Posts Tagged ‘Hunter’
Old Friends
Yesterday, Cyndie was in the vicinity enabling her to pay a visit to our horses at their current home a couple hours west of us. I am living the experience vicariously, aided by pictures.
That’s Cayenne and Dezirea who were in a corral of their own for some respite from harassing suitors seeking to be primary keepers. These ladies can definitely fend for themselves, but a little break from others is something we could all use from time to time.
At the time, Cyndie didn’t spot Hunter, but learned later he was off in one of the much larger pastures.
They looked great. Cyndie was able to untangle Dezi’s perpetual snarl in her mane.
I can tell it was a little heartbreaking for Cyndie, but still energizing to be with them again. Coincidentally, I found myself pausing in a walk with Delilah at about the same time Cyndie was with the horses, stooping to pull thistles that were overgrowing an old pile of manure in the large paddock.
I must have been feeling the reconnect they were enjoying and was drawn to the place they formerly occupied here.
Love those horses.
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Deeply Sleepy
I mentioned in yesterday’s post about my turning the compost pile in the paddock while Cyndie brushed the horses, but I completely forgot to describe the startling incident we witnessed while there.
While we silently toiled amid the unparalleled calm of a windless spring sunny day, Dezirea was wafting off to sleep. I wasn’t paying direct attention to her as I huffed over heavy pitchfork lifting, but that changed when she suddenly jerked.
“Did you see that?” I asked Cyndie.
She had.
Dezirea was standing on the slope just beyond the overhang, facing downhill. In the warmth and serenity of the morning, she fell into a deep enough sleep that her front legs buckled. In the same way I do when my head jerks in inadvertent loss of consciousness when unplanned sleep surprises me, she startled herself back to alert.
Sort of alert, that is.
Seconds later, she did it again, except this time, she actually dropped all the ways to her knees. We both tried to encourage her to simply lay down for a serious nap.
In our thinking, we could be trusted to watch over the herd while she slept. But I can understand her hesitance. My attention was not as aware of our surroundings as it was on what I was working on directly in front of me.
Struggling to get back on her feet, instead of going down the rest of the way to the ground, Dezirea made her way around so that she was facing uphill, where she resumed the usual upright nap that horses deftly accomplish.
I didn’t take any pictures during this drama, but I do have a series of images to share. I was intending to get a shot of Hunter’s mane, which he somehow finds ways to crop short, but he picked up his head and provided these views of his munching hay, instead.
Bon Apetit!
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Warm Welcomes
For those who haven’t been paying attention, we’ve reached the last day of February. Geez. It’s like 2018 is half over already. Tomorrow we welcome March to our calendars, historically a month when we can receive whoppers of snow storms in this region. In my youth, that was grand. Now, as a man with property and animal responsibilities, the big late-season storms threaten too much damage potential to be welcomed.
I’ll be pining for calm and boring as winter slowly makes its way into the history books.
After a couple of days back in our own bed again, things are settling back to normal. We are feeling fresh sensations of missing Fred and Marie (as well as Mike and Barb) and our meals and conversation on the lanai beside the pool, with the pond fountain spraying away spectacularly as our backdrop.
I have been enjoying a particularly warm welcome home from our cat, Pequenita. I think she missed me.
Not that Delilah didn’t, but ‘Nita just shows her lust for my attention much more emphatically. She steps right up for some prolonged hands-on contact and melts into a puddle of kneading, purring fur, regardless whatever blog writing I had in mind to accomplish.
On Monday afternoon, we welcomed a new farrier to the ranch, as George wasn’t available and the vet had prescribed some hoof trimming to treat Hunter’s laminitis. Our veterinarian provided a name and Cyndie was able to schedule the visit before we left town last week.
That was another reason I needed to have the driveway opened wide yesterday, after the two trucks had been dug free of the drift. Company was coming!
Hunter was a trooper, and suffered his way through standing on three feet, despite the pain. The new farrier, Marcus, said he tells people to imagine having migraine pain in the hoof. Today, Hunter is standing on a couple of reverse horseshoes, and seems to be okay with it, despite his otherwise having only ever been barefoot.
The reverse shoe supports the heel and relieves pressure at the toe.
We are definitely welcoming any relief Hunter can get. It’s been over a month now that he has been suffering, and pretty much everyone around here is suffering right along with him. It takes a toll.
Here’s hoping March brings calm weather and better health. It’s been a tough winter at Wintervale this year.
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What Led?
The weeks that have followed the unexpected death of Legacy, our Arabian gray who was the herd leader of three chestnuts, have been made even more difficult by some extreme winter weather, the death of a colleague and friend whom Cyndie worked with during her years as Principal of Eden Prairie High School, and now signs of some laminitis lameness in Hunter.
Among the many contributing factors listed for laminitis, we found that hormonal imbalance caused by stress of moving a horse or the loss of a field companion spoke directly to the situation effecting our remaining three. Sadly, this recent heavy snow accumulation, followed by the dramatic thaw, has added another risk by making the uneven frozen footing in the paddocks hazardous for bruising or mechanical damage to the cellular bond between sensitive laminae and the hoof wall.
