BARBS, ETC

Preparations and Equine Weight Management

2012-02-12T12:32:00.000-08:00

Just like we need to keep certain things maintained on our vehicles to attempt to avoid mechanical failure, there are a few things that horses need to be kept up on as well. Spring riding is just around the corner so in preparation for that, I have my Spring Equine Readiness Checklist to start checking off. One of those items was accomplished yesterday. Brego and Maggie went to the vet for some scheduled maintenance. They were both due for dental work. Neither one have had anything done in that department . Brego just turned 5 and hadn't needed anything until now. Maggie has also never had her teeth floated. I mistakingly thought we had her in last year but juggling the care of 6-7 horses often gets confusing, especially when I don't keep up on my records! As it turns out, they both had wolf teeth and they both needed them removed. Typically, this is completed early on in a horses life. With colts, it's done at the same time they are gelded. Brego was gelded at 6 mos so his wolf teeth weren't in at that time. Other than the pain from writing a fairly large check to have this done, both horses are recovering fine. Maggie is a little more sore as it took a fair amount of yanking and pulling with pliers ( it's not exactly a high tech procedure to remove these things)to unearth the healthy roots she had. If she goes off the groceries a little, it is going to hurt anything.
Both horses were weighed prior to the procedure to help determine the correct dose of sedative to administer. Both horses are over 1000 lbs, Maggie the heavy weight of 1084 lbs. She's only 14.1 hands. Brego is just a big horse and still growing. My vet was concerned about Maggie, especially given that Magggie is your typical easy keeper Morgan. Along with that comes the risk of her developing Insulin resistance and Cushings disease. Because of this little fact that I am well aware of, managing her feed intake is an ever evolving issue in the spring and summermonths.

It won't be too much longer before green shoots start emerging in the pasture. Other than confining Maggie, which often backfires because she gets out of every confinement if she is hungry, my vet and discussed a few options:
1) get a grazing muzzle- Not sure she would keep that on.Have never used one of these and I would worry about the safety of her getting it caught on something.

2) Confine her- We already do this. She often escapes , through electric fence, and I come home to find she has been grazing on lush green pasture for 3 hours...or more..need to invest in electric fencing suitable to hold back Tyranousaurus Rex apparently.

3) Excercise, Excercise and Ecxercise- no explanation needed.

4)Back off her off hay ration and supplement with straw (up to a 1/3 )to keep her busy and satisfied. This one was concerning to me because straw can increase a chance of impactions. My vet felt that as long as she is a good drinker and has access to temperate water in the colder months, this should not cause an issue. Maggie is generally a good drinker when she isn't being ridden and we have tank heaters so, both things are in her favor. But this leads to some other questions specific to using this as a feed for the distance discpline.

I will pose this question:
Has anyone used straw with the horses they have in endurance training?
What issues have you had , if any?

In the meantime, I guess it's time to get into research mode.

Schlepping

2012-02-07T09:13:00.000-08:00

It seems like just few weeks ago I was enjoying the mild winter we were having. I was actually riding in my outdoor arena. The footing wasn’t totally ideal, mildly frozen but it was snow free and certainly rideable enough for some walking work. Temps were in the 40’s and even 50’s into December.
As if winter heard my thoughts, and probably those of many of others out there thinking the same thing, winter blew in with a fury in late December. The mountains received feet of snow in a 48 hour period. Fortunately the valley only received about 8 inches. You could almost hear the collective sigh from the skiers , snowmobilers and other winter sport enthusiasts among us. Most of that has melted now here on the valley floor and what remained, refroze, harder than cement. Ice in other areas. ever since, the mercury has stayed in teens and twenties . Regardless, I laughed in winters proverbial face and planted herb seeds anyways about 2 weeks ago. They are growing nicely in my southern window. I can hardly wait for gardening season, but I will have to wait.

In the meantime, riding at home is not an option for a while as the footing has degraded to more ice. In an effort to continue to ride, we have been hauling over to an indoor arena that is only about 1 mile up the road. It’s quite convenient. We have been going over once a week and getting an hour or so of ride time in. The going rate for haul ins around here is $15/horse/hour. It’s a bit pricey and somewhat of an inconvenience to load up and schlepp ourselves, the horses, the horse gear and all my layers of clothes over there in the name of getting an hour of riding once a week. My alternative is to board which is more expensive, about $300.00 for one month. How many times does $15 go into $300.00??? You do the math.

We’ll continue schlepping.

Our arena time was interesting the first time. I had never had Maggie in an indoor arena with deep sandy footing. She stepped into that sand and thought the devil himself was under her hooves. At first she wouldn’t move, then when she did, she went straight in the air, then she high stepped and snorted around like a hopped up, ginger tailed Standard Bred show horse. Luckily, the footing started to take it's toll and she resigned to the "weird" footing. Then came the issue with the cattle chute/pen configuration on one end of the arena, not to mention the daylight that was coming in under one of the doors and roping cattle wandering around just on the other side of that door. The owner of the facility is heavily involved in the rodeo scene and holds ropings and penning at the facility. Cows are just part of the gig.

We have been to the arena four times. The scary end of the arena gets a little less scary with each trip. Ofcourse, last weekend, we had to share the arena space with two longhorns and another guy exposing his horse to cattle.
Maggie was pretty sure she hadn’t signed up for this program and wanted to leave the scene in a hurry. We worked through it but we didn’t get much of anything else accomplished. I suppose getting her to walk up to the cattle and even moving them off (even if unintentional) can be defined as success.

I was surprised at Maggie’s reaction to the cows as she has ridden in among them before numerous times, but it has always been out in the open with range cattle. Apparently cattle in an arena look and smell a whole lot different.

I look forward to another round of cattle exposure in the arena, sort of…if for nothing else than to check it off the list of one more thing to expose her too. Overall, the arena experience has been an adventure and in the spirit of finding the good in things I think it's been a great learning experience. Look at all she has learned..

-the fake roping cattle dummy thing isn’t going to kill her, until someone moves it… then you should turn and bolt like hell to get away from it
-dirt clods that fly up from her hooves and hit the arena wall with a thunk are not worth jumping straight in the air with all four feet and nearly driving the riders seat bone into their abdomen upon landing
-Condensation dripping off the roof of the arena that land on your butt should not require a bolt and a buck that would qualify one for the pro circuit rodeo
-Arena footing is downright exhausting and it’s a lot of work to go around being tense
-Light coming in under the arena door isn’t horse killing aliens landing their mothership
-And.. last but not least, you can and will be passed by other horses who are in the arena at the same time as you, even horses going the other direction and no, you can’t turn around and follow them..(still working that one out!)

Spring can come anytime… trail riding is way less work!!!

Are your dues Paid??

2012-01-11T07:33:00.000-08:00

For those of you out there still procrastinating, (like I was) on getting your AERC membership renewed.. GET TO IT..I finally did.

AERC continues to struggle to hold onto membership during the ongoing difficult economy, it's a small fee for the services they provide us. They need us and we need them to continue doing our sport that we all love. So go renew.. DON"T WAIT!! Its easy too. Just go online and in 5 minutes, you can have it done!
(ok, that's the extent of my sales pitch)

Have a great day!

1st Ride of 2012

2012-01-06T18:27:00.000-08:00

With unseasonably warm weather and no snow, I have hopped on Maggie a few times this winter. I am thrilled that we have had such mild weather. No ice, no snow and temps that are, well, unheard of for December and January in Montana. Last Monday was our first official ride of 2012. Quickly growing bored with riding around the pasture and arena, which was a little slippery due to the skiff of frozen rain from the night before, to do any trotting work, we ventured on up the road..the sun was shining and the mercury was pushing 46 degrees...I was feeling good and it wasn't too long that I realized Maggie was also feelling just as good. We made it about a half a mile from home and she suddenly realized "uh oh, I am out here all alone". We zigged, bobbed, and crow hopped our way up to the hill and I decided it might be a good idea to go home. Now I know what your thinking, but I didn't go home and put her up... no, no, no. We turned around and just as she thought she was off the hook, we trotted right on by our driveway and kept on truckin', right to the end of the gravel road that we live on. At the end of the road is a cul-de-sac, perfect for working a horse in a generous circle. We spent the better part of 20 minutes working at a trot in a circle, changes of directions, half circles, serpentines , spiral ins and spiral outs. Maggie has the coat of mammoth right now so when she gave me a few nice bends and leg yeilds without kicking at my stirrups, we quit. We will try to venture out alone away from home again, weather permitting. My suspicion is that I will have a few repeats of this episode but if that is what it takes, fine.
Maggie didn't see much of the trail last year. I am hoping that 2012 will be a better year and we can get back to a conditioning schedule. Our biggest challenge once again, is the distance from where I live to where any rides are held. I hope to find a way to attend atleast a couple of limited distance rides.

Good thing come in Furry Packages

2011-12-28T14:02:00.000-08:00

About a year ago, I had to say goodbye to my good friend, Munci. It was heart wrenching. For 12 years, we were inseparable, best buddies. He saw me through a lot of life ; 3 moves, numerous jobs, bad decisions, and miles upon miles of trails , both tagging along behind the horses or at my side for a hike or run. He was my chore buddy, my nurse when I was sick , my guard dog when I was threatened and my best friend. He withstood a brutal attack from a Mastiff to keep me safe. We spent some of our best days together chasing rocks and minnows along many Montana rivers and lakes, In the end he developed lung cancer. Always a stoic being, he hid any symptoms that he was sick. We didn’t know until it was so far gone there was nothing we could have done. I only had a few days and our time together quickly came to an end.
The topic of getting another dog has come up a lot lately but a subject I tended to shy away from. The thought of another dog was more than I was ready for. The thought of a puppy was even more alarming! Losing one dog is hard enough but we had actually lost three dogs with a year and half time. We both missed all of them terribly but for me, I decided that when the time was right for another dog, a dog would find me, just like Munci did.
Things have a funny way of working out but through a series of events and happenstance networking, we were put in contact with a German Shepherd rescue facility about 3.5 hours from home, which also happened to be 5 minutes from friends of ours who we happened to be planning to go visit on December 23rd, which just happened to be one year to the day of losing Munci. Life is so weird sometimes.

German Shepherds have always been my first choice in dogs (grew up with them) and I always thought that someday I might like to get another one.. just not now. Nonetheless, since we were going to be in the vicinity anyways, I was convinced that I should go have a look, meet the lady that ran the rescue and just "see". Tom threw the doggie travel crate in the car when I wasn’t looking.…hmmmm.

Well, here is what we came home with. Meet Xena (my Warrior Princess).

She 18 months old and has a little history. She grew up with a family but had to be given up due to employment difficulties. She was then adopted out to another family but it didn’t work out due to allergies. As a result, she has some anxiety as she has been bounced around a little. Who wouldn't? German Shepherds are generally one person /family dogs that bond very closely. She seemed to take to Tom and myself pretty quickly during our visit. I guess the deal was sealed upon seeing that. She knows her basics and has a sweet temperament. She needs some doggie socialization time but otherwise, her worst habit is jumping on poeple when she wants to play. She isn't a chewer , shows no signs of separation anxiety, and not a barker. She isn't sure about the cat yet but she hasn't shown any aggression either. The horses were totally new to her but she is quickly getting into the chore routine. It seems her biggest downfall is that she just hasn't been exposed to much in life. We'll change that!!

In just the few short days we have had her, she has definitely filled a void in our lives that I didn’t want to accept was missing.
Yah, I am a little smitten…

Welcome home Xena.

Short Horse Story

2011-12-12T13:00:00.000-08:00

Here it is again, weeks and weeks with no posting. Yes, it’s ridiculous. I know. (hanging head)
Compared to last year at this time, we are enjoying a non-winter – winter (if there is such a thing) thus far!

Well,okay, not completely…
It has been cold but we have nothing more than a skiff of snow on the ground which means I have been able to ride a bit more. Maggie is quite plump. We.. I mean , I, have practicing the best technique of how to get on a round horse with a fluffy slippery coat. I swear one of the other horses has gotten a hold of my show sheen and is wiping Maggie’s back down with it when I am not home. What the hell is with her slippery coat!! (yes, it's a sign of a healthy horse I suppose but seriously??) It’s requiring some athletic capabilities on my part in order to get on without sliding the saddle over. Maggie gets pretty irritated about the whole thing and has actually walked over to the mounting block as if to say "please.. just use this .." Yes, I could always use the mounting block and some days I do but I think I just like the challenge of. I almost have it down to a science! Maybe I will do a little write up on details of the "How To's" and yes, there is actually a technique involved!

Maggie has also been perfecting her Houdini acts and has the "getting into places where she shouldn’t" be down to an art. I guess the allure of the compost heap full of rotting hay , chicken and horse manure was too much for her stomach to ignore any longer?? Sans electric fence. Getting in is one thing, the getting out she hasn’t really perfected yet, much to my fencing’s demise. When she first started her latest antics, she patiently waited until someone came home and rescued her. We would unplug the fence, un string the wire and release her from her confines. Well, the last time, it was Tom that got home first and ultimately had to deal with her. I am just guessing but I would imagine he cussed a blue streak all the way out to her and back and called her a few choice names in the process. But ever since, things went back to normal again. Maggie stayed out of the area. I figured she probably grew bored with the whole routine and realized there wasn’t anything worth eating in there anymore. Perfect! We were done with finding her stuck somewhere she shouldn’t be and I didn't have to worry about her getting into bad hay.

I am not exactly sure what happened after that because two days later, we came home to find the entire perimeter fencing of the compost heap saggingm ripped and two of the poles(cheap temporary plastic ones) broken right off and , as if to add insult to injury, Maggie and Cassidy were contently standing on top of the immaculately groomed grassy knoll that serves as Tom’s archery stop, which is also .. correction.. WAS fenced off . More wire fence busted. 12 degree weather…( I LOVE this mare, really...)

As if that weren’t quite enough, as we walked into the pasture, brother and sister took off, leaping off the mound (quite impressively I might add)and kicking up fairly large clods of sod as they went.. of which one landed at promptly at Tom’s feet.
Do you suppose they planned that part??

I didn’t want to look at Tom at that moment because he surely had to have steam rolling out of his ears by now…after a few seconds, as Maggie and Cassidy did what I presume was a Victory lap, I couldn’t help but start laughing hysterically at the whole thing. It was as if Maggie gave him the middle hoof… !!

I figure Maggie decided at some point in all this that she was pretty offended at what Tom called her just days before. I guess she got the last laugh and I will be fixing the missing hoof clumps on the arrow mound.

Bored horses… I may not have a fence left on the place by spring..

Catching Up...

2011-10-10T08:01:00.000-07:00

Wow, it’s been a while. I have really fallen off the social media and horses scene. It just seems that there hasn’t been enough free moments that allow me to take time to post anything or even catch up on anyone else’s blogs.

I’ll take my chances and assume there are a few of you wondering and possibly still curious about things here at Acer Farm, so let me try to catch you up. In fact it shouldn’t be too hard.

Since late July I think I went 7 weeks, without riding a horse. In fact, other than feed them and gaze upon them in the pasture, I don’t even think I had one piece of clothing with horse hair on it.. and that’s not because I was ultra careful around them.. I just didn’t get around them much in order to get horse hair on me…
Life has been busy and there are many reasons I took a break from the horses. I guess in retrospect, I needed the break in order to take care of some other things I had been neglecting. Sometimes, you have to come up for air. The important point is that things are slowly getting back on track and I am hoping to pick up the pieces with my horses.
Two weeks ago I dusted off my Duett, found JB’s girth and bridle, (buried behind loads of other tack ) and loaded JB up to take our first trail ride since the accident. JB did very well and seemed to enjoy a chance to see something new. He has some difficulty going downhill, I suppose due to the rigidity of the joint now, but otherwise, he did great. He's slow and careful. We poked along at a walk for about an hour. Tom was along with his horse and patiently waited for us when we lagged behind. It seems JB is officially a pleasure trail horse. He’s been sporting a set of natural balance aluminum shoes since early July which helps support his sole and help him break the right foot over more quickly. The dynamics of how he travels with his new “bionic” pastern joint foot lends itself to needing corrective shoeing. I had hoped he might be okay with continued barefoot trimming but so far, he does better with the shoes. That may change in time but that is what he needs for now.

Maggie is an embarrassment. She is back to her “barrel” with 4 legs figure. She is about 75 lbs overweight and sassy as ever. Her daily exercise routine these days equates to running to the water trough and then galloping as fast she can back to her hay pile for fear that she might miss a few bites. (Yes, I purposefully feed her as far away from the water tank as possible… I figure atleast it’s some sort of activity and it provides me with entertainment of watching her run). Actually I did take her for a 5 mile ride this past weekend. She started off really quiet and happily walking along behind Tom and his colt. Unfortunately that didn’t last too long. Tom’s colt decided that a deer was the closest thing he had seen to a horse eating monster and spooked, which startled Maggie, which then seemed to set the tone for the next hour. Maggie mostly quieted back down but the “hurry” in her feet kept showing up, requiring many “training” moments… Oh well, what could I have really expected after not riding her in weeks and weeks? We finished on a good note and she got into her big flat footed, head bobbing walk that most horses twice her size can’t hold a candle to … as long as she was walking, I was leaving it alone!!

The days have gotten shorter and cooler so sadly, most of the good riding weather season is behind me, which is just typical. I finally get myself back into a riding frame of mind right about the time that riding becomes almost impossible.

The garden really took off in July. We have been busy in the last couple of weeks harvesting our bounty. Its been fun and challening. The last time I had a garden I was in high school. The food dryer has been running full time drying bags of apples, plums, tomatoes, strawberries and peppers and proven to have been a sound investment. I still have a few squash to pull and the cold season veggies like carrots, parsnip, beets, and spinach are going strong. Next year, we need to get cold frames built.

The chickens are laying eggs daily and the two young roosters we inherited from a friend are developing their crow… lucky us…

So , that’s the latest and greatest. I am hoping I will get back to some blog lurking again and with any luck , more time in the saddle this month.

Keep your fingers crossed the weather holds just a bit longer.

Bracing the Sails

2011-08-15T13:46:00.000-07:00

In my last post, I posted that Endurance just wasn’t in the cards this year for Maggie and I. Our slow start into conditioning due to weather hindered any progress right from the get go. From there, it just seemed like it was one thing or another popping up that got in the way and my whole spring riding season kind of imploded on me. Any conditioning rides we did manage to get to, starting in late June, became nothing but a battle on the trail. Maggie was usually fine if I rode alone. I could keep her at a decent pace but add one other rider and the fight was on. I wasn’t having fun on the trail, Maggie was a terror and before I knew it, I was 3 weeks out from the only nearby ride on the schedule this year. I had planned to attend for months.

Fortunately for me, some of the most difficult decisions can be the easiest decisions when you look at the facts. The facts were that Maggie wasn’t even close to being ready, physically or mentally to complete a limited distance ride. So, I bagged plans to attend and , subsequently, resigned to the fact that everything endurance related in my life was just going to be on hold for now.

Disappointed ? Yes but also a sense of relief came with it. Hubby and I headed out shortly thereafter that decision for a vacation to Idaho and Oregon. During that week away, I decided that when we returned I would make plans to attend an upcoming Alice Trindle clinic for a weekend of private lessons for Maggie and I. Tom was also on the schedule for some lesson time with Alice to do Garocha work. The clinic was being hosted at a friend’s ranch about 3 hour’s away, so we had a place to stay.

I needed a new gust of air to fill my sails. I thought maybe this would do it. If nothing else, it would give me another fun weekend away.

The clinic began on Friday July 22 and we headed down that day. My ride time was Saturday afternoon.

The Training issues I wanted to address:
-Rushiness due to hyper sensitive to any leg pressure . Not able to get any effective responses with lateral work due to hypersensitivity.
-Tension when traveling counter clock wise, locking her back and jaw and pushing through her outside shoulder when doing circles in that direction
-At a halt, hind quarter release with leg pressure ; get Maggie to take just one step over when applying leg pressure as opposed to wanting to blast head or rear (when I tried to block her forward motion)
-Tension in Maggie creating me to brace my lower back which caused more tension in Maggie, which caused more tension in my lower back, which ……; well you get the picture.
-Getting her relaxed enough at a trot where she did not hold her breath.

Training Sessions at Home (what I had started doing)
-From the ground, ask Maggie to step a hind foot over, just one step in each direction without walking forward.
-Once she was accepting that, I would get on and purposefully move my legs around along her sides while walking , but not asking anything to get her to begin to differentiate between real leg pressure for a queue and the sensation of my leg touching her sides.
-Bending at a walk using lots of circles, serpentines, etc . Walk over ground rails, stop and back with a soft feel.
-Turn and change direction without speeding up in the turn.
-Different speeds at a walk, slow walk, faster walk, fastest walk and vice versa (Hurry does not Mean Worry)

Knowing that things fell apart in a trot, I kept our home sessions mostly at the walk (as maddening as it often became for me, it was what Maggie needed). .

The Goals for the clinic
-To get some further ideas and help in slowing Maggie down
-Figure out if what I have been asking is correct. What do I need to change?
-Learning to recognize when her braciness is a direct result of my braciness.
-Figure out how to help Maggie start putting less effort into fighting me and more effort into listening to me

The Lesson
Out in the middle of a large mowed hay field , an “arena “was marked off by 4 cones. I talked to Alice about my frustrations with Maggie and what we had been working on and what I had hoped to accomplish. We started out working at a walk and she had me bend Maggie around each cone at the corners. As I turned her around the cone, Alice wanted me to open up the inside rein way out(so traveling left, I would turn her by opening my left arm out and down towards the ground) She also had me over exaggerate my posture and weight distribution to the inside of the circle by leaning down and bit a forward, towards her shoulder and the ground (don’t know how to make that make sense any better than that ) as I was guiding Maggie around the cone. As I came out of the circle I would balance up and let Maggie follow my seat aid for a leg yield over to the straight line of the arena. At first, we were out of sync and Maggie was wondering why I was leaning and throwing her off balance but she was having to compensate and shift how she was moving. AHA! She was having to pay attention! I wasn’t really long before Maggie started slowing down and listening to me. Part of it was that it was something totally new, part of it was that I was putting her into a bit of physical bind , causing a mental change in her. Pretty soon, the whole picture started coming together, she softened around the cones and actually started following her nose, stepping under herself and as she came out of the circle , she started floating over to what would be the rail of the arena. I wasn’t having to apply unnecessary pressure with my leg. Instead, she was responding to the balancing up in my seat. After a bit, we lessened the exaggeration of the weight distribution and went back to correct posture and Maggie continued to listen well. So basically , we set it up so Maggie had to pay attention to me with exaggerated “not so good” posture. This little exercise threw a total wrench in things for us at first but it worked. We repeated this process at a trot. As expected it started out rough. Ofcourse I got bracey with my lower back and as you can imagine, so did Maggie. Once I settled in and started focusing on relaxing my back and seat, Maggie started working for me instead of against me. By the time the hour and half lesson was over, I had a horse who was trotting at a normal rhythm and pace, that I could easily sit to . I had a horse that was soft , able to bend, and driving from her hind end. It was lovely.

Key points:

-Insisting on a change of gait from Maggie when I asked her to slow, even if it means we momentarily break into a walk and her head comes up and she momentarily travels like a camel.
-As rough and uncomfortable as it can get, work through various speeds at the trot ; anywhere from slow as a peanut rolling Western pleasure trot to Maggie’s fast trot to a normal trot and vice versa. Let her trot big and fast for a lap , but then insist she come back down. All the while, mix it up with changes of direction, circles, serpentines, etc keep her guessing.
-Don’t let Maggie go too far in a straight line at this time
-Change speeds often- it may take a while to help Maggie sort out that she actually can travel at different speeds at my request.

So there you have it. In the spirit of sharing those not so great times that I know we all have in training our horses(but are all too often not mentioned amongst us!). Maybe it will encourage someone else out there struggling with their horse like I was, to take a step back and look at what their horse needs , instead of staying the course with our own goals.

A lot of what I took away from my time with Alice was similar to what I had already been working on but it really makes a difference to have someone else confirm what you think is the right thing and then getting to see a change in your horse as a result of getting a little instruction. Getting to feel what it feels like when things are good and not just guessing that it was right!

In the last couple of weeks since the clinic, Maggie and I have had some really nice arena sessions on our own.

I do believe our sails are braced and I can finally advance the ship in her course.

Realizations and Refocus

2011-07-20T08:03:00.000-07:00

I should be packing and preparing to attend what would have been my first ride of the season this weekend, (yes, while the rest of you have already attended 5 or more already!) It’s a new ride this year in Potomac, Montana. A one day ride that offers both a limited distance of 35 and a 50 miler. Between weather, work, saddle fitting issues and a huge list of other bumps in the road, I never got into a conditioning schedule this year with Maggie. I have managed to get few good 10-12 mile rides under my belt but that was it. Any remaining delusion that I could have Maggie ready for the July 23rd ride was quickly decided for me a few weeks ago when I actually looked at the calendar , factored in that I was gone the week before the ride, and considered Maggie’s latest recovery rates on our conditioning rides. Maggie was barely managing 12 miles of hilly country at a moderate pace.

It was just enough to know I couldn’t ask her to complete a 35 mile ride, in hilly country.

So, yet another ride scratched for the season. But it’s not a bad thing. In fact, I am feeling a bit rejuvenated over the whole thing.

About 2 months ago, it was just a tickle in my brain, a passing thought here and there.. is endurance is even worth doing in this part of the country? We only have 1-2 rides that are even remotely close (5 hour or less drive away) and if your lucky, you might be able to seriously start conditioning in June. That alone makes endurance a difficult goal where I live. Then there was the issues I was seeing in Maggie that I didn’t like. Over the course of the last several weeks, that nagging thought kept coming back every time I climbed on her. She was tense, rushy, bracey. Every ride with others was getting a little worse, a little more of a battle to keep her quiet and relaxed. I realized I needed to do something. I don’t know about other endurance riders, but I refuse to have a horse that is a barely controlled runaway with t braced jaw and braced back just so I can fly down the trail and compete in endurance. Not my idea of fun and I am sure not much fun for Maggie either.

When you keep trying to do the same thing and you keep running into road blocks, it’s time to change the path. That is what I have decided to do. No, I am not giving up on endurance. I am just refocusing. For now.

Without the hours of pounding out the miles, I have been spending more time in the arena with Maggie and I have realized a few things. Things I didn’t like. For one, endurance has really done a number on my riding. I have become stiff and bracey in my sitting trot, I have developed tension in my hips and lower back and guess what? It directly translates to my horse.

I have enough years of dressage and equitation lessons to draw upon to fix all of this. It just requires me to spend time on it. And that is what I intend to do.

The arena work has always been there but it was a means to an end, just enough to get by, to get down the trail. A little bending, a little lateral work, a few circles, a few half halts, etc. Now, I am going full blown back to my roots of Dressage, Equitation and maybe a little jumping just to mix it up a bit. I f I want a soft responsive horse that does more than go down the trail, its what Maggie needs. We are already making some good progress and it’s only been a couple weeks of concerted effort. Maggie is finding her slow relaxed trot and getting as soft as butter in my hands. For the first time in a long time, it feels really good to ride her and I think she is happier as well.

So, this weekend instead of packing up to go ride 35 miles, I am packing up to get a few private lessons with a respected horsewoman, Alice Trindle. She is in Hamilton, Montana putting on a 3 day clinic and it’s been a few years since I have had the opportunity to train with her. I think it will be money better spent for where Maggie and I are in our journey.

Mental Health Days

2011-07-01T18:14:00.000-07:00

I took time off work yesterday and today just because. I needed a few days to catch up on things and just have time to myself and not worry about being somewhere at a certain time. Yesterday, I paid bills, ran errands, and got groceries. Today I went riding, a long slow 12.5 miles. A friend joined me today but in the last two weeks I have logged more miles than I have all season. I guess with no one to distract me (husband) I found that riding was as good of a distraction as any, and the weather is finally cooperating.
This past week , I managed to go out and hit the trails 3 times. That has to be some kind of record! Maggie is slowly coming back into condition but it's taking a while. Today she was tired when we finished out 12.5 miles and we didn't ride fast at all. The last few miles she started getting a bit stumbly. I'll give her a few days off, which probably works out best since driving in this valley on the Fourth of July with a horse trailer is nightmarish. People seem to come out of the woodwork.. I guess it's all the summer residents with their fancy lake homes.

I think I am starting to figure Maggie out a bit. When I ride alone, she is getting much more confident and is much more relaxed on the trail. I actually prefer , and I think she does as well, when we are alone. We can trot along the trail in a nice relaxed trot, loose rein for miles on end. It's absolutely wonderful.
Add another rider and horse, she gets competitive and racey. It's not enjoyable because I am constantly having to be on her mouth half halting and getting her to slow up. She assumes MACH CHICKEN speed most of the time and trying to find a rhythym in her trot is impossible. I just have to get in two -point and stay off her back a bit. There is NO posting to that gawd-awful pace! Today we clocked a 14 mph trot. Those are the times I think, " I should just sell her as a harness trotting horse!"

So, as long as I don't ride at any gait other than a walk when another rider and horse is along, we're fine, right? Problem solved.. BORING!!

I will say that Maggie is a total ROCKSTAR on those narrow windy trails that have tree roots and rocks. She's like a cat, and it seems the faster the trot, the better she is. She just picks her way effortlessly as we fly through the trees. I never have to worry about her taking a missed step. It's a pretty cool feeling to ride a catty little horse that handles technical terrain so well at speed.

So I guess the plan is that we'll keep working on pacing at home, and getting Maggie to listen to half halts and hope that it continues to translate to the trail when others join us, but if any of you have suggestions out there for a race brained mare, they are more than welcome here.

European Update

2011-06-29T19:12:00.000-07:00

Well, Phase 1 is completed in Salgen, Germany. the horsemanship clinic went quite well and they want him to come back!! (next time with wife ofcourse). He and his travel partners rubbed shoulders with royalty, having stayed on the grounds of the Castle of the Princess of Bavaria. Granted they stayed in a yurt on the castle grounds but they showered in the castle!! How many people can say they have done that??? They also got a private tour of the castle. Tom reports it was unreal to see. So cool...(kicking self for not going!)

Then, the travelers were off to catch a train to Budapest. After a few hairy moments of being on the wrong train and almost heading to Croatia, they figured it out and got on the right train. It was an 8 hour all night train ride, in which they had to stand up for most of it as they were last to get on and couldn't find seats, until about an hour before they were at their destination.

Tom is now safely in the Valley, in Hungary, although "safe" could be the wrong term. He has done some training, riding in armour , herding pigs and oxen, and apparently drinking wine and Polinka(hungarina brandy) based on the texted phone pic he sent me today. He takes his warrior test on Monday which involves running 6 miles with hills, shooting 500 arrows in 90 minutes or less, and riding bareback for two hours.

