Best Day of The Year

First day in their summer field! We were delayed this year due to waiting for the boy's gelding appointments, so there is a LOT of greenery for them to enjoy.

They all get along super well

It was super cute walking them over. It's just across the street from the end of our lane way, but as soon as we turned right instead of my normal left I'd take to go riding, Sophie knew what was up and was very excited. The boys remained confused so it was fun seeing their reactions when we set them free.

Picture quality is not what I'd hoped, we've had a return to winter rain and temperatures. Bad for me trying to get sharp photos, but hopefully good for wildfire season :)

Day In The Life

 (Less an actual day in the life recap, and more an excuse to post a million photos from the backlog I have)

Spring is well and truly here and with that, the ponies all get so much more time out on grass. We've had such a wet spring they can't even keep up with the vegetation growth, which is insane given there are three of them on just over one (very carefully managed) acre full time. Currently, they're out every morning until lunch, then again from late afternoon until 8-9ish (pony dinner/bedtime)

Correction: make that two grass consuming equines and one tree browsing giraffe

Their summer field around the corner from us looks like a wilderness - the property owners are like "send help now!" :) but gelding got delayed and of course we did not want any surprise foals next spring so group turnout had to wait. I've promised the mowing crew will be starting this weekend. I'm excited and hopeful for everyone to start sharing pasture space. They're been sharing fence lines forever and the current situation is that Sophie wants Buck's baby and thinks Reggie is gross, which Reggie is totally fine with. Both the boys think Sophie is weird and could care less about her company. She calls for them and tries to tell them to stay close to her but they completely ignore her lol. So I have hopes there won't be too much drama.

There are much more interesting things than Sophie, says Buck. Mowing crew training is going well.

Mostly they just chase each other in circles all day though. And I literally mean all day, this is the current game that never gets old. This is also why we need to use a lawnmower, they don't spend much time at all actually eating.

My daily spring projects have ranged from re staining fences to loading trucks of manure for removal to other people's gardens. I'm continuing to work on the riding ring area. Parts of it aren't compacting as I would have hoped but as always, we have a plan to better it and it's certainly rideable and usable as is and I remain grateful for it.

These two just like to use it as a litter box, of course. Also, they so different! It looks like I have a gypsy cob and a thoro-cob atm. It's fun watching them mature and I'm so curious to see what the future will bring. Buck is surprisingly sporty given how little he liked to show off as a foal, and Reggie was a very fancy baby but is definitely going through the world's longest awkward stage now  :).

The babies both get daily grooming and handling. Buck is feeling and looking so much better, but we needed to extend the antibiotics as he's not quite fully healed yet. Luckily he continues to be a good boy about it all - the silver lining to all this is that he's much more well handled now than he would have been if I didn't have to medicate and clean twice a day.

Reggie doing grown up things. Still hates being groomed, is only here for the snacks. Grateful it wasn't him needing twice daily inspections because while he's lovely and lots of fun, by nature he's not nearly as forgiving and patient. I'm confident he'll get there eventually and turn into a fabulous riding horse, but for now he's still part baby orangutan.

Pony kindergarten is going to resume next week. I guess I could have been taking Reggie the past couple of weeks, but it felt mean depriving Buck of his friend when he was feeling unwell (separating them goes OK, but there is room for improvement with Buck in particular missing his friend and worrying). Next week for sure.

Still with the baby face, and I am powerless against it. He gets what he wants.

Black Beauty incoming!

Buck currently wins tag games as he's far more maneuverable...will be interesting to see if that changes in the big field, Reggie has a ginormous stride length compared to compact little Buck.

Used to have a nice trot but now it seems like he only has canter or gallop installed.

I'm still 1000% happy with the decision to purchase the both of them, even though it leaves me with less space and time for riding age horses. I was apprehensive they'd be a lot of work, but despite them both being babies with the obvious crazy energy levels and minute attention spans, they are both really good guys and fairly straightforward personalities. Especially when we compare to the menace that was baby Sophie, lol! If she can turn into a good girl, there's hope for just about any young horse.

is a good girl

Baby Sophie for tax

Finally, I'm sure with me waffling over Sophie it might have crossed a few minds that I might regret leasing Bridget. The answer is a giant NO.

