Vet wrap & saddle bags

One of my horses, Skippy, lost a front shoe.  We decided to try an Easy Boot on our ride today.  She could probably go without her shoe but we erred on the side of caution and used the boot.  Only thing is I wasn't sure it would stay on.  It seemed just a tad too big.  Saddled the horses, out on a test ride.  Lost the boot 3 times in 2 miles.  Yup, too big.  So to remedy that situation I decided to put vet wrap on her foot then put the boot on.  Zoe and Skippy were very patient with all the stopping we did on this ride.  I carry lots of things in my saddle pack and vet wrap is one of them.  Only I discovered that my vet wrap was old.  Very old.  I did manage to get it unwrapped, ripped alot of it in pieces to get a solid strip going, tried to do it with minimal lumps in it-finally got her foot wrapped and the boot back on.  We decided to keep it at a walk with a few slow trots and try not to go on many technical up and down hills.  The boot stayed on.  Yay!  But one of the morals of the story for me concerned my old vet wrap. I need to go thru my saddle pack on a more regular basis and take stock of what is in there and replace old stuff.  Also need to pick up a smaller Easy Boot.

Grandson's trip to the barn

It seems that about every 3 months I take my grandson, Zeke, to the barn.  So it was time-today.  He is 19 months old now. I didn't take any pictures of him with horses because my hands were too busy keeping him safe.  He did enjoy sitting up on them, smiled alot, even hugged Sky while sitting up there.  So here are other pictures.

Amma showed me how this lever moves the bucket, I knew it did something!

We have been talking about wheels and this tractor has big wheels!

I found a big truck 

Hugging Little Foot 

Napping on the way home

Endurance horse mets trail horse

This week I got to go riding with an old friend, K, and her horse Major.  It was great fun to go riding together.  The last time we did this was about a year ago.  We see each other more often than that and I enjoy catching up with K's horse activities on her blog....trails-and-trials-with-major.blogspot.com.  Our horses are different types of movers.  Major is more of an endurance horse, he likes to move out, trots fast, enjoys distance, and new places-just his nature.  Zoe is more of a trail horse, trots but not too fast, distance is okay but not all the time, and new places-well she's getting better at going to new places-just her nature.  So we decided to ride together this week.  Pushed the "edges of both of our envelopes".

We went the back way to Look Out Rock.  Zoe in the lead and she trotted some, but was a bit lazy so I had to get on her case with the spurs.  Major followed and was such a gentleman, he didn't run up on her and gave her some space.  And Zoe didn't mind him being back there.  For 2 horses that don't see each other very often they were being polite to each other.

On the way back Major was in the lead.  K let him trot but not his fastest trot which was fine with Zoe. Zoe had to really move out to keep up and sometimes wanted to break into a lope to stay with him.  But I just said no, pulled just a little bit on the reins and she stayed at a trot.  I wanted her to work on her extended trot...which was slower than Major's "not so fast" trot.  So sometimes Major was way ahead of us, around curves and out of site.  It was okay because I knew K would stop and wait for us.  What was nice was that Zoe was not panicked that Major was out of site and going faster than her.  She just listened to me and we caught up with him.  Major was being very good and listening to K, trotting towards home but not as fast as he probably would have liked.  And stopping to wait for us.

Sometimes we would let the horses walk side by side.  Major was great.  Zoe laid her ears back a few times but for the most part was fine with having him beside her.  The last time I met up with another rider that I don't see too often and we rode side by side-Zoe had a terrible attitude.  But today was much better...mares...can be so finicky.

We decided that we should do this more than once a year.  Maybe we will aim for twice a year!  We don't ride together very often.  Our horses aren't good matches for each others gaits.  But for a few times a year-they can handle it.  And today they handled it wonderfully.

K and Major 

Me and Zoe 

                 

Coyote

Today I didn't have to ride anywhere to see wildlife.  This coyote was outside of Zoe and Skippy's pasture.  Looks pretty healthy to me.