Hopefully he will hold off on the Polinka until after he has completed his test...

Trails, Trikes, Horses and Dogs

2011-06-26T06:47:00.000-07:00

I loaded up yesterday and met a friend at the State land for a day of riding. The weather was good enough, it wasn't a downpour and it was above 40 degrees. We dosed up on mosquito repellent and the same for the horses and headed out. This was the first time I had been out on the trail since getting my Specialized saddle so I was interested in seeing how it felt for myself and Maggie in terrain other than my arena. Steph brough along her little Springer Spanial , Molly who is pretty well behaved on the trail, exept for the occasional chasing of a squirrel or deer. Normally I prefer not to have a dog along in this area because there are lots of other people with dogs and it's just one less thing to have to deal with in my opinion , but Molly seemed well behaved enough. They have recently logged this area so the "old" trails that I once knew very well are all but a memory now, so we put on our adventurous hats and just rode out onto various trails to see where we ended up. The thing about this area is that most trails eventually get you somewhere you are eventually going to recognized. As we came off one such trail, we realized we had been riding for 3 hours already and it was about an hour back to the trailer so we headed back down a trail that would take us back to the trail head. Along the the entire ride we had run into several mountain bikers and for the most part, they are generally willing to be courteous when they see a horse but they often aren't familiar with horses or comfortable around them. Mountain bikes coming down the trail at a high rate of speed toward your horse will tell you quickly how well trained your horse is. Unlike horseback riders who are always looking around checking the scenery, mountain bikers are so busy watching the terrain right in front of their wheel , they often don't realize they are coming up on a horse until it's almost too late. Horses often can't figure out what a person on a bike is. Even more terrifying to a horse, is a child on the back of it's parents bike! The other problem is that this area is heavily wooded. You can't always see the bikers coming but your horses is usually a good indicator that something is coming at you. Having to deal with bikers is just a reality where I live. Have to share the trails. The key to keeping the situation safe for everyone is to get the bikers talking. As soon as they say something, then the horse can recognize that it's just a person with really weird legs..However, if the bikers happen. Steph and I had run into about 4 sets of these mountain bikers and all were very friendly. If they happen to be coming up behind you that's almost a bit more difficult. yesterday we were only a short distance from the end of th trail head and there is a steep rocky decline to get down. Maggie seemed to be a bit tired so I jumped off of her to walk her down the steep hill. We were just about to the bottom when Maggie's head popped up , laid her ears back and wheeled around. 3 bikers popped over the top of the hill and were coming at us very fast, along with a vary large Chesapeake dog. I pulled maggie out of the way to the side of the trail because they still hadn't seen us, again trying not to crash on on a bike while going down a steep hill takes alot of concentration! With bikers, they are supposed to yeild to horseback riders, and most times they do but I always opt to get out of their way and let them go by, for obvious reasons. Most will yeild and stop and cautiously go by. This group hit the brakes as soon as the biker in the front saw me, which by that time he was only 10 feet from me but his dog was a different story. His dog came at Maggie and I , barking and growling. I guess it was just a reaction but had my lead rope in my hand and the dog caught the business end of it right in the nose, right about the time he was about to get way to close for comfort. I am not sure if he would have just sniffed me or Maggie but he was showing way more aggression than I thought was necessary so I just reacted I guess. It startled him but he got pissed and came back , more towards Maggie's nose. The owner, who was telling him "No" wasn't being effective in the least. At this point, the dog barked and growled and was trying to figure out how to get around the crazy lady with the rope when the owner finally had enough sense to ride off so the dog would follow him, meekly apologizing.

I climbed back in the saddle once we got to the bottom of the hill and kept heading for the parking lot. We got to the end only to find that these bikers were still there, in the biker/hiker parking lot (which is separate from the trailer parking) and so was the dog. I had to get past them one more time, cross the road and go another 1/4 mile to get to the trailer. As I passed through, the dog ofcoruse, came towards us again. They were able to grab him in time before he followed me across the road.

So, another adventurous day on the trail . Maggie is pretty tolerant of things like this, for which I am grateful. She wasn't rattled afterwards,, but it did scare her a bit. I couldn't help but wishI had been riding JB at that moment the dog came at us. JB gets down right "stallion" like and would have tap danced all over that dog had he come at us like that.

I don't mind sharing the trail with bikers, hikers, dogs, and other non-motorized recreators, but it seems that maybe there is some opportunity there to educate one another since we both have to share the trails.

Anyone else run into these situations? How do you deal with them?

On a the flip side, the saddle worked out great. I was very happy with how it fit Maggie and I was comfortable as well.

Lettuce Gone Rogue

2011-06-19T18:59:00.000-07:00

Okay, I couldn't help it because Funder's post about her one spinach plant reminded me that I have been meaning to post a few photos of our garden. I took photos last week and that was as far as I got.

It's been so wet and cold here that being in the gardening mood has been a bit of an uphill climb. The weather is really starting to wear on people's tempers. We had a rough winter , like so many other parts of the county and Spring time in the Rockies has been tempermental to say the least. I think I can count on one hand the number of days we have had over 60 degrees. We spend our weekends playing cat and mouse with rain storms , splitting our day between attemptimg to get our necessary weekend chores accomplished,like mowing, and lazying around inside with a cup of tea and good movie or book.
Sadly, we are quickly approaching full saturation.We are in the 500 year flood plain. We check our crawl space every day to make sure water isn't coming up. So far, so good and keeping my fingers and toes crossed it will stay that way. Several houses in the neighborhood have had sump pumps running for weeks.We haven't so far.. ofcourse, I have probably just jinxed myself... Sigh.

You know, it just figures that the year we decide to put in a garden happend to be one of the coldest , wettest springs on record. We started designing our garden boxes last fall and worked like dogs all spring to get them in. Finally, the seeds we sowed over Easter for cool season veggies are starting to giving back.

My lettuce has gone rogue. It's out of control. I have lost patience with trying to harvest "properly" and only nipping the outer leaves. Tonight , I couldn't even tell what was what so now, the lettuce and mesclun section looks as though a herd of rabbits got after it. I just went at it with the scissors. (Tom would be appalled I am sure but by the time he is back, it will have grown back atleast 6 times!) I couldn't help it. I now have 4 gallon bags loaded with greens and there is still more to pick. I have one other third of a garden box with more greens. Note to self for next year, plant less lettuce!

The tomatoes , peppers and herb garden are maintaining at this point but barely. If we don't get some heat soon, we may lose alot of them.

Okay Funder, unlike you, I absolutely can slaughter and consume what I reep.. so this one is for you...

Happy Gardening

When Opportunity Knocks

2011-06-19T07:19:00.000-07:00

You better answer...

That's exactly what my husband is about to do. Tom just headed off to Europe this morning. I wish I had been on that plane with him but for various reasons, it didn't work out logistically.

This is a huge opportunity for him and I am very proud of him. It's really one of those situations that kind of fell into his lap but sometimes those are the best way for things to happen.

For those of you that don't know, I am lucky enough to be married to someone who is as crazy about horses as myself. He's also pretty darn talented in the horse training department as well and I say that as objectively as possible. Tom has been breeding, training and riding for ...., well, forever it seems. Most recently, he got involved in a bit of a unique equestrian sport called Horseback Archery. It has become his ultimate hobby and passion. No, it's not the Native American genre of horseback archery. It pre dates that by may years, back to the culture of the Steppe warriors.

In the village of Kaposmero in Southern Hungary, Master Lajos Kassai has founded a school of archery and has dedicated his life to recreating the ancient traditions and culture of his people. He also holds a few noteworthy world records, shooting over a thousand arrows in twelve hours.
and the second world record was in 2002, out of 286 gallops, shooting about three thousand arrows in twelve hours. I think there is a third world record as well but anyone can look it up on the Internet if you are really interested.
let me just say this, the man is impressive to say the least.

I can't do the sport justice in trying to explain what it's all about, but just imagine taking a horse in full gallop , with the rider shooting with the bow, (so no reins) hitting target after target, front, side and the "parting " or back shot. The horseman has to be in sync with his horse and and in total control of himself. The power of the galloping horse combined with the total concentration of the archer. It is a reflection of a complete harmony between man and horse.

The main school resides in Kaposmero,Hungary but there are many other subsidiary schools; Germany, Austria, the USA, Canada, Slovakia, Greece, New Zealand, and Norway.

I have watched my husband train for 5 years now, coming up through the ranks of the various levels through rigorous training and testing for this mounted martial art, and now, all his hard work has come to a point where he has an opportunity to go to the main school, aka The Valley, in Hungary, and partake in an international festival and training with Lajos Kassai himself.

But, before all of that, as luck turns out, Tom will be involved in another unique opportunity.

Tom is first headed to Munich , Germany where he will be putting on a 4 day horsemanship clinic for German Horse Expo. This all very overwhelming and came on the heels of the German Archery school. with Pettra Engelander. Pettra is the leader of the German Archery school. With the encouragement of Tom's own teacher and leader of the USA Archery school, Todd Delle, Pettra and Todd arranged to get Tom to Germany to put on a Horsemanship clinic. It's kind of complicated how it all came to this (and I am trying to shorten it for brevity purposes) and almost unreal when I think about it all! . So, Tom , who is quite modest about his training abilities and never wants to be in the public eye, is going oversees to try to help some Germans learn something more about horsemanship.

Something like this doesn't always just come along. I am very proud of him and all of his hard work that has brought him to this point. I can't wait to hear how it's all going.

Hoof Abcess

2011-06-12T16:31:00.000-07:00

A few days ago, I went out to do morning chores only to find JB very very lame. At first, I thought it was his front right, and my heart skipped a beat but when I asked him to move off he looked lame on both fronts. His paddock was very muddy and he was slipping around so it was hard to tell exactly which leg he was lame on. I checked him over, no swelling, no cuts, no heat. If I had to give the lameness a grade, he was probably somewhere between a 2 and a 3. The mud and bad footing made it hard to detect much of anything definitely and since he didn't act like he was in any large amount of discomfort, I threw him his hay and headed into work for the day. I would have to address it more closely later. That was Wednesday.

That evening I checked him over more thoroughly and was able to determine it was not his front right, but instead his front left. Still no swelling, hheat or cuts that I could fine anywhere, however, he was holding his heelup, keeping his fetlock cocked so as not to put weight on the back of hhis foot. At first, I thought well, he must have slipped in the mud and ttweaked something. I had a vet appt scheduled on Saturday so I decided to jjust keep a close eye on it and if he got worse, I would have to vet check the leg out. Ofcourse, he got worse.

On Saturday, JB had a pretty strong pulse in the front left. The vet hoof tested him, checking for a bruise, inflammation (laminitis) or indicators of an abcess but nothing revealed itself in those areas. We ended up doing xrays to check for a broken coffin or navicular bone. Nothing, which was good news. We decided that the only possibility was that it could be an abcess in the coronary band or a bruise in the heel that was fairly deep and undetectable. We wrapped his foot in a poultice and they sent us home with instructions to keep him contained (in case it was a soft tissue injury in the hoof or leg), keep his foot wrapped for 48 hours, give him bute that afternoon and see how he did.

By the next morning, JB was even more lame and the back part of his lower cannon (just above his fetlock joint) was hot and swollen. I gave him 1 gram of bute for his discomfot and spoke to the vet late that morning. He wanted us to pull the bandage off and repack it because he was certain it was an abcess. Ofcourse, my med kit had everything but what I needed to repack the foot properly. I had to run into town anyways so I planned to stop at the vets to get some Magna paste (way better for a drawing salve than Icthamol)and wrapping material and then get the foot rewrapped later in the afternoon.
By the time I got home, JB seemed to be feeling better so I let him out into his pasture to graze for a while. He took off running and bucking, sans a bit lame yet but he seemed better. I planned to repack the foot after a while when he had a full belly. When I finally got the bandage off Saturday evening, I noticed a strong putrid smell, something I recognized as pus. I looked the foot over and sure enough, there it was. The abcess had obviously erupted, which would have explained JB feeling better earlier in the day.

The abcess was on the left heel bulb and things were still looking a bit swollen and tender. I soaked his foot for 15 minutes in Epsom salt and then repacked the area with a bit more Magna Paste, in case there was still some drainage. I rewrapped everything to keep it clean(with all the mud around) and will pull it off again tomorrow.

It's been a while since I have had a horse abcess and have never had one at the heel bulb . Not sure what could have caused this , possibly he caught himself with his hind foot or it is simply just the fact that it's been so muddy. Either way, JB is already feeling 90% better since it released and I am so relieved that this is all it was...

Saddle Update and other news

2011-06-08T07:59:00.000-07:00

After returning the 15” specialized saddle, the 16” finally arrived last week. Short story- it’s definitely a better fit for me. No more pain in the places where there shouldn’t be pain!! I have only ridden in it at home and haven’t had a chance to get out on the trail with it but it looks like I will be keeping it. I love how close contact it is. I can actually feel Maggie’s back lifting when she softens. No more hauling my 30 lb Wade tree onto her. Now, I just have to do the final fitting tweaks for Maggie’s back. I think I have it pretty close and Maggie seems very comfortable but I plan to have the dealer come out and give it a look over. I like a lot of things about the saddle, the look , the lightness, the adjustable stirrup position and the adjustable fit but honestly, I think Specialized can come a long ways in the area of quality and craftsmanship. I think they compromised quality in order to get a lightweight saddle. One thing I will be having modified is the D ring attachment for the breast collar. Right now, they are just stitched to a concho. There is no attachment into the actual tree of the saddle. One tough uphill pull with a little strain on that breast collar, and I could easily see that D ring popping right off. Not sure what they were thinking on that design. I was wondering if anyone else with a Specialized has modified this D ring for the breast collar? Has anyone had issues with it pulling out or breaking?

So, now that I have a saddle that is comfortable for horse and rider, maybe I can get motivated to ride a little more? Let’s hope so. For whatever reason (stress??) I have been dealing with several weeks of not feeling well. I had the flu, then bronchitis and now finally recovering from some other virus that didn't test positive for strep, but felt like it. I think I am climbing out of it and getting myself healthy again but the weather hasn’t exactly been conducive to hours in the saddle either. We have had a few teasers of nice 70 degree (mostly during the work week) in between the torrential downpours. We are setting flooding records and with all the rain and as of last week, we were still adding snowpack in the mountains. It’s been a crazy year weather wise. Riding in summer rain is one thing, riding in heavy downpours at 45 degrees? Not really my idea of a good time.

So, there is that.
The other big news , atleast for us, is that I am getting ready to send my husband to Europe in just a short couple of weeks. He is headed to Germany to put on a 4 day horsemanship clinic and then onto Hungary to train and compete at the Kassai Horseback Archery school. I am very proud of him. He has worked very hard to get to this point. Stay tuned for more details.

Focus

2011-05-23T08:50:00.000-07:00

Things have been pretty chaotic around our place. I have barely have had time to breathe , let alone sit down a write a worthy post. So, I will just try to summarize and give a few updates for now.

I have managed some decent conditioning rides on the weekends with Maggie as well as squeezing out an evening training session or two in the arena during the week. Our average mileage has been anywhere between 7-10 miles on the trail, but much of that is hill climbing. We certainly aren’t setting any records on speed or distance at this point but Maggie is becoming quite fit nonetheless. She constantly amazes me with her strength and willingness to "just keep going". On the down side, I have run into a few “training” issues with her that I am working on. Her “go” button appears to be stuck in the on position and as she has gotten more fit, it just gets a bit worse each time. I had this same issue with her last year but with some concentrated work in the arena, we made some good progress last fall. Maggie was listening well to half halts and would slow up and listen. I was even getting to where I could ask for a couple of different speeds at the trot. This year, we seem to be back to this same problem, however, I realize that that the issue is more about her focus. Her thought is not on me and the task at hand and there's a good reason for it.
For starters, she has become ridiculously attached to the younger gelding she shares paddock space with. We are going to have to separate them but that's a whole other post! It’s a love hate thing between Maggie and Brego, Tom's up and coming gelding. Often times, I am on Maggie and my husband is riding Brego at the same time in the arena and the training session turns into a frustrating battle for all of us. Both horses just worry constantly about where the other one is. It's impossible to get much accomplished if you can't get the horses attention for more than 3 milliseconds at a time.

The second part of the problem is me. It dawned on me this weekend. I have been doing a piss poor job of keeping her thought on me. This year, I have fallen into the trap of just "get on and go". Why?? Well, that ‘s pretty simple…. I am not focused, why should my horse be? I am not even trying to tune into her, why should I expect her to tune in to me, right?

I won’t go into details but there are some major stressors going on in my life right now that I am trying to manage. Unfortunately, its taking my focus away from everything else and at this point, it has to. At least for the time being.

So, pardon me for a while, I might be a bit more absent on blogs, face book and maybe a bit slow to respond to emails as this other situation consumes my time and energy. Eventually, I’ll make it back around to some sense of normalcy in my life and hopefully get back to being more “plugged in” at some point in the future .

Until then, Happy Trails!

JB's first ride..

2011-05-07T18:53:00.000-07:00

I started this post out originally talking about all kinds of announcements of sorts I wanted to share with you and spun in the news at the end about JB's first ride, but when I finished, it didn't seem right , it seemed like JB's first ride really deserved it's own post, so I erased all that other stuff and started over. The other stuff can wait.

For a few weeks now as time and weather have permitted, I've been taking JB for walks and doing ground driving sessions in the arena. Friday night I had gone out to halter him and the plan was to just brush him really well and let him hand graze. I was just coming off having a knock you on your butt flu and I wasn't feeling real motivated to do much, but I needed to go out and be with a horse nonetheless. The sun , which hadn't been out all day suddenly appeared from behind the clouds and it got nice and warm. I walked back into the tack room to get a different brush and JB, who tends to like to also get into the tack room, followed me in and sniffed at his saddle. I know this is going to sound a little crazy but he seemed to be telling me wanted to go for a ride. JB and I are pretty connected and I would like to beleive, after everything we have been through together, that we are tuned into one anothers thougths on some levels. I thought for a second maybe it was too soon yet. All the doubt crept in but really , what was I waiting for? For him to tell it was time?? Well, he seemed to be doing just that. So, the decision was made for me...
As soon as I grabbed his bridle, he got the most anticipatory look on his face that I have ever seen on a horse. He definitely got excited about it. He was trying to get him mouth on the bit before I even had it ready to pop over his little ears. He was pretty cute about it. Anyways, your probably wondering when I going to stop babbling and tell you how it went , right??

Okay, I'll tell you. It went fine. I know.. anti-climactic, right ?? Well, there really isn't much to tell honestly and that is exactly how I imagined it would go. I got on and we walked off, quiet as ever. JB was very tentative and unsure of himself, having to bear the extra weight of a rider. He was very careful and that's a good thing at this point.

The less than good thing is that JB is not sound, not really anyways. It's not what I would call a limp, but a shortened stride on his right side, which I beleive is coming from the shoulder, not the pastern. His shoulder sustained numerous soft tissue injuries (torn muscles, ligaments, etc) in the accident and he had a huge hematoma in his heart girth area. My hope is that this will improve as he gets stronger, along with some massage work and stretching. He's not in any pain, he runs and jumps at liberty without hesitation. The pastern doesn't seem to bother him in the least and I am very happy about that.

Riding JB for the first time was obviously a bigger deal for me than I am able to even try to begin to portray here so I won't get into all that. When I finished my ride on JB and jumped off of him, my husband, who had come up to the fence of the arena to watch, walked over to me and said "Congratulations, this is a big deal" I hadn't thought about it that way because it just happened and I hadn't planned on it being the day I ride JB, but he was right. It was a big deal, considering. I managed a meager "thank you" and choked back the tears I could feel coming. I was mildly sad because I had hoped JB was going to walk off feeling much more sound than he did but realistically, a year ago, at this time, I was struggling with the decision on whether I should put JB down. I can deal with a shortened stride and a horse that is just happy to be with me.

Really???

2011-05-04T07:50:00.000-07:00

So it's May, the sun is shining and Monday night I came home from work with a killer headache which turned into a migraine. I woke in the middle of the night with the chills and achey all over.. Tuesay morning, the full blown flu had descended upon me... This is the first time I have been out of bed since yesterday.

I haven't had the flu in years. Guess this is why people get the flu shot..

We weren't exactly lost....

2011-05-02T07:52:00.000-07:00

First , for those who lost a loved one on September 11th, I hope that last night you slept just a little better knowing that Bin Laden is dead. Stand up and salute those who serve. Here's to the land of the free and the Red , White and Blue.

Now, onto yesterday's ride.

I headed out to my usual training ground, a large section of State land, known as Kuhn's. It's about a half hour drive from home but it's actually the closest to me as far as area's to ride. I have ridden this area for 10+ years so I know it pretty well. You can easily ride several 12 -15 mile loops and if your adventurous, you can get more mileage as well. There are plenty of good hills as well as nice long flat areas. It's really a great training area. Yesterday, a friend and I headed there for the first time this season. We planned for an easy 8-9 mile ride.

I had heard the loggers had been in there over the winter, but I didn't worry too much about it since they have been logging small sections in this area for the last several years. The terrain is very heavily wooded and definitely needed some logging, however what we found yesterday was quite surprising.

For the first half of the ride, I mostly knew where I was. Mostly. Atleast well enough to find a few of the trails I was familiar with. The second half of the ride, we somehow managed to get into an area I could not even recognize. It was amazing to me that the logging had changed the look of the landscape to me so much. I kept thinking that something would eventually look familiar but it didn't. So, we just kept riding, figuring eventually it would come out somewhere that we would recognize. It never did. I knew we were quite a ways south of where we needed to be and when we ended up in behind a subdivision I was finally able to recognize, I realized wewere about a mile and a half south of where we needed to be but if we back tracked it was about 3 miles.

Maggie and Zira were starting to get a little tired and so we opted for the shorter route, given it was already after 5:00 p.m. Unfortunately, the shorter route also meant we had to trespass and potentially get shot at or chased by dogs. Sometimes, you have to weigh the odds !!

We cut through a couple of back yards, which was an area known for it's "back woodsy " folks who didn't really like "visitors". Luckily, no one seemed to notice us, or if they did, they didn't bother with us.

We finally made our way out onto the gravel road that I knew would get us back out to the main road. From there, we could then follow that back to where the trailers were parked.

Lesson learned?? There were a couple: First; learn to use GPS I carry for more than just mileage and speed tracking. Second, never sweat getting a little "turned around"..Given the changes to the landscape, it probably won't be the last time I get lost in there this season.

Great Ride Today!

2011-04-27T17:54:00.000-07:00

Despite the dark clouds looming, I made plans to meet a friend for an easy condition ride with Maggie this afternoon. After getting what felt like a good start last weekend, and looking at the weather forecast for the coming three days, I was determined to get atleast something in before Sunday. The morning was beautiful but I was stuck working. By the time I was ready to go, I wasn't sure what kind of weather we would end up riding in. I hesitated when I went to hook up the trailer, but ony for a moment. (damn the torpedos....full speed ahead)As I drove south, theweather changed from sun, to wind, to gropple, to rain , to just clouds. Luckily, the clouds held off releasing their heavy burden.

It wasn't a very long ride but we had several little climbs to make our way up. The footing was a bit slippery with mud in places . Maggie only got a little bothered for about a 20 minute period during the entire ride when my friends mare starting her "jigging". Maggie eventually started listening to me and I was able to get her walking flat footed again, which is much better than jigging. Anyone else hate that as much as I do? I see alot of endurance riders who allow their horses to do it. I know for me, it's one of those training issues that drives me crazy. It's terribly uncomfortable and wears both the horse and the rider out.

We finished just in time and then the rain let loose, for about 15 minutes.

That short ride will have to hold for a few days.. there is snow in the forecast... again....

Will it EVER end?

A little Levity- Seven Stages of Aging on Horseback

2011-04-26T07:26:00.000-07:00

I am sure some of us might be able to relate?? Atleast on some aspects!

The Seven Stages of Aging on Horseback
>
> Stage 1: Fall off pony. Bounce. Laugh. Climb back on. Repeat.
>
> Stage 2: Fall off horse. Run after horse, cussing. Climb back on by
> shimmying up horse's neck. Ride until sundown.
>
> Stage 3: Fall off horse. Use sleeve of shirt to stanch bleeding. Have
> friend help you get back on horse. Take two Advil and apply ice packs when you
> get home. Ride next day.
>
> State 4: Fall off horse. Refuse advice to call ambulance; drive self to
> urgent care clinic. Entertain nursing staff with tales of previous daredevil
> stunts on horseback. Back to riding before cast comes off.
>
> Stage 5: Fall off horse. Temporarily forget name of horse and name of
> husband. Flirt shamelessly with paramedics when they arrive. Spend week in
> hospital while titanium pins are screwed in place. Start riding again before
> doctor gives official okay.
>
> Stage 6: Fall off horse. Fail to see any humor when hunky paramedic says,
> "You again?" Gain firsthand knowledge of advances in medical technology
> thanks to stint in ICU. Convince self that permanent limp isn't that
> noticeable. Promise husband you'll give up riding. One week later purchase older,
> slower, shorter horse.
>
> Stage 7: Slip off horse. Relieved when artificial joints and implanted
> medical devices seem unaffected. Tell husband that scrapes and bruises are
> due to gardening accident. Pretend you don't see husband roll his eyes and
> mutter as he walks away. Give apple to horse.

> Trust me. Despite a lack of bounce-ability, aging on horseback isn't so
> bad, as long as you know what lies ahead. And as long as you keep your sense
> of humor.

Splendid Days

2011-04-25T07:40:00.000-07:00

I just came off two splendid days of riding and I still feeling the euphoria. The weather, for the first time THIS year , was sunny and above 50 degrees. I rode Maggie for 3 hours on Saturday , trying out the new saddle and then 2 more hours on Sunday ( I couldn't help myself!), again in the new saddle. Maggie apparently feels like a rockstar in the saddle. Me? Not so much...I have the beginnings of bruises on the inner thighs but I was willing to sacrifice a little of my own comfort in the name of getting to ride and give Maggie a saddle she could be very comfortable in. The good news is that after riding for 5 hours in the saddle, I think I have the issue figured out. Whether it can be fixed or not remains to be determined. I am working on that with my dealer so more on that in a later post.

***(E.G- if your interested in hearing the details of what I know at this point, I can email you separately since your also having similar issues, just need your email address!)

Today and most of this week, we are back to rain so I am glad I was blessed with two solid days of riding. I have no idea what mileage we covered since I forgot my GPS (too excited to be going out riding I guess!)

MMaggie is feeling very strong and ofcourse , wanting to travel a whole lot faster than I would like her to at this point. We did a lot of walking and a couple of easy hills. I'll admist, I couldn't resist letting her drop into her big Morgan trot for a 1/4 mile. She freally loats in that gait and she loves to travel in it. My guess is as she developes her lungs, muscles and ligaments, this will likely be her most efficeint gait. Last year, she struggled staying in it without breaking into a canter. This year, she seems to have figured it out over the winter all on her own.

Good times ahead ....

The Eurolight has Landed!

2011-04-20T19:10:00.000-07:00

It arrived today! I ran right out and got it on Maggie, played with the shims and pads and I think (fingers crossed) I got a halfway decent fit for her. I may need to do a little further tweaking but I have to get her a little more sweated up to see what kind of pattern I am getting.

The fit for me however is a little different story.

It's hitting my inner thighs and quite uncomfortable. I don't know if my ass (oops there I go swearing again) is just too frieken big and I am coming too forward in the seat for their version of a 15" saddle (it's usually the right size for me) or the twist is too wide.

I have an email into the dealer I went through so hopefully it's something we can fix. Otherwise I love it!!But I can't ride in it for any length of time the way it is now.

Where the Hell is Spring????

2011-04-20T07:15:00.000-07:00

Cover your ears.. I am going to bitch...and swear... a little..

Snowshowers , hail and thunder storms with snow since last weekend. That is what we have been dealing with. It hasn't accumulated to much more than a couple of inches on the valley floors but several feet are reported in the mountain. It's been one snow squall after another for days.

I get it , really, I live in Northwest Montana, I KNOW we can get snow, even the occasional freak storm in June but THIS??? We haven't even hit 60 yet this spring.. nope not once!! In fact we have only had one or two days in the low 50's We even broke a record since 1917 for not hitting 60 degrees by this time of the year.

GLOBAL WARMING?? my ass ... ( I warned you to cover your ears)

So, when Tamara over at IntheNightFarms posted on FB that she was doing sprints in shorts in the sunshine (while I was looking out at my snow and ice covered horses) I posted that I wanted to cry... she gave me some great advice and I think I'll take her advice..

Excuse me while I go build a snow man and proceed to blow it to smitherenes....

The Eagle has Departed..

2011-04-15T12:10:00.000-07:00

FINALY I HAVE A TRACKING NUMBER FOR MY EURO LIGHT!!It should be here next week.

This has been a long process but apparently when I ordered my saddle, there was a back order on the black leather seats. Just my luck.

It was going to delay things a bit. Fine, I could understand that. I was told they should have it by end of week and ship the following week. That was 3 weeks ago. I expected it to arrive last week while I was out of town, but last Friday, nothing. So Monday I called and after alot of confusion about what saddle was mine and why it was delayed , I was told they would ship Tuesday and I would have a tracking number.

When I still didn't have a tracking number yesterday, yep, you guessed it, I called again, exept I think they stopped answering my calls. I left a message just the same..yes, I was losing my patience..

This morning, a tracking message magically appeared. Kowinkidink?? I think not..

So did they just forget or what? I went through a dealer and she had a harder time than me on getting answers from Specialized or even getting return calls.

I think Specialized needs a little help in the customer service arena is all I have to say!

Sustainability.. Diving in Head First

2011-04-10T16:58:00.000-07:00

It's been a topic of discussion at the dinner table now for the last several years at our house. For some reason or another, we always came back to the answer of "not this year". Usually it was the extra work involved, the extra chore, the extra time, the extra money out. There just seemed to be more reasons not to. But this year, with the cost of food and inflation now really starting to hit, it seemed , for the first time, to just make good sense..

We have committed to raising some of our own food. Last fall, we built several garden boxes in preparation for this spring. Over the last several days, we have been busy filling those garden boxes with lots of organic compost (thanks horses!), peat moss and topsoil. Neither of us are new to gardening , having both grown up with gardening, but it had been a while for both of us. We spent the winter researching and educating ourselves on how we wanted to do our garden. We now have a plan and I can hardly wait until I can start planting some veggies.

