Posts Tagged ‘horses’
Light Wounded
Whose brilliant idea was it to write about healthy horses yesterday? Cyndie and Asher are both away for the weekend, leaving me home alone to tend to the horses and the mowing. When I popped out of the house first thing in the morning and headed toward the barn through the trees, I found Swings and Mia lying down, napping in the paddock with Light standing over them.
Right away, I noticed something looked odd with Light. She was twisting her head and neck, and looked really uncomfortable. I recorded some video of her gyrations and sent it to Cyndie for her opinion. I was unsure about serving their morning grains if Light was unwell.
When I did put out their feed buckets, Light showed no interest whatsoever, but the other three carried on with their normal morning routine.
It was a good thing the Vet was already scheduled for an appointment later in the morning. Light was fighting some invisible battle. Cyndie said it looked like maybe something had gotten inside one of her ears.
I thought it looked neurological. Before the Vet arrived, Maddy, our handler from This Old Horse, showed up to help get things prepared. She is the one who spotted a brief glimpse of a wound under Light’s mane, between her ears. We couldn’t get Light to settle down enough to check it, but at least now we knew what we were dealing with.
The Vet started in with checking teeth and vaccinating the other three horses. Swings went first, and as soon as the sedative kicked in, the doc had her hand in Swings’ mouth and pulled out a tooth.
Sounds like it’s time for Swings to be eating soft senior feed. At the ripe old horse age of 29, she is already down a couple of other molars. She looks so great outwardly, I tend to forget that her internal parts could be wearing out. Maybe we need to start treating her with a little more respect for her elderly condition.
Mia was next and tolerated the dental work stoically. Mix, the youngster of the herd by a year, didn’t need any tooth care and was done after a couple of vaccine shots.
That left Light, who did not want to let us touch her, but needed attention more than all the others. It took quite a few tries to get her cornered under the overhang where the Vet could administer a sedative and provide some sweet talk while the drug took effect.
It was not obvious how Light received this gash, but they suspected she had knocked her head into something. She was given something for the pain, and they went right to work filing her teeth. The doctor felt around for any other sensitive spots on Light’s head and mentioned the possibility of a minor concussion, but generally felt it wasn’t any worse than just the obvious wound.
The injury received a water-resistant aerosol bandage to protect the exposed tissue from dirt and flies, yet allow the wound to breathe to promote healing.
Now I just need to watch the horses for any negative reactions to the vaccine shots and keep an eye on Light’s wound to make sure it is getting better and not showing any signs of infection.
By the evening grain serving, Light was eating normally, but all the horses seemed a little less perky, like maybe the way humans feel after a dose of flu vaccines.
Just another day keeping four horses healthy and happy. Sheesh!
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Healthy Horses
While I have been distracted by the significant growth occurring all over our property, I didn’t notice that the surrounding corn fields have suddenly gone from little sprouts to full stalks. They must have doubled in height a couple of days in a row. They’ll be over our heads soon.
The horses seem to be loving the high grass in the back pasture. I’ve caught them romping around back there several times lately. Too bad it’s going to get cut again soon before the weeds can go to seed. I tried recording a video of them running back there, but only captured a few seconds of a sprint back into the paddocks.
Last night, while I was retrieving feed buckets, Light suddenly squealed and spazzed out as I was standing among them in the tight quarters of one side of the overhang. I was able to back away and give her room to kick and flail as the other horses did the same. It looked like she was hurting severely. I couldn’t find any obvious physical evidence, but my suspicion is that Mix bit her.
Her reaction looked a lot like mine did that time Mix nipped me on my back when I didn’t see it coming. I wanted to be mad at Mix for hurting Light, but since I didn’t see what happened, it wasn’t fair of me to judge. There hasn’t been much in the way of infighting among the horses lately, so I’m passing the incident off as inconsequential.
A Veterinarian is scheduled to be here today to administer shots to the horses and hopefully file down their teeth. We think Swings, in particular, is not chewing well, most likely due to sharp high spots that can develop on their teeth. She has also been “quidding” a lot, which is dropping partially chewed wads of hay from her mouth.
I tell ya, sometimes it can get complicated keeping horses healthy and happy. The rest of the time, caring for them is a breeze, and we get to sit back and enjoy watching them in all their glory.
In the woods lately, I’ve been seeing evidence of another herd that spends time with us, just mostly out of sight.
It’s fun to watch the variety of sizes of hoof prints that show up in the mud from deer using our trails. We’ve found several occasions of itty bitty prints that look like recently born fawns. When we come across some that look huge, I always hope it might be a buck that will shed its antlers on our property in the winter.