Ice

I liked the pattern in this puddle when I was out on the trail the other day.  Usually the ice lines are straight but this one had curves.  

Mom...I TOLD you I like my mud!

One of the few clean spots on my horse lately.....sigh

Wasn't a boring ride

Today I had a fun ride.  It was fun for many reasons.

Zoe, and Sky (with riders) helped Glory out to the trail.  Glory is a younger filly with not much trail experience.  Her owner decided to hand walk her out to the trail head and walk back with her.  We had done this before and it worked fine.  But today was different.  We put Glory between us with Zoe in front.  Glory decided to act like a young horse, not knowing how to obey or what to do with her extra energy.  She was a little too energetic on Auburn/Folsom road and we stopped while her owner dealt with her.  Around the corner Glory decided to buck, kick, fall and slide on her side.  Zoe heard all of this and was not able to see it so she got excited and danced a few steps.  I turned her to see and Zoe just stood there while the owner dealt with her horse.  Zoe was a little excited but very controllable.  Sky just stood there too.  It's nice to have calm horses while one horse isn't so calm.  Then we continued to the trail head (by the way, Glory and owner did just fine and made it back home fine too)

Little did I know that we would get to practice being calm with excited horses a few more times on this ride.  At the trail head we said good bye to Glory and owner and met up with Dune and owner.

I took everyone the back way to Look Out Rock only I've found another way that stays off the rutted road.   Dune's owner was happy with the ride, she was amazed at all the different things to see.  On the way back Zoe was still in the lead and Sky in the rear and Sky decided to try to charge up the trail when we picked up a trot.  We stopped while Sky's rider dealt with him.  Zoe and Dune did really good, just stood around and waited.

Then we decided to try something different on the sewer road just before we cut off for the trail to FLEC.  Sky has recently been helping Dune with some trail lessons at this juction in the trail.  The girls wanted to try trotting off and leaving a horse behind.  I said ok, but with 3 horses it would be tricky.  The plan I came up with was to leave 1 horse at the man hole cover, the other 2 horses would walk away together, go 1/2 way up the road, 1 of them would stop there and the other one would continue on to the top of the road but stay in sight of everyone.  Then the original horse left behind would walk up to the 2nd horse.  Then get left behind again while the 2nd horse walked up to the 3rd horse.  At the end the horse left behind would join the other 2 horses.  We started this out at a walk and it worked fine. Zoe got to be the horse left behind and the other 2 did great.   So we tried this at a trot.  Zoe was again the left behind horse and she did fine.  Then we mixed it up and Sky got to be the left behind horse and he did fine.  Then Dune got a turn and he did fine.  When Sky got to be the left behind horse Zoe didn't do very well trotting away with Dune.  She was having a PMS day (Pissy Mare Syndrome)-got to love those mares.  I kept her trotting but boy did she have attitude-alot of verbal reprimanding and rein correction was involved.  She was happy when Dune trotted off away from us to the top of the road.

Then we tried to take the trail back towards FLEC.  Sky in the lead, next was Dune and Zoe last.  Sky thought it was time to charge up the trail.  He got a little excited I guess.  (Owner off and disciplining horse)  Dune got excited too and tried to charge but didn't get away with it.  (Owner circling horse)  Zoe got to see all the excitement this time and danced a few steps but listened to my reprimands.  It really helps when ALL riders know what to do with their horses to calm them down and get back control.  I've been on trail rides with people who didn't know what to do with their misbehaving horse and the ride is no fun.  I start to get worried about the poor rider with the misbehaving horse-concerned for their safety.  Then all the horses start to get worked up because there is no correction/disciplining going on.  It makes for an uncomfortable/tense ride.  But this situation turn out better-all riders took care of their horses in appropriate ways and we were back on the trail.

So I guess I liked this ride for many reasons.  It was good to work on trail manners with excited horses. It was fun to show someone some new trails.  And it was fun to work the left behind excercises.  And it was good practice trotting next to another horse with my PMS horse.  We will have to do this again.