And , since we are doing the vegetable garden, we thought we may as well add a few chickens to the landscape. Following the Primal lifestyle, we consume alot of eggs.... and chicken. So, over the last few weeks we have collected a few Heirloom varieties of pullets, along with a few meat birds that will be , well, you know... We are also going to be acquiring two Welsummer hens and a rooster from a friend who is brooding them, but that will be later this summer. In the meantime, we have 2 Black Australorp, 2 Buff Orpington , 2 Americaunas, 1 Lakenvelder and for now, 6 Cornish cross with a larger order due in the coming weeks.

A few years ago, I didn't want to be bothered with the additional work it will require , especially the start up, to add and maintain a garden and build the chicken coop(70% done at this point), and then keep them healthy.

A few years ago, I didn't feel as good as I do today either. Eating and living a Primal lifestyle has changed my outlook on things.

Sustainable? Absolutely. Raising a little of our own food just makes sense.

Priming the Pump

2011-04-01T14:59:00.000-07:00

JB and Maggie both got some much needed attention yesterday. The grooming session left me sneezing and itching with the amount of hair that is being shed from my horses. Holy Hair!

JB and I are started revisiting ground work basics last night. I never get bored with this stuff because it seems that no matter how many times I do it, I always find some other small little thing to fine tune. My favorite thing to do to see how “little” it takes to get a horse to give me the response I am looking for. It’s amazing how little it can take!

With a year of being pampered, spoiled, loved on and being asked nothing of, it appears that JB needs a lot of fine tuning. Last night, a few observations I made and worked on:

-He blocks his right side…that’s to be expected. When I put my self on his right side, he will try to reposition himself to that I am on his left side. Or he will try to block me from coming from his left side to his right side with moving his head into my way as I come around the front of him. He’s very sly about it to…

-He travels stiffly on the end of the line as I ask him to travel around me clockwise. He falls in with the right shoulder.

-He wants to be in my space all the time and is not comfortable being at the end of the line. He wants to keep coming into me. He can’t just stand at the end of the line and be there mentally or physically.

-He wants to lead me instead of me leading him.

I realize I have created a lot of these issues as he has gone through his recovery. I'm okay with that and fully expected it. It’s a small price to pay considering the alternative. He knows this stuff, we just had to grease the gears up a bit. It took some doing but by the end of the session, as we took a walk down the road, he was light as feather on the end of the lead, watching my cues with intense concentration and getting ready for my direction. If I slowed my paced, he slowed his, if I stopped, he stopped at my side. He did several alternating turns on his haunches and forehand without any trouble or resistance. The blocking of his right side still needs some work, but that will come in time.. he’s protecting that side… we'll work through it.

I think the mental stimulation will be good for him. He seems to be longing for a purpose, a job. Purely by mistake, I have started working on some trick training with JB. He seems to have taken a liking to having me call him in from the pasture, he comes galloping up to me, stopping only a millisecond from crashing into me, I pet him , then I send him off, he goes galloping away, I call him again, repeat, repeat. It was the funniest thing when he just did it out of the blue and it was definitely his idea. Now I just have to figure out how to get him to do it on command!

I have only dabbled into trick training in the past and only know very little about it. I have great respect for those that do it successfully because it requires a huge amount of time and commitment and trusting relationship between handler and horse.

With Maggie, I also spent a few minutes revisiting groundwork basics before I hopped into the saddle. My session with her ended up being mostly walking. She would have liked to have gone faster but I knew if I asked for any trotting it would have just turned into a fight. Instead, I spent about 45 minutes working on circles and lateral work to keep her brain engaged on the task at hand instead of getting out away from me. Maggie, being a Morgan, has a natural tendency to get High headed so I spend a lot of time working her long and low. She’s still learning.

All in all, It felt damn good to climb back in the saddle and actually accomplish something with a horse again.

I will be traveling next week and will lose another week of training but it's early in the season and there is rain rain rain in the forecast...

Spring Fling...

2011-03-24T12:45:00.000-07:00

It could hardly be considered a real condition ride but I did manage to saddle up Maggie and take her for a short ride last night.

Of course, she found every excuse to be snotty....

Of course JB and Rebel had to "help" by running and bucking their way along the fence line as we left the property....

and..

Of course, Maggie thought that was a good enough reason to jump , crow hop, dance sideways and generally misbehave.

I began to wonder if I had really put almost 400 conditioning miles on this mare last year , not to mention the countless additional hours in the arena. Based on how she was behaving, it was like starting all over again..Good grief.. this mare is a pistol.

There were more than a few moments I thought any minute she might just manage to send me on a spring fling if you know what I mean.

Tom came along too and rode his 5 year old bareback. Brego did a wonderful job of making Maggie and I look like it was our first time out….. oh wait it kinda was…

(sigh)

There is a lot to be said for geldings. Even young, hardly trained geldings…

So, I guess Spring conditioning can officially begin. I just wish I had a 10 mile section of road that wasn’t unsafe. Riding the roads regularly isn’t really a good option due to safety issues (we have a lot of traffic on our dirt roads and rude drivers). I’ll be trying to ride a couple nights a week in the outdoor arena for now. That will atleast help to get Maggie legged up a bit. Weekends, we’ll start hitting the STILL snowy trails and praying for warmer weather...

10 Months Ago...

2011-03-20T18:57:00.000-07:00

Today was kind of a big day. I hadn't planned it specifically but I have been waiting for this day. Things had to be just so and Today was the day.

JB got turned out into a "pasture" for the first time since prior to his injury.

....10 months ago.

Truth is, he was actually given the "ok" from the doc back in December for turnout but our footing has been much too icey and dicey to be safe so I held off, choosing to keep him confined in his corral which was about a 50x70 area, until the footing was better.

So here are a few shots of JB testing out the new leg. He was huffing and puffing pretty good after only a few laps of running the perimater of his 2 acre pasture. He came trotting up to me several times as if to say .. "Did you see what I can do??"

The photos didn't come out the clearest(still trying to get used to the new camera!) but I hope you enjoy them atleast as half as much as I enjoyed watching JB romp and play for the first time in 10 months.

New Saddle for Maggie!!

2011-03-13T15:35:00.000-07:00

This has been an interesting process but it looks like I am going to be the proud owner of a new Eurolight!

It started with sending drawings of Maggie’s back to Dave at Specialized and speaking with Amanda on the phone as well. Without seeing the drawings, Amanda was sure that I would need the mule bars and the wide tree.

At first I was going to go straight through the manufacturer, but then decided to call a Specialized dealer here in Montana who lives about 3 hours from me, Lisa and Jack Emory. I worked with Lisa 3 years ago when I was trying to find a saddle for JB. Both her and Jack have tons of experience with saddle fit and both ride in Specialized as their personal saddle.

I decided it would be best to work with a Lisa again, who had experience using and fitting these saddles. I trust her and she’s knowledgeable and she’s right here (sort of) if I need help.

I called Lisa and explained Maggie’s back and shared with her what Amanda thought. As it turns out’s Specialized has made some changes since I last looked at these saddles 3 years ago. The tree is now laminated wood, as opposed to a molded plastic and they have made their standard tree wider. In addition, they also offer an even wider version, called the Draft tree.

Lisa said she had a tree with the mule bars on hand she could send up to me. It was a tree for the western style saddle. It wasn't their new wider standard width but it might atleast give us a starting point to see if the mule bars were really needed for Maggie. A couple days later, I had the tree.

Here is what we determined when we put it on Maggie’s back:

Bars were bridging at the center of her back, way more than we could likely shim to correct. This indicated that the mule bars were too straight (or flat) for Maggie. Mule bars were probably not going to work for her. This was kind of surprising. Maggie apparently needs more rocker than I thought so regular horse bars on the saddle would probably do the trick. Mule bars really are quite flat but they are also at a steeper vertical angle. Maggie has pretty well sprung ribs and these bars are more for a slab sided horse or mule.

Maggie definitely needed more room and flare in the shoulders. The newer wider tree would likely work but if not, we can order the draft tree, which is wider yet.

The Bar length on the tree was longer than I was comfortable with. If we could get everything else working fit wise, this was the one thing that I could see would beproblematic. The bars on the demo tree were 22” long in a 15” seat. I would prefer about 20" on the bars.

After a few emails and phonecalls between myself, and Lisa and Dave at Specialized, we confirmed that the Eurolight actually has 20 1/2 inch bars. I could live with that. I could also opt to have the tree maker shave more off the tree length if absolutely necessary but it wasn't advised due to the weight bearing area becoming smaller. Dave reassured me that the Eurolight was successfully being used on Icelandic ponies without having issues with bar length. So with that piece fuigured out, the plan was to just go ahead with the order, along with a draft wide for the gullet width.

In a last minute stroke of good luck for me on Friday afternoon Lisa said she was coming up to my area today to look at a horse. She could bring her personal 15" Featherlight Western which has the newer wider (standard) tree. Lisa would be able to see Maggie's back first hand and we coul make a definitive decision on which width I would need based on her saddle.

After playing with a few shims and pads , it looks like Maggie won't need the draft afterall. the standard width will work and leave room for a pad.

So , Lisa will put the order in on Monday and it will be 2-3 weeks build time.

When it arrives, Lisa will work with me get it fit and shimmed correctly. The plan is to haul down to Lisa's for the day and take a ride for a couple of hours to make sure all the shims and pads are placed right.

This was probably one of the fastest and easiest saddle fitting processes I have ever gone through. I am very thankful for a helpful , knowledgable Specialized saddle dealer. It really makes the process much better.

Ode To Mud

2011-03-11T08:15:00.000-08:00

Dirt...

Not exactly a substance we give much thought to. It’s not thrilling, its not glamorous. This time of year however, it gets a fair amount of attention and discussion. When the snow finally begins to melt, that dirt turns to mud, lots of mud. In fact, in Montana, we actually give it it’s own season. When mud season rolls around, my thoughts start drifting to long days in the saddle, the smell of sunshine and horse sweat in my hair. (again, not glamorous) I have to remember that what appears like a mucky mess now, will soon burst into brilliant colors and blooming things in the coming months.

So, those of you also in the quagmire, just remember, until we get through it, keep your muck boots pulled on tight, your trucks in low gear and just try to enjoy the ride.

Farm Life isn't all it's cracked up to be.. Or is it??

2011-03-03T11:06:00.000-08:00

Sometimes, I wonder what life might be like without horses, without chores, without the responsibility that never goes away.

I get up at an hour that, in most people view, is insane, atleast to most 8-5’ers in the work force. This morning’s routine wasn’t all that different than most mornings. It started with putting on the coffee, bundling up in coat, boots, mittens and hat and slogging out to the corrals and hay barn to feed the horses. By this time, my eyes are mostly open but still in a sleep fog and could be easily startled by any stray cats that come running out of the hay barn as I enter. Recently, my morning routine has gotten a little more complicated. It involves extra pampering for my older grade gelding Rebel. I have been giving him a beet pulp mash with electrolytes morning and night. (more on that in a minute)

Giving Rebel beet pulp requires me to pen him off from the other three horses he shares a pasture with. We have an adjacent corral to that pasture where the shed and water are and there is a two strand wire gate , electric, with insulated handles that separates the corral from the pasture. At any given time, there is 6-8,000 volts of electricity running through my fence so I usually don’t have any trouble.

This morning, Rebel was already in the corral, (he knows the routine) waiting for me. I ran over to shut the gate before the other three caught on to what was going on. Just as I got the gate, Maggie, Brego and Cassidy were just coming around the corner, only 10 feet from the gate. I quickly shut it, which I know they saw . Satisfied with myself that I got it latched before they could beat me to it, I turned around , walked 5 steps and CRASH, here comes Maggie.

Yes, she had busted right through the wire gate like it wasn’t even there.That's my girl... (but that is not what came out of my mouth)

Normally, I am a patient person when it comes to horses and generally, all animals (which people who know me are always amazed at, because I am the most impatient person with other people) but this??? This kinda got me peeved….

Maggie has been a problem with busting through electric fence since she arrived on the scene two years ago. She’s like a tank and just goes… with total disregard to what is in her way… It’s an issue I have had to work on a lot with her because she was a real sow to handle on the ground. We resolved the handling issue and she is now very respectful on the ground, but apparently the fencing piece hasn’t sunk in yet. She doesn’t think fences apply to her I guess.

Anyone know what the wire /voltage was that they used in the Jurassic Park movie to keep dinosaurs in??

So there I was, 5:00 this morning morning, with my flashlight, trying to fix the blankety blanken wire gate, which was completely busted in two. I ended up having to just piece it together so I could at least hang it safely out of the way. It would have to waut until I could deal with it in the daylight and when it wasn’t 20 degrees out.

So , that is how my day started today . Sometimes I have to wonder on days like today.. is it all really worth it??

Yeah.. even in the face of constant work , repairs, issues to deal with, I consider myself one of the lucky few who have space, horses, a lifestle in the country. How many people out there would give it all up for this life?? Probably a lot more than we realize. Farm life, it's definitely worth it...

Back to Rebel-
So, after two episodes of mild to moderate colic in the past Month, giving him beet pulp seems to be keeping him from trying to dehydrate himself to death, something we are still trying to figure out… Also, for the first time in the 17 years I have owned Rebel, has decided that temperatures below 40 degrees are too hard on him so he now gets blanketed as well. I guess it stands to reason. He’s about 19 years old, give or take and has been pretty low maintenance up until this winter. I shouldn’t complain but he has me worried. He’s been a great horse, with challenges, but a great horse nonetheless. We've seen some things together over the years and in his semi-retirement, he's once again, proven his worth and willingness and has become a back up archery horse for my husband. He's actually my husbands "fast" archery horse...at 19, he still runs faster than most horses half his age. He’s the horse that first got me interested in endurance many years ago and was an amazing athlete and always full of P&V.
This process has been hair pulling for both my vet and I to try to pinpoint what exactly is going on with him. He’s been such a stellar of health. Each day is a new challenge. His behavior seems to vary from normal, to withdrawn, to full on depressed. Some days he barely wants to eat and only does if I stand there with him. Some days, he won’t move for hours on end, just standing in his shed unless I take him for a walk. Sometimes, he lapses into another colic episode, I give him a dose of bantamine and he snaps out of it within a few hours. The only thing I have been able to narrow down is that I think his colic episodes are brought on by him not drinking. I don't know why , but sometimes he just stops

At first thought, I thought it was the water tank heaters but we have tested them and all the other horses are drinking just fine from them. Besides, we have them wired to a GFI so if any little trickle charge is detected, the breaker trips… no shocking or scaring the horses that way.

I suspect something more serious might be going on with Rebel but it’s hard to say what. Could be ulcers, could be a tumor, could be anything really at his age. All I know is that he is definitely not himself and definitely doesn’t feel good.

Tomorrow afternoon, I am taking him into the vet. We want to rule out it’s not his teeth bothering him. Rebel was due for a float this year anyways. I am keeping my fingers crossed that this is the cause of the issues.

I will keep you all posted.

Saddle Fitting For the Wide Backed Horse

2011-02-27T20:17:00.000-08:00

If you have read anything about saddle fit, these types of back are one of the more challenging backs to fit a saddle to. Rocker and sometimes bridging are a couple of the more common issues to contend with.

With the start of the ride season just weeks away, the process of finding a new saddle to fit Maggie has begun. It seems like just yesterday I was going through this same process for JB, who , is surprisingly wide for a smaller framed horse. I found the answer in the Duett Companion Trail saddle. It's by far the best saddle I have ever ridden in.

Maggie will be more of a challenge than JB ever was, and that was a challenge. JB atleast has some withers to speak of. Maggie's build features the classic old style Morgan, known as the Lippitt Morgan. In the beginning, the breed consisted of 17 mares and 8 stallions going back to one stallion known as Ethan Allen II. It's hard to find a good Lippitt these days as breeders have introduced all kinds of other traits into them that, frankly , just don't belong. traits like color, height, and a myriad of other things. Maggie is one of the full blooded Lippitts and is as classic as you can get. Well sprung ribs, strong shoulders, short coupled, no withers, strong as an ox , and unfortunately, wide as a table. The Morgans were bred and used as cart horses, but Morgan's are also one of those breeds that can excel in many disciplines. For Maggie, it appears she'll continue down the endurance path but in order to do that with any success, I need to find her the right saddle.

Another Duett is a heavy contender, but I want to consider the Specialized as an option. I have looked at these in the past, a few years back for JB. At the time, they just weren't making them wide enough. They have since made some improvements and made a wider option on the tree. I took some measurements of Maggies back and have sent them off for Dave and Amanda at Specialized to review. Their initial impressions were wide tree and mule bars. No surprise there. It just so happens that a Specialized dealer here in Montana has a demo of a wide tree saddle. She also has a tree with the mule bars that she can send me. Mule bars are a bit shorter and flatter, made to fit, well, mules, or in this case, like Maggie.(shhhh, don't tell Maggie she has to wear a mule tree) Here are some photos of my wooly mammoth.Pardon the hair...Its winter in Montana..

Here's what I like about the Specialized Eurolight.

-The placement of the low spot in the saddle- its very balanced compared to alot of endurance saddles out there.
-The lightweight feature, 12 lbs.
-The adjustable stirrup position.If I want to jump in it, I can. If I want to ride dressage I can.
-The ability to adjust it to fit a couple of different horses using the shims
-The ability to adjust the fit for a horse as his/her back changes with age/condition using the shims.
-The minimalist build while keeping the attachments leather. I like to have as little leather between myself and my horse as possible but I want leather, not nylon or some other synthetic material for my girth or leathers.

I will keep you posted on the process. With any luck, the things I like about the saddle will work out for Maggie. If not, Duett will win out again.

Stay tuned

Breaking the Ice

2011-02-19T19:10:00.000-08:00

It’s been since November since I have been able to really do any riding. Four months of no work is far, far too long. There is more snow in the forecast, another round of winter weather advisories and warning. The icy wind has been blowing for days. The ice in the pastures were beginning to lessen until this recent refreeze. Old man winter is far from being done with us here in Northwest Montana . There isn’t much I can do about that. I’ll have to settle for taking solace in knowing that we are atleast on the back side of winter. Patches of brown grass are beginning to poke up in the yard, the angle of the sun is changing, the horses are beginning to shed, and the daylight is lingering just a bit longer in the evenings. There is still a skim of gray light across the landscape for evening chores.

Without wanting to get too fussed up over planning for the season, there are a few to-do’s before my riding season can officially begin.

This year I have a new challenge. Two horses to work, consistently, each with very different needs. Maggie needs continued conditioning , long and slow as they say . She’ll be six this year. Last year, I had just barely had her saddled for the first time by this time of year and in a short few months managed to get her through her first limited distance. What can I say, she was a quick study! This year, her muscles, tendons and ligaments are still underdeveloped for longer distances. Two definite rides are on the schedule, with 2-3 other possibilities. Maggie and I are also going to get a bit more serious about dressage this year. Maggie likes to be in charge and the discipline of dressage work brought her a long way last year, but we have a long way to go yet.
By the end of the season I hope to be riding her at training level and successfully riding Test 2 with ease. May as well set the standard high!! Ahh, the dreaded 20 Meter circle and canter transitions….

JB will begin conditioning again but not with the goal of completing any rides. My focus with him will be a slow rebuilding of his mind and physical well being after a year of being off any work from his surgery. More dressage and long slow trail rides will definitely be on the books for him. My guess is, he’ll be tagging along one way or the other on several outings. The simple joy of just spending time riding him again is enough to keep me totally content. It will be like long lost friends reunited and I am so looking forward familiarity of our partnership.

In the coming weeks, as things begin to shift, 9and hopefully the ice and snow really starts to disappear. I will take the anticipation of wanting to ride (and waiting out the weather) and direct that energy into something productive, like plucking away at the task list I seem to have acquired for myself for ride season start up. There is much to do.

--Maggie needs a new saddle -
It’s time I get serious about getting Maggie her own equipment . I used the Duett last year but that is JB’s saddle. It fits JB like a glove (or at least it did when he didn’t look like a stuffed cupcake like he is now!) For Maggie, it did the job and got us through the Thompson River Ride last year but it isn’t the best fit for her. Last fall, on any conditioning rides, I was riding her in my Wade but that isn’t something I want to ride her in for any distance. It’s fits her well, but it’s 33 lbs and doesn’t have free swinging stirrups. In the coming weeks, I will be working on taking measurements of Maggie’s back for a couple of different saddles I am considering. I will do my best to try to post pics of this process as time allows. Ofcourse, I’ll also need to get the required accutrements, breast collar, girth, saddle pads, etc…add that to the list…

--Maggie will also be getting borium shoes put on.

***Barefoot people, don't run to comments to give me heck about this one...I have already done the research on boots with studs and until they come up with a safer alternative, I am sticking with borium.. sorry to disappoint but that is just how it is going to be***

Having Borium shoes on will allow me to start riding Maggie now, as opposed to waiting until April or May. A few of my more adventurous riding partners that have already begun hitting the snowy trails. I am anxious to start whittling away at Maggie’s winter waist line (she’s a Morgan, she can’t help it) . Winter has been good to the girl.
Riding through deep snow is one of my favorite things to do on a horse this time of year and if careful, it offers some great conditioning similar to sand.

--Get the Horse Trailer ready-
I dread this one. The old grey steel gooseneck needs some help this year. I had hoped to purchase a new trailer by now, but it looks like the old Standy by will have to get us through another year, which is fine. It just makes camping for me a whole lot less convenient. New tires, a few welding repairs, and repacking of the bearings will get it ready to go. It’s also due to pulling the mats, powerwash the floor boards and of course check the floorboards for any signs of rot and replace as needed but they should all be fine as we redid the floor a few years ago years ago. Anyone in the market for a 1995 S&S Steel Gooseneck Stock Trailer??

--New windshield for the truck-
can’t ignore that crack any longer…

--Restart the boot fitting process with JB
I want to see if I can use the Easyboot Gloves for his hind feet. I also need to get new pads for front Epics.

--Get on Liz Tukey’s schedule for July or August for a couple of lessons.

As far as Horse related things to do, I think that should keep my mind and wallet plenty occupied for now. We are also getting ready for some new features to the farm this year.

What goes cluck and has big ears?

Stay tuned.

My First

2011-02-19T18:46:00.000-08:00

Well, I never set out to win any awards for my blog and I rarely win anything but Karen over at Wren Loop Thoroughbreds nominated me as having a Stylish blog.. well fancy that!!!

Me.. Stylish?? Who'd a thunk???

Well, Karen , if you say so, who am I to argue?? Thanks for the award and here's to firsts in the world of blogging.

All of you readers, Go check out Karen's blog. Pretty good stuff over there!

Resurgence

2011-02-05T15:39:00.000-08:00

I took a walk today on my horse, bareback with nothing but a halter to guide her. We tromped through snow drifts and lazily made our way around the pasture, once, twice, three more. My ears and nose pink with the cold, but my hands warm tangled in her mane. It was the first time since November I have climbed on a horse. My senses awake and alive.
It wasn't much of a ride, but Maggie was huffing a bit, almost felt a bit warm with all of her hair. Do I dare call it the first condition ride of the season??? No, not a condition ride. A time to remember, to remind, to reconnect. To feel, to sense, to listen to each others hearts.
It wasn't much, but It will have to do for now until the snow melts away, the evenings linger just a bit longer and the sun warms our faces. It wasn't much, but it was a start.

The road ahead hold promises, dreams to come and miles to run, and sunsets to chase.

The Human Horse Relationship

2011-01-26T13:53:00.000-08:00

I ran across this video a couple years ago. I often go back to watch it. I have watch it probably 50 times, maybe more and each time, it send chills up my spine. Each time, I am in awe at the sheer mastery of horsemanship of this rider and the profound relationship he has developed with his horse. Leaving the highly heated debate of the Spanish Bull Fighting aside, one cannot argue the fact that this duo has something special, something earned. Those of us striving to develop a deeper relationship, better communication or just better riding skills. take note. There is alot going on between man and horse in this video that most of us can only begin to grasp.

I don't know about any of you, I find this video an inspiration.

I encourage you to appreciate the tradition that this sport is steeped, look past the graphic content , and truly watch to see some amazing horsemanship unfold before your eyes.

Warning- somewhat graphic content

January Blahs

2011-01-25T19:55:00.000-08:00

Imprisoned into the safe confines of sanded corrals, the horses are crabby, sullen and terribly bored. Their legs yearn to run, their lungs to burn with the icy crystalized air and their manes tossing wildly with the gusting winter winds. They will have to wait.The ice sheet that now covers the majority of our 5 acres left me no choice last weekend. A decision between safety and confinement or freedom and danger. I chose safety. The risk of a a horse down on the ice, unable to get up , or worse, a broken limb, was too high.

I hate winters like this; lots of snow with below freezing temps, followed by a warming trend which brings rain and melting snow, only to be followed by dipping temps once again and snow, to now hide the disastrous footing from unsuspecting equines.

So, we have officially entered the January blahs, a point in time where my horses and myslef long for warmer days to frolic and play in the sunshine.

C'MON SPRING!!!

Picasa help!

2011-01-15T16:03:00.000-08:00

Okay, it CANNOT possibly be this difficult to upload photos from Picasa but apparently it is..

I saved certain photos to a specific album name in Picasa, then opened up a new gadget for a slideshow, chose Other, copied the URL from the new folder and when I saved it, the gadget just sat there and said "loading" forever and never actually uploaded any photos...

Any advice???

Dirty Laundry

2011-01-06T19:57:00.000-08:00

A blog is a wonderful place to connect with others, meet new people, share interests, bounce ideas and blab about whatever your heart desires. I started my blog for all those reasons and because I love horses, I love to talk about horses and I love to talk to other people about horses. Pretty simple.

Since starting this blog in 2008, I have shared a lot of things, mostly horse related but there have been a few other topics as well. I have enjoyed having it as a “creative “ outlet of sorts but at times, I have struggled with finding a balance between not sharing those things that I feel should be left sacred and sharing those things that are okay to share that my readers would enjoy reading . I have also treaded lightly on subjects that can turn into a perceived insult. Lets face it, horse people can have pretty strong opinions and thoughts about how things should be done when it comes to horses. In a lot of cases, I have found those opinions, methods, and thoughts are all too often based on ego driven agendas with horse people. In 2011 I might risk going out on a limb a bit and dabble into a few more “touchy” horse subjects that I have avoided in the past.

In the meantime, I thought it might fun to air a bit of my dirty laundry with you all and followed in the steps of a post idea that several , like EG, Tamara , Funder (and probably numerous others) have already done.

Here's 31 “things about me” that you probably didn’t know , or would have never guessed, or maybe didn’t want to know but now do??? Anyways, hope you enjoy them and try not to laugh too hard???

1.I first fell in love with the Spanish Horses in 1995 when I had the rare opportunity to train one of the first few Spanish Norman fillies by Spanish-Norman sire Romantico HHF from Hamid Hill Farms. I also had the honor to show her in harness at her very first show. She was awesome and I was in love. I knew I definitely wanted another Spanish horse someday back then. I never knew the experience would come full circle with having the opportunity to own the type of horse, a Barb, proclaimed to be the ancestor of the Spanish Norman warhorses Linda and Allan were breeding back then. Life is funny.

2.I love splitting wood as an occasional stress relief.

3.I am quirky and get worse as I get older.

4.I am obsessive compulsive about things, like unplugging my curling iron before leaving the house in the morning. I have been known to get miles down the road , only to have to turn around to re check it again, only to find, every time, that I did in fact unplug it (it does have an auto shut off , but don’t go there)

5. I am left handed to eat and write with, but do almost everything else right handed.

6. I occasionally partake in Horseback archery competitions and have to hold the bow upside down in order to hit the target. Must be a left handed thing…

7. I swam before I walked because my older sibling threw me in our pool (with water wings ofcourse) when mom and dad weren’t watching.

8. I prefer not to use the last of anything, especially toothpaste. Refer to # 3 for an explanation.

9. I constantly misplace my car keys.

10. I have the olfactory sense of a bloodhound. I can smell things you don’t even want to know about.

11. I think I have a good sense of direction until I get lost, which happens a lot…

12. I was kicked in the head by a horse at the age of 11 and should not have survived.

13. I ruptured my spleen a year later and almost bled to death. The spleen healed on its own with blood transfusions as supportive therapy. The surgeons said it was unheard of given how bad the rupture was.

14. I never outgrew that annoying habit that kids have of asking “why” . I am insanely curious about things and tend to be a research geek. I never settle on an answer until I have researched it myself.

15. I have more interests than I have time to pursue.

16. I am deathly afraid of lizards, spiders and snakes and I don’t much like chickens or turkeys either.

17. I have two brothers and a sister.

18. I have an eclectic taste in music but my favorite is Jazz. My uncle was a jazz musician.

19. I am pretty good at shredding people verbally if they want to argue about something and I am a master at using one’s own words against them.

20. I require a lot quiet and alone time.

21. I spent several years wishing I was the crafty creative type. I tried various crafts, trying to find the one that worked for me. I went through cross stitching, sewing, beading, bracelet making, quilting and who knows what else. In the end, I ruined a sewing machine, glued myself to material, and all kinds of other mishaps before I resigned to the fact that I am not crafty or creative. If I am lucky, I can sort of sew a button on my shirt in an emergency… maybe.

22. On the other hand, I am pretty good at interior design. Go figure.

23.I absolutely cannot follow a recipe to save my life. I always have to change something. I blame it on growing up with my Hungarian grandmother who was an amazing cook. I inherited her skills.

24. I hate unloading the dishwasher.

25.I find belly buttons repulsive and belly button jewelry triggers my gag reflex. Feet are barely tolerable. Again, see #3.

26. I learned to play a Jembe drum but in the process, also learned that I am Rhythym challenged. That would explain why I dance like Elaine on Seinfeld.

27. I find it hilarious when people fall and have offended more than one person as a result. I am told it’s a nervous response. I diasagree, I just find it friekin hilarious to watch people fall down.

28.I grew up living next to Meryl Steep and knew all her kids.

29. I taught Jane Curtain’s daughter how to ride horses in Pony Club.

30. I excercised one of Whoopi Goldbergs Arabians for a summer. He was crazy.

31. I hate shopping, unless it's for horse stuff..hate hate hate it.

So there you have it...me and all my "quirks"

Bonus(just because)
I am ALWAYS the one to find a hair or something disgusting in my food at a restaurant. AlWAYS....

From Our farm to yours ...

2011-01-01T13:10:00.000-08:00

Wishing you all a very Happy New Year. Here's to new beginnings, new trails, and new adventures.

All the best to you as we begin yet another year at Acer Farm.

Season's Greetings

2010-12-27T20:55:00.000-08:00

Forgive me. This is late.

Merry Christmas to all of you.

