I Feel Good

I'm a big believer in the magic of Back on Track products.  I had a sheet and saddle pad for Buddy, and they made a huge difference in the winter for him.  Peebs is similar to Buddy in that he tends to get more muscle sore/stiff than joint stiff (furiously knocks wood).  So I bought him a sheet over the summer.

I had the chiro out a month or so ago for him and she noted that his hips and back feel much better than usual but his neck is still his weak spot.  He loves to impersonate a giraffe; part of it is how he's built, and part is he likes looking around. I always know when it's time for him to see the chiro because he stops being able to bend his neck to the right and will brace and hold tension in his neck.  So my one Black Friday/Post-Thanksgiving Sales purchase was a BOT neck rug for 20% off.  Then last week SmartPak had one of their 25 days of Christmas specials as a BOT pad with free polos.  It also combined with another 15% sale, so I got a pad and polos. 

I've been using the sheet since we started blanketing the horses, sometimes layering it under another sheet or medium blanket once the temps dropped. Peebs started wearing the neck rug Tuesday and I just started using the saddle pad and polos last night.  He's been warming up much faster than before and feels good.  Almost too good.  So good he needs a lunge before we ride if he's had a day off or a couple of easy days.  So good I dropped my whip earlier in the week and didn't use one last night.  So good that I had to do our canter work last night in a half-seat or two point because if I sat he impersonated a race horse.  I'm happy he's feeling great, but I'm knida worried about the monster I've created. 

Bringing Home Baby

Once again I've fallen behind on blogging.  But the biggest and most important thing is that Cinder came home last Sunday.  I'm excited, but also terrified.  Who let me buy a baby?!  I have no idea what the hell I'm doing.  I'm assuming this is kinda what if feels like to bring a human baby home from the hospital.

I convinced a couple other boarders at the barn to come with me when I went up to get Cinder on Sunday.  I figured having someone to talk to in the truck would help calm my nerves and get my attention off every bump and sway in the trailer.  We took Rosy, my BO's mini as a travel buddy for Cinder with the plan of putting them in a stall together over night while Cinder settled in. As we were getting ready to load up, KP (who is a vet) and I talked and decided to give Cinder her vaccine booster then and she took it like a champ.  We put Rosy in the first stall in the trailer, shut the divider, and Cinder took maybe 45 seconds to load.  She did get a bit nervous when she realized mom wasn't with her, and called a couple times.  But once we were on the road, I didn't hear or feel anything.

That's the sound of my heart melting

Rosy must have had words with Cinder because back home when we turned them out in the indoor together Rosy pinned her ears and Cinder wouldn't come within 10 feet of her.  Obviously Rosy does not appreciate having to play babysitter, thank you very much!  We let Cinder play around in the indoor for probably close to an hour and she called maybe five times?  Way, way less than I was expecting.  We decided to split Cinder and Rosy up and Cinder was walked happily down the aisle away from Rosy past a bunch of other horses and into her new stall.  She paced for a few minutes till I gave her some hay then seemed to settle in.  And from the reports I got (our BM lives in the apartment in the barn), she was pretty quite during the night.

BM put Cinder out in the indoor during the day Monday for me and said she was great.  When I came in the afternoon she seemed like she had been living there forever.  I turned her out again to clean her stall and tried on the foal blanket I got for her.  She spun a couple slow circles around me when I first put it over her back, but didn't seem to care at all when it was on and fastened.  It was hilariously too small so I ordered a pony sized one.

We used to have a 3yr old boarder here that had problems getting her head over the door.  #giantbaby

Yesterday the farrier was out so we brought Cinder out to mess with.  She was super not happy about her back legs being picked up, but a light smack on her ribs and a firm "Knock it off" got the point across.  She's smart, and once she realized that she got pets and scratches for holding her foot up she was fine.  Farrier rasped a little bit off on each foot since she was in the middle of a cycle and didn't need a full trim.

Good luck with that Cinder

A post shared by Molly Basney (@mollybasney) on Dec 5, 2017 at 4:32pm PST

I turned Peebs and Cinder out together after their feet were done.  I was a bit hesitant because Peebs can play kinda rough, and his favorite game is chewing on other horses.  But baby sister wasn't having any of that.  He tried to bite her neck and she whipped around and let both back feet fly at him. He backed way off, and pretty much let her do whatever.  She tried to nurse from him and he just took it with a confused look on his face. I'm pretty sure he's going to be squarely under her hoof from now on.

What's in a Name

I'm on day 10 of 12 working in a row....and the last few days have been ROUGH.  Like we normally have 7 people but have been down to 3 or 4.  Mentally and physically I'm fried so, for funsies I'm asking for help on picking a show name for Cinder. 

Every princess needs a sparkly crown.  Also, that's her dad's palomino butt in the background

Her sire is Chancellor (Rogue for a barn name) and dam is Brenna (Abby/barn name) by Buenos Aires. Doesn't give me a whole lot to work with.  Of note, Brenna's grandsire, Bolero, was the founding sire of the B-line Hanoverians and the grandsire of Brentina. 

