like our garden is eager to get going?:
I’m trying to absorb some of the horses’ patience about the uneven transition from the snow season to our growing season.
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Not Fooled
April. Really?
Fool me once…
I thought I was going to shovel snow. APRIL FOOLS!
It was more like cement. Maybe stucco. Plaster?
Just to add to the ruse, nature makes it look gorgeous.
I fear this mess will be un-plowable. How fast will it melt? I’m going to clean up around the edges and see how conditions change after the sun shines on it for an hour or two.
I don’t think the horses see much humor in this kind of practical joke. Our trees don’t think it’s very funny, either.
My new zero-turn mower is due to arrive on Tuesday.
Happy April everyone!
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Getting Bugged
March weekends are spectator sport-acular and the past two days didn’t disappoint. It’s primarily college hockey and basketball competing for my attention as both sports are heading into their final four tournament games next weekend. Between the many men’s and women’s games, I snuck in portions of a Minnesota Wild NHL victory, MSL Loons match, and even a half-inning of MLB Twins grapefruit league game.
I LOVE seeing athletic endeavors. My basketball skills were learned in grade school and I played in the neighborhood, on intramural teams in high school, and in pickup games after hours with co-workers. I was a terrible shooter and generally too short to be effective but I knew how to dribble back in the days when officials would call palming violations.
It bugs me to watch poor dribbling discipline allowed to happen unchecked. Carrying the ball, letting it bounce over shoulder height, turning the hand over like it doesn’t matter. It matters to me. Unfortunately, it doesn’t matter to referees anymore.
I hate to be a whiner about horses getting frisky over the increasing hours of higher-angle sunlight but it bugs me when they get unpredictably jumpy and put my well-being at risk. I had a lapse of good judgment for a moment and tried standing my ground against Light as she wanted to run out from beneath the overhang because Mix was flexing her dominance. Thankfully, Light paused just long enough for me to come to my senses and get out of her way to let her pass.
I think I startled her by staying put and leaning into her chest. She stopped for a surprised second, allowing me to realize the mistake I was making. I would have felt awful if that had enabled Mix to give Light a bite in the butt. In this case, Mix was just telegraphing her disrespect toward Light’s direction with pinned ears and a feigned step.
Another thing that bugs me is box elder bugs.
Really? That is the sign of spring that greeted me as the sun warmed the south side of the barn yesterday? No thank you.
I’m going to stay focused on the calls of the robins that have returned to the branches of our trees. They don’t bug me at all.
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Mud Nap
The benefits of mud have been manifest in facials and baths but I bet not many have considered the wonder of a mud nap. When mud is pretty much all you have on a sunny spring afternoon, why not? Mia chose to do just that while I was nearby, scrubbing away to clean out the green slime growing in the waterer. I was aware she had dropped down on the muddy slope behind me while I was struggling to reach every complex nook and cranny –corners were actually becoming more black than green– but I didn’t give her more than a quick glance.
Mia got my full attention when I heard her start to snore. That is evidence of a good equine nap. She was resting her snout in the mud, which lets her drop into a deep sleep without laying all the way over with her cheek on the ground. Maybe that would be a bit too much mud for her.
I pulled out my camera, hoping to capture the sound of her snores in a video but as soon as I started recording, Light stumbled because she was falling asleep without locking her legs, and that woke Mia. The focus of my attention shifted to Light, as she seemed to be fighting an epic battle to NOT lie down to sleep.
Maybe she had accepted the role of staying on her feet while Mia sought the few moments of deep sleep but didn’t realize how mesmerizing the quiet March sunshine was that hour. Her knees buckled multiple times. She took a step back. She stomped a front leg on the ground. She was not going to lie down.
The reason I have decided to not upload the video is that it is seven minutes long with periods of not much happening. It looks more like a picture than a video.
When Light finally brought herself under control, I turned my attention back to Mia, hoping she would drop back into that deep level of slumber that produced the snore. That didn’t happen but the nuances of her adjustment and readjustment of her nose resting on the muddy ground were interesting to watch on a micro level. Then she nickered.
That was definitely not a snore. I think she was dreaming. Probably because the mud made for such a wonderful surface on which to sleep.
It always interests me that the horses get drowsy while I am making a racket nearby. Plowing around the barn with the ATV often results in horses napping. As I clattered with the waterer and triggered the loud sounds of water jetting onto the metal pans, they were getting sleepy. Then I stopped for seven minutes and there was barely a bird chirp or a distant bark from a dog.
Suddenly I became self-conscious about making any sound for fear I would now disrupt their peace.
I gathered my bucket of cleaning tools and tiptoed through the muck back up to the barn so they could continue in nap mode uninterrupted.
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Eaten Tree
There was a time when the willow tree was happy and healthy inside the space that we fenced off for our small paddock. Knowing full well the threat livestock pose to trees within their confines, we tried several versions of barriers intended to keep the horses from chewing the bark. It was fine with us that they munched the hanging branches. It gave the tree a look of being well-trimmed at all times.
After the first few attempts to protect the tree trunk proved insufficient –read: the horses just chewed up whatever we tried using– I chose to wrap the tree with hardware cloth. In time, even that protection broke down under the constant rubbing and biting from the horses, but it no longer appeared to matter by then. The tree was beginning to fail from the compression of the soil around the roots and we suspect, the heavy dose of horse urine that stagnated there as well.