I just want to say a big thank you to all of you who read my ramblings, of which I have not been very good at these days.I will work on it, I promise. But you should all know. There are many days that just seeing your responses makes my day, just knowing that some of you read what I actually write. It's hard to believe but I am very grateful. Writing this blog allows me to connect to others in this large world that I wouldn't otherwise have the opportunity to do.. so thank you.

Since I was late for Christmas, I may as well be early for the next holiday.

Happy New Year !!

I know, I know, 2011 isn’t quite here yet but I am really looking forward to a new start. Heaven knows I need one.

2010 was one of the roughest years I can recall. It was a year of many stressors. It had a few high spots like completing Maggie’s first limited distance but overall, 2010 was a year of big challenges for me. Everything from health issues with family and friends, divorces, deaths, injured horses, expensive vehicle repairs and just when I thought I had reached a point where the year's misgivings couldn't possibly get any more difficult, it did just that.

I found myself faced with having to say goodbye to my best friend of over 12 years, my dog Munci. On December 23rd I had to make the devastating decision to say goodbye to Munci. He had developed cancer and by the time we saw any symptoms, the cancer had metastasized into his lungs. There was nothing we could do except keep him as comfortable as possible, give him lots of love, pray for a miracle and wait. Prayers are often answered in ways that you don’t always understand. My prayer was for Munci to make a miraculous recovery so we could have more time but most of all, my prayer for him was not to suffer. I didn’t get the first part of that prayer answered but the second part was. It was only a period of 5 days from the time we learned of the cancer before Munci and I had to part our ways. It will take some time to adjust to the silence that remains after a dog is no longer there in your home anymore.

Looking back at 2010 , I have to believe there is some other force out there that explains why so many difficult times ensued in 2010 for me. Maybe 2011, I get a clean slate. Atleast that is what I am hoping for.

Usually this time of year, I begin putting together a plan for training and conditioning for endurance, getting ready for at least one ride. Unfortunately, Hooves and Company, the local distance riders group I am part of, won’t be putting on a local ride like they (we) normally would. That means that I won't have access to a local ride in 2011. That really stinks butat this point, I am not going to stress about it.

Instead, my plan is pretty simple… just ride, as often as I can, as long as I can. JB will need many hours of rebuilding, mentally and physically. Maggie just needs many hours period. If a ride works out that I can attend, great, even if I have to travel. If not, I can still ride and log miles. I am planning a few weekend horse camping trips with friends. I am just looking forward to a summer of good times spent with good friends and good horses.

There are other things in store for 2011 at Acer Farms as well.

Stay tuned and once again, thank you for reads Barbs Etc.

One, Two, Three; One, Two , Three; One, Two, Three

2010-12-15T09:21:00.000-08:00

Yes, I am counting. What am I counting? I'll get to that in a minute..

So, it's only days before Christmas is here. Are you still shopping, wondering what to get your horsey friends? I have the perfect thing.

For endurance riders, we're kind of a funny bunch. We're really into our equipment and many are really into accessories... We spend alot of time in the saddle and we focus alot on pacing, rhythym and timing. We all know that if we are tuned into our horse and our horse is tuned into us, we'll likely both come through 25, 50 or more miles a lot less fatigued. Getting into a rhythm is pretty important.Often times, when I am working in the arena on dressage or other flat work, I find playing music with a good beat helps both the horse and myself find cadence in a canter , or keeps the trot steady but having access to music while your out riding the trail isn’t always convenient, even with the age of personal music devices such as IPods. If you want your horse to be able to hear it, you need to pack along speakers and that just doesn't work. Believe me I have tried. As it turns out , there's another way to bring along some music with you and your steed out on the trail.

Rhythm beads, aka Speed beads. You’ve probably heard of them. Or maybe not.

What are Rhythm beads? Only the coolest thing I think an endurance rider could possibly accessorize their endurance "get up" with, in my humble opinion. !

They are jewelry for your horse but they are more than that. I think it’s a valuable training aid used to help accentuate the rhythm and cadence of your horses gaits. Remember that counting I was doing???
Those of you that are Rhythmically challenged….. listen up! This could be your ticket to not bouncing into your saddle anymore!
These Rhythm beads are worn like a necklace on your horse, just in front of his/her shoulders. They are typically made of glass beads interspersed with small bells. Similar to how a musician uses a metronome, the bells and beads omit a soft jingle as the horses move with each stride. It helps the rides learn to hear the gait, then learn to feel the gaits. Even better, horses seem to get something from them as well and will often learn to follow a tempo.Its not uncommon to see these necklaces worn in the dressage shows where riders and horses score depends stricly on finding rhythym and cadence in every gait at every moment. I have even used them when I do a little jumping to help me count strides between fences. The beads can also serve other functions as well. On the trail, they help alert wildlife that something is approaching. That can be beneficial when you live where I do and occasionally have to deal with bears , wolves and cougars. The last thing I want to do is surprise a mama Griz with a cub. The rhythm beads would let her know something is coming long before I get there, hopefully. (Ofcourse, I could always strap on a few larger bells to my saddle like a lot of riders do here, but to me they are kind of like a dinner bell to a bear since all the hikers in the park wear those big metal bells. Besides, the rhythm beads have a much nicer sound. Ofcourse, the other perk is simply that it kind of looks nice on your horse, you can match it to your color scheme and with most women, we all like to accessorize, right???

You can google rhythm beads and find a number of places that sell them or, if your like me, you can dabble into making your own and get double to pleasure of coming up with your own customized design. What a fun winter project!! And what a great gift idea!

Orthopeadic Injuires- Positive Outcomes

2010-12-02T12:55:00.000-08:00

Ever since JB’s accident, I tend to read anything I can get my hands on about tendon, ligament and other orthopedic related injuries, surgeries or treatments. The opening paragraph of a recent article I ran across caught my attention.The article touches on some of the high level issues surrounding tendon and ligament injuries and the subsequent recovery. I have added some information to the points made in this article based on my own personal experience with Pastern Arthrodesis. It includes things I have learned and some of what can be expected when you put a horse through something like this. Hopefully, it may help provide some answers to someone else out there who is facing this surgery with their beloved horse. When I was hunting for more information , it was hard to come by.

Warning- This post got more lengthy than I had hoped.

The article is by:
Jennifer G. Barrett, DVM, PhD, Dipl. ACVS; Marion duPont Scott Equine Medical Center; Virginia-Maryland Regional College of Veterinary Medicine

Tendon and Ligament injuries in horses causes both economic and personal hardship for horse owners and industry professionals. A prolonged period of layup and rehabilitation is necessary, but whether the horse will be sound at the end of the rehabilitation period is uncertain. Lameness due to tendon and ligament injury is common in performance horses, affecting up to 25% of racehorses over a career and accounting for up to 43% of injuries in event horses, but it is also common to companion horses. Chronic lameness often follows the initial injury, with recurrence as high as 80% of racehorses with tendinitis.

Indeed, hardships .. hardships for me, ,my family (believe it or not), for JB and to some extent the vet and his staff( since I bugged them all the time with questions). In JB’s case, there was nothing I could have done to prevent him from rupturing his MCL, other than not letting him be pastured in the adjacent pen next to Grace, who, in hindsight probably antagonized him to the point he couldn’t take it, but the fact remains, it didn’t make the situation any less difficult. From the time of the injury to the point in the road when you get the conformation that everything is healed, the horse owner, the horse, and even to some extent the vet, are on pins and needles. Infection, too much inflammation, broken hardware, lack of healing, potential movement of hardware, or just re-injury . All of these things which could make or break the positive outcome. It could happen in the very beginning, it could happen towards the end, you just don’t know. In the beginning when JB had his cast on, he laid down a lot, (stress a lot) It wasn’t necessarily a bad thing because as long as he was down, the weight was off the leg. This was good in the initial days. But with laying down a lot , you can also have other complications; Gut motility, respiratory issues, and he was at risk of hurting his leg every time he went to get up on all four feet, should he twist it or tweak it wrong. Another complication we dealth with was bed sores. Poor JB had the most horrible hock sores that I battled with every lotion, cream , salve under the sun to try to keep from reopening. As soon as they would start to heal, he would tear one open again in the process of pushing off his hind legs to get back on his feet. He got pretty sore on his hocks and while I think he knew I was trying to help with the goop I was constantly trying to apply, he preferred to not be touched much at all back there. We came to an agreement eventually but not before he managed to catch me a time or two from kicking out. Did I mention the little bugger has fast little hind feet?? I sustained more kicks from JB in those weeks than I have ever received from any horse. In one case, he caught the inside of my left knee. I got lucky that day, it was not a hard enough kick to injure my knee joint, just the tissue around it. That knee swelled like a balloon and turned some of the most putrefying colors…. So… Hardship??? yah, you could say that…Beware, your sweet horse you once knew will tend to get ornery at times...

Tendons connect muscle to bone, providing elasticity and increasing both gait efficiency and support to the lower limb alignment. Ligaments connect bone to bone, giving structural support for joints and maintaining suspension of the fetlock joint as part of the suspensory apparatus in the horse. Tendon and ligament injury can be classified into three categories: traumatic laceration or rupture; acute inflammation with swelling and pain (tendinitis); and a more subtle degenerative injury due to a failure to heal due to repetitive damage

JB fell into the first category , traumatic laceration or rupture but the interesting point here that caught my attention was Gait efficiency and gait, in general. With an endurance horse, it’s kind of important to have a horse be able to pass a vet exam so you can participate. In order to cover mile after mile, gait efficiency is very important. With the Pastern fusion procedure, JB is essentially now missing a key joint that provided cushion from impact.
We better do a quick anatomy lesson before I go much further:

The procedure fused the First and second Phalanx bones , or a.k.a. short and long pastern bones.
So what does this joint really do?

From the bottom of the cannon bone, the long pastern bone (First Phalanx)is the first bone we are talking about. It’s called a long bone because it has a central marrow. It is angled between the cannon bone and the short pastern bone and acts as part of the shock absorbing mechanism of the leg. The top of the bone is deeply grooved and divided into into two articular surfaces, which fit snugly together with the lower end of the cannon bone forming the fetlock joint. The lower end of the long pastern is also divided into two articular surfaces, the inner surface larger, but the line of division is not as distinct as the upper end. On the front surface of the bone is a bulge where the common digital extensor tendon attached. The superficial flexor tendons are attached at the back, on either side.

Below that lies the short pastern bone(second Phalanx) is a solid bone with no central marrow. It is important because it is partly inside and partly outside the wall of the hoof and also because it is the first bone to sustain concussion as the foot hits the ground. The short pastern is also an angled bone and is supported at the back by the deep flexor tendon. The superficial flexor tendon is also attached to the back surface and the common extensor tendon is attached to the front surface, just like the long pastern bone.

With a pastern Arthrodesis, the biomechanics of the joint change and the surrounding ligaments, tendons and joins will take on an additional burden. That means, JB's way of travel may always look a bit different. At this time, it’s hard to tell how JB’s body will adjust to this change. To call it lameness, right now, we probably could. Hopefully in time, that will lessen.
My vet and I discussed this part at length, given my hopes to return JB to limited distance or at best, longer distances, maybe real endurance?? In order for him to ever stand a chance at passing a vet exam at a ride again, his way of going will have to improve. As the vet indicated, given how well the fusion is healed in the xrays, he was surprised that JB had a slightly shorter step on the right side.. It's not something my vet wants me to worry about right now. When it comes time to start riding JB here in a couple of months, my instructions are to not let that short step deter JB returning to light work (to start). It could very well be something higher, something soft tissue in the knee or shoulder. It would stand to reason , given the position JB had himself in when he got injured and that he struggled badly. Could just be a soft tissue injury, and we all know how long those can take to heal. The bottom line is that all the indicators are there that he will return to full use. It will be a matter of working JB gradually back into fitness and seeing how he reacts each time. My plan is to take it slow, track his progress with each ride over a period of time and adjust where we need to.

The connective tissues from which tendons and ligaments are made are closely related. The highly organized structure of tendon enables it to be both strong and elastic. The cells within tendon produce the extracellular matrix that is organized into the fibers responsible for tendon's unique mechanical properties. The tendon fibers are made of the protein collagen (predominately type I). The collagen forms long interlaced fibers in the same alignment with the tendon length, but the fibers also have a pleated pattern termed "crimp" that, like a spring, gives elasticity to the tendon.
When a tendon is injured, tendon fibers are ruptured or degraded by the inflammation. Attempts at healing frequently fall short of the exact structure of normal tendon. Abnormal orientation, size and organization of the collagen fibers that replace the original structure have less strength and elasticity. This is thought to increase the risk of re-injury once the healing process is over.

Most of this doesn’t really apply to JB because the MCL is no longer part of JB’s anatomy. However, there are other ligaments and tendons to be watching as he returns to work. Re-injury is always lurking in the back of my mind. There are some things I am doing to help decrease that as much as possible and I will get to that in a minute. I don't even want to think about the word re-injury!

Because of the large amount of tissue matrix, tendons, and ligaments have a relatively small number of blood vessels and cells that can make new normal tendon. When the tendon is damaged, the injured fibers and matrix need to be degraded and removed during the inflammatory process. It is thought that poor healing in tendons results from a prolonged and inefficient inflammation needed to remodel the tendon and prevent scarring. Therefore, tendon requires as long as nine to 12 month for complete healing. Even with a careful rehabilitation program, re-injury is common.
Like tendons, injured ligaments can have a painfully slow healing process. We’ve probably all dealt with a bowed tendon? Now amplify that by about 10 times with a MCL or suspensory injury. If I opted to let time heal JB’s ruptured MCL, the outcome would have likely been poor. The ligament would have healed eventually on its own, in some fashion, but the likelihood of soundness were very low with pain and arthritis being very high. In the end, JB’s ruptured ligament was too severe for any hope with this approach, even with careful rehabilitation. Typically , it’s a torn or lacerated ligament injury, the outcome of letting them heal on their own is usually better. Arthritis on the other hand is always a factor in these cases.

Both acute and chronic degenerative lesions in ligament occur in all equine endeavors, with suspensory ligament injury (desmitis) being the most common. Suspensory ligament desmitis can cause a chronic lameness and be resistant to currently available treatment modalities. Also, because current therapies have not been compared to each other or proven, it is often difficult to know which one gives the best chance for complete healing.
In reality JB's suspensory ligament could be impacted.This is because the pastern fusion changes the biomechanics of his pastern joint. The vet isn’t overly concerned that he will have any issues, but if he goes back to work over distance, it will be something I need to be paying attention to. I may consider using SMB boots for support. My vet is consulting with a sports medicine vet on whether this will be helpful or not for JB. Stay tuned for updates on this topic. Or, if anyone has any input on this, I would love to hear about it.
There are more and more studies coming out about using stem cells for tendon injuries in horses. This procedure is actually increasingly being used in a number of clinical practices with some impressive results. There are two types of stem cell therapy, one is Mesenchymal stems cells (MSC’s) which are obtained from the horses own bone marrow. The procedure is invasive. The process then takes several weeks to culture the cell before they can be reinjected directly into the damaged tendon. The other therapy is Embryonic stem cells (ESC’s) This therapy is very new in treating horses with tendon injuries. The initial studies being done are showing a higher survival rate of the cells in the 10 day post injection period. It’s still very early in the process to know how effective they will be but the studies suggest that ESC’s could be a very viable option in the near future for tendon injuries. ESC’s can be used “off the shelf” unlike MSC’s.
Interesting stuff that I will likely continue to read up on.

Of course, there are other risks I am going to have to do my best to dodge. Arthritis in the surrounding joints (won’t be in the fused joint, for obvious reasons…).Through out his recovery I kept JB on a supplement for Glucosamine, Chondroitin Sulfate , Hyaluronic Acid , MSM and Vitamin C. It’s a product through SmartPak called SmartFlex Reapir. It helped give him everything he needed for joint, tendon and ligament health during his recovery period. It wasn’t just his injured leg I was supporting. I wanted to support his other joints as well during his healing. He was stall bound for 4 weeks prior to his surgery and then 6 more weeks after that. The skeletal structure of a horse is designed for movement and without that, there is a risk of negative impacts to his other joints and tendons. I wasn’t sure if supplementation would help in the long run, but I wasn’t sure it wouldn’t help either. It was kind of like purchasing a little insurance. It certainly couldn’t hurt so there was nothing to lose. One thing I am certain of is that it kept inflammation down with the MSM. Low inflammation translates to increased healing.

Our understanding of how some degenerative and acute injuries are related to each other is incomplete. The current thinking is that a low level of damage or degeneration occurs in the tendon or ligament over time. This damage is not completely repaired and can go unnoticed, because there may be no lameness, pain or swelling.
The failure to completely heal may be due to the inability of tendons to remodel or because of the repetitive forces these structures experienced regularly during exercise. Then, at a critical point during exercise or overexertion, the low-grade injury can no longer hold up to normal use or perhaps to an overload, creating an acute lesion with heat, swelling and lameness. This injury typically starts in the center or core of the tendon (called a core lesion), where blood and serum form a clot that replaces the tendon fibers and creates more inflammation that results in more damage over the following days or weeks.

This paragraph points out why I am concerned about JB's suspensory ligament and the other supporting structures. It will be interesting to see how he progresses as those other tendons and ligaments begin to be stressed once he returns to regular exercise. I have very little concern about the fused joint itself as it has healed very solid. I have discontinued the Smart Flex Repair product since his x-rays, but will return to using a similar product for maintenance once JB goes back to work in an effort to continue to support those structures.

The diagnosis of tendon and ligament injuries has improved dramatically in recent years. Several newtreatment modalities are being used, a long lay-up period and the risk of recurrence are still factors for recovery. Newer treatments such as injection with stem cells or platelet-rich plasma are promising,as mentioned above, but their benefit has not been fully understood.
Other treatments I have and will continue to utilize is chiropractic and massage therapy and, even craniosacral therapy. JB had three craniosacral therapy session with a craniosacral therapist who works on large animals (imagine!), in the weeks after his surgery. The purpose was to help reduce inflammation and pain. Again, I have no idea if it truly helped or not but I was willing to do whatever I could for a successful outcome. Fortunately, I have access a very good, LEGITAMATE equine chiropractor who travels to this area for individual sessions. I have been taking horses to him for several years, including JB. You can be sure we’ll be on his list next time he swings through this area.

Further research into the detection, causes and best treatments for tendon and ligament injury are all needed. In a survey of American Association of Equine Practitioners members by the AAEP Foundation in 2009, musculoskeletal disease was ranked No. 1 as the equine body system that needs further research. Additionally, 75% of respondents believed more research is needed to specifically help treat tendon and ligament injury. Though there has been much attention given to arthritis research, relatively little research has been directed toward tendon and ligament injury.

The importance of tendon and ligament injury cannot be understated; it can be responsible for the development of joint disease and is frequently associated with navicular disease. Research on tendon and ligament injuries will to help prevent and treat this cause of lameness.

I did a lot of research regarding the procedure and the recovery period . When I was first researching the Pastern Arthrodesis surgery, living on a fence for those weeks, trying to make a decision, I was frustrated at the lack on information out there on this procedure and the associated recovery rates. I was hungry for information beyond what my vets and consulting vets were telling me. I found a few studies that had been done, none of which were all that helpful because the study was outdated and focused on a comparison of techniques used with different types of hardware and placement of hardware relative to success. Of course the techniques that they were researching in that study are now standard practice as far as what kind of plate and screws are used and how the screws are placed. It was only one study, and not useful in what I was after.

I wanted to know what to expect, what to be prepared for, the good the bad and the ugly. How often did horses really return to full use? What kind of full use? Were we talking Jumping, roping, endurance, dressage , endurance? Or were we talking occasional arena /trail horse? What about the difference in breeds? Small horses versus big horses? Does one heal better than the other? Have there ever been any other endurance horses that have done this and returned to full use? Ideally I would have liked to talked to a few horse owners that had had this exact surgery done and hear what their experience was. There just wasn’t much to be found and I felt as though I had to make my decision in a vacuum, hoping for a positive outcome. I would certainly agree that more research should be done in this area. I would even be willing to have JB’s progress as part of a study for recovery rates, if there ever was such a thing…

Rehabilitation
Rehab for a Pastern Arthrodesis (fusion of first and second Phalanx )is a bit different than Rehab for a tendon or ligament injury, although they they share some similarities. The time period is almost the same 9-12 months for optimal healing, sometimes longer. Injured tendon or ligament cannot withstand sudden heavy loading during this time and is highly susceptible to re-injury. Same with pastern arthrodesis. An example of a controlled exercise program is described below for a tendon/ligament injury. By gradually loading the tendon/ligament in increasing amounts, you are stimulating the tendon/ligament to heal to the best of its ability. With Pastern arthrodesis, impact to the joint was what was going to trigger the fusion, because bones respond to impact. Think about foals, they should have access to run and play for the best development of their skeletal and mucle structures . So, our rehab for JB was a bit of a spin off of this program once he was released to start hand-walking and ponying. In addition, JB has slowly been graduated to larger and larger paddocks so , by default, rehabbing himself.

**It is important to remember that this program noted below is to be used as a guide. Each horse is different., depending on the structure involved, severity of initial injury and progression of healing.
Controlled Exercise Program
0-60 days- handwalking )clock started at 5 mos post op for me
60-90 days - 5 minute trot/jog
90-150 days - 10-15 minute trot/jog
150-210 days - 20-25 minute trot/jog
210-240 days - canter 5 minutes / gallop 1 mile every other day (racehorse)
240-270 days - canter 10 minutes / gallop 1 mile every day (racehorse)
270-300 days - low jumping / short breeze (racehorse)
300-330 days - normal jumping / breezes (racehorse)
330-360 days - competition

WIth tendon and ligament specific injuries, recheck ultrasound exams are performed every 60 days to assess healing and to prevent reinjury. Ultrasound can detect evidence of tendon or ligament damage before a new injury occurs. In this case, the horses exercise level is reduced to prevent further injury. It is important to remember that horses should not advance in their exercise program without re-evaluation by a veterinarian.

With Pastern Arthrodesis, they did xrays when the surgery was completed to show placement of the hardware and then xrays again at the 6 months post op time. JB shouldn't need any more xrays unless something goes wrong.

PROGNOSIS- WILL MY HORSE BE ABLE TO RETURN TO HIS JOB?
At this point in time, JB’s orthopeadic surgery has been , a very positive outcome. My vet is very pleased with his progress and how everything has healed. He also feels that his chances are very good that he will return to distance riding. He may never be a 50 miler or a 100 miler but we just don't know yet. Lastly, I wanted to share a few key things I felt were most influential in having or getting a positive outcome.

1) Make sure your horse can handle being confined for a long time. If you don't think he can, either opt for keeping him medicated or don't go through with it. I kept JB lightly sedated, (enough to take the edge off) for the time he was in his cast.The longer the horses can keep the cast on the better the chances are for healing correctly.
2) Make sure the surgeon doing the procedure has alot of experience with it
3) Get several opinions, talk to as many people as you can about it.
4) Set it up so you can bring your horse back to the environment he is most comfortable in and make sure he is comfortable. It will keep him less stressed and less risk of injury during recovery. If that place is a boarding facility, make sure you or someone else you trust can be monitoring him daily at the minimum , ideally multiple times during the day. Things like your horse getting cast in his stall can be a huge set back. Monitor his eating, peeing, pooping, and his attitude. Make changes as you need to.
5) While in a stall, give your horse something to keep him occupied. For JB, I had a radio going, a fan to keep him cool, and I kept a quiet horse in a paddock about 20 feet away that he could see at all times. Every day, I would bring a horse over to JB's stall just to let JB make contact with another horse over his stall wall. They are herd animals and seek comfort in their herd mates. I also picked JB buckets upon buckets of green grass every day. You might consider hanging a "lik-it" toy to hang from the ceiling as well. I hung a ball that JB played with a little but it wasn't really his gig.
6)Give your horse the best possible feed you can and keep hay in front of him as much as possible. You may also want to supplement.
7)Supportive care like massage or craniosacral work. I also rubbed JB's other legs down every evening with arnica gel, especially his front left leg and his right knee , which was getting alot of pressure when he was in the cast.
8) Spend time with your horse during his recovery, as much as you reasonable can. At the risk of sounding a little woo-woo, talk to your horse in calming tones, tell your horse he/she is going to get better and that this is temporary. Use this time as an opportunity to bond. They understand more than you realize.
9) Keep your horse clean and his bedding clean. JB was groomed every day and because he couldn't roll while he was stalled, he especially enjoyed this time to get the itchies taken care of. I also cleaned his stall morning and night for all 10 weeks of his time being in a stall.
9) Keep a positive attitude- they can sense things we have no idea about.

Welcome Winter...

2010-11-29T07:15:00.000-08:00

We are finally seeing some light at the end of the snow and cold tunnel here. We went from this....To this (okay, this is in the mountains, but you get the picture) in a matter of days.

The days leading up to Thanksgiving, we were busy surviving almost record setting frigid temperatures, not to mention the wind chill factor. An arctic cold front from Canada came whipping down on us. . The day time highs were zero if we were lucky, the night dipping down to minus 20 with wind chills somewhere around 35- 40 below during the worst of it. It was a full time job keeping plenty of feed in front of the horses, making sure they were warm enough and keeping an eye on the water heaters, keeping the wood stove going and not to mention making sure our own vehicles kept running. If something is going to break, it usually going to be in the bitter cold. As it turns out, our Dodge diesel pick-up went on the fritz (while we were taking JB to the vet for his xrays a week ago no less.) and is in the shop for repairs. Like I said, if something is going to break…..Welcome winter...

While winter can come as early as October here, we don't typically see temperatures this low this early in the year. Fortunately, we were as prepared as we possibly could have been. The horses managed just fine and I didn’t even have to blanket anyone. The Morgans were clearly made for weather like this and it didn't seem to phase them. All the horses just hunkered down in their barns with hay piled up to munch on. Luckily after 4 days, the arctic blast lifted and the temperatures soared to 15 above. Balmy…atleast it felt like it after the 35 below…The horses thought so too as they ventured back out to the pastures and played in the fresh new snow. Once the cold moved out, we were then greeted by more snow. With the arctic cold and wind, most of the snow blew away but this next front was here to cover the landscape with lots of white stuff. Its been snowing for 5 days, each day adding just a few more inches. We have about 8 inches on the level I would guess. The horses have been froliking while I have been shoveling and shoveling and shoveling. I guess it’s a good addition to my workout routine..(silver lining??) I am hoping the sun will come out soon and I can get some photos. It makes for such a pretty setting. It makes me wish for a horse drawn sleigh!!

So, winter has arrived with a vengeance.I didn’t want to believe it , but maybe La Nina really has decided to come for a visit. If that’s true, I guess the best thing to do is embrace it because we have a long one ahead.

So , if you would excuse me. I’m off to bust out my snowshoes, my skiis and ofcourse, my shovel….

Post Pastern Arthrodesis - Final Phase

2010-11-21T07:50:00.000-08:00

April 28, 2010 is etched in my memory as one of the scariest days I have ever had to experience with one of my horses. This was the day JB found himself hung up in a gate, hanging upside down from his front right pastern.

May 21st, 2010- JB went under the knife to have Pastern Arthrodesis surgery to repair his damaged leg, facing a 70-80% chance of returning to a usable horse, and I , staring down the barrel of many months of doctoring him through his recovery.

November 20, 2010- is etched in my memory as one of the happiest days I have ever had to experience with one of my horses. 1 day shy of JB's 6 month post surgery and an appointment at the vet for his 6 month radiograph; the moment of truth; to see if the fusion was successful, if the joint had knitted together correctly without the body adding too much extra bone or calcification.

The result?

6 months of worry and work, fussing and fretting, lost hours of sleep, schedule changes....

The fusion was a success. JB has healed exeptionally well. In Pastern Arthrodesis, one of the main concerns is that the body will develop a large amount of additional bone or calcification at the site of the metal plate that held the joint in place (along with 5 screws) Often times, in response to the inflammation at the site of the plate, too much calcification can occur, and this makes it more unlikey that the horse will return to soundness. In JB's case, he developed only a small amount of calcification which should not hinder him. The vet was very pleased with how everything looked and the joint is solidly fused.

JB still short strides on the front right and this should lessen over time as the suspensory ligament and other supporting tendons adjust to the change in mechanics of the leg. The joint that is now fused will no longer serve to absorb shock like it once did. The other structures above and below the joint will have to take on the additional burden.
It's something I am going to have to keep an eye on over the course of time and possibly support with sports medicine boots.

So what happens now?

JB gets to go back out to a pasture for the winter. He gets to be back with other horses and during that time, he continues to heal and get stronger. Ofcourse, I worry about the footing. It's winter and it can get icey, but I am going to have to trust that JB will continue to take care of himself as well as he has through this entire process. He deeserves his freedom, afterall, he's earned it. It's been a long arduous process.

In the spring, JB will go back to work under saddle. The vet doesn't believe there is any inidication that he won't be able to tolerate limited distance in the future, noting that it may take 2 full years before that can happen but not to give up hope.

I wanted to say Thank You to all of my readers for all the support , prayers and encouraging words many of you sent our way during JB's surgery. Words can't express how much it helped me keep going, even during some of the more difficult days of his recovery.

It's all about me.

2010-11-14T16:18:00.000-08:00

"I should do it"... "I should just sit down and do a post.." This is what I have been saying to myself for over a week now. But... the truth is.. I really don't have much to post about these days. Nothing horse related anyways.....Sad.. really. So instead, you'll have to live through a post about me...

A couple weeks ago, I went to Scottsdale Arizona for a quick getaway to ring in my 35th birthday in style.

Okay, so last minute, my sis, mom and I decided to gallavant off Scottsdale, stay at a ritzy hotel, get served like we were royalty while we bathed in the sun, took walks around the desert golfcourse, swam in the pools, went to the spa for a massage, sat in the lavish steam room and just relaxed for a while. I gotta tell ya.. people that treat themselves to spas and fancy spa vacations on a regular basis have it all figured out. Normally, a vacation like this isn't my gig, but I figured since I had to turn 35, I may as well do something nice for myself and that was this little spa getaway. So, for 4 days, I enjoyed life without the daily grind of having to feed someone or something, no alarm to go off, no place I had to be.. just worry about myself.. I even , for the first time in my life, got myself a pedicure.. Aha! Now I understand why women go for these... Previously I usually scoffed at this idea . My toes sure look prettier than I have ever seen them before..I came home feeling totally rejuvenated and honestly, at 35, I feel better than I think I ever have.