On top of these issues, this weekend Cyndie and I were smacked with the reality that her car is in need of cost prohibitive repairs. Logic indicates it is time to shop for a different vehicle for her.
Roll all these issues together and our grieving minds both came to a similar thought: has our dream of making Wintervale Ranch into a functioning business met with defeat?
Life was a heck of a lot less complicated for me when I lived in the suburbs and only had to deal with maintaining the house and our tiny lot. I hate to admit there are aspects of that which look desirable in comparison to our current situation.
Our unpredictable and decidedly inadequate combined incomes do not make shopping for a replacement vehicle as simple as it once was for us. Right now, shopping for a different car seems to be a tipping point for our analysis of this whole crazy move to the country to build a self-sustaining retreat and learning center.
What led us here in the first place?
We found ourselves revisiting the series of inspirational events that sequentially fueled our passion and groomed our decisions. From the magical trip to spend two weeks with Ian Rowcliffe in Portugal, to Cyndie’s apprenticeship in Linda Kohanov’s Eponaquest workshops, to our discovery of this gorgeous property and log home in west-central Wisconsin, the mid-life transition we embarked on seemed supernaturally ordained.
Where is that inspiration now?
Instead of the surprisingly achievable answers and solutions that have blessed us in response to all the incredible challenges that arose throughout the early years of this adventure, we are increasingly noticing a lack of income-generating response to our offerings and an increase in stressful difficulties with our animal partners.
Obviously, the most dramatic stressor being Legacy’s sudden death.
Just like all that has come before, we know there is a lesson for us in this. Even though he is gone, Legacy still has something to teach us.
At the center of it all is, love.
We grieve because we love and experienced a loss, but loving is how we got where we are today.
We believe it is possible to rediscover the love and inspiration that guided us here and we are seeking to re-attune ourselves to more of the surprisingly achievable answers and solutions that have graced our journey thus far.
What led us here is exactly the same as what will lead us to what happens next.
Please keep your seat belts fastened and your arms and hands inside at all times for the remainder of this wild ride.
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Crime Scene
Yesterday morning, Cyndie walked into the barn to find one of the chicks was perfectly perched on the stick I had added to the brooder. Not only are our new babies healthy, but they are smart, too.
The horses are also smart, but they (or at least one of them) didn’t practice healthy decision-making overnight. Beneath the overhang of the barn Cyndie stumbled upon what appeared to be a crime scene. One of the slow-feeder boxes had been assaulted.
Evidence is entirely circumstantial, but we believe one of the geldings, most likely Hunter, was the culprit. The big unanswered question is why? And why all of a sudden, after years of leaving them be, for the most part.
There was a single isolated incident, way back when the boxes were first put in use, that we found one box mysteriously moved out of position. Both times, what surprised me most was a distinct lack of drag marks. I have a hard time visualizing how they might be picking up the box to move it without one part dragging in the dirt.
This time the box was both moved about 10 feet and turned completely upside down.
If I had to guess, I’d say the message for us is that they are unhappy with the limited supply of hay we have been serving, as well as the quality, since they are again getting more of the bales for which they have previously demonstrated a very vivid disdain.
Cyndie held out a suspicion that the grate may have gotten hung up and they were messing with the box to remedy that situation, but became startled by something, leading to the chaotic catastrophe she found in the morning.
That theory lost a little footing when she found this later in the day:
They didn’t even wait around for darkness to make their opinions known a second time.
I guess I should think about moving the trail cam to the paddock to capture what the horses are up to when the innkeepers are away. The mis-behaver might end up losing some privileges, which is the opposite of what he is after, I’m sure.
I hope this behavior isn’t a way to act out over jealousy about the new tenants getting all the attention in the barn. The chicks are just so irresistibly cute, don’t ya know.
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Precious Protector
Conditions weren’t ideal to assess Cayenne’s status yesterday, because the first days of March this year brought us a classic spring thunderstorm that showed up under a very-early-in-the-year Tornado Watch. It unfolded with uncharacteristically warm temps, high winds, LOTS of lightning, plenty of thunder, and finally, some pea-sized hail.
Cyndie moved the horses into the barn before the wild weather ultimately let loose, but she did have one interesting anecdote to share from a little earlier.
Whenever the wind is blowing, it puts the horses on edge, so they were already a little skittish when Cyndie was moving among the herd brushing out their shedding winter coats. As she was working with Hunter, a tractor in our neighbor’s field roared to life and startled the younger gelding into a little emergency evacuation drill.
Dezirea happened to be blocking his first escape route, so he faltered in his anxious reaction and suddenly appeared as though he wanted to go through Cyndie to get away.
Cyndie explains it all as happening in a split second, but she had time to have her own thoughts of panic and admonished Hunter not to run her over.
In that same instant, our somewhat hobbled patient in the new shoes overcame her tentative maneuvering and rushed to the scene, placing her body between Cyndie and Hunter, forcing him to make one last adjustment and exit, stage opposite.
Cayenne is obviously doing well enough to think fast and move even faster.
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