Pony Kindergarten

Both ponies have settled into A's barn pretty well by now and we've got a good routine started.  Peebs has obviously been here many times and settles into most places well so I wasn't worried about him. But this would be the first time Cinder would be out with horses other than Peebs (or her mom and another pony at her breeder's) and I was a little worried. It's like dropping you kid off at kindergarten and hoping they play nice with the other kids.

Letting Cin get settled in with Peebs in the drylot at first

Of the four horses at A's, all are gelding and three of them are in their mid to late twenties. Scottie is 14 but acts about 4 with other horses so both A and I were hoping he at Cinder would play together.  And they do.  Scottie tends to be a  bit lower on the totem pole and Cinder, while not yet showing alpha mare tendencies, does push him around a bit. One of the other geldings, Giz, is only turned out at night but he and Cinder are back scratching buddies and get along well.

Red, the oldest on the place at 28 is the one with the broken coffin bone.  He's turned out during the day with Peebs in the dry lot which shares a fence line on two sides with the big pasture.  Red used to be boarded at my old barn and both his owner and I kinda forgot that he sometimes falls hopelessly in love with mares. The first few days Cinder was out Red was frantically pacing the fence line trying to catch her attention and push the other boys away from her.  She couldn't have cared less about him.  We started calling him the creepy old man and told him that toxic masculinity bullshit will not be tolerated at TCF. He does seem to calmed down a bit and isn't quite as frantic when Cinder's close to the fence.

Out with her best bud Scottie

The biggest issue has been between Cinder and Blue.  Blue is the herd leader and doesn't tolerate bullshit. The first few days Cin was out with him, I saw him pin his ears at her and she respectfully stayed out of his way.  But the morning before we left for the horse show A called me that Cinder had jumped the pasture gate destroying it. Blue and Scottie had been down by the gate when she put Cinder out and she had her back turned to them when she heard scrambling and turned around in time to see Cinder's escape.  Cinder hit the metal gate with both her front and hind feet, but landed fine and ran back into the barn and into her stall. The gate sadly died on impact.

RIP gate

We kept Cinder in till A and I got back from the show, and luckily her parents were able to get a new gate and install it that same day. When I went to put Cin out again Blue pinned his ears and snaked his head at her.  Cinder went full on panic and ran back to me clearly terrified of him.  We're assuming Blue must have gotten after her and since Cinder absolutely does not want to touch the hot wire fence she must have jumped to gate to get away from him. So currently Blue is turned out in the smaller field by himself during the day and with Giz at night and Cinder and Scottie are in the big field 24/7. I feel awful that Cin has caused such a ruckus and wrote A's parents a check to replace the gate. And I know part of having horses turned out together is them not getting along and finding the right buddies.  But it feels like I sent my baby away and she got beat up by the school bully.

Peebs (and Cinder) go to Summer Camp: 2019 Edition

Last summer when I first started hauling Peebs over to A's place for lessons, he spent a few days there and gave her cousins pony rides.  I've been hauling over to A's somewhat regularly for lessons and to ride with her since.  I love A's barn and have lamented over the fact that she doesn't have enough stalls for my two ponies. They have one extra stall, but I have two horses.

Peebs hanging out in one of A's stalls

A is going to be gone this summer for a 10 week internship in Ecuador. Her parents were planning on taking care of the horses, since they all typically live outside 24/7 in the summer and come in once a day for grain/fly spray/feet picking. But one of the boarded horses broke a hind coffin bone and is on stall rest indefinitely. He also has some other medical issues, and combined with the injury and possible side effects, A's parents felt they weren't equipped to handle it.  I offered to help take care of the barn and they've graciously accepted and are letting me move my ponies in for the summer.

Peebs testing out his summer home this past weekend

If everything goes to plan, Peebs will live in the small pasture that's half dry lot half grass and has a run in shed. Being out on full pasture 24/7 isn't great for Peebs' delicate stomach (and his waistline) so this will hopefully be a good solution. I'm planning on chucking Cinder out in the big pasture with the three geldings.  A's gelding Scottie loves to play but the other two don't so I'm hoping he and Cinder will play together and wear each other out. At my current barn, the ponies only get about half day turnout in the summer in paddocks, so I'm excited to get them out more and let them be horses.

Meeting the other ponies

My trainer is also going to coming out to A's more this summer to help keep Scottie in shape.  I'm looking forward to getting more lessons in and having her help me start long lining Cinder.  I'll probably also ride Scottie a bit too, which will be good as he's a very different ride from Peebs. We haven't worked out exactly when I'm moving in yet, but probably within a few weeks.  A leaves in early July, but we're planning on going to a show the end of June together and I'd like to have Peebs over there to jump more before the show. I'm super excited for this summer but so sad that A will be gone. 

Triple Whammy

Poor Peebs and I got a 1-2-3 punch this weekend. We had a jump lesson Friday night and while we kept it together it was far from our best.

My trainer's been out of town for vacation and work so we haven't seen her in a few weeks. I've been feeling somewhat directionless and in need of guidance. Unfortunately Peebs was up and spooked pretty hard a couple of times at goblins in the bushes. We mostly just tried to keep him calm and relaxed, trotting fences and lines. The one time we attempted to canter a fence he bolted out of the scary corner then went sideways. We did manage to trot out of the corner and over the jump, but didn't attempt cantering a fence again. Another horse bolted in that some corner later that night, so there really must have been something there.

The whip and the neigh neigh

Saturday there was a western dressage clinic in the barn that we rode in, except in jump tack, that completely fried the pony's brain. I told the clinician that Peebs likes his face to be left alone and she said that her style is a lot of seat and leg and to ride them front to back. Sounded good to me. She had me really focus on his head in our transitions, keeping him deep and round. While she did want me focusing on keeping my seat active and bumping him with my legs, she did want a lot of contact with his mouth.

Clinician and another rider

Going left was pretty good but going right, his hard side, we hit a brick wall. He got very pissy, started sucking back and not going forward. She had me shorten my reins and lift my hand to follow his head, but my reins ended up being about a foot long. My hands were at the end of the braided section of rein, with my arms fully extended. I was supposed to be channeling him forward but he decided that going up was a better option. He popped up with his front end, not a full out rear but definitely a warning. She kept telling me to turn him and send him forward but by the third time he did it I mentally said f**k this and turned him left and let him walk on a long rein. 

We were able to trot left, do a half circle and trot right, then go back left before we called it quits. She told me I need to ride with my reins that short for a few weeks for him to get it. Umm, no. How bout not. I'm really not doing a good job of clinics this year.

Before the carnage

Sunday my BO was doing some fence and pasture work and we turned a few of the horses out together. Peebs went out with my BO's young gelding, who he's been turned out with before, and one of her mares. Peebs and Charlie were fine but once Liza was out it all went to hell. Liza kicked Peebs in the shoulder and they separated and seemed ok for almost an hour till he got too close to her grazing and she went after him again. A scrape on the right front, a kick to inside of his left hind gaskin and cannon bone later I pulled him out. He was a bit gimpy at first, but seemed fine by the time we were back in the barn. I hosed and washed everything, liberally applied vetericyn, buted him up, and left him in his stall. Hopefully he won't be too sore tomorrow. So much for a relaxing end to a killer weekend. Sorry bubba!!