Since I have been back, I have had to hit the ground running. Work is crazy. I leave in the dark and come home in the dark. It can be a brutal schedule. There are chores to do, mouths to feed, and my workout routine has gone back into full swing. With riding time being on the back burner for the dark days of winter ahead, I get to change gears and focus on my own conditioning. As an endurance rider, I have pretty strong opinions about the fitness level riders should be in. I think that if your going to ask your horse to carry your ass over varied terrain at speed, you had better be in good enough shape to hold your own and carry your own weight if needed. I have always been an active person, regularly went to the gym since my days in High School but two years ago, I hit a wall, gained more weight than I ever had and felt miserable. During this same time, sustained an injury to my left foot while out jogging and that set me back even further. I kept doing the same stuff over and over and going backwards. I looked bad and felt bad. I started researching a bit. I started slowly cutting certain foods out. I felt better so I cut out a few more foods and felt even better. This process went on for months. The last major jump I made was discontinuing my gym membership and getting in the best shape of my life.

Wait.... what???

Last December, I was disgusted with the gym scene. There had to be a better way. Right after that, A friend gave me a dvd excercise program to check out. I said I would, but only because I was trying to be polite. I wasn't the work out at home kinda girl. No way was I going to pop in a dvd and workout in my living room. I'd never do it.

That DVD set sat on my desk for two weeks before I finally decided taking a look wouldn't hurt anything. Well, here I am a year later. I went from not being able to do more than a couple push ups to being able to do over 20 pushups. That 90 day workout program turned into a 180 day workout program for me. It was the hardest thing I have ever pushed myself through, physically. I have never felt stronger or more durable in my 35 years. Thank you P90X.

I entered the summer months feeling great. My first few conditioning rides on Maggie didn't leave me tired and sore like they would have in the past. In many cases, I was able to get off and run for a few miles without a second thought. In June, I had a minor set back when Maggie spooked and bucked me off. It was actually a bad fall because she ran into another horse while bucking and when I came out of the stirrup, I twisted my ankle, landed on my left shoulder and bounced my head a bit. It was bad timing too. 3 weeks before my scheduled Limited distance on Maggie. I gimped around with it taped for a couple days and did the ice and anti-inflammatories for a few days but in less than a week, I was mostly fine. It hurt if I lifted my toe or squatted down but otherwise, I bounced right back. I credit those intense workouts that I had been doing all winter and spring for my fast recovery. I have sprained that same ankle 3 times now and it has never healed that quickly.

A week ago, I got back into my winter workout routine. I am starting something new for a few weeks. It's another at home DVD program. It's high intensity interval training. Having not done a regimented workout through most of the summer, I am using this new workout to limber up again. Once I complete that, I will go back to a combination of interval training and P90X.

Remember what I said up above about feeling better than I ever have at 35? Well, it has a lot to do with these workouts and my eating habits. As far as endurance, I am setting the stage so that not only will my horse go the distance, but so will I and isn't that the best feeling?

First Ponying Session for JB

2010-10-25T06:48:00.000-07:00

A couple weeks ago, Tom snapped some photos of me taking JB for his first spin to try out his wheels. This was our first attempt at ponying and it went off without a hitch. I had been taking him for daily handwalking and trotting for a couple weeks before this but I had expectations of JB being much more animated once he was allowed the extra freedom and increased speed of trotting alongside another horse. In the end I think he was so happy to have the closeness and companionship of another horse, he didn't even think about kicking up his heels. Nevertheless, the wheels seem to still be working. He takes many more steps that look sound than unsound so I am very pleased with his progress.. October 21st marked 5 months post surgery.

First trot, and ofcourse, he is trying to out trot Cassidy.. (still has the competitive edge I see!)

Bearing weight on the right front in a trot.. JB seems to be saying.."ok, fine, I will stay back here then"

Finally has it figured out to stay at Cassidy's hip

Coming around the corner

And finally back to the walk , with Munci (the dog) in tow. (sorry about the archery pole in the middle of the picture!)

This , my friends, was a glorious day.

Leaning

2010-10-08T09:24:00.000-07:00

In riding, this is one of my bad habits, born from the days of being thrown into a jumping saddle at a young age, atop a horse much too big for my short legs and flying around a jump course, in two point. What can I say…Old habits die hard… but leaning forward isn’t always a fault.

The 2010 riding season proved to be a storm of challenging winds blowing down on me. A career ending injury to a barely budding endurance athlete. JB had just begun to hit his stride in the Fall of 2009 with his first successful completion of 25 mile CTR ; a most difficult ride as far as terrain, footing, obstacles. JB managed to bring both me and himself through it , not without out struggles but in one piece and healthy nonetheless. It was defining moment for JB and I as partners. We faced some steep challenges but he definitely showed me he was the little horse that could. In the following spring of 2010, some of our first condition rides out, I was pleasantly surprised with this new horse that seemed to be emerging right before my eyes. He strode out with strength, speed and sureness in his step that I had not experienced before. I was overjoyed. After 3 years of struggling to get JB to this point, mentally and physically, we had finally arrived. He was ready to do endurance. It felt like we were on the golden road to many exciting adventures. I was looking forward to the journeys that lie ahead for JB and I.

But the golden road of future success took a hard left for us when JB was injured.

JB’s subsequent rehab from Pastern Arthrodesis surgery has consumed most my time since April. The process has proved to be a windy, challenging course. There have been unpredictable gusts, and alternately, there have been persistent, steady winds. There has been rain, thunder and clouds that loomed.

And we aren’t quite half way yet. There are still puddles to step in, winds to face.

I have tried to limit posts on JB’s rehab, not because I am trying to hide or diminish the challenges we have faced, there have been many; but because I am busy leaning into the wind, facing those challenges as they come at me, and trying to stay the course, stay positive, leaning forward into better times ahead.

JB has been transitioned into a 48 x48 pen now. He’s been there for 3 weeks. He bucks and runs, as much as he can in that space. Physically he’s getting stronger with each day that passes. Mentally, he’s recovering and I see glimmers of the old JB come out. He’s getting less reactive on noises but sometimes, he has bad days and he reverts. I am encouraged however; I can now at least start the lawnmower within a few of his pen without worrying that it will send him into a panic.
We go for daily walks in hand; he wants to trot, but I can’t let him. He wants to run with the herd, but it’s not time. His manners have suffered during his recovery, so I have started asking for him to remember. He’s coming around but it’s a process. Every day is a new day for us.

His old atrophied hoof is still growing out and the new hoof is coming in….slowly. I am not sure what he’s going to end up with at the end of his healing. Right now, his hoof looks very odd. Every 3-4 weeks, we have to rasp his hoof to keep the wall from making too much contact with the ground, in order to keep as much torque off the joint as possible. JB will remain on Farriers Formula until the new hoof is completely formed and hopefully he’ll have a relatively normal foot again.

JB has his 6 month post op anniversary in November. At that time, we will do radiographs. I am both anxious and nervous for that day. It’s the day I’ll know what our future road will look like. Will we find that golden road again where we can cover mile after mile together? Or will it be an easier path that we’ll need to take?

Only time will tell. Either way, as long as it’s a road we can travel together , I am happy.

When I bestride him, I soar, I am a hawk: he trots the air; the earth sings when he touches it; the basest horn of his hoof is more musical than the pipe of Hermes. ~William Shakespeare, Henry V

Summer 2009 Lupine Lake

Fool Me Once

2010-10-04T15:55:00.000-07:00

Knowing that the good riding weather opportunities can slam shut at any given moment I spent the whole weekend riding. There was a mountain of laundry that needed washing and folded, pans to scour and vacuuming to do, but it could all wait. Weekends like this weren’t meant to be spent doing household chores. The weather was absolutely perfect and the pull of an autumn ride was tugging at me.
Maggie is finally well enough after her cold she has been battling. Since mid to Late August, she was suffering from a cough/ sneeze/snotty nose thing that just kept lingering. It never got real bad, she never spiked a temp but was lethargic and not her usual spirited self. The symptoms ebbed and flowed. She would be coughing a lot one day and the next day nothing. My vet wanted me to wait it out as these things usually take time to work through, as long as she never got any worse. For 5 weeks, I waited it. She was improving bit by bit, but still, every time she did more than a walk, the coughing fits would start. I finally decided to put her on antibiotics and within 4 days, she was already showing improvement. We are now back in business.
Saturday, I loaded Maggie up and we headed out for a ride. We’d be going it alone today, and I was actually looking forward to being on my own schedule. It was a hellacious week at work and this was a good way to put it all behind me. The sun was shining and the sky was that deep bright blue I have only ever witnessed this time of year in Montana. The trees were brilliantly lit up with the red, yellows, oranges of fall. They looked like they were glowing from within. The plan was an easy ride, maybe 6-7 miles of walking. Much of it would be hills, which is somewhat unavoidable at Herron Park. We’d take it slow. I suspected that Maggie had lost a fair amount of conditioning in the last several weeks. I took my time getting ready, enjoying the sun on my face. Herron Park was buzzing with people. Maggie was taking all the sights and sounds in. We headed out just in front of a few other riders . Maggie is still unsure about heading out alone. In time, with each new experience, she’ll gain confidence and march out onto the trail with purpose in her stride. For now, it’s often a difficult start, filled with hesitant steps, a moment to look back over her shoulder, to see if anyone else is with us, an occasional call to see if anyone will answer. But she does go on, responding to my words of encouragement and soft strokes to her neck. In time, I hope she’ll look towards me for guidance and reassurance when she isn’t sure of something. In time, I hope I can show her I am worthy of her trust.
With Maggie, this is all new to me. By the time I started riding JB, we already had a strong foundation together. Having brought him out of the wild, and gentled him over the course of many years, the trust was well established by the time I ever climbed in the saddle. With Maggie, we are still getting to know each other. We passed a few hikers and dog walkers along the way without any incident. So far so good, no cough, no sneezing. After about 2.5 miles, I noticed Maggie was beginning to sweat quite a bit and breathing fairly heavy . Her winter coat is already about half grown in and given the temps were already approaching the upper 70’s, I wasn’t surprised when she decided to take a break and catch her breath. We rested there for a few minutes, I gave her carrot snack and then carried on. Pretty soon, she stopped again. It was a bit of a long gradual uphill section of trail so I let her take another break. This went on a couple more times. After the fourth time of her doing this however, in a short distance, I started to become a bit concerned that something was amiss. After the last rest, she refused to go forward. When I nudged her sides with my legs, she pinned her ears, swished her tail and tried to cow kick my stirrup.
Uh-oh..I thought… could she be tying up?? How could that be? She isn’t on any grain other than handful of beet pulp morning and night , enough to mix her vitamins in.
I jumped off and felt her hind quarters. No tightness or spasms. She wasn’t standing funny and she didn’t look like she was in any distress. She just didn’t want to go any further.
Could it be she’s just a bit overheated?
I decided I had better play it safe. I turned her around and hand walked her for about a ½ mile. She willingly walked along just fine. Everything seemed fine. I decided to get back on and see how she did. We rode all the way back in to the “park” area of Herron Park without incident. In fact, she walked out so nicely I was really pleased with her. She even offered to pick up a trot a time or two (towards other horses of course) .
At this point; I figured if she were tying up, she definitely would not be this willing to move. I took her back to the trailer, unsaddled her and hosed her down. Normally she dislikes the hose, but this time, she just stood there and seemed to be enjoying the cool water. I thought my suspicions about getting overheated were confirmed. I supposed getting a bit too warm, combined with her lung capacity taking a toll from her cold, maybe she just wasn’t feeling great. I was glad I made the decision to listen to her and turn back. She hung out at the trailer to dry off and happily munched her hay with some hay while I visited with some people I knew who happened to be riding there as well. She seemed to be acting normal so we loaded up and headed home. Upon getting turned back out, she rolled, and frolicked and acted healthy as a horse, which I was relieved to see.

Sunday was cooler but still nice out. I decided I would take her back to Herron Park again and see how she did. Once again, we headed out, but took a different trail this time. There were fewer distractions around and she seemed more willing to focus on getting down the trail. We were on the flats and she offered to pick up a trot. We trotted along for a good mile before she wanted to stop. I could tell she was breathing quite a bit heavier than what was normal for her. Her stamina had definitely suffered with her cold. I suppose it’s just like when a person gets ill; it takes a while to get back to yourself physically. We headed up another loop trail and had to do a bit of climbing. About half way up the hill, Maggie stopped again. This time, I was less concerned about any other issues creeping up. She wasn’t sweating but I would just let her take her time. No sense over doing it. We rested, then we went on our way. Pretty soon, she stopped again. I took advantage of the stop to take off my sweatshirt and tied it on my saddle. In the process, I gave her a carrot from my packs. I climbed back on and asked her to move off. She did, but with a little hesitation and swish of her tail. Another few minutes, she stopped again. "Hmmm.. This again?"I thought.
Had I really managed to unintentionally taught her in one ride that if she keeps stopping, we’ll turn around and go back?? I encouraged her forward with my legs and she tried to cow kick me again. I asked a bit stronger, only to be greeted by her turning her head back over her shoulder to give a pinned ear mare look and another attempt at a cow kick. It’s her signature move and she usually manages to catch the bottom of my heel. (Something I know I will have to address at some point, but not this day!)
At this point, I knew my next attempt might become a bit of a battle of wills and I wanted to be prepared; or as prepared as I reasonably could. .I attached my GPS to my saddle packs so it wouldn’t go flying out of my hand. . In the process of me fiddling around, I noticed her ears suddenly perked up at the rustling of the packs and she looked at me over her shoulder as if to say…”Snack???” Talk about an Aha moment… I realized what the issue was…at least part of it anyways.
She had managed to figure out that when she stops, she often gets a carrot snack. She wasn’t getting a snack and that was why she was getting pissy and would keep trying to stop, both days. She wasn't feeling bad the day before, she wanted a carrot.. UGGH …How could I have been so dumb??? So, what else is there to do but to correct the problem I had created.
I asked her forward, with no offer of a snack. She refused, I asked with a bit more insistence with my legs and a strong verbal cue of “forward”. She shook her head, pinned her ears and half crow hopped a few steps.. ah yes, the Maggie snit fit… I asked again, this time with a stronger bump, bump with each heel. She went forward, in a sideways kind of motion and finished with a large leap crow hop forward.
"Your getting closer"….
I asked again, only softer this time, she took a step.. shaking her head in frustration. Again, a nudge, and a step. " Now you've got the right idea!"
Another squeeze, and finally she took three or four steps forward. Not happy, but forward. I'll take it...It was a place to start.
We carried on this way and went through this a couple more times before she decided she wasn’t going to get that carrot and we weren’t going to turn around and go back either.

Fool me once, but not twice... All in all, we made it 8 miles on Sunday and worked through those issues. Maggie is feeling fine. It will take her some time to get her stamina back to what it was but that will come in time. We got back to the trailer and I gave her a hay bag. I don’t know if I will continue to carry snacks with us anymore, at least not for a while. I learned a valuable lesson. I have a mare who is way smarter than I gave her credit for.

Fun with Tarps

2010-09-20T12:52:00.001-07:00

It's been a while since I posted much in the way of photos so here are some taken when I was reintroducing Maggie to dragging something around.

She's pretty bored with it, as you can see but it's a valuable tool. Tarps or things that "blow" in the wind can really spook a horse and land a rider a visit to the hospital. I will usually start out with a rope just dragging. I will switch hands, and therefore the horse will need to "switch eyes" ** make sure you have worked on this from the ground before you try it from the saddle..please!) I will also have soemone else drag the tarp, husband, or husband on his horse and we will follow the tarp along. In both dragging and chasing, we start at a walk and work up into a canter. To progress, we eventually add a towel to the rope, then a bag of some kind of plastic , something that makes noise and then progress from there depending on how the horse has handled it. I should mention that I didn't just jump on and start dragging noisy things around. I introduced her to all of this long before , from the ground , as part of her groundwork. Noisy plastic bags and tarps, and even bubble wrap was all part of her ground work. Maggie seems to be a pretty brave girl and doesn't get too worried about noises so this process has gone quite fast in comparison to what I have experienced with other colts.

Pulling Power

2010-09-14T18:59:00.000-07:00

As the days roll by , Maggie is slowly getting better from her recent cold, virus or whatever it was that was ailing her, thankfully. I would say by the weekend, she'd be ready for another long day. She has had over two weeks off from work now. Unfortunately, two others, Rebel and Roman, began exhibiting the cough , snotty nose, lethargic affect. So they are working through their symptoms now. It may end up hiting the rest of the herd as well but I am keeping my fingers crossed.
With Maggie on the mend, I thought maybe some easy work in the arena might be good for both of us. With endurance season coming to a close for me, I shift gears a bit this time of year. I get back into doing all the "other " stuff as far as training goes.

Maggie is a Morgan and what is a Morgan made for??? Pulling, Harness....yes pulling a rider up hill (tailing) is a good thing too, but that is not what I am talking about here. I am talking about hooking onto something with some heft and dragging it away, be it a log, a bawling calf , or whatever needs to be moved.
I started the leg work with Maggie this past spring with getting her accustomed to dragging tarps and dragging ropes. Maggie took right to it and the other night , with a short refresher course, I looped my rope around around small 8 ft wood pole and away we went, just like she'd been doing it all along. In time, we'll work towards pulling heavier and heavier objects and maybe I'll have to dust off my old harness eventually and get her hooked up to that!

Fits and Starts

2010-09-08T10:31:00.000-07:00

In response to a few of your concerns, no I haven’t gotten lost in the wilderness, eaten by a grizzly bear or abducted by mountain goats. Yes, I have been a bit absent, I’ll admit. So what’s been going on?

In early August, for the first time in a long time, I had no desire to climb on a horse. I had no motivation to do much of anything. I fell of my normal exercise and eating routine and felt even worse, but I couldn’t seem to get myself to straighten up and fly right. I think it was a compilation of the stress at work, caring and rehabbing JB, and balancing a couple of other stressful personal situations that have come up this summer. Basically, I hit a wall and started experiencing bad Ju Ju… (or at least that is what a friend called it, whatever Ju Ju is…)

So I took a much needed vacation. 14 days days of R&R to be exact. I wasn’t productive at all, I didn’t really go anywhere special, and I only climbed on a horse once. Since, I have slowly managed to regain some traction in the motivation department. I am back in the saddle and have resumed some sort of conditioning routine with Maggie. I decided that for the fall season,(however long it may last before the weather turns too bad) I would focus on building Maggie’s stamina on the hill work. Long ,slow hill work. It’s her weak spot.

During my funk, Maggie ended up getting about 3 weeks off by the time I pulled myself back together. So we lost some ground in the fitness area but I am happy to report with things getting back to a normal routine, Maggie was making some good gains on her endurance on the uphill climbs. Things were humming right along until about two weeks ago.

Two things have reared their ugly heads in an attempt to derail us. The first thing is that it appears I am having some saddle fitting issue now with Maggie. She has already started getting her winter coat (ughh) The first time I went to put a saddle back on her after her long hiatus, I noticed white hairs on her back, right where the bars of the saddle lay. Not only that, but the hair coming in had arippled looked to it.. definitely a problem. The worst of it is towards the front and while there are more white hairs on the right side, they are present on both sides. I was shocked... really. My saddle does actually does fit her quite well, even had it checked, and approved, by a professional saddle fitter this past spring. Her back hasn’t changed all that much, atleast not to the naked eye. I have been using the same pad situation all summer. The sweat patterns always looked even. So why/how did the white hairs appear now? Why would they show up during a time when she wasn’t being ridden at all? I have consistently checked her for soreness in her back and she has never once shown any soreness, even after the 35 mile ride in July.
I have had poor fitting saddles before but never had an issue where white hairs showed up.

......................So what am I missing!? !

So here is where you readers come in.... help please...

How long does it/can it take from the time the saddle starts putting pressure to the time when the white hairs show up? Could it be that the saddle has been putting pressure on her all summer and the hairs are just now showing up because her winter coat is coming in??

Or could she really have developed them from one or two rides where the saddle wasn’t riding right? Can white hairs appear that fast?? Still, wouldn’t she exhibit back soreness?

I did remember that one of the last times I rode in the saddle, prior to her hiatus, the saddle seemed to be creaking more than I recalled it ever doing. I remember thinking that was odd and chekcing out the saddle but everything seemed in check. I didn’t give it much more thought. Maybe the saddle is needing reflocked?? I guess I also need to check the tree, make sure that something hasn’t happened there. I thought I would also try riding my older gelding in it and see if it creeks with him. If it doesn't, maybe that indicates it really doesn't fit her anymore??? I'll report back on that.

So for now, until I can figure this out, I am riding her in my Western wade, which is working well as far as fit.. for her. It’s just a bit heavier than I prefer and isn’t real comfortable for me for long hours…. But I’ll deal with it I suppose.

The second issue that has creeped up on us is that Maggie started coughing during a conditioning ride about a week and a half ago. At first I thought it was due to dryness of everything. It had been very dusty. Last weekend, I hadn’t heard her cough in a couple days and thought it was resolving. She wasn’t exhibiting any other symptoms to indicate she was ill. No snotty nose, no wheezing, no temp, eating drinking, etc. So, chalking it up to the dryness, I opted to head out for a 4 hr ride last Sunday. She seemed fine for the first several miles, but I noticed she seemed a bit lethargic. About half way through the ride, the coughing started whenever we would do more than a walk. I also noticed she was showing some discharge from her nose but it wasn’t yellow, more of a grayish/whitish color. So we finished our ride short and headed home. I took her temp which was well within normal range. I watched her for the rest of the weekend closely. In an hour of being within earshot of her, I heard her cough three times. Not a lot and not consistent but she did continue to act lethargic , even out in pasture. By Monday afternoon , her nasal discharge was bit more on the yellow side but then later her nose was dry, with a little clear fluid. It seems maybe she is fighting something off and I would imagine if it were serious she would have shown more in the way of symptoms. None of the other horses are exhibiting any symptoms either, which is good. So, for now the vet says to let her rest for a week and see how she does. If she gets worse, I'll probably have to take her into the clinic. I am hoping she just has a little cold due to the extreme weather change we had. 80’s to low 60’s and wet … certainly makes me want to cough and go hide under a blanket.

Easy Care- Bringing on a new Product

2010-09-07T19:04:00.000-07:00

I was perusing around the Easy Care website, when I stumbled upon a new product they are looking at possibly making available. No, its not a new model of hoof boot , or a hoof boot accessory. It is a portable Corral system. They are looking at partnering with the company called RoFlexs , which is based out of Germany, to bring this product to the US. For right now, Easy Care is looking for feedback on this from their customers, what would we be willing to pay, etc..

Check it out here to watch a video on the system.Being that it is made by the Germans, I am guessing the engineering is likely top notch.

FOR SALE: Fleeceworks 25 Mile Pad

2010-08-23T10:37:00.000-07:00

I have , with some regret, decided to sell my Fleeceworks 25 Mile Endurance pad. It's by far one of the best pads I have seen, used on market for endurance. I have found that when it comes to protecting the horses back combined with breathability, this is a superior pad. This particular model is what is called the 25 miler and is recommended for lower distances, but it can certainly withstand a longer ride. The foam inserts are removeable . The underside is Merino Sheepswool and the pad is overall very well made.

Unfortunately, the cut of it doesn't fit my saddle very well so I find myself having to adjust it frequently. Otherwise, I have no complaints.

Trumbull Mountain is selling for $140. I am offering mine up for sale for $100 or best offer (+ shipping). I have only used it maybe a dozen times. It has plenty of wear left in it, and there are no tears, rips or any other damage to it.

See info about it here:

If interested or have questions, feel free to email me @ jonnakelner@gmail.com

Horse Dreams

2010-08-08T08:43:00.000-07:00

Once in a while, if you listen closely, you'll here a "whrrr, whrrr, whrrr" sounds coming from the paddocks these days. I've never been able to sneak up without being caught in the past, but the other afternoon, JB must have been exeptionally tired because I was able to snap a few shots of him during his afternoon siesta. I couldn't resist, just take a look at the photo's below. He was even smiling in his sleep.(atleast it looks like it!)

Ever wonder what a horses dreams are made of? I think I know what JB was dreaming of in this one, his legs were twitching and moving, and I suspect he was dreaming of the day when he can run with his herd once again.

Patience grasshopper, soon you will be set free to run again. In the meantime, rest up kiddo...

He finally got up about 10 minutes later and I snapped this shot..he still looks sleepy!

You can see his front right pastern in which he had surgery. He is bearing full weight on it now but will occasionally hold the knee a bit buckled. This is lessening over time.

Elk Lake- Great Bear Wilderness

2010-08-08T08:21:00.000-07:00

We headed out for a ride with some friends into some steep country, near Glacier National Park. All in all it was only 12 miles but technical, steep and by the end of the day , it felt more like we had done 40 miles. I rode Maggie and she did well overall.

Tricky water crossing, as you come down the trail, there are logs and rocks to step over in order to drop into the creek. Maggie is proving to be a thoughful trail horse in tricky footing and carefully picked her way across.

This photos gives you an idea of some of the less steep areas...

Elk Lake

Pictures- Thompson River Endurance Ride

2010-07-26T20:23:00.000-07:00

Riders making their way through the mist, across the hay field. I am well behind this pack....somewhere....

At the finish... being told not to get off yet till the picture was being taken.. "what????" "I can't get off yet??"

Coming in and totally relieved...

**********For the ride story, you'll have to scroll down to the date July 19th on the page. For soem reason, the blogger would not let me update the entry date on post options.....

Phase III Pastern Arthrodesis-and other updates

2010-07-21T06:28:00.000-07:00

So much news.. so little time!

First and foremost, I took JB in yesterday for his post op xrays. This was the first time he has been out of the stall in 2 months. I wasn't sure how he would behave but he was perfectly calm and relaxed. I think he was just happy to get out and see something new. The xrays show that everything is healing nicely and the bone fusion looks very very good, with no extra calcium build-up around the joint (indicating irritation). Dr Erfle was very impressed with not only how the fusion looked but also how JB was moving on the leg. The best news is that JB can probably be moved out of the stall and into a 24 x24 area now and begin handwalking , but my vet wanted the surgeon to review the radiographs and give his nod of approval on that first. So I am waiting to here back on that.

I didn't realize how much I was living on pins and needles until seeing those radiographs. It's like a huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders.

The second big newsflash, big for me atleast , was that Maggie and I completed the 35 miles at the Thompson River Ranch Ride successfully.

Ride story and pictures coming soon.

Bitter Sweet Success- Thompson River Endurance Ride-

2010-07-19T13:37:00.000-07:00

Ofcourse, in the wake of the Tevis completion, this little ride story pales in comparison, but for those of you that have been most patient and waiting to hear how the ride went here goes.

To begin with, Maggie and I both had some first-evers with this ride, some of which was bittersweet for me, as I had hoped to have my first AERC sanctioned ride completion atop of JB. But I rode the horse I had and she has impressed me. This was Maggie's first ever limited distance, first exposure to an endurance ride period and the first time we have ever ridden this far.

I am still bubbling with the excitement and the sweet feeling of accomplishing a long sought after goal. I had a lot of reservations about riding Maggie in this ride, given the distance. I felt she was prepared for a 25 , but when the ride changed to a 35, I just wasn’t sure. Simply put, we had not had the time to condition for a 35 miler. Another strike against us was that we had not had the opportunity to condition in any sort of heat. Our spring has been rainy and cold. The weather for the weekend of the ride was predicted to be in the 80’s, some of the first heat we've really seen. I decided, after much consideration, that we would try for it and take it mile by mile. I knew I could easily get her through the first 16.5 miles. If worse came to worse , I could rider option at the halfway point.

We set out at 7:00 a.m. My first goal was to avoid the “pack” and keep her mind with me instead of getting race brain. At 6:35 I walked her away from camp and Cassidy, Toms gelding and her half brother. After about 10 minutes of hand walking and letting her look around , I managed to climb on. My calm mare was suddenly kidnapped, only to be replaced by a horse I barely recognized. She was calling out, filled with nervous tension at all the activity, and although I had nothing to do with it, (sorry to say) displayed some beautiful piaffe steps. At one point, she lapsed into full mare temper tantrum mode when she insisted on wanting to turn around and go back down below to her safe haven (camp). When I insisted she stay with me, she let out a couple of healthy bucks. I managed to shut things down before it got too out of control but it seemed that the stage was set for a rough start.

I let the pack head out and found a spot not quite last, but about 4th from last and with plenty of room for ourselves. Maggie settled in a bit and started to relax. We managed to walk quietly along the creek and made our way to the cattle path through a wooded area without any difficulties. The start had to be a controlled start because we had to also weave our way through a bunch of cattle corrals and a section of the ranch yard before heading out across 2 miles of hay field. Things were going along nicely.

As we approached the end of the wooded area and about to embark across the cattle pens, I could hear the heavy breathing of a horse coming up quickly behind me. I glanced over my left shoulder to see a rider approaching on my left. He proceeded to slide in next to me, even though the trail was really only set up to handle single file. He was crowding me and Maggie and she was not happy with it. I politely asked him to give us a bit more room as my mare may kick( not really but it was a good excuse to get him to BACK OFF!) He backed off some, but continued talking , sharing that he was on a green horse and this was only her 2nd LD. His horse was beginning to creep up on us again so I stopped and asked him to go on by. I could see that he was going to travel a lot faster than Maggie and I . Luckily he walked on ahead and out of sight. I was glad to be rid of him. Maggie was a little upset that she got left but not overly reactive about it.

We popped out of the cattle path and headed toward the cattle corrals, where the bulls were being held..... when I looked up to see who?? My irritating friend who I was beginning to wonder if he was going to be a problem for us for the remainder of the ride. This time he had pulled off to the side and was waiting for me... He called out to me to ask if I would go first through the cattle pens, as his horse was unsure of it. Muttering not so nice things under my breath, Maggie and I went on ahead and walked through without any problems, trying to just get by and mostly ignore the fly (which is what he was reminding me of). I was hoping he would just stay behind me at this point because we had one more little obstacle get through, a partially exposed drainage culvert. I wasn’t exactly in the mood to babysit anyone else’s horse because I had my hands full with Maggie. I knew there would be no relaxing on this ride with her. I was going to have a full time job. The culvert was no doubt going to be a bit tricky but Maggie is not afraid of climbing things, so I was hoping it would be fine. She stopped, looked at it and then kind of hopped over it without much problem. I no sooner got over it and the fly started buzzing again, asking me to wait. I did, reluctantly... only to find out that he had already taken his horse down here twice to look at this obstacle the night before…so he said...

He continued to attach himself to me as I made my way out across the field, and continued babbling on about his horse. At this point, I was thoroughly irritated and wanting him to just go away . We began our 2 miles across the hayfield and he continued to ride next to me as he asked me numerous questions about the area, the trails, and all sorts of other things I wasn’t interested in talking to him about. Pretty soon, he picked up a trot and blasted away, yelling “ Well, have a good ride!”. I didn’t respond but was more than relieved to be rid of him. Guess he only needed me as a crutch to get his horse through the tough spots... gee , thanks a lot buddy.