The horses are so observant, I’m curious about whether they get to know the deer that regularly frequent our land. I wonder if wildlife has opinions about domestic livestock, maybe feeling sorry for their confinement. At the same time, wildlife might wish to have food delivered twice a day, like the horses do.
I hope our rescued Thoroughbreds recognize they are living the high life here.
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Scary Moment
If I haven’t already ranted enough about how long the grass had grown at home while we were up north for ten days over the Independence Day holiday, let me add one last exclamation point. After I completed a second round of mowing, there were still enough leftover grass clippings to rake into windrows for making yard bales.
While I was playing around in that small plot above the barn, I heard some knocking on one of the horse’s feed buckets. We try to bring the buckets in after the horses have finished their grain, but I had left one out because there was a portion uneaten, and Mia was showing interest in it. If we leave the buckets indefinitely, the horses have a history of messing with them, and the metal handles get all bent out of shape.
After three knocks, I decided I better retrieve that last bucket before it gets wrecked. To my surprise, when I stepped through the door to the overhang, I saw it was Swings who was knocking the bucket in the spot where Mix usually eats, and she was standing with one foot in it.
Thankfully, she appeared totally calm with the situation, but at the same time, in a somewhat precarious position. Concerned that things could quickly take a turn for the worse, I bent down to assist her in getting out of this predicament. I reached through the fence boards and grabbed the sides of the bucket with each hand to hold it down, hoping she would then simply lift her foot out.
It didn’t work that way. I couldn’t tell if she didn’t want to pull it out or couldn’t pull it out. I got the impression her hoof might be wedged in the bottom, but it wasn’t clear since I couldn’t tell if she was pulling up or pushing down. The bucket was moving around and eventually pinned my gloved hand against the fence board hard enough that I began to bellow at the pain as Swings appeared to try standing on the hanging bucket with all her weight.
It was a scary moment. In my increasing panic, I tried to determine what was going to give. The bucket needed to be lifted upward to come out of the latch on the strap it was hanging from. I had no way to cut the strap in that instant. The metal handle looked like it was bending a bit, but the heavy plastic bucket wasn’t looking near its breaking point. It pretty much depended on what Swings was going to do next.
Luckily, she still seemed totally calm about the mess we were in, even with my screaming. Somehow, she shifted just enough that I was able to get my hand free, and it seemed undamaged. The residual tenderness of the bruise didn’t show up until later. Just as mysteriously, the two of us did something that allowed me to finally pull the bucket down while she moved to get her hoof out.
I don’t know how she got her foot in there in the first place, and if it was intended or not, but it occurred to me that she might have been unable to lift it high enough again to get it out. I’m still not clear about whether it was wedged in or if it was just her not taking the weight off that kept it stuck.
Thank goodness for the happy ending. I was home alone at the time, so that heightened my distress during the peak drama. And hooray for the other three horses remaining chill throughout it all. Once Swings had all four feet back on the ground and I was standing there holding the mildly reshaped bucket, it was as if they were all thinking, “What was all the fuss about?”
Nothing to see here. Carry on with your normal healthy horse routines. I’m going to go back to raking up grass clippings.
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Busy Morning
It’s the time of year when my mornings get jumbled up by live broadcasts of the Tour de France bike race. No time to play my usual morning word games. Conflicts with trying to write blog posts. And this morning, I need to prepare for the potential arrival of a crew from my asphalt company, who will be filling the cracks that appeared last winter and sealing the pavement overall.
That means I need to get the mower out early, and Cyndie needs to get her car down the driveway before they show up and keep us off the surface for a couple of days.
Enjoy this photo Cyndie captured last evening on her last walk of the day with Asher. I gotta go…
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Nonstop Mowing
When the order of the day involves cutting the grass or trimming the sides of our trails, there isn’t much in the way of adventures to write about. It was hot in the direct sun, the mower worked perfectly, I accomplished a little more area than I thought I would yesterday, and I still have over a day’s worth left to finish. That’s not counting the fence line trimming that usually takes several days to fully complete.
Even though I have so much groundskeeping work to do, we won’t get anything done this morning because we have a brunch date in River Falls with some old Eden Prairie acquaintances. To my family and old EP friends, the names Herzog and Westerhaus might ring a bell. You never know who you might come across in life after a move to the country like we did over twelve years ago.
That’s about it. Since that’s all I’ve got, I’ll throw in a photo Cyndie took of the horses grazing in the freshly cut hay field.