Even when provided two years free of horses in that paddock, the gorgeous willow tree continued to show evidence of an ongoing downward spiral. Based on that, when we found out that new horses would be coming to live with us, we decided we would no longer do anything toward protecting the trunk of the tree.
This is what unobstructed access to the trunk of the tree looks like after two years:
I’m a little surprised by how interested the horses are in the roots. They’ve almost chewed more roots than bark at this point. At the very top of the image, you can see the horses also like to reach up to chew well above their shoulder height. Since we’ve given up on the tree, I see the chewing of tree bark as taking away some of the pressure on the boards and fencing around the overhang.
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Busted Post
When we noticed a large gash on Swings’ side a few days ago, I probably should have searched further for the possible cause but I assumed it was either from one of the other horses or the fence up by the overhang where they spend the majority of their time.
Yesterday, we had a farrier appointment that had me closing gates and putting halters on the horses in preparation. When I came to the gate by the round pen I found an alarming sight.
I’ve worried that the individual cross boards might not hold up against the weight of the horses when they push against them but I never expected they might snap off one of the 4×4 posts. Oops. Most likely, too many horses were trying to squeeze through that gate opening at the same time, and at high speed and Swings smacked into the fence. That must have been quite a scene.
I won’t be able to replace it until the ground thaws so I’m planning to splint it for a temporary fix. I need to buy some big wood screws first, though. Until then, that gate is closed to further traffic.
There was a bit of wind yesterday that contributed to unsettling the horses before I started putting halters on them and closing gates. Getting haltered just riled them up even more. I worried that this would make things much harder for the farrier, Heather, but she breezed through all except for Light. The delays of Light’s skittishness over being constrained and having her feet picked up were not atypical behavior. We’ve changed our minds several times about what her issue might be but we’ve found that simply out-waiting her reluctance without adding to her anxiety has allowed Heather to give reasonable attention to all four feet during the last two sessions.
We are grateful that Tom and Johanne from This Old Horse always show up to support Heather, which takes some pressure off us in managing the horses’ behavior. It also feels good to have them get a fresh look at how the horses are doing.
Other than a broken fence post and a big scuff on Swings’ side, the horses were assessed as looking good and doing well.
Now it’s time for me to put on my fence-repairing carpenter’s hat.
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Hanging Ball
Lately, there are two very different reasons the horses have been confining themselves close to the shelter of the barn overhang. I was showing off the mud yesterday but that has now turned rock-hard because the air temperatures have plummeted to single digits with a wind that feels like someone set the clocks back to January. The snow down the hill from the overhang that was melting two days ago has become dangerously glazed again with the re-freeze creating a hazard that the horses wisely choose to avoid.
Just in time, I hung up a fresh boredom-busting treat, Uncle Jimmy’s Hanging Ball that Light immediately went for.
The enticing grains held together with a sweet molasses coating are hard to gobble because the ball is hung high and swings away from any attempt to get a big bite.
Sometimes I feel like it’s cruel to tease them with this but watching how they don’t give up over time and eventually the ball starts to show signs they are getting nibbles off it makes me think it is serving the intended purpose of giving them a challenge that helps fight boredom.
Surprisingly, I have yet to see the barn birds claiming ownership of these sweet grain treats. It seems like it would be obvious bird food. Just in case they are chipping away at it when I am not around, the length of time the treat lasts tells me they aren’t cheating the horses of nibbles. In fact, that would probably help the horses out because when it is completely round at the start, all they can really accomplish is to lick it.
How many licks does it take to get to the center of an Uncle Jimmy’s Hangin’ Ball?
The world may never know.
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Mud Returns
Pick your adage: Be careful what you wish for. What could possibly go wrong? You never know how things will turn out. How much worse can it get?
It’s March. We are ready to be done plowing and shoveling snow. We are looking forward to seeing the ground again. We want the snow to melt. However, the ground doesn’t suddenly thaw out all at once. Just like it freezes from the top layer on down, it melts in the very same way.
Well, the top layer has thawed just beyond the overhang and it is now a muddy, mucky mess. The water can’t soak into the ground because the next layer down is still frozen solid. Water is just standing in hoof-sized pools.
My perpetual quest to clean up manure beneath and around the overhang promptly becomes an unwinnable battle when fresh droppings land in the pockmarked slurry of muck the horses keep walking in. It is a Sisyphean task that I nonetheless continue to wage despite the mess and my limited success.
Meanwhile, the space beneath the roof suddenly becomes an even more luxurious oasis than it usually is.
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The long day of drizzling rain was beginning to become sleet blown sideways by gusty winds when I went down to feed the horses at dinnertime. Beneath the overhang, it was calm and dry. Once again, I found myself praising the location and orientation of this barn.
The mud might be around for a long time to come in the days and weeks ahead but we are already starting to get antsy for conditions to allow me to get back to landscaping projects and Cyndie to try walking the uneven terrain down to the labyrinth. We have hopes of being able to promote World Labyrinth Day on May 6 this year if the ground dries up enough for hosting larger gatherings by then.
I’d like to offer a shout-out to friends, Patty and Steve who plan to visit us in April to experience Wintervale in person for the first time. Here’s to the gift of unexpected connections/reconnections that seem divinely inspired. Thanks for reaching out to us, Patty!
We are three days from the vernal equinox. I’m sensing spring is preparing to be sprung. Is that too much to wish for?
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Relative Something 