Maggie on the other hand, was now sent into a mental meltdown since she realized she was suddenly left alone. She began tossing her head and having another temper tantrum until she frantically spun around to see the 3 horses that were still coming behind us. Had I let her, she would have hit a dead run in their direction, back towards where we just came from and the comfort of a herd. When she started to amp up and began doing her best impression of High Ho Silver, I decided to get off and hand walk her until I could get her out of the pasture. Pretty soon the 3 riders caught up to us and one of them happened to be a friend who was planning a slow ride. She offered to ride along with me , which was actually a relief because she had a fairly experienced horse. The other two riders she was riding with went on ahead. We were now dead last in the pack.

Maggie spent the next several miles fighting me to go faster, and several of those miles were a long steady uphill climb. I finally got to an area where it was open enough and we decided it would be best to let both horses blow off some energy, especially Maggie, who needed to stretch her legs . We cruised for a few miles in that pace, and my frineds horse, Max, really paced almost perfect with Maggie, who after about 3 miles started to settle in, eventually offering a nice steady trot, instead of the super fast road trot. After that, she was great and by the time we hit about 12 miles, she was much more relaxed and listening well. For the next several miles, we trotted where we could and walked all the uphills. She didn’t drink at any of the water stops (every 5 miles) but we had to cross a small creek about quarter mile from vet check. She took several big gulps at that point, which I was thrilled about. By the time we hit the vet check at 16.5 miles, she was beginning to feel a bit tired but certainly not out of gas. It took us 4 hrs and 15 minutes to get to vet check, an excruciatingly slow pace. This was partially due to Maggie's weak spot, trotting uphill, forcing us to walk all uphills to keep her heart rate from sky rocketing, and partially because we thought we took a wrong turn and backtracked for about a mile and a half, only to realize we were right to begin with.. grrrrrr. That little detour added an extra 45 minutes by the time it was all said and done. All I can say is lesson learned there, don’t listen to someone who is panicking that we are off trail when there are flags and your gut tells you we are correct. But, I digress. I was quite happy to have arrived at vet check, my momentary bliss was interrupted by the fly that I had started out with. As I walked in, he made a remark something to the effect of a comment about me finally making it in. I ignored him.. thinking what a little "ish" he was..

Once into vet check, it took Maggie a little longer to pulse to criteria because it was very congested and chaotic. The PR person kept saying she was right on but then she would jump up to 16 or 17 in last three beats. I moved off into a quieter spot away from the commotion and Maggie pulsed down to 15. She went through vet check and was given all A’s. Since the vet check was out of ride camp, Tom met me there with food for both Maggie and I , refilled water bottles and encouragement. Maggie didn’t eat her beet pulp at all but picked at her hay. Her appetite wasn’t what it should have been and I began to waiver on whether I should continue. On the other hand, Maggie was drinking well and took several good gulps of water while in our hold. I debated during the hold whether to rider option given her energy level but she perked up significantly in the last 20 minutes of the hold, ate some of her hay and I decided I was going to try to finish. She had A's on everything afterall and I knew that the ride back would be mostly downhill or flat with only two hills to climb. I could get off and hand walk her for that if needed.

So back out we went, to finish what we set out to do. For the first mile or so , Maggie felt fairly low energy but her ears were up and after only a short distance of walking, she perked up and offered to jog. We were alone , and at the back of the pack. My riding partner got out a few minutes ahead of me because her horse pulsed down quicker. She was nice enough to ask me if I wanted her to wait, but I told her I would go it alone on the way back and I would see her back in ride camp. I let Maggie pick her pace and we traveled along at the nicest little easy jog. I was thoroughly enjoying having the trail to ourselves. I kept a close eye on her heart rate and she stayed in well below 120. We traveled this way for several miles. When she wanted to walk, we walked. When she wanted to jog, we jogged. Going back, she drank at every water stop and she got thoroughly sponged down, as the temps were now climbing. A few 50 milers passed me and I was leap frogging another set of riders, who got offcourse apparently. Maggie and I even stopped a couple of time so she could get a few mouthfuls of grass along the way. Before I knew it we only had 5 miles left and suddenly, she must have figured it out because she got her second wind.

We crossed the finish line in 3 hrs from leaving the hold, cutting off an hour of what it took us to get to vet check. We repeated the earlier episode of her not pulsing down to criteria, again the same situation. As soon as I got her in the shade and away from the crowd, she pulsed down. We got all A’s in the final vet check other than her gut sounds were a little quiet, which I expected, given the fact that she had not eaten well at the halfway point.

I took away a lot of lessons learned about my horse from this ride. I rode my own ride, I took care of my horse, and I finished, with a healthy, happy (tired but happy) horse and that , my friends, is all that matters.

Its Here..

2010-07-13T09:53:00.000-07:00

The Thomspon River Ranch Endurance ride. For months, the Hooves and Company crew have been working hard , putting long days in the saddle to put this ride on. Since the ride is being held in a totally new location, none of us new the geography. Even before all the snow was gone, we have been out with our GPS units and maps trying to find trails, which was no easy job. So many trails we tried would dead end , or turn into a trail that was not suitable for endurance. We spent a lot of time backtracking, rerouting , unmarking and remarking, even up until last week in fact! It’s been an interesting time but I think, by god, we have the makings of what might turn into a great endurance ride! With the majority of the work done for trail crew members like myself, things aren’t exactly winding down . Not only are most of us working the ride, but most of us are also riding the ride!
Maggie and I will have our go on Saturday with the 35 miler. Ironically enough, with all the miles I have marked preparing for this, I have only seen the first two miles and the last 2 miles of the 35 miler so it will be as much of a surprise to me as it is to anyone else coming in. No advantages here! Darn... All of my other trail discovering adventures were for the 50 miler or sections that we ended up not using this year.
Originally the limited distance ride was going to be a 25 miler, but with the way the trails came together, it turned out we had to add a few more miles to make it work right coming into vet check. I am a little concerned about how Maggie will handle the extra 10 miles but luckily , there isn’t a lot of elevation so I think if I pace her correctly, she’ll be fine.
This will be Maggie’s first competition and believe it or not, it will be my first actual AERC sanctioned ride. Everything else I have ridden , or attempted , was CTR’s. I hadn’t exactly planned on competing in my first AERC ride with Maggie, let alone doing it this year, but when life throws you lemons…. You know what they say.

For now, I am just trying to get through a busy work week and I guess I better start thinking about packing up. We'll head out on Friday morning.

Hope to see a few of you there!

Phase II Pastern Arthrodesis- Photo's after Cast Removal

2010-07-07T10:20:00.000-07:00

I forgot to grab my camera before the vet got there and these were taken with my phone, not the best quality but you can kind of see.

This JB's leg right after the vet removed the cast. Pretty ugly looking in these photos. There is still some swelling and it actually makes the hoof look completely disfigured, which its not. It's just the way the picture looks, thankfully. Ofcourse, angle wise, the hoof is off and the surgeon's farrier skills when he trimmed the foot during surgery to fit inside the cast leaves much to be desired...

....Nonetheless.. (I am trying not to friek out about his hoof after working for two years getting his feet right!!) we knew JB's hoof was going to need some rehab after all of this. The stitches were removed which were on the front of the pastern. The incision looked really good. JB has a few sores from the cast, a couple at the back of the fetlock joint and one on the front of his cannon bone but none of them were very serious and it's apparently to be expected to get a few

We washed his leg really well, which must have felt wonderful (although JB was pretty well drugged so he probably didn't notice). JB then got that foot trimmed once again,(yes, I was cringing) but it was a necessary eveil. Luckily, my vets farrier skills are far superior than the surgeons but still, JB had to have his foot trimmed down to a very small size (removed alot of the wall) to lessen the torque on the joint. As a result, poor JB's front left is bigger than his front right. His other three feet have had limited trimming as well. As you can imagine, he had difficulty bear weight on his injured leg , which made it difficult at best to get his other 3 feet trimmed correctly. We mostly rasped what we could , for as long as JB could withstand it, and that was brief. Right now, his feet aren't in the greatest of shape but we'll worry about getting them fixed over time.

JB is now in a cushy , soft support wrap and is hobbling around fairly well. He will remain in that for a couple weeks, which has to feel so much better than that rigid old cast. At that point, we will do xrays and see how things are progressing.

His risk of injury is certainly still high at this point but without the cast, he seems to be even more careful in moving around his stall. I am sure it's quite sore without that extra support and that leg is most likely weakened extensively.

So that is the latest and greatest... I am so relieved that cast is off of him and he made it the full six weeks..

Good Job "P"... you've been a real trooper through all this.

Self Preservation isn't always a good thing...

2010-07-05T09:31:00.000-07:00

Last Friday, July 2nd, marked the 6 weeks that JB has been in his cast. 6 WEEKS! I am so proud of him for being such a trooper through this whole thing. I won't lie and tell you its been an easy 6 weeks. It's been 6 weeks of constant worry , many hours of extra work to keep him comfortable, and all kinds of interesting schedule adjustments. When someone asked me the other day if I would do it again.. my simple answer was "No"...Without a doubt, I would never go through this again. I don't regret the decision I made for JB, but I would never do it again, albeit JB or any other horse.

But.. that said, we have arrived at our 6 week destination point and for JB atleast, there is no looking back.

The timing of getting the cast removed was less than ideal, right before the 4th of July. While things are healed enough to get the cast off at this point, JB certaintly isn't healed completely and is still at risk for injury or undoing things. With that in mind, I opted to make him go a few more days to get through the fireworks with a little added insurance policy of leaving the cast on. (cringe) I didn't want to extend it because I wanted so badly to give JB the relief of getting out of that cast , but I also know what I would be facing on the night of the 4th.

You see, through this trauma with JB, and being confined, he has changed a bit. He's not entirely the same horse. As with any trauma, whether a person, a dog or a horse, there are lasting effects and unfortunately these are usually negative.

In JB's case, it's noises. He has always been more hypersenstive to noises than any other horse I have ever dealt with. He startles easily and his first reaction ofcourse is to flee. The accident (possibly the noise from the gate during his thrashing in his attempts to get free??) and the pending confinement of not being able to see his surroundings have amplified issue. These days, he startles terribly, nearly jumping off the ground with all four feet at even the smallest sounds, such as metal can being dropped to the ground after emptying his pellets into his feed pan, or when I accidentally smack the pitchfork against the wall of the stall. Noises that never used to bother him now just about send him over the edge. Strong self preservation can work against a horse in a case like this. I am hoping that in time , when he gets out of the stall, this reactiveness to noises will eventually lessen , although, I suspect I will have some work to do to help him get through it.

So, when the fireworks started, you can imagine what he was going through, even through a good dose of sedatives. 6 weeks is a long time to bring a horse through recovery and I wasn't about to let it slip away now. I spent 3 hours in the stall with on the night of the 4th, keeping hold of his halter, petting him to try to soothe him and just trying keeping him safe, from himself. He was very scared and had I not been there, there is no doubt in my mind that he would have attempted to leap out, even though the panels are 6 feet high.

Self Preservation....

I have tonight to get through with him as well. It will be more of the same I suspect but maybe not as much, hopefully not as long. The cast comes off Tuesday morning. I am anxious for him to move onto the next phase of healing.

Rhabdomyolysis and Selenium levels

2010-06-30T08:07:00.000-07:00

or... maybe better known as Tying- up or Azoturia. It's one of the things that endurance riders fear. Quite some time ago, I was informed that I might run a greater risk with Maggie being prone to tying up because of her build, (heavier muscling) and was encouraged to supplement Vitamin E, Selenium and Lysine, which has shown to help lessen tying up problems.

Not being one to just do as told, I went looking for myself before I did anything. Turns out, Maggie is not really at any greater risk than any other horse for sporadic or chronic Rhabdomyolysis. Any horse, any breed, any age can run into issues with the sporadic version if they are over worked beyond their condition level or being asked to perform in hot humid weather without sufficient electorylytes. Maggie is less likely to run into what is considered the Chronic version , which is then split into two categories; PSSM (polysaccharides Storage Myopathy) which I won't get into , or RER(Recurrent Exertional Rhabdomyolysis). According to an article written by Lydia F. Gray, DVM, MA in August 2007, it states that researchers has once believed that RER was due to the build up of lactic acid in the muscles, however recent studies are showing that it may be more related to abnormal regulation of intracellular calcium that makes muscles more sensitive to contractions. As it turns out, there are three breeds that are prone to REr, which include Standardbreds, Arabians and Thoroughbreds. Maggie doesn't fit into any of these, however she is Morgan , which did influence the standard bred... so I suppose there is always the possibility. The good news is that it really has nothing to do with muscle/body build, from what I can glean.

This whole topic did make me want to be sure that , given her recent workload in the last two months , she was receiving an adequate amount of Selenium , Vitamin E and Lysine.

I also live in an area considered Selenium deficient. That means that our hay and our grass in the pasture may not be providing enough.

I found this article. In this article, it gives some very interesting information about plants and Selenium uptake. The article also indicates that the area of Montana tends to have sufficient or higher levels of Selenium, which I found a bit surprising since that was a direct contradiction to everything I have understood for several years. I kept looking and found this resource (USGS)that gives a little more accurate information . You can zoom in and click on your county to get the exact ranges of Selenium levels. Cornell has an article which states that for areas with identified deficiencies, animals should be getting between 0.1-0.3 mg/kg per day and more specifically for horses, the nutrient requirement for simple maintenance is 0.10mg/kg per day of Selenium. According to the map (USGS) link for Flathead County, Montana, the minimum is 0.101 and the maximum is 1.926 (ppm) . If I wanted to convert that to MG/LB I would need to multiply that by 0.4536 or if I wanted to convert it to Mg/Kg I would multiply by 1.

So, roll up your sleeves and lets do some math! (not my strong suit at all) I just took the upper end ppm of 1.926 x 1 which gave me 2 MG/Kg or 1.926 x 0.4536 gives me 1 MG/LB. So, if I give nothing but hay and pasture and assuming the numbers on the USGS map are correct , it seems as though the Selenium amounts my horses are receiving are just above the recommended range for maintenance of 0.10 mg/kg thus telling me that I wouldn't necessarily need to supplement Selenium. With a hard working horse, apparently there is some wiggle room upward from those numbers as the requirements may increase with workload.

As a general rule, I have used Horse Guard for years as a broad spectrum Vitamin /Mineral supplement , along with hay and some limited pasture during the summer. Horse Guard also happens to also provider 3 mg of Selenium and 4,000 IU of Vitamin E.

But how much Selenium is too much?

According to the FDA (and ofcourse their info is always a bit suspect), a horse should not be allowed to ingest more than 3 mg per day of Selenium and they go on to say that even as small amount of 2 mg over that 3 mg , a horse can develop toxicity. When I read this, I was a bit concerned. The 3 mg that Horse Guard provides, combined with anything my horses might be getting from hay and/or pasture, (remember about 1MG/LB, I was suddenly seeing that our horses might be getting approximately 4 MG/LB per day, which was possibly creeping up into the upper ends of what was a safe number???

I consulted with my vet and she felt that while the numbers on the USGS were good general guidelines, there are variations. She was aware of several hay crops in the area that have been tested and all showed that there was definitely a deficiency. I supposed I could have my hay and soil tested but in the years I have been using the same feeding program, I have never seen any symptoms of toxicity in my horses, such as hair loss, cracked hooves, dull coat, etc. For now, I'll keep with what I know works and watch for any symptoms..

I would like to hear from anyone with any other information regarding this.

A Word on Horse Camping

2010-06-29T08:28:00.000-07:00

For many of us, the word "camping" elicits sweet memories of family time during our childhoods. Growing up, my family didn't do a lot of camping and if we did, it involved a Winnebago. Most of my summers growing up weren't spent camping at all, but instead, playing in the sandy beaches of the Atlantic, , catching mussles on the piers, and having lobster races. I spent a lot of my summers at my cousins beach cottage in CT. So, camping wasn't something I was really into growing up. As I grew older , went to high school and college, I did get introduced to camping, which usually involved loud music , boating, and generally a good time with friends. Since, I have done several horse camping trips with my husband over the years with a wall tent as well. Yeah, it was fun but to be perfectly honest, I really don't enjoy '"roughing " it. That said I do love endurance riding and camping kind of goes with the territory and when you don't have a LQ horse trailer, one must get creative in order to be comfortable.

In just over 2 and 1/2 weeks, I plan to compete in the July Thompson River endurance ride with Maggie (her first!) and I will be camping for 3 nights and 3 days. I have already started the process of pulling out my camping equipment (how does someone who doesn't camp alot acquire all this crap!) to see what I have , what I need, etc because I plan to make a few updates to the horse camp "set up" this year.

Let's begin with the sleeping arrangements;

Old approach; On the previous rides I have done, I have usually packed along a one man Eureka tent. After getting soaked all three times I have used it, it was time to rethink things.

New Approach: A cot in the back of the horse trailer with a tarp to keep the weather out(its a open stock trailer). I could also possibly throw an airbed into the bulkhead of the horse trailer like Tom and I usually do on our combined trips but it's awkward getting up and down from it, especially in a hurry.

Either way, beats sleeping on the ground.

Cooking/Kitchen Arrangement:

Old approach: I didn't really have one come to think of it, other than packing the coleman stove, the tub of miscellaneous camping utensils, and setting it all up on a camp table. Not very organized or user friendly.

New approach; Take the coleman camp stove and set up the Cabella's camp Kitchen, which, has never ever been taken out of the box since we received it as a gift 3 years ago for the husband's hunting camp collection. This little unit should solve alot of organization and dish washing issues.

Bathroom /showering Arrangement:

Old Approach: wash up with cold water or dive into whatever frigid body of water happened to be nearby, or last resort, just go without a shower.

New Approach (this is my favorite!) I will not go without this time. There will be portable bathrooms of course at the ride camp but my main concern was a place to clean up a bit. After riding all day, I am going to want a shower because no matter how hard I try to stay clean I am usually the one covered in sweat, dirt , leaves and branches sticking out of my helmet you name it. I have always envied those endurance riders that finish a ride looking as clean and refreshed as when they started. I have no idea how they do it but I am not one of them! So I must have a way to shower up, otherwise, I get very cranky when I have to remain covered in sweaty horse grime for any length of time. To help resolve this issue I purchased a shower/utility room tent, along with a couple of solar shower bags. Warning: I am about to dive into personal material here .... Ever had to change clothes in the cab of a truck? You know, the contorting of your body in order to pull off those sweaty breeches only to become more sweat soaked in the process because the cab of the truck is about 120 degrees from sitting in the sun for two days? You know what I am talking about. This little shower tent will solve that issue and give me a cooler place to change clothes , with privacy, and never having to worry about ducking down out of sight onto the floorboard of your truck to avoid the person that just happens to be walking by at the very moment you are indisposed.. yep, all the comforts of home.. well almost....right? (at least until I can win the lotto and buy a LQ horse trailer!)

A Place to Relax arrangement:

Old approach; Plop a camp chair down in a grassy spot with out horse manure, under a tree if you can find one. If not, pull on a ball cap, shades and squint and sweat while chit chatting and relaxing (relatively speaking here).

New Approach: Since they say that one of the most important things about camping is being able to relax, I clearly has some room for improvement here. I don't really ever recall being totally able to relax on any of my camping excursions. If I am not worried about the grizzlies (husband camp trips) or a moose coming into camp, I was worried about the horses. This trip, while we have run into Grizzly bears and moose while marking trails, I doubt they are going to be anywhere near where ride camp will be. So , I decided what my camp needed was "atmosphere". I am adding a temporary awning to the trailer. Basically I will attach a tarp to the opposite side of the trailer, run it up and over the top of the trailer and then straight out. Using two tent poles, that end that comes out will come down at a bit of an downward angle (like a real awning) and be staked to the ground. It will provide my shady area and the tarp will help keep the weather out from the inside of the trailer, where I will be sleeping.

So that's it. With these few changes and upgrades, It should be just like home , right??? or at least a step closer than I was!

So, since I have to believe I am not the only endurance rider out there that doesn't have a LQ horse trailer and doesn't really enjoy camping, I wanna hear about your camp , how you make things more comfortable ...what are your must have's and things you are willing to go without?

Thompson River Endurance Ride

2010-06-17T13:00:00.000-07:00

For the last several weeks, I have been busy with helping to mark trails for the Hooves and Company upcoming Endurance Ride . It's an area that is all new to us to host a ride at. For our small crew, it's been a tremendous effort, with still alot more work to do. We have spent hours riding, driving, hiking and biking to find trails that are suitable. It's beautiful country. If you haven't been to this area (Northwest Montana) for a ride or have been and ridden at our past location (Herron Park), mark this ride down and plan to attend. You won't be disappointed. The picture above was taken near the Vet check area...

Ridge View

Miles of soft , grassy logging roads to fly on!....

Tom and I at Whitney Springs... We were soaked to the bone at this point as the rains were coming down hard.. and yes, it really is this lush , atleast right now!

Tom and I crossing the creek.. yes, this will be part of the ride..... but by July, it will be running less than this. This was the first time I had ever taken Maggie across anything more than a puddle of a small creek..

Maggie and I taking a break at Whitney Springs...

Tell all your friends, this

Getting on my big girl pants...

2010-06-15T14:21:00.000-07:00

Still playing with this heart rate monitor thing and last night. I took Maggie out for a 2 hour solo ride last night and noticed some interesting things.

Up to this point, I have always had someone along with me while riding her. While I can’t use the excuse that Maggie is still new to me, I still don’t feel like I have all her buttons figured out and we are far from “gellin” yet. Her reactions to things are not always consistent. Until we get all that figured out, I prefer to have someone along with out on the trail , but last night, it just didn’t work out and.. well…she needed to get ridden… besides, it was time to take a step forward in our relationship, maybe try to put a little trust in her and officially put on my big girl pants...

Maggie was feeling rather “fresh” so I decided it would be a good night for the loop with more elevation challenges, in the hopes to channel that energy appropriately.

We headed out and took the left onto the trail I was after. Right away, while traveling at a walk , still on relatively flat ground, I noticed her heart rate was higher than what it had been running the last few times I have had the monitor on her. Of course, this is all still new so I have no idea if I really have a true baseline yet. All I can say is that in the last 5 times I have used the monitor she had been running anywhere between 88 and 94 while we walk and the ground is relatively level. Last night she was hanging out about 108-109. I thought maybe it was that she might be a bit nervous being alone and all. She was definitely much more on alert to every squirrel, bird or any other noise that was made.

During the climbing sessions, she jumped up to 155 once, we stopped and she came down to 105 within a couple seconds so I wasn’t alarmed. I noticed on the next hill, she went up to 143 for just a few strides and then seemed to level off at 136 , and stayed there until we reached the top. Not bad?? I am honestly not sure since I don't know what she should be at for climbing a hill.

As we got further into the ride, she did seem to relax and she leveled off, thus staying about 90 on the flat ground. I finally got into some area where we could do some trotting and work on pacing. I thought it would present the perfect time and would be easy without any other horse to compete against. Boy was I ever wrong! She must have known we were sort of headed in the direction of the trailer, (but still several miles away) because she was pulling very hard, very speedy. Normally at a trot, when I can settle her into a reasonable pace, she has been running about 117-118 . This time, having to holding her up quite a bit , she kept spiking up to 136-144. Way to high for a trot! That much I knew.... Clearly, she was using more energy to fight me. I asked her to walk again for a while to settle down a bit. When we got to a long section of flat open dirt track. I asked for the trot again but this time, I let her pick the pace. I wanted to see what would happen with her heart rate because I know that every horse varies on what speed they are most efficient at. It was a stretch of trail of maybe a ½ mile. Ofcourse, Maggie chose a big fast trot. Her heart rate spiked at first to 144, then to my surprise, it back off to 123 and that is where it remained for the entire ½ mile.

So what does this mean? Does it mean she has to travel at that fast pace to be efficient ? I would think that I should be able to teach her to relax enough so she can travel at a slower pace and still be efficient. ( I hope so cuz I can’t ride that trot for 25 miles!!)

What about her heart rate during climbing? If she is recovering within a few seconds to a better rate, should I be concerned that she is jumping up to 155 ? Or do I just have to be patient as this will just improve over time as her condition improves?
I am beginning to see some changes in her from even two weeks ago; a two hour ride used to wipe her out for the next two days. In the last two weeks, I am seeing that 2 hours is no longer much of a challenge anymore for her. I think we are making progess in her conditioning but I would love to get any feedback anyone with more experience than I with heart rate monitors.

After Market Withers Would be nice....

2010-06-09T13:53:00.000-07:00

Still battered and bruised from my weekend “event” with Maggie, I managed to load her up again last night for another round…

(I’ll get back to that in a moment)

Believe me; going riding was the last thing I felt like doing with how I was feeling but… Tuesday would be the only decent day before the weekend and…if I am going to ask Maggie to complete a 25 mile limited distance on July 17th, it’s time to start putting more time and mileage on the clock.

So, after icing my ankle and neck for 20 minutes, popping a few ibuprofen, I loaded up and headed out to the state land for a 2 hour ride. The weather was beautiful. For the first time in weeks I didn’t get rained on while riding. I even managed to find a way to place my rate monitor Maggie where it didn’t bother her. It proved to give me some good insight into her level of condition, which I hope to track over the coming weeks.

Last night's ride was going to be a faster paced excurion but Maggie was either a bit tired still from Sunday’s long day, or possibly the fact that she was in heat was affecting her energy level. Needless to say, she seemed a bit lethargic. After a couple miles, she did perk up a bit. She even decided that she wanted to travel at a nice easy trot. As long as she didn’t get too speedy, I let her decide what pace we traveled at. When she offered to trot, we trotted, when she wanted to walk, we walked. This was kind of a huge revelation for her because normally, she wants to just go, go, and go. We did have to climb a few hills and her heart rate would jump a little higher than I would have liked to see, 145-155 range, during the climbs. I would stop her at these points and let her recover before continuing on. She did manage to recover to below 130 within a short amount of time which I was glad to see however, I can see, her fitness level is lacking in hills. On the long and flat areas where we trotted she seemed to maintain at about 117-120 range. I thought that was decent. We probably managed to cover at least 10 miles, several of which was alot of up and down. I won’t ride her again until Friday or Saturday so she should have time to recover well.

Now, back to last Sunday....

Let's just start by saying, I haven't been bucked off a horse in a very very long time. I have had horses trip and go down with me but actually getting bucked off just hasn't happened for several years. Maybe I was due and as it turns out Maggie was just fit for the job I guess.

Yep, she unloaded me pretty hard last Sunday and I am still working through various injuries, mostly minor but still painful... I was thankful I had my helmet on as I took a good bump to the head, which caused me to have a bit of a sprained neck, a sore shoulder and a swollen and painful ankle , probably sprained as well.

Anyways, we were out marking trail for the upcoming endurance ride here. We all rode out in teams of two, with our maps in hand. The goal was to start placing flags lightly to mark the assigned trail. There were 4 teams of two riders. Steph and I were a team and going along enjoying our route. We had already ridden about 6 miles and were supposed to turn back at the creek and mark the trail as an out and back. As it turned out, we were surprised to meet up with another team, who weren’t supposed to be where they were based on where they rode out from. Of course at that point, we all got curious and thought there must be a way to loop this trail (it’s all new territory) . We decided to see if we could figure it out. We rode for quite some time before we popped out onto a nice two track grassy road and decided we could make up some time and do some trotting out. The other team was out in front, then me and my co captain Steph. One of the other riders had a dog with , which wasn’t any bother to any of the horses, including Maggie. Mostly... The dog at one point, decided to pass Maggie and I on the right hand side, which just happened to be a steep uphill bank. There wasn't much room between the hillside and where we were. The dog, realizing it was harder to run along on the side of the hill decided to jump down....right in front of Maggie. She tried to avoid him but couldn't and as he yipped away, out of harm, she startled. She let out buck and a huge (or what felt like a huge) jump. I think the dog startled her to be honest because he appeared out of no where from her line of vision. Unfortunately, when she jumped, she slammed into Steph and her horse to my left, practically landing on them and in the collision, I lost my right rein... which was completely stupid... I have no idea how I lost my rein. As I scrambled to try to regain the rein, she continued to buck but added a little twist, what I prefer to call a sunfish maneuver. Now, remember we were traveling at a fairly fast trot when this all started, so we have a good amount of momentum built up. At this point, my saddle is starting to slide and Maggie is still trying to climb all over Steph’s horse. I suppose it had something to do with the fact that I have no right rein, and cannot steer her off to the right. As I am struggling to grasp at the rein and managing to only find air, Steph is now asking me in a somewhat panicked voice “What is she doing? Get her off?” Being a little pre occupied to answer Steph’s question, my saddle is now starting to roll to the left. Maggie has the withers of a 50 gallon whisky barrel so there is nothing to stop the saddle at this point. I am already unbalanced, yet still … trying to get that rein!!At this point, Maggie decided to end the whole thing and put me out of my misery…and lets out yet another hard buck, I imagine at frustration. I remember thinking during this entire thing, "I'm not coming off, I'm not coming off, I've almost... got....it...." atleast until that final buck when I finally thought to myself..... “Oh the hell with it”…
...and there I went… off the left side.
I landed on my left shoulder and somehow ended up rolling onto my back (the momentum I imagine) and hitting my head on the ground. I remember looking up and cringing as I thought Maggie was going to step on me but she managed to avoid me, thank god….

Everyone got stopped and I got up, mostly unharmed. The headache set in right away from hitting my head. (yes, I had my helmet on) I was fairly sure it wasn’t hard enough to get a concussion but I knew I needed to pay attention to see if I started feeling worse… I readjusted my saddle and climbed back on. We still had a ways to go to get back. The good news is that we did manage to find a connecting loop for that trail. The bad news is that it poured the rest of the way back.

By the time we arrived back to the horse trailer, I was feeling the soreness set in and while my head hurt, my symptoms weren’t getting any worse. I figured I was mostly okay and likely to not lapse into a coma or anything. My right ankle was giving me more grief than my head, which was odd because I didn’t remember hitting it . Nonetheless it was quite painful when I got out of the saddle and it was certainly swelling up. I think Maggie was as happy to see the trailer as I was as she announced our arrival. Two other riders were already back. That made two more riders still out.

I unsaddled Maggie. She was tired but happily munched away at her hay bag. I took advantage of the time to rest while we waited for the other riders to get in. My head was throbbing by this point. It turns out that two other riders also had “incidents” but nothing serious. Guess it was just one of those days.