One added note: Cyndie just described a successful exercise with Asher off-leash while she was trimming small branches from the large oak limb that fell. (We don’t see much of each other on days when I mow and she is busy with other projects. I hear about her adventures later.) She said he busied himself exploring the woods for a while as she worked, then eventually wandered over to sit upright nearby on the trail and waited until she finished.
Good dog.
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Coping Nicely
While Asher, Cyndie, and I are able to take refuge from the extremely hot weather by retreating to the air-conditioned house, the horses must endure the blast furnace nonstop until it abates. In the same way that they stand stoically against the worst of winter’s cold, they find ways to make it through the worst of the muggy heat.
It’s a bit shocking to me that I didn’t find them the least bit ill-tempered when I showed up to serve their afternoon grains.
Later, when I arrived to retrieve the feed buckets, all four of them were out grazing in the back pasture. I thought it was weird that they were standing in the direct sunlight, as the heat had yet to loosen its grip.
One second later, Swings and Light had returned to the shade of the paddock. Out in the field, Mix and Mia were a picturesque pair. As I had my back turned, dumping a load of manure into a compost pile, Mix and Mia returned, as well.
It was a shock to step out into the open and find them standing right in front of me. It’s as if they use teleportation to cross that distance in such a short time. One moment, they are stationary with their heads down in the grass, and an instant later, they are calmly standing in the paddock before me, not even breathing heavily.
When Cyndie was out with Asher on his last walk of the evening, she found the horses mingling around in the vicinity of the shade sail, even though the sun was low enough that trees were shading the whole area. They have given every impression they are coping with the oppressive conditions nicely.
The last few rain threats have missed Wintervale, leaving us pretty dry. Cyndie spent a fair amount of time last night watering all the flowers she has planted around the house landscape. It would be great if we could get rain today and tomorrow, but not on Wednesday or Thursday.
We leave for the lake on Friday and will be gone for ten days, so I would really like to cut the grass one more time right before we go. I’ve got a routine established now with the electric riding mower that I can cover the entire property on three charges over two days.
You could say I’m coping nicely with the rampant growth that is occurring this time of year.
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Yes, Hot
It’s not just the heat, it’s the humidity, too. I started receiving weather warnings from the app on my phone sometime in the middle of last week. While at a restaurant on the bike trip, I spotted a weather map on a TV screen over the bar, and it looked like 80% of the US was depicted with a burning deep-red, indicating extreme heat was on the way.
Well, the heat has arrived. Try being a 1200-pound horse in this kind of weather.
Cyndie put out the large water trough that the horses have a history of splashing in when we intended it to be used for drinking. Now we would be glad to have them splash in it.
Mia came right over while Cyndie was filling the tub from a hose and dipped her face into it. I said she should have placed the trough under the shade sail. We may still move it there later today.
Asher isn’t taking the heat much better than the horses. Luckily, he has an air-conditioned house to lounge in. He begrudgingly accompanies us on walks to tend to the horses.
I am deeply grateful that this level of heat didn’t occur while we were biking for hours every day. If there were a choice between riding in the rain or high heat, I would choose the rain.
Unfortunately, I still have some mowing to do today. I’m going to try to finish before the hottest part of the afternoon. Not that it matters, since the temperature was 81°F with a dew point of 72° when we woke up at 6:30 this morning.
Yeah, it’s hot outside.
There is one really cool thing about today, however. It’s Elysa’s birthday!! Here is a celebratory photo of her from six years ago:
Happy Birthday, dearest! Stay cool!
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Quiet Time
Even though I continue to avoid exposure to news media, there are still enough trickles of information that I am aware of Marines being ordered to Los Angeles, where citizens are protesting. It is crazy reports like this, reflecting the many lunacies spelled out in Project 2025*, that are happening right before the world’s eyes, that reaffirm my choice to refuse to wallow in real-time reporting.
*(So I’ve read other people reporting, since I haven’t personally looked at the document; I simply voted against anyone who would have anything to do with it)
Instead, I walk outside and listen to the birds and the chirping frogs, bathe in the scenery of green growing plants and trees, and spend some quiet time with the horses.
Last evening, someone was riding a horse along the road at a slow, clop-clop pace, and it got everyone’s attention. Asher’s hackles went up, and he started barking with great purpose. While the other horses retreated to the small paddock, Mia did the opposite and headed all the way to the fence line along the road for a closer inspection.
When her curiosity was satisfied, she decided her return to the rest of the herd should happen at top speed. It is moments like this that make it easy to visualize these thoroughbreds as the race horses they once were. She did one heck of a beautiful sprint.