Bridget's little girl wrote a book! (About a girl that loves a pony named Bridget, obviously :D) I get regular updates of all their adventures together and it's about as cute as you'd expect. She gets more love than any pony could ever dream of. While I miss her and am sad sometimes, it's absolutely the best decision I've ever made for one of my horses (and I can see her whenever I like).

Decisions (Or Lack Thereof)

 I know I keep promising a proper Sophie update, and I apologize that it's taken over a month since her vet visit. 

Proof of life

She is doing fantastic, likely she had just strained a muscle over her right hindquarter. I feel lucky that out of all the things the vet suspected, this was the one 'easy' answer. So, she's good to go back to work any time now. But! Long story made shorter, I think I've mentioned a few times here that she matured quite a bit smaller than I had hoped and I always feel slightly big on her. With this years saddle fitting challenges and then the lameness that we had to wait weeks to get diagnosed, I went to place where I was sure the problem was myself/my weight and I kind of spiraled into a bad place. 

I bought her sight unseen and so took everyone's word for her size...true story I think the vet filled in what he thought her mature height and weight would be, not the actual. So I was expecting a 14.2hh, 750lb two year old, and instead a 13.1hh, maybe 500lb two year old arrived.

I've tried writing a proper post on this a million times but it always ends up feeling way too personal to put online, and honestly I am not a role model for body positivity, mental health, etc. I aspire to be, and I have a wonderful support crew in place, but it's simply not me right now. It's not something I feel overly embarrassed about (it's just one of those things that are what they are) but equally it's hard to find the right words to talk about it. 

I have considered selling her. I did go shopping for something I'd feel more comfortable on (but did not buy), and eventually just came full circle this spring to keeping the status quo while I take a bit more of a break. It's been a bumpy couple of years riding wise and I'm a little burnt out.

looking like she lives in a fancy park with a fountain. The horses can't keep up with the grass so we needed to mow to keep the weeds out, then the neighbours turned on their hay field sprinkler to complete the picture.

I'm keeping half an eye out for the right sale or lease pony, but with every month that passes I'm that much closer to having not one, but two, cobs of riding age. If nothing else, I have a pretty big balance in the "Future Planning" account.

Currently busying themselves with non stop shenanigans

Filed under: things not going to plan

 Sorry for the radio silence, I had meant to follow up with a Sophie update, but decisions are still not completely formed about next steps and I'm boring even myself with all my waffling and vague thoughts. For now, she's having a continued break and is happy and content while I think on the best path forward.

I've been very distracted elsewhere because poor Buck is having some complications with gelding. That's obviously been very upsetting and taking up most of my thoughts.

He's out in the yard basically 24/7 right now because I feel like otherwise he parks in front of the hay net for too many hours of the day and steady movement can only help. He spends most of his day eating trees and shrubberies and following me around, he's less fussed about grass/grazing

If I'm not mistaken, we're almost two weeks out from the vet visit now. There were a few days immediately after of 'Ugh, I don't feel great about this swelling, but it's within the realm of normal and he's bright and happy and running around like normal' so I tried to just relax and go with the program. After all, he's young and healthy and everything I've ever been told is that it's a pretty minor surgery with minimal chance of complication.

 Then suddenly last Wednesday night it really wasn't OK at all.  Things got nasty fast. Everything swelled up twice what it had been. The drainage that had previously felt like it was in the realm of normal turned into a flow of horrible looking stuff complete with chunks of infected tissue. The poor little guy was really depressed and in a lot of pain. I've normally got a pretty strong stomach, but when it's my horses that goes out the window. Don't even talk to G about it, he was already having some manly sympathy around the whole thing and now it's basically the stuff of guy nightmares.

Here's a picture of some lilacs

and a sunset

We are starting to see improvement with continued antibiotics and bute. It's nowhere near resolved. I'm optimistic the worst is behind us but I'm also still not feeling great about the situation. I trust the vet but I'd feel better if she was local and could come check him out in person because I'm a worrier and read too much. 