I was not looking forward to the drive home, and wishing Steph knew how to drive a truck and trailer since she was riding with me. Unfortunately, luck was not with me that day and my co pilot, only nineteen years old had had no experience driving a trailer. Now certainly wasn’t the time to learn.

After resting for about 45 minutes, it was time to load up and get us all home. The drive went without incident but by the time I pulled in to my driveway I was ready to be done…

So, ice and anti-inflammatory meds are my close friends this week. My sprained neck is improving but the ankle is being a bit less cooperative. I think it’s just a soft tissue thing because I can bear full weight on it. Like I told Tom, now JB and I both have a bum right ankle!

Afterthoughts:
I couldn’t help but think with this incident that I really have been rather spoiled with JB. Had I been riding him, things probably would have looked a little different. He would have simply taken care of the situation, struck at the dog to get him to move out of the way, and carried on just as though nothing had happened. I guess I have a few things to learn yet about Maggie.

I just wish I could have a set of aftermarket withers installed on her...

Post Pastern Arthrodesis

2010-06-03T13:48:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow marks JB two weeks Post Pastern Arthrodesis surgery. Overall, JB is doing well. He’s done with his Bute 7-10 day post op period and doesn’t seem to be too uncomfortable with out it. The cast is bugging him some , but no more than we expected. JB has figured out how to hold his leg to relieve the pressure on the front of his cannon bone and assuming he doesn’t develop cast cores, we are letting him be. He seems to know how to take care of himself. He lays down a lot and rests, which is good. Ofcourse, he’s developed hock sores as a result of the laying down. Wrapping them doesn’t work because of the location so I just try to keep medication on them. His front left leg is in a standing wrap. I unwrap once a day and rubbed down with Arnica gel , then rewrapped. Hopefully the wraps will help stave off any risk of laminitis. His appetite has been very good this entire time, in fact , it’s been a bit insatiable. Ofcourse, he has gotten a bit spoiled with the buckets of green grass that I am picking for him daily. The green grass seems to help keep him occupied, it’s loaded with good nutrition, it’s good for his gut, and I think it helps him mentally as well. On the down side, I believe I have created a bit of a monster. He gets rather demanding of his fresh grass!

Ok – promise not to laugh???? JB also gets a weekly appointment with a cranio sacral therapist to help alleviate inflammation and pain, and hopefully quicken the healing process. Thus far, JB’s had two sessions; I can’t honestly tell you if it’s helping or not… but it certainly can’t hurt. The craniosacral therapist herself comes highly recommended from trusted sources… so who am I to judge??? if it helps expedite the healing…..all the better.

JB also gets Resperine as a sedative. It seems to help take the edge off. I’d prefer to give it only on an as needed basis but, unfortunately, this drug has to build in his system to be effective. He gets 5 mg every other day. I wasn’t thrilled about keeping him mildly sedated but without, JB gets a bit more rambunctious in his stall than I am comfortable with:)

….bucking and jumping around in your stall just can’t be tolerated right now. Sorry kiddo…….There will be time for that later…

Keeping him medicated is the lesser of two evils…

So, that’s the status of things. Keep your fingers and toes crossed that the days go by quickly and he continues to do well.

CORRECTION!! NOT RITALIN

2010-05-27T06:58:00.000-07:00

I had to post this correction, just in case some of the readers don't read comments! It was not Ritalin that JB is on . It is Resperine, which certainly has it's side effects but quite a bit better than Ritalin!!!

Sorry for the misinformation.

Ritalin Use in Equines

2010-05-25T10:25:00.000-07:00

We are all familiar with this "wonder" drug for the apparent ADHD issue that everyone claims to have kids diagnosed with these days. I worked in MH and I know the bad of Ritalin, atleast in kids, such as changing the chemistry of the brain , permanently. But horses????

You can imagine my surprise when my vet suggested Ritalin to help keep JB as calm and relaxed as possible for his recovery. I had never heard of it's use with horses. Apparently, it's widely used in the show world and the racing industry. My vet assured me that is was safe for short term use and since I know how JB can get a bit nervous and worked up , I agreed; atleast for the first couple of weeks, but I have some trepidation about it.

I tried to see what I could find out about it on line , but there really isn't much.
My eventual plan is to switch to something like the SmartPak product Smart Calm Ultra .

In the meantime, does anyone have any experience using Ritalin in horses? Side effects? Things to be careful of?

Looking forward to hear any info anyone might have on this subject.

Moving Ahead with other Plans

2010-05-24T16:55:00.000-07:00

I was going to wait to write this, but I was itching to post about something a little on the lighter side, some good news. Afterall ; it's been like living on pins and needles here these days....

While JB recovers, there is another little horse that needs my time and even through all of this over the last several weeks, I have managed to continue to ride Maggie. Every Saturday and Sunday, I have been taking her on 2-3 hour rides. We have managed to make some great strides in the last few weeks together.

We have passed through knee deep snow, waded in deep water, chased mountain bikers (only the rude ones!) and even crossed paths with a black bear. We have passed hikers, marked trail for a poker ride and even managed to keep our wits about us when another horse blew up in front of us.

Yesterday, we rode up into new country. A trail called Wild Bill trail ( how appropriate..)was the intended location. We climbed to about 5000 feet in elevation, taking various trails only to find outselves hitting dead ends. For the first hour and a half, we were lost for 80% of the time but having fun nonetheless. Pretty soon, the snow starting to come down which then turned to hail, which proceeded to come down very hard and fast. The visability was horrible and I could barely make out Maggie's ear's. I wasn't too concerned as I knew it was a passing squall but it was certainly taking it's time to pass. We rode along, (still happy since we were riding !) wet and covered in ice pellets , several of which had made their way down my back by now when finally, we discovered the trail we had just spent the last 2 hours looking for. YIPPEE!! In the midst of all this excitement, we turned a corner, only to find a large bull moose standing right in front of us. RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME SINCE I WAS IN THE LEAD! (thus the reason for being lost most likely) He couldn't have been more than 20 yards away. With the snow and wind, he must not have heard us (my friend and I weren't exactly being quiet either complaining about the snow storm we were in) but there he was, in all his glory,standing taller than what a 16.2 hand horse would be. Maggie, as surprised as I was, just stood and stared. There wasn't an ounce of fear in her. Luckily, the moose decided two of us was more than he really wanted to deal with and dashed off through the woods. Phew......We turned back and headed the way we came , partly because he headed in the direction we needed to go and partly because in order to continue down our newly discovered trail , we were going to have to cross chest high water. We decided to loop back (we were scouting new trails and doing alot of back tracking) and found another trail , only to find ourselves back in the same place we had just left... and wouldn't you know it, there was Mr Moose again !! This time he was a bit futher off thankfully. Maggie seemed fascinated by him. I was just counting my blessings that it was a bull and not a protective a cow with her new calf. We would have been in more trouble if it were. We turned back around for the last time of the day and headed back to the trailer, about 4 miles down a forest service road.

So, Maggie has picked up where JB left off and we are logging a few LSD miles with good success. She has even taken to drinking out of puddles along the way as she sees fit. She takes good care of herself. I really like that about her. She's unsure about alot of things at this point, but for less than a year's worth of riding, I think she is doing quite well. Confidence will come in time.

More wet saddle blankets... please.

Time to Heal

2010-05-24T12:04:00.000-07:00

It's not fair when your goals are suddenly scattered like spring time dandelion seeds in a gust of wind.

It's not fair when the road that was paved with promise suddenly turns into heart break.

It's not fair when your best friend for the last 8 years can no longer go with you to chase down a few miles on a sunny afternoon.

It's not fair when that friend who you have carefully raised and taken every precaution to keep safe and healthy suddenly becomes incapacitated.

It's just not fair...

and yet... Life carries on.

There are other horses , other work that must be done. You deal with the challenge and you get on with it. You change your course of direction, you adjust your focus, you do what must be done. You push through , you endure. And isn't that what Endurance is all about anyways? Endurance to keep going, regardless of the demons you face along the way. Just keep putting one foot in front of the other and make the best decisions you possibly can. Sometimes, not because you want to , but because if you don't, you will crumble.

JB had surgery on Friday, May 21st. The surgery went well and he is now home recovering. He is on medication to remain as quiet as possible. He is going to be laid up for a long time, 2 months of stall rest , in addition to the 3 weeks he has already endured. It's alot to ask of from a horse like him and yet he has surprised me at how well he has adapted.

He requires much more of my time these days, but for different reasons. Our relationship has developed a new layer. These days, our time together is about healing, time to comfort and care for him , and time for patience, with each other. There will be time spent giving him long grooming sessions, massage and body work sessions and then just time to be quiet together. He's adjusting as well as can be expected. We have a long journey to endure together.

Update on JB

2010-05-10T10:01:00.000-07:00

A horse can lend it's rider the speed and strength he or she lacks- but the rider who is wise remembers it is no more than a loan.
(Pam Brown, b. 1928)

The photo above was taken 3 days before his accident. He was having an absolute blast tearing around the arena.

Quick update on JB; He has been back at home for almost a week and doing reasonably well with his stall confinement. I will be taking his cast off tomorrow to see how the crush injury is healing. The vet took it off last Wednesday and all looked well then. If everything still looks good with no sign of infection, then he gets the clearance for surgery from the vet.

A Terrible Accident

2010-05-02T20:33:00.000-07:00

The above picture is of JB's leg in a cast. Sorry for the quality of the photo but I took it with my phobe. I can barely bring myself to write this post, but sometimes writing can also be healing for me. I am still in a bit of shock and just trying to deal with all the complications of what has happened.

Last Thursday , April 29th something happened to JB. He was in a terrible accident. I was just leaving from work, when I received a call from my husband to get home quickly. The neighbor had just called him and said that JB was caught in a gate and was hanging upside down from his leg and was in big trouble. “ Get home now..” was Tom’s last words before he hung up the phone. Tom was only a mile from home at that point. I was still 12 miles from home, stuck in 5:00 traffic.

As terror ripped through every cell in my being, I managed to think clearly enough to call my vet. Even if I couldn’t get there quickly, atleast the vet could and meet Tom at the house. I knew for sure that whatever condition JB was going to be found in, he would need a vet.

I made it home in record speed. The vet was already there. I ran around the barn to find JB standing at the horse trailer, soaking wet, full of mud and trembling uncontrolably. His front right leg was bleeding and he was not bearing weight. He nickered when he saw me. The vet had already given him bantamine and a sedative and was waiting for it to kick in so he could be examined. I threw a second blanket over JB to help keep him warm and hopefully stave off any further affects of what was clearly shock setting in.

Tom filled me in on the details. Somehow JB managed to catch his front right leg in between the top part of the gate where it is attached to the barn. The problem is that how he did it is still a mystery. There was absolutely no gap between the barn and the gate. We build all of our gates this way to prevent this exact nightmare. And here we were. Needless to say, JB managed to get hung up. His front right foot was up in the air and JB was on his back underneath the gate. It’s hard to imagine, even now. I have probably gone to look at that gate 100 times in the last 72 hours trying to figure it out. My best guess is that he reared up, came down with his front feet on top of the gate, which is 6 and half feet high, and as he tried to get his feet down, his feet must have slid to the left and his right foot got caught in the process... somehow… The weight or angle or both must have been enough to force his foot down between the exterior wall of the barn and the gate. We have no idea how long he was in this position. The UPS driver was who noticed JB in his predicament and alerted the neighbor, who then called Tom.

Tom was able to unbolt the gate and get JB free. He said JB jumped right up as soon as he was free but it was obvious his front right leg was not in good shape. It was bleeding and he was not putting weight on it. The vet got there shortly thereafter.

As Tom caught me up on the details, I stood there trying to offer whatever comfort I could to JB, the freezing rain pouring down on us while the vet examined him. His foot and pastern was “sloppy” (sloppy meaning there was too much lateral movement. We needed to get xrays to see what was going on, possibly something broken. We put a temporary cast on him and got him loaded in the trailer.

The xrays revealed , to my surprise, no broken bones. But, nearly as bad, maybe worse. It appeared he had torn his medial collateral ligament (MCL) of the short and long pastern bone, or the proximal interphalangeal joint. This was the reason for the “sloppiness “ of the joint from side to side when the vet first examined the foot. Normally, xrays are not the best diagnostic tools for tendons and ligaments. Ultrasound is the more traditional method but the vet was able to maneuver the joint in such a way that allowed a clear image, showing the displacement of the joint, indicating clearly that the ligament tear.

The treatment:

My vet encouraged me to have the radiographs reviewed by an advisory board at Pullman. He felt that they would be able to give me a more accurate prognosis , because they would obviously see more of these types of injuries than he would . He would be able to email the radiographs over night and have an answer the next day.In the meantime, the vet put a cast on and JB stayed the night at the clinic.

I went ahead and had my vet send off the radiographs and Friday I spent the day waiting to hear back .

The options are complicated. For right now, JB has to be in his cast for about 10 days until the swelling has come and gone. JB also sustained a crush injury to the tissues just above his coronet band. That has to heal. For right now, JB is on stall rest and he has to be on even ground. Since I don’t have a stall, I have him at a boarding facility about 3 miles away. Atleast for now. The plan is to get him home and we started making that happen this weekend (more on that later).

In 10 days, he will be ultrasounded, and recast again. This cast will be more permanent, for 6-8 weeks. JB would remain on stall rest for 3-4 months. Assuming he is healing well at that point, the cast can come off and then he can be moved out to a small paddock. That’s assuming everything is healing as it should and other complications don’t arise along the way. The final outcome of this method,which I'll refer to as the conservative method for now, is that JB would be a horse that might be sound enough for a pleasure but would have arthritis complications for the rest of his life…most likely.Ofcourse, every horse is different so my vet was not able to be more specific than that.

The other option is to put JB through surgery and fuse the two joints. The vets at Pullman that reviewed his radiographs thought this would be best option if JB is to stand any chance of recovering to full use, but as with any surgery, there are no guarantees. They felt that he would most likely be able to go back to work as an endurance horse if the joint was but there is always a risk. Ofcourse, the other down side is that the surgery is very expensive. On a good note, if I do opt to do the surgery, there is a surgeon that can come here from Great Falls, and perform the procedure. The recovery and rehab period would be a total of 6-7 weeks. With a fusion, there would also be no risk of arthritis since the joint is one unit, so to speak.

At this point, I haven’t made a decision yet. I have to consult with my vet further, I have lots of additional questions. Since JB has to get through these first 10 days,I do have a little bit of time to make a decision.

Right now, JB is at a barn about 3 miles from home. I'll try not to over exaggerate but it's a dreadful place. It's noisy and stressful there for him and he hates it. It's dark in the barn and there is an arabian stallion across from JB's stall that is completely out of control. Keeping JB quiet and as stress free is going to crucial to his recovery. That's why I am getting him out of there by Tuesday. It’s killing me to have him away. For the last two days, I have restacked 6 ton of hay to one side of the hay barn so that we can get a section set up for a stall for him. That involved getting my brother to come up with his skid steer to scrape down the dirt floor of the hay barn for an even base for gravel. A truckload of gravel is coming tomorrow. I will then place rubber mats down, section off a 12x12 stall using panels, which will then have plywood attached to the inside of those panels to make them completely risk free.

Right now, I can’t think about 3 months down the road, I am only taking it moment by moment. Getting JB home will help my emotional state, as well as his. I am hoping I can then think a little more clearly. His body is hurting, his nerves are tattered. All I can do is everything for that horse right now.

To all my blog readers, I hope you keep us in your thoughts and prayers. We need all the help we can get right now.

Level of Condition-The Morning After

2010-04-27T11:12:00.000-07:00

There have been a few posts of late out in the blog world of endurance riders about maintaining a level of condition on their horses. A lot of good, thought provoking questions have been raised on the topic such as how much conditioning is needed on a weekly basis to be ready for a 25 or 50 or more, how much conditioning is too much, how many miles should be put on in a week’s time and what should those rides look like, (i.e.; speed, hills, intervals, etc)
Just like so many other endurance riders out there, these questions have been spinning around in my mind as well this year. I haven’t had as much time this season to devote to conditioning as I would have liked, it’s just the way it is right now. A few weeks ago, I sheepishly admit to having a couple of meltdown moments where I slid into “catastrophize” everything mode. Between limited time to ride, having no place to condition unless I haul somewhere(which doesn’t really happen during the work week) and only having one ride in the area that I don’t have to trailer 9 hours to, I was feeling a bit frustrated with the state of things. I had all the reasons in the world to want to throw up my hands to this sport in those moments. I suppose it didn’t help when JB came up lame either, which probably created my momentary tail spin. But, in the end, it was just a meltdown and regardless of all of those things, I still want to ride my horses. I still want to do this sport. If I only manage to attend one endurance ride a year, so be it. I’ll do what I can, when I can, as much as I can.

So with that worked out in my mind, and getting myself refocused, I wanted to get a good feel for what my two horses current level of condition really might be. In my opinion, I am able to judge alot by riding a horse one day for a longer distance and then seeing how they are feeling the next morning. Sometimes I work them undersaddle, other times, it will just be liberty work.

Side note***(JB has recovered from whatever issue he was having that was causing his lameness. It’s a bit of a mystery but I’m chalking it up to the kick in the shoulder he sustained and keeping my fingers crossed at this point).

On Saturday, with the help of Tom who willingly offered to ride Maggie for me, we set out for a ride. Given the foul weather, high winds with gusts of what seemed like at least 40 mph, we decided it might be best to ride over at the State land which offers lots of cover and heavy timber to protect us from wind. Of course, the compromise for lack of wind then became creaking trees and the occasional branch crashing down.

I thought that a 2- 3 hour ride would be a suitable ride time and probably put us somewhere in the 10-12 mile range, which was more than sufficient for both of them. I even hooked up my HRM, (finally) to JB but apparently did something wrong or didn’t have enough goop because I couldn’t get a reading. We headed out on the loop that offered a few good hills to start out with but then switches to open flat after the halfway point. We walked most of the first half. Tom had to work pretty hard as Maggie is still figuring out the hill thing. Riding Maggie downhill is something akin to water rolling down hill. She just keeps building speed if you let her. Maggie motored up the hills with the occasional detour to one side or the other , going off course a bit. I am not sure if she thought she had a better route but it seemed that each time she detoured, she chose what appeared to be the steeper route…. Aahhhh.. greenhorns…. I tried not to snicker too loudly at all the machinations Maggie was going through as she tried to figure out how to engage her engine. Ofcourse, right about when I was feeling overly confident with my mount and his stoic behavior, a branch came crashing down behind me , landing only 5 feet away. That sent JB charging ahead for a leap or two. It didn’t seem to even phase Maggie, even when JB bumped into her as he jumped ahead in his momentary startle.

JB and I mostly stayed behind Maggie. She tends to get a bit racey at this point when she isn’t in front and for Saturday’s ride, Tom wanted to choose his battles for the day! ( I can’t blame him and I wasn't going to say anything ,afterall , he was doing me a huge favor ) Other than the branch incident, JB was very good about staying behind Maggie. It was a perfect opportunity to spend some time working on staying a horse length behind her. He surprised me and settled into his own pace, which happened to be a horse length behind. For most of the ride, I rode JB on a loose rein, even on some of the steeper downhill. Normally I have to give a little half halt on the downhill’s check him back. This time, he carefully picked his way down and I never had to remind him to slow up. I know we have yet to actually compete or finish in an AERC sanctioned ride, but JB seems to be graduating into seasoned trail/endurance horse. To ride him on the trail, he feels like he just gets down to business and is ready to do his job these days. I definitely felt as though we have maybe begun to cross over into some new territory.

We rode for exactly two hours and if I am correct, the loop we rode is a 10 miles. So we averaged 5 mph. Maggie worked up a pretty good sweat even though it was cool out. Ofcourse, as a green horse just learning the ropes, she’ll likely tend to work harder than JB , atleast until she starts to figure things out. No doubt she was tired at the end, but, had we asked her, she would have gladly kept on going. I see some great potential in her. She’s certainly a tough little mare…

As far as level of condition on these two horses, it’s kind of like comparing apples and oranges. JB has been consistently ridden for 3 years now and at the end of Saturdays ride, I probably could have easily done another 5 miles oh him without too much trouble. Sunday morning he looked bright eyed and bushy tailed so I decided to saddle up and do some arena work , mostly at a walk with a little bit of trotting. I wanted to make sure he still felt sound and I wanted to work him through some lateral work to help with any stiffness he may have had. He felt like he had had a week off of no work and willingly dropped into a couple of sweet little canters. Considering his conditioning has been in fits and starts this spring, he felt very good for his morning after. I think he either maintains his condition extremely well or the little bit of riding I have been doing is helping more than I thought. It probably also helped that he was not wasting a lot of energy in how he traveled. He just set a pace and stuck to it, even when we did some long stretches of trotting. I think we’re still on target for a limited distance in July.

Maggie has come a long way in a short amount of time. She is definitely the orange in the equation. She’s built a bit heavier, a bit rounder, than JB. Based on that, it may take her longer to become fit for this sport. She is also only 5 years old this month so she is still developing. It was less than a year ago she was severely overweight. Have you ever tried to get weight off a Morgan? Good grief. She’ll definitely be an easy keeper! On Sunday, I watched her pretty closely to see how she would do after that mileage. I found that she was laying down quite a bit that morning and seemed pretty tired. I took her out to the round pen later in the day to move her around at liberty, hoping it might help to work out any stiffness she may have been feeling. At first she moved pretty slowly but after about 5 minutes, she was kicking up her heels, literally, and was rather playful. I suspect that while she was a bit tired from her day before, she was still in good spirits and that was a good sign. Right now her stamina isn’t built up yet, her muscles, tendons and ligaments are not accustomed to long distances. We’ll continue with regular riding, and keep the rides in the 10-12 mile range for her for now. I think I could probably have her ready for slow limited distance in July but we'll definitely play it by ear.

Looking forward to July 17th and 18th .

M Classic Grace

2010-04-26T06:54:00.000-07:00

Finally got around to a couple of photos of Grace. She is finally settling in a bit. We were worried about her initially as she seems to be quite afraid of alot of things. She isn't the same horse we knew 7 years ago but I think in time, she'll be fine. I have been taking her for daily walks, hand grazing and grooming, although as you can see, she isn't exactly lacking in the way of groceries.

Enjoy...

Who's on First?

2010-04-22T12:08:00.000-07:00

Two and a half more weeks .. before school is done..
Then maybe I can get back to posting something worthwhile on this blog.
I have been riding a couple times during the week, just at home in the arena. Sometimes I can only sneak in a half hour, other times, its over an hour. JB has been laid up, as I mentioned in an earlier post but there is good news. I’ll get to that in a moment.

While JB has been off, I had to shift gears a bit about who would be my mount for the ride in July. Initially I hadn’t planned on riding Maggie for that . I didn’t think I could have her ready and still don’t, but with this recent development with JB, I had to at least work toward that as a goal. I still have faith that JB will be fine but in case he’s not….

I rode her three times last week at home and last Saturday, I made a fast dash with Maggie to Herron Park for a quick 5.5 mile loop. Yes, I drove 16 miles one way for a very short ride but I needed a study break and it did us both a world of good. This was only her second time out on a “real” trail and she did beautifully. She was tired and sweaty since it was all uphill on the way out, but she did learn that trotting uphill might not be such a good idea after all…she also started to really figure out how to travel downhill without crabbing.

Sadly, for safety reasons, I have had to stop riding on the dirt roads near my house for conditioning. After another recent close call of nearly being run into (what appeared to be on purpose by a crazy neighbor who hates the world), I decided enough was enough. I am tired of fighting crazy drivers; I am tired of my quiet horses being given reasons to be scared of traffic. I am tired of assholes… to be perfectly honest. Trying to ride on the roads around here is just creating anxiety in my horses.. and me , for that matter. I can’t say I blame the horses, when trucks and cars come whizzing by at 55mph , kicking up gravel and stones and dust. Anyways, I digress…

Without the use of dirt roads for conditioning, that only leaves me the arena, pasture and my dead end half mile cul de sac for riding during the week, but at least my horse and I are safe. In a couple more weeks, after school is out, I’ll be able to get home a bit earlier in order to load up and get to a trail head at least once during the work week. That combined with long days in the saddle on weekends will have to suffice for conditioning.

On to JB. JB has maintained a level of fitness from last year so even at this point, so even with this setback, I could still have him ready for July assuming this issue clears up. At the same time, I also realize the window of opportunity is closing in on me for that. I’ll only be doing the limited distance but I had really hoped to ride him both days for the limited distance. The ride is less than 11 weeks away, considering I wouldn’t ride the week before. I am trying to stay positive and flexible at this point.

The good news is that the lameness is improving and I would consider it a low grade at this point. The chiropractic/body work lady came out on Tuesday. By then, JB was already making some improvements and moving about 65% better than he was even 3 days prior. I had thought initially it was front left, where he had been kicked but it was a bit hard to tell because to me, he felt off in the front and the back. When she worked on him and watched him move, she felt his soreness was on his front right. My first thought was .. “Oh no, not again”. Of course, JB’s issue 2 years ago was a sole bruise on his front right. I know that he hasn’t bruised anything because he is only ever ridden in boots and none of our paddocks have rocks since it’s old river bottom. Given that, I knew I could rule out another bruise as a potential issue this time. It could also be compensation, for his front left. It’s really hard to tell. Long story short??? I have no idea at this point what I am dealing with. The good news is that everyday he is showing improvement. There continues to be no heat, no swelling, no odd bumps, etc. The chiropractor felt he was certainly sound enough that I should start riding him again. Light riding, of course, no tight circles, or anything like that and see how he does for the next few days. I don’t think I am ready to take him into the vet for a lameness exam quite yet. I know it will end up in doing nerve blocks to identify the area of lameness and that gets extremely expensive.

So last night, for the first time in over 2 weeks, we saddled up and took a spin. He actually did pretty well. He didn’t feel obviously off like he had 2 weeks ago but at the same time, he definitely didn’t have the “gusto” in his trot I would like to see. He didn't do the stumbling thing like he was two weeks ago when I discovered the issue. We worked for about 20 minutes and I put him up. We’ll do the same thing tonight. Keep your fingers crossed that he continues to show positive changes.

With no tests to study for, I’ll be in the saddle most of the daylight hours this weekend.

So many horses to ride, so little time....

Special Delivery from Texas

2010-04-20T11:31:00.000-07:00

I seriously considered not mentioning this bit of news. After all, it has little to do with endurance or anything of that nature. It doesn’t matter whether any of you know or not. It has little to do with this blog , just like so many other aspects of my life that I don’t share here. In fact, it’s really not all that important, in the larger scheme of things.

And yet.. it is.

Because not too often do you get a second chance on a bad decision you regretted for the next several years. .

Let me rewind to a bit. Approximately 7 years ago we (my husband and I ) decided to get rid of all the mares we owned. We had three of them and wanted to down size and simplify.. He had 4 horses and I had 4 horses. We were just engaged and we wanted to keep the management of the herd as easy as possible. So we sold them. I also ended up selling one of my warmblood geldings, a TB gelding and my TB mare. Tom sold his last remaining Morgan mare from his breeding program, known as Grace. Of all the horses sold, she was the hardest to let go.

As a result, it took us a while to find a buyer for Grace. A potential buyer corresponded with us for 3 months before we made the decision to finally sell her. We wanted to be reassured that this would be a good home. So the deal was made and we shipped Grace to her new home. The owner called a couple times to ensure us that Grace was working out wonderfully. She had bought her for her daughter and that they all just loved the mare. 2 years after we sold Grace, we got a call from another lady, who was claiming she now owned the mare. WHAT???? This alone was a huge shock, since we had the original buyer sign a first right of refusal agreement.
This new owner was calling to get background information on the mare. The new owner was led to believe that the mare had only recently come from Montana, within the last few months. Apparently, the mare was in really bad shape and half starved when she bought her. The original owner said she came to her this way from us. Long story short, we set the record straight and even sent the new owner photos of Grace the day we loaded her on the trailer to go to her new home. The new owner loved this mare and was getting her back to health. Ever since that day, we’ve kept in touch with this new owner over the years and even developed a friendship of sorts as a result of the entire debacle. Grace has had a great home ever since and has been dearly loved. She was groomed twice day by the ranch hands, had a bug free, temperature controlled barn to go into at night and all the grazing she could ever want.

This past December, we got another call. It was Grace’s owner. Things had changed in her personal life due to medical reasons and she was needing to get out of the horse business. She wanted us to buy Grace back. We weren’t in any position to buy any more horses, currently sitting on six head as it was. I even considered selling Maggie to get the money. As the weeks went by, the topic of Grace often came up in conversation at the dinner table. We were worried of course about where Grace would end up next, given the hisotry but we couldn’t give the owner the money she wanted for her and didn’t want to insult her with a low offer. Both of us realized in our own ways that we regretted selling that mare over the years…. but you can’t go back…

In late February, we got another call. It was Graces owner again. This time, she told us that if she had to get rid of her, the only place she felt safe sending her was back home to us and that if we could arrange to get Grace back to Montana, she would give us the mare back. We were shocked. No , we didn’t need another horse, that was certain. But this was mama Grace and sometimes, things work out for reason we don’t always understand. We told the owner that we needed a little time to sort things out, see what shipping would cost (or what it would cost us to drive down to get her). She said take as much time as we needed. She would hang on to her for another year if we needed to but she wanted her to come back to us.

So the shipper arrived with Grace this afternoon all the way from Texas. I can’t wait to see her and give her a big hug.

Sometimes, you really do get second chances…

Welcome home Mama Grace. We missed you.

Weekend Horse stuff...

2010-04-11T17:08:00.000-07:00

This was the first weekend in some time that I was able to focus almost entirely on horses and horse related tasks. Let me say this...it felt good. No errands, no family obligations, no other things to I must do. I forgot just how good it feels to just say no to all the other demands on my time .
It started out with JB getting his scheduled trim. His feet continue to be doing very well. I curried, curried and pretty soon had another layer of his winter coat off of him and onto me. I booted him, saddled him, and off we went. It was a bit chilly so we started out slow, doing lots of bending, leg yields, circles, etc at a walk. I had decided to work him in his bitless bridle Tom recently made for me (another post maybe) and this was only the second time I had ridden him in it. He was responding nicely, much better than the first time I put him in it. I decided to ask for a trot after about 15 minutes of warm up work. He hesitated.. "well, it has been a while and it has been cold..." , I thought to myself. I asked again , this time a little more insistent... He picked up the trot, although he pinned his ears a bit . He offered three or four strides and then he was back to a walk. I thought that was odd but since Tom had just left with his gelding maybe he was being a bit barn sour. I gave him the cue to trot again, and he obliged , but clearly wasn't happy about it. The trot he gave me was choppy, slow and then he started stumbling all over the palce. Then I knew something was definitely wrong. When he had foot trouble 2 seasons ago, that was one of the most noticeable symptoms, he stumbled over nothing. I got off him, pulled his saddle and bridle off, and made him move at liberty in the arena. There is was, a definite front left gimp. Tom came back out about then and asked what was goin on. He watched him too, definitely front left. His previous foot issue was his front right and was due to a stone buise of the sole. His soles have thickened and he also had his boots and comfort pads. Besides, his trim was only a small amount of rasping. No sole was taken and JB hasn't even sluffed his winter sole yet. So I knew whatever this lameness was , it was unlikely that it was foot related. I caught him up again, ran my hands down both front legs, no swelling, no bumps, no heat, no nothing. I pulled the boots, no soreness in the heel bulbs, no rubs, no nothing.