Long after all the excitement had faded, the horses chose to stay in the small paddock, grazing the grass growing there.
I snapped a photo when Swings was looking right at me, with the fresh branches of the once mighty willow tree on full display just beyond her.
When the evils of the current US administration have reached their peak, and people like me are incarcerated for any reason they choose, I will conjure memories of standing with these horses and the peacefulness I was able to experience at one time in my life. […that’s hyperbole (I hope) – if you didn’t sense it]
I will try not to recall the unhealthy air quality we were enduring at the time.
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Best Outcomes
One of my very favorite property maintenance projects is converting unsightly piles of tree branches into valuable piles of woodchips, and on Monday, we did just that.
It made a huge difference that we had previously staged a pile of limbs we had cherry-picked exclusively for their perfect size for our chipper. It kicks the level of efficiency for making useful chips way up when excluding small branches that can plug up the chipper and inevitably add long sticks to the chip pile.
It was pretty hot out, and I’d already snapped one shear bolt by the time we finished that stack of limbs, so we decided that would be enough chipping for the day. However, while I had the tractor out, I felt it would be a prime opportunity to mow the back pasture, and my time out in the heat got extended for a few more hours.
Over the past few years, we have waited well into the summer before mowing that field. We always hoped that the farmer who cuts and bales our hay field would also do the back pasture, but he’s made it obvious he doesn’t want to mess with the smaller field due to the short distances between fence lines. Since it will be up to us to mow it before weeds mature and go to seed, it’s to our benefit to do it much sooner in the growing season.
Knowing that the following day would bring rain made it that much more rewarding to have jumped on the chance to knock that chore off our list in a spur-of-the-moment decision.
The horses took great interest in my activities in their field and watched over me much of the time.
They are locked out of that pasture for a few days until the cuttings dry out, but I believe they will find the freshly trimmed grass to be a best outcome for their grazing purposes. It’s a nice reward when the end result is one that makes everyone happy.
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Goodbye Trails
We said goodbye to the Rails-to-Trails in the driftless region around Sparta yesterday and made our way home. I am very happy to be writing on my laptop again instead of my phone. The horses look to be in great spirits. Cyndie sent me a picture of Mia getting some nice attention from Light as they practiced a little mutual grooming.
It probably goes without saying that the grass needs to be mowed. That meant I couldn’t dawdle upon arrival yesterday just before dinnertime and had to set in almost immediately with processing the post-trip routine of cleaning and drying the tent, the rainfly, the ground sheet, my sleeping pad, airing the sleeping bag out, and sorting out clothes that need to be washed. I’ll get to the clothes later, but everything else is cleaned and dried in preparation for packing it up again in two weeks for the Tour of Minnesota biking and camping week.
With that taken care of, I hope to snatch a few precious hours this morning to mow before we set off for Savage, MN, to attend a graduation party for my grandnephew, Drew. I’ll cut what I can. We also learned that the person who was going to feed horses and Asher while we were away is no longer able to come. Sorry, Hays clan, our visit will be brief so we can get back for afternoon chores. Maybe I will be able to do a little more mowing as a result.
We have guests coming to brunch on Sunday, and Cyndie would like the place to look respectable when they arrive.
I’m still in the afterglow of the fabulous four days with Rich. Did I mention we were the only car and campers at the walk-in campground in Sparta?
We were also the only ones in the campground in Elroy (the one with the impossibly steep hill) on our first night there. Thursday night, one other campsite got claimed. After the first night sleeping in Elroy, we figured out ways to avoid making any extra trips up that incline. We left a lot of stuff in the car parked across the road so we could shower at the trailhead after riding and before heading out for dinner without climbing back up to our tents.
Yesterday morning, we were able to bring everything down in one trip, dropping it at the gate to be loaded after Rich brought the car over from the lot.
We added 44 miles to our 4-day total, riding the “400” State Trail from Elroy to Reedsburg and back before showering at the trailhead in Elroy and heading home. Brunch in Reedsburg was at Greenwood’s Cafe, a gem of a place for breakfast with a small-town feel.
The exclusive dose of gravel railroad bed trails took a toll on our minds and bodies, so if I were to do it again, I might look to add a change of pace with some miles on a few country roads. The trails plum wore us out each day. On the bright side, though, the effort should serve us well in preparation for the Tour coming up in just two weeks.
That reminds me, I didn’t give my bike a bath yet to wash off all the accummulated grime. I wonder when I’ll find the time to get to that.
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Relative Something 