Playing wild stallions a few weeks ago

I think I'm going to opt out of gelding procedures in general for the rest of my life. It's been rough. The actual procedure for Reggie didn't go smoothly at all, and now this with Buck isn't giving me the warm fuzzies either. Mares or existing geldings only from now on, please!

The one silver lining in all of this? Buck is an absolute certified angel, like you couldn't ask for a better patient. I know he was G's pick and 'his' horse, but it's a not-so-secret secret around here that there is a conflict of interest and he is my favorite pony while G "has no favorites'' but is quite partial to Sophie ;)

Iz friend

I'm used to mares who choose violence and hold epic grudges if they're even slightly inconvenienced or uncomfortable, so maybe my standards are low. Buck is a star regardless, though. This morning I just walked up in the field with my silver honey spray and fly repellent and jar of swat and antibiotic pills he was like 'ok lady, do what you gotta do'. No halter, no worries. He also just eats his meds right up without me having to get super creative. Easy and low fuss is absolutely unheard of around these parts so you can bet he's being told how wonderful he is multiple times a day.

Happy muddy pony on his first birthday a few weeks ago. He's feeling pretty sad right now and I hate that for him.

Shout out to Reggie too, I thought for sure I was going to need to separate them (and stress poor Buck out further) but he's been very respectful and has put his normal super intense self on hold. No bullying, no trying to roughhouse, not even any generic destruction of objects. He's scaled back his energy level to match Buck and is being a very good and supportive friend. We don't admit Reggie is a good boy out loud around here, though, because compliments go straight to his little rock star head.

Looking very civilized. Good boy, Reggie.

Fingers crossed for some normality soon, I'm going to sleep a lot better once Buck is healing and feeling more like himself. We're not quite there yet, but I feel like we're trending better. The big summer field around the corner is waiting for them, just as soon as Buck is feeling well enough.

Vet Day

 

Pony kindergarten didn't happen last week because I somehow caught pneumonia a couple of weeks ago and have been basically sleeping and feeling sorry for myself. I also missed the clinic I signed up for last weekend, which stinks, I feel like I've been on a roll for a year or two with signing up for clinics only to be unable to attend.

This week pony kindergarten also didn't happen because they got gelded that day instead. Fun times! I've had colts before but it's been a while. I didn't remember it being an overly big deal and wasn't worried about the appointment (I paid for college by being a vet assistant so you'd think I'd be OK) but the experience felt really hard this time around...definitely emotions involved because they're my horses, but also the actual procedure didn't go super smoothly for Tradey. Before you worry, it all turned out fine. But turns out he's just kind of impossible to sedate, so even with draft horse quantities of sedatives he was still randomly waking up and flailing and groaning and it all felt dramatic and gory and took way longer than I would have liked. Then of course he was on his feet way sooner than he needed to be despite everyone's best efforts to keep him quiet, and was quite upset to see his buddy Buck down for the count. 

Grazing quietly last night.

I'm probably making it sound like a nightmare and logically it was fine, the vet team is great and calm and professional - just as the owner it was tough to see him struggling so hard and I think if there is a next time I will opt to take them to the clinic and not be present. Husband G was there to assist with holding recovering ponies (Sophie got her annual teeth and vaccines too so we had three sleepy ponies to keep an eye on) and he was visibly upset which just added to the feelings. You know how you're barely holding it together and then if one person cracks you're done for? I was feeling it. Poor guy didn't sign up for this sh!t. So, current feelings are 0/10 would not recommend, but glad it's done and over with. We're two days out and both boys are doing well, just a little quieter than normal.  Hopefully by this weekend they'll be back to their normal activity levels and pony kindergarten attendance will resume.

Buck practicing for kindergarten last week

Sophie got her check up too, and after the dramatics and worry over the last visit, it was decided she probably strained a muscle in her right hindquarter a few weeks ago. A huge relief. She is barely reactive to it now, and was declared sound, so has the green light to get back to work. I've got a lot of thoughts incoming, but I'll save that for the next post.

Sleeping off the sedatives with her head propped on the hay bag