Hmmmm. Maybe he just strained himself playing with Brego.

Right about then, Tom said..

"Didn't you say the other day that you noticed he had some hid missing on his shoulder?" "Which side was that?"

It was true. He did have a good sized scrape and indeed it was his front left shoulder. Initially I assumed it was a bite when I first saw it because he and Brego are constantly playing and biting one another. I looked at it again, it could easily be a scrape from a hoof, without a doubt. So,JB is mildy to moderatly lame.

My plan? Give him a week with some slow easy walking work and see if it goes away. If not, called the chiropractor , if still no improvement, off to the vet for a lameness exam. Initially at the discovery of this, my stomach flipped as I envisioned my already short season being ripped away from me. Howevewr, I was encouraged when I turned him back out to his pen when he was rather playful and willing to jump around. At the very same moment, I decided it was time to separate him from Brego for the time being. He is now in with just Rebel. They don't play and JB usually bosses Rebel. His chances of getting injured further would be far less.

As for Maggie, well.. Maggie and I are at a bit of an impass. Maggie is learning that she can go as fast as she wants to and I will still be there. Here's the thing, Maggie gets anxious and travels around tense and thinks that if she just goes, faster things will be better. That combined with that fact that she is terribly herd bound. Fighting her with half halts isn't working, its just frustrating her more. She's too strong willed. Maggie needs to learn to let go of that anxiety and if she needs to move her feet to do so,then that is what we will do. Think about it, have you ever tried to run a mile holding every muscle in your body tense?? How tiring is that???? Could you travel 25 or 50 miles like that? Maybe but not without a high likelihood of injury at some point.

So, today, we started out slow and as predicted she wanted to go faster. I let her and pretty soon we were moving around the arena (and eventually the pasture) at a big trot or a canter if she felt the need. As a disclaimer, I should mention that while we are moving at a quick pace, she isn't in runaway mode. So I let her go, while directing her a bit with circles and changes of direction. Then, every so often, I offer her a good deal, asking her if she would like to maybe slow down a bit, using my seat and reins, If she responds, we slow up a bit. If not, we kept on moving at the speed she feels the need to move at. sometimes it was a canter and sometimes it was a big fast trot. We continued this pattern for some time. Pretty soon, when I suggested she slow up, Maggie listens and her pace slows, maybe just a bit, but that's a try, and that's something... Pretty soon, Maggie is trotting quietly around and eventually she slowed to a walk. several times, this walk only lasted for a few minutes before she decided that she needed to go quickly again. We repeated this process and I rode her for quite a long time. At the end of it, she had made some progress. We could trot a lap or two around the arena at an easy pace with out her trying to hurry. Better yet, I could ask her to slow to a walk and she willingly walked and stayed in a walk. I ended the lesson at that point.

Some might read this and say, sure, you just tired her out.. and I would say that that is a wrong assessment. Believe me, this mare was far from tired. It's crucial that Maggie learns that she doesn't need to travel so fast and tense. I can see that I am not going to be able to make any training progress on anything until she lets go of this anxiety and tenseness and I refuse to be in a horses mouth constantly to get them to slow up. In order to do that, I need to put her in a physical bind to get a mental change. Remember , I didn't ask her to move quickly or choose the pace we traveled at. I let her decide and continually suggested..... "We can slow down now if you would like" . When she did , I rewared her, and let her slow down. When she left quickly ,I let her but directed her feet. I am a strong believer in presenting things and then letting a horse work through all the possible options. Eventually she'll figure out that she doesn't need to work so hard. I know this process will need to be repeated several times before we get it perfect but it's a good start to a long road ahead.

Submitting to the Schedule

2010-04-05T07:12:00.001-07:00

Ok- I give. I took at week off with plans to get some really concerted riding done, but the wheels of the universe had other plans, apparently. I think I rode once the entire week, when there was an abbreviated break of snow and rain. The wind however nearly blew JB and I across the field. Needless to say, I didn't get much accomplished, but atleast I got on and cruised around a bit, stretched our legs. It felt good nonetheless. So what did I do with my week off?? That's the infuriating part. Not a whole lot of anything I considered overly productive. Family consumed most of my time, and not exactly good ol' family quality time, but I won't get into that. When I wasn't playing taxi for someone, I did manage to get my dresser painted and re decorate the bedroom a bit, but otherwise, not much else

So the schedule isn't looking a whole lot better in the next several weeks. I have succumbed to not even try to get serious about my endurance conditioning until after the week of May 12. Besides, we got more snow in the mountains over the last several days. Can't get too far without having my horses sharp shod, which I refuse to do at this point.

Hope everyone else is getting some good ride time in!

Conditioning, Compromises and Questions

2010-03-16T09:00:00.000-07:00

How do I make compromises and keep an endurance horse in shape?
Riding and training for endurance is a huge commitment, especially in the time department. It seems that a large number of people who are really serious competitors in this sport have the luxury of time to commit to it. I am not one of those, especially right now. As Spring weather is arriving, I am going a bit crazy. I work full time (+) and, until May, I am also going to school. Time in not in my favor but I still want to keep my thumb on JB’s fitness level. We are slated for a limited distance, our first ride of the season, the weekend of July 17th. By May, school will be out, but until then, riding time will continue to be limited. So how do I accomplish my goal? and keep my sanity? (I do need at least a few hours of sleep)

For now, I am just trying to do as much as I possibly can because I am a firm believer that doing a little is better than doing nothing at all. But how little and how often? Can I realistically keep a horse fit enough on these time restraints to be ready for my first ride of the reason on July 17th? I’m planning to do the limited distance. I had hoped to have both JB and Maggie ready for this ride so I could ride one horse each day, but that is one compromise I have already come to terms with. I am only going to be able to have one horse ready and that needs to be JB.

Here’s my Plan: I would love to get some feed back.

Session 1:
From now until Mid May – 8-10 miles rides on Saturdays and Sundays, every weekend. Two days a week of 1 hr sessions in the arena of trotting/cantering and dressage exercise. It seems this would at least serve to keep JB legged up and in halfway decent condition.

Session 2:
May 15 – July 12- I can probably manage a ride 2 evenings a week consistently of 8-10 mile from home (since it’s the work week and I won’t have time to haul anywhere after work) and then either Saturday or Sunday as my long day in the saddle away from home. Maybe 15-20 miles, depending on the terrain.

Here are my questions:

For session 1, would 8-10 mile rides back to back from now until May be too much if it’s fairly flat (at 7-8 mph trot)? JB seems to have handled 6-7 mile rides really well right out of the gate a few weeks back after being off for 3 months.

For Session 2- Is one weekend day of longer miles enough when combined with the shorter rides during the week?

For my goal of the July 17th ride, What’s too much? What’s not enough??

Am I being reasonable in my goal to have him sufficiently ready for that date?

Also, to keep in consideration, JB tends to be of the “hardy” sort and seems to recover from a long day in the saddle quite well. In fact, I can see him excelling at multiday rides more than one day 100 milers…but I also don’t want to take advantage of that fact and risk over conditioning.

I realize so much of this depends on the individual horse, but I am looking for guidelines from those of you with the experience that I lack. So, please… share some of your thoughts, experiences, suggestions.

Velcro Butt

2010-03-08T15:29:00.000-08:00

I am not sure where the last two weeks went but quick comes to mind.

Before I realized it, too many days had slipped by without so much as even a short condition ride. Between work, work travel, school, and few other family obligations, the horses have slipped a bit.

This past weekend, I did get back in the saddle and was able to get at least a few miles on both Maggie and JB. Tom and I headed out Sunday to scout some of the trail areas. Along with us was another rider/horse. The plan was to ride one loop that she had plotted out on the map and attempt to begin marking potential trails for the July Endurance ride that is being held here.

After an hour and half drive to get to the riding area, rushing to get saddled up , we were all anxious to see some new country. GPS in one hand, map in the other, we headed out , ready for a new adventure.

After over an hour of fumbling around, backtracking and bushwhacking to avoid the massive sheets of ice that blocked large sections of trails, we ended up just riding on the forest service roads, realizing it was still a bit early to be out, unless you had borium shoes on. The roads didn't make for a real scenic ride but there was not traffic and it was a beautiful day. There were long straigh sections and it made nice conditions for long trotting. We did end up doing some unexpected hill work when we couldn’t cross one section of ice and the only safe option was to point our horses nose up the embankment. The steep embankment no less. Thank goodness for breast collars!

With all the confusion in the beginning of the ride, JB was about as irritated and frustrated as I was and then the fight was on. Everything became an issue. We crossed a small running creek once, not a big deal but then, when we had to cross it again, (last in line of 3 horses) he thought he was going to be left all alone and proceeded to launched himself like a pole vaulter, nearly landing on top of my husbands horse and almost swiping me out of the saddle by a huge branch on his less than graceful landing.

I was thankful for three things in that moment, to have been wearing a helmet , sunglasses because the branch hit me directly in the head and lastly that I had a long background in jumping. As JB landed and I got hit with the branch , I was not exactly centered. I scrambled to right myself, just in time, before he jumped a log and scaled up a muddy hill. For a moment I was having a flash back to being on a cross country course…

I finally got JB to WHOA (dammit), gathered my reins back, straightened my helmet, took a deep breath, turned JB around and headed back the way we had just come..

....to cross that damn creek one more time …

and hopefully do it a little more appropriately. Training opportunities don't always come when you want them too.

As I passed my friend, who was eyeing the bits of pine needles and twigs sticking out of my helmet, I heard my husband quietly say... take a deep breath….in a kind but firm voice...

hhmmphh....I thought to myself...

Honestly, my husband is my rock and grounding rod. I tend to flare quickly at times and that never works with a horse, especially one like JB. He was right and I knew it.

So I heeded his advice, took a few more deep breaths and after about 10 minutes of me asking with gentle squeezes with my leg, and encouragement with my voice and seat, JB eventually ran out of dry ground and inched all four of his toes into the creek. He stood there for minute.. I pet him , took another deep breathe, told him he was a good boy and we quietly exited.

Mission accomplished…

....and apparently, I have a new name… Velcro Butt.

My friend , not having known my previous life in riding, was apparently impressed with my ability to stay in the center (sort of) of the saddle through all that…

What can I say?? This ain’t my first rodeo…(hope I am as lucky next time….)

Creepy Crawly

2010-02-25T13:20:00.000-08:00

As things continue to warm and the ground begins to thaw, I start wrinkling my nose when I step out to do chores. Springtime on a horse farm gets a little .. uh. pugent.. shall we say.. as the snow and ice disappear, giving way to a couple weeks of mud and muck. This time of year also gets me thinking about worms . You know, those nasty little creatures that can cause a myriad of health issues such as colic, heart problems, weight loss and even behavior issues. The mere mention of things like Strongyles or Ascarids makes my skin crawl just thinking about it!

Spring time worming is just around the corner and normally, like thousands of other horse owners across the country, I would be getting ready to dose everyone with a syringe full of whatever I had on the rotational 10-12 week worm schedule.

.....Not this year folks. This year, I am taking a little different approach and I invite all of you to consider doing the same.

40 years ago, when effective wormers entered the market, worming became part of the regimented schedule of equine health care maintenance.. Initially, the vet came out twice a year, wrestled with your horse to stick a tube down his nose and then poured some foul looking liquid into his stomach. Life got easier for everyone shortly thereafter, when paste dewormers came available. All you had to do was read the directions and figure out when to rotate the wormer type every 8-10 weeks. A few people took this one step further and thought well, if a little is good, a lot is better….

All that enthusiastic deworming has now caused us a bit of a problem.

Research has shown that the worms have developed resistance to deworming drugs, of which fenbendizole (Panacur), oxibendizole (anthelcide) and oxfendazole, have seen the most widespread resistance. So, as resistance increases, the ability to use these drugs effectively decreases… What goes up, must come down….

I decided to see how my little herd was fairing in this department. The last thing I want to deal with is issues in my herd with heavy worm loads due to drug resistance. You know what they say about an ounce of prevention…

What’s a responsible horse owner to do?? Well for starters, only deworm when necessary and in order to determine when that is??? Contact your vet and have them do an FEC, or Fecal Egg Count.

I have made arrangements with my vet to do an FEC for each one of my 6 horses. It will be a bit pricey but I suspect in the long run, it will be offset by what I spend in wormer over the course of time. Unfortunately, there is some strategy to getting this done. In order to get the best results from an FEC is all about timing. Based on the last time I wormed and with what product, I have to wait so many weeks beyond that time for the vet to be able to do the testing at the potential heaviest egg count, if there is one…Mid to late March is the window for me.

So, in a couple of short weeks, that time will arrive and I will start the tedious process of collecting a fistful of manure from each individual (with gloves ofcourse) I hope the kids will cooperate in supplying those samples on command (cough) but if not , I am prepared to wait them out... glove and baggie in hand.

I hope that the FEC will shed some light on which of our horses needs worming more , or less, and if we have any resistance. This new information , combined with our pasture management methods will certainly give me a little less to worry about.

Here is a link on the subject that I thought was interesting to share.

So, bloggers....Have any of you done FEC studies on your herds/horses? What have you found? I would love to hear about it.

Saturday Sunshine, More Miles

2010-02-20T15:05:00.000-08:00

The day started out on the chilly side but the sun was out. I would take JB out first. Things got off on the wrong foot while I was trying to get him ready. His deep seated fear of motorcycles, 4 wheelers, snowmobiles, (or anything in that category ) came bubbling to the surface when a neighbor from down the road came by our house on a scooter. JB happened to be tied to the trailer, far out of harms way , but it doesn't matter with him. It could be a mile away and he gets worried about it. He paced frantically at the trailer as the scooter passed by. I am not sure how I am ever going to get this horse through this now. He was actually doing quite well until last fall when he was traumatized at the ride in Washington when we had to pass right through the middle of a dirt bike rally.Anyways, I could see that the scooter set things in motion for our ride today and I almost decided against going since I was a bit on the edgy side now, and I knew I had seen a couple other 4 wheelers go by earlier. If I went out, there was a good chance I might run into one of them. I really didn't want to give JB another bad experience but at the same time, I need to continue to expose him to it and hope that eventually I can get him over this fear. I took my time saddling and and getting him ready trying to decide what to do. I decided to handwalked him up and down my dead end road for about 15 minutes to see if he would settle in a bit(and it would give me a chance to settle my nerves) It seemed to work and he started relaxing a bit. I walked him up the road until I hit the dirt road and then got on. JB was pretty tense but after about a mile, he settled in. No dirtbikes or 4 wheelers to be seen.
Most of the vehicles that came by were courteous today and slowed way up. Ofcourse, I stop my horse and face the oncoming car. It seems to send the message loud and clear to "slow down"! Not sure why it works but I am going to keep doing it. We made it back and the last mile of the 4 we completed was probably the best. Just as we were coming over the last little hill before my house came in to sight, the 4 wheeler came down the road. JB ofcourse locked on and tension ripped through him again. Luckily the 4 wheeler went the other way.. thank goodness. JB relaxed again and we made it home with no further incident.

Since the sun was still shining, I quick grabbed a snack and caught Maggie.
The photos posted below in the reverse order that I wanted them to post in. I tried everything and cannot resort them on the page. I even tried refreshing my blog by clearing my cache, but it didn't work. I gave up after fiddling with it for a half hour. (If anyone has any suggestions, please do tell because it's absolutely maddening not to be able to organize the photos the way I want to)

Anyways, Maggie is saddled and ready to go in the first photo. I have to ride her in my western because its the only saddle I have that fits her table back. She is ridiculously broad. Scroll down to see the before and after She was an absolute mess when I caught her. She apparently has been enjoying the mud a little too much.

Maggie and I went about 4.5 miles. This was the second time I have had ridden her with out a companion. She's very honest when she is unsure about something. She just stops short(very short) and looks. Sometimes she shies a bit but so far nothing too out of control. All in all, I was quite proud of her today.

Conditioning in Full Swing

2010-02-16T10:17:00.001-08:00

I love long weekends but I usually come out of them totally exhausted because I crammed so many things into the schedule. This past weekend was no different. Now, I am feeling the effects of just that. I guess the conditioning season has officially started for me, but I am afraid to even say it, lest there be a snow storm to stop the progress I feel as thought I am making. (knock on wood) Compared to the last two years, I am getting riding time in way earlier than usual.

First order of business; ....News to share
The weekend started off busy with non-riding activities. The distance riders group I am a member of, Hooves and Company, has started the planning process for the July endurance ride that will be held in this area. Guess who is part of that planning process? We’re a small group so it takes all of us to get things accomplished. Since I plan to ride both days, my contribution will be in pre planning instead of volunteering this year! The ride is on the AERC website as Hooves & Company for the NW region. CHECK IT OUT! The location is new for the ride this year and if you haven’t ever been to this area for an endurance ride, consider putting this one on your ride calendar. It’s July 17th and 18th. The scenery, trails and camping accommodations are going to be fantastic. If you want more info, email me. I will be glad to tell you what I know, which at this point, isn’t much but stay tuned!! I should be getting some first hand knowledge over the next several weeks. Here’s the scoop; We were granted permission to use a large guest/cattle ranch west of town, which is surrounded by National Forest. This is new territory from where we have held the endurance races in the past. Given the new territory, Hooves and Company members have lot of new trail to identify. Thank goodness for Google Earth, GPS and nice ranch owners!.

Back to the riding part of the weekend;

Riding was first on the list for Sunday. I wanted to get both JB and Maggie out for some miles. Tom, also getting the spring riding itch, decided to come along for a ride when I took Maggie out. I was happy to have the support and company of him and Cassidy. Maggie started out a little strong and ramped up but listened well when I asked her to check back. Of course, being young, she had to be reminded frequently for the first 2 miles. After that, she seemed to catch on and realize we didn’t need to hurry. She only argued with me once when I asked her to stop and wait for a truck to come by. Her argument was a shake of her head. For the rest of the ride, she settled into a nice flat footed steady walk, on a loose rein! This mare definitely has some “smoke” so my focus with her is keeping things quiet and relaxed. She has a real knack for going from 0-60 in nothing flat! Tom tells me it’s pretty common in these little Lippitt Morgan’s. I guess he’d be the expert having raised and trained them for as many years as he did. She is surprisingly very responsive to half halts and is responding well when I ask her to “chew the bit” down and travel long and low. Overall, I think we are off to a great start.

Focus area with her:
Be choosy about who I ride with, when I ride her . No fast rides! No nervous riders!
Continue to keep the rides quiet and easy
Exposure to new things to help build her confidence
Do not get caught up in enjoying her speed!!! (We’ll save that for later)

One thing that stands out to me about Maggie is that she has such a willingness to go, and keep going, that I will have to be careful about distance. Her strength, both mental and physical, can be deceiving on how tired she truly might be. We went 6 slow easy miles with her felt like a good starting point for her fitness level. I will keep her between 5-8 mile rides over the next several weeks and pay careful attention on her recovery. As soon as my arena is snow free, we’ll be back at working on basics. She is still very green so basic training will take precedence over distance work. If all goes well, I hope to have her ready for her first limited distance at the July ride. Our plan is to get the turtle award.

By the time I finished with Maggie, grabbed a snack, rehydrated and got my self geared up to go back out and do it again, the day was getting away from me. I saddled and booted JB in a big hurry. We only went 3.5 miles. I would be meeting a friend the next day for a longer ride so I wasn’t too concerned about mileage. I just wanted to get him out to stretch his legs a bit. My ride on him had me working full time to keep him between the “navigational lines”. He wanted to look everywhere but straight ahead and we looked like a drunken sailor as we wandered back and forth along the road. After about a mile and a half of this ever so fun exercise in patience (on my part) he finally settled in and started listening. He has developed a nice rhythmic walk. The trot however is a different story these days. A year ago, I was peddling him along, fighting for forward every step of the way. Looking back, I know this had to do with how his feet were feeling and that he was also stallion. While he still gets a bit concerned about who were leaving and often tries to look behind us, the need for peddling has long since gone away. JB has found his big horse trot and Sunday’s ride had us cruising along pretty nicely. As much of a thrill it is to ride him in this big trot (which is amazingly smooth) it is early in the season and I don’t want any injuries!!

Monday’s ride we completed 6 miles of mostly trot work. Other than his melt down with having to get by a grain truck filling up at the silos, and the noise and sight of the auger, he was a real trooper. I worked on switching from leading to following with Debbie and her horse and maintaining a steady pace.

Focus areas for JB:
Develop various speeds within the trot
RATING, RATING, RATING ( if you had asked me a year ago about having to do this with him, I would have laughed at you)

That’s all folks.. now back to work…

Signs

2010-02-13T06:05:00.001-08:00

I know alot of endurance riders around the county are getting anything but spring weather, like Endurance Granny, who keeps getting hit with huge amounts of snow. For whatever reason, things seem to be moving in the right direction here in Northwest Montana. I am hoping it continues on that path.

Just the other night, I noticed one of the first signs. It's a yearly event that I eagerly wait for. Y'know, that time of year when you go to pet your horse and your glove becomes one big mat of horse hair??? Well, it's happening here at Acer Farm. The horses are shedding and I am ecstatic. (they say it's the small things , right?)

Ofcourse, in another month , when every garment I own has remnants of horse hair, I may not be so ecstatic.

Time to dig out the curry combs and face mask....

1st Ride Away from Home

2010-02-10T05:11:00.000-08:00

Yesterday there was achange in my schedule and I had an unexpected , but welcome gap of time available. So, when given the choice of what to do with a free afternoon, what would one trying to condition two horses for endurance do??? Boogie home, change and halter up Maggie for a ride, but ofcourse!
She was not expecting to see me and I interupted her afternoon nap. I don't think she was all too pleased about it either. I had to halter her while she was laying down and it took some coaxing to convince her to get up. Eventually she groaned, stood up and looked at me as if to say.."thanks alot"
I decided that I would put the saddle on her today and see about actually making her carry me for today's ride. I hand walked her until I got to the gravel road, about a 1/8 of a mile, tightened the girth and proceeded to try to climb on. Maggie decided right about then that maybe it was time we turn back to the calling companions we had just left. As I was in mid swing with my right leg, she did a nice quick turn and pivot. I managed to land fairly squarely in the saddle, keep myself from plunking down, and got her stopped and turned back , all in one not so graceful motion. My saddle was also turned.
........... "All I need now is someone to come by with a truck and scare her" I thought to myself.
I got everything situated, took a deep breath and we set off at a brisk walk, pondering how it would be riding this mare over distance. She has absolutely NO withers. She's as table backed, mutton withered as they can come.. Getting on her without twisting the saddle is nearly impossible, even with an athletic leap to launch myself, and a good handful of mane.. the darn thing still comes over. "Deal with it...."
Up ahead was our first obstacle to get through. A truck with a flatbed trailer parked in the middle of the road. Its occupants were mulling back and forth, trying to fix something on the trailer.
.................Walk, stop, look, head up like a Giraffe, step, step.. stop...look... blow....
This is how we proceeded towards this horse eating monster, while I tried to gently talk to her , encouraging her it was okay. As we got closer, I decided, based on the tension rippling through every muscle in her body, and remembering the saddle rolling issue, it might be best if I just hopped off and led her through this. I didn't have much room to squeeze by them and the last thing I wanted was for her to decide to stop and spin and potentially running into the truck or trailer. Ofcourse, I had to really think twice; was it worse to get off and have to fight the saddle again or take my chances I could get us both through this while staying mounted. The logical side of my brain won out, wanting to make sure I do everything I can to build her confidence in sticky situations. I reluctantly hopped off and we walked by, said hello and made it through with no incident. I've learned that pride will often get a person hurt.
Shortly thereafter, I did the mounting dance once again, using a snow bank as an assist. As we made our way down the road, she began to settle in a bit and I took a deep sigh, which in fact prompted her to stop holding her breath as well. (funny how that works). This was our first ride away from home afterall. So I was a bit tense.. ok I admit it...
We got to a long straight stretch of road and I asked her up into a trot. What started out as a nice quiet easy jog started to build into a bigger, more impulsive, famous Morgan road trot.
......."damn hard wired genetics..." I was really hoping she would be reluctant to get into that big trot that is so bred into her, atleast for a little while!
As much as I was enjoying the impulsion and burst of effortless speed, I realize this mare needs to be contained a bit. She needs more encouragement to stay quiet and relaxed at this point. Forward is NOT a problem with her, the total opposite of JB. She can tend to get "caught up" and has way more go than I need or want with her at this point. I must say though, I think I'm in love!!!

The rest of the ride went fairly well. There was one other point in the ride that I opted to hop off again, as we were passing a narrow section of woods , woods that were making crunching sounds, which were apparently alarming. Nevertheless, she is much more brave and confident when I am out in front and I have no problem letting that be the case for now.

We managed to go four miles and she had adequate (ok more than adequate) energy at the end of it. She got warm but did not sweat, which was good since it was only 32 degrees out and she has a coat like a big brown bear! She got a good rub down, a mud removal scrub and a couple carrots.

Mission successfully accomplished.

Legging up again...

2010-02-08T06:24:00.000-08:00

I did stick to the plan and get out out with JB for our first real "condition" ride of the season. A friend came over to join me with her horse , also her first ride of the season. JB was being pretty well behaved considering. He got a little ramped when Rena, the friends mare, starting jigging. Both horses were feeding off each other's energy and it would not have taken much and they would have been at a full run. Note to self, first few rides out, go it alone maybe....

It took some time but he did settle back into a walk, a fast walk, but a walk nonetheless. It wasn't the warmest day but I had bundled up well enough , only my feet got a bit cold. We ended up turning back at 2.5 miles up the road, since we started running into ice. Besides, 5 miles for the first time out was probably sufficient. I was pleased with JB , he felt quite strong after being off for a solid 3 months. He could have gone another couple miles with out any trouble but we'll take our time legging up and getting back into condition. I didn't get to use my heart rate monitor because I was so excited about just getting out to ride, I completely forgot. Next time though. It will be a busy week and I likely won't be doing much riding until next weekend again...

darn it.....

Heart Break

2010-02-06T19:34:00.000-08:00

Sad news this evening. JB's only filly, Mazie, passed away suddenly as a result of an Aortic Rupture. It happened quickly and there was nothing that could have been done. She was only 3 and a half, much too young.

Mazie was a real doll and will be missed dearly by her owner, who adored her.

Aortic ruptures are a rare thing and are usually fatal in horses. In some cases if the rupture is within the heart, sometimes the horse can survive but it usually only a matter of weeks. Since they are so rare, there has been very little research done on it. They aren't able to link to much of anything like age, breed, genetics , etc. There is some that believe it might be related to a type of strongyle infestation that ruptures the wall of the vessel but it hasn't been studied to be proven.

Its just not fair.

Test Drive

2010-02-03T10:19:00.001-08:00

You met Maggie last June. I did this post when she arrived ( previously known as April) arrived at Acer Farm. She was here strictly for one reason; , that was to be bred toJB. The breeding never occurred because an unexpected offer lay on the table ; April's owner at the time, due to health issues, said he would like me to have her, but if I couldn't take her, she was headed to Oregon, with what sounded like a questionable future. And so, over dinner, we made the deal and the Doe eyed Diva stayed put. I had no idea , really , at the time if she would really do much in the way of endurance but something about her peaked my curiousity..... The first order of business however, was to get her dry lotted. She was terribly overweight and on the verge of founder. She was herd bound with her damn, who she arrived with. She was all attitude... and I liked it....

Over the next several months, we got to know each other during round pen or arena sessions, working on the basics. We made leaps and bounds in the bonding process because she hated being confined to her pen and seemed to looked forward to the distraction of our sessions.

So, 8 months later I am seeing a slimmer, more mannerly version of the same horse out in the pasture and we have started some very initial spring training. In the last week or so I have pulled her out of the pasture, done a cursory brushing, slapped on JB’s older Epics and took her along with me and my dog for a walk. May as well kill two birds with one stone, right?

Normally, my preferred choice of getting a colt out and about is to pony them, but I am a total chicken about the footing right now. It’s still slick in many areas along the roads I use for conditioning. No sense putting me and two horses at risk. So we walk and sometimes we stop, we look, we carry on..

Hand walking certainly has it’s benefits. It's like a test drive, get a feel for things and play it on the safe side. Since I only got the chance to take her out on the trail once last summer and she had a buddy along, I wasn't sure how she would handle leaving the herd, deal with passing vehicles, any of the other distractions we might happen upon. I wanted to set things up so Maggie could begin to look to me for confidence. Hand walking seems to be a great way to do that.

It also gives me opportunity to work with her on leading, manners on the lead and getting her to respond to voice cues. We pass the miles , when we are n't stopping to gawk at something, working on whoa, walk, walk up, trot. It's a good thing she doesn't have to chew gum and walk at the same time because she doesn't seem to be able to multi task yet!

The trotting in hand sessions have been kind of entertaining. She has a nice little jog that I can easily keep up with for some time on my own two legs, a job that I can picture riding along to for miles on end; but she tends to get caught up in the moment and shifts down a gear , or two , and gets into her big Morgan road trot(that thankfully isn’t totally developed). I have to stop her because I can’t keep up. Obvioulsy Stupidly, I have tried, atleast given it my best shot but the short legs don't stand a chance. She just kicks it down again and goes faster... (I think she likes to race!) Not sure where her final gear might be, but I suspect as she gets in better shape, she might find a few more... good for later, bad for now...

On our last walkabout, during one of these trotting sessions, it hit me like wall. I suddenly realized what it was.... the thing that I saw in her early on.. but couldn't quite put my finger on...her power. It resonates off of her, travels down the lead line and hits me like a bolt of lightening. This I think , will make a fine endurance mount.

As for JB, no I haven't forgotten him. His turn will be this weekend.. He's healthy, strong and has been vibrating for weeks. It's time to rechannel that energy into something productive. If he comes out of spring at all like he did last year, I might need to find my Hi Ho Silver Costume first.