Like mother, like daughter

I'm thinking something fire related to play off of Cinder, or maybe something in Spanish as a thanks to my parents (who live in Mexico) for helping me get her?  Currently I'm liking Sparks Fly, but my uncle's nickname is Spark and I don't really get along with him that well as he's THAT uncle at family gatherings.

So interwebs, help a girl out.  Anyone got any suggestions??

Worth His Weight

The past few weeks have been pretty good in terms of ponies.  Peebs' has been awesome over fences, minus one day when we attempted bounces, and I've feel like we've really figured each other out and have become a pretty good team. 

Hoping this week goes as smooth as this line #mcm #easysix #aslongasiholdwithleg #alwaysaddleg #canyousayrightdrift

A post shared by Molly Basney (@mollybasney) on Oct 30, 2017 at 10:36am PDT

Over the summer I had set up a couple gymnastics for Peebs, all one strides.  He was a champ going through them so when I set up one with a bounce to a one I didn't think anything of it. We started cross rail bounce to a pole and he seemed ok with it.  I made the pole a cross rail and while it rode a bit long he seemed to get the idea.  I shortened the bounce and it went fine.  I then put the second cross rail up to a vertical and all hell brook loose.  The bounce suddenly seemed super long and Peebs knocked the vertical with his hind end.  So I shortened it again.  Then he tried to put a one in the bounce, a few times.  My life might have flashed before my eyes when the one stride put us almost on top of the vertical.  But God bless him, Peebs never once felt like he was going to stop, or run out.  Every time he somehow managed to get over the vertical without pulling the rail or killing us. We finally managed to bounce the bounce and I quit with that.  I'm hoping to work on bounces in lessons over the winter to see if we can figure them out.

Absolutely no problem with the spooky Halloween jump

That ride over the bounce really cemented that Peebs is a trier, and will do his best to take care of me.  Phoenix would have stopped, and Buddy probably would have just gone through the vertical, if they were in that situation.  But even with some truly awful distances and take off spots, Peebs was rock solid and I felt completely safe with him.  The old me would have been in tears and would have given up. But with Peebs I was laughing and making jokes about it.  We had a lesson the week after and while we didn't have any bounces, we did have some bad distances.  And again, I felt 100% ok with it and Peebs took everything in stride..haha! Bend the bending line too much and end up at 4.75 strides?  Ok.  Don't hold enough in the outside line and get 5.5 instead of 6?  Whatever.  Seriously, this horse is worth his weight in gold!

A couple months ago my farrier (whose work I like, but as a person, not so much) made a comment about how much I paid for Peebs.  Basically he thought I got robbed and paid way too much for him.  And maybe in other people's minds I did over pay.  But to me, Peebs is priceless.  These past couple of weeks have only cemented that fact. I will happily pay more for a horse with a great brain who tries his heart out.  And as my trainer said in my last lesson, put a flying change on him and some 2'6" show miles, and I could list him at double what I paid.  But I'm pretty sure Peebs is with me to stay, forever.  

It Started with a Text

A former boarder at my barn, KP, texted me on a Saturday out of the blue asking if I wanted to buy or know of anyone who did her 4 month old filly. She's out of an imported Hanoverian mare by a Oldenburg/Trakehner stud.  The stud was who she used to board with us last year when he was 3 coming 4, until the testosterone really kicked in and she gelded him and took him home to recover. This is his first kid; KP has the same mare and another mare in foal to him for next year.

Hello world!

I really, really like Rogue, the stud/now gelding. He was a sweetheart on the ground, and you would have never know he was a stud till this spring.  He was the one Peebs was in love with last year. I was briefly toying with breeding Tia to him instead of Yorke, but physically Yorke was a better match for Tia.  Rogue is bigger boned than Yorke, and Tia needed Yorke's refinement.

Not to sure about this whole hatler breaking thing

I jokingly texted my mom, who was helping to pay for Tia's breeding expenses, and asked if she wanted to buy me the filly. She replied with "Ok, how much" and after I picked my jaw up off the floor and responded and said KP would let us do payments till she’s weaned.  So the next day my BO and I went off to meet her.  She is a beautiful foal.  Very well put together, great manners, friendly and best of all, a gorgeous mover. Seriously, all the things I want in a cute red package. KP's plans for her were dressage, but hopefully she'll take to jumping.

Baby's first selfie

She's not weaned yet, and probably won't come home till late November/early December but it looks like I'm buying a weanling!  I'm hoping I can make it over to KP's a few times before she comes home to play and get to know her. They mostly call her the baby, and the name they gave her I don't really love, so I'm trying to come up with names. I'm thinking Cinder for her barn name but I'm not 100% yet.  I think I need to get to know her more before deciding. The one downside is that Rogue isn't registered, so she can't be registered in a breed registry.  So I have some time before I need a show name for her to be registered with USEF. I need to double check what the dam's registered name is, but I think the name I had picked out for Tia's foal will actually work as well. 

Evolution of Peebs' Poop Problem

Back when I bought Peebs I was told that he had occasional soft poop and watery discharge down his butt and hind legs. I've had a couple different vets look at him, and tried various supplements, feed, probiotics, and what not. It would kinda get better, then kinda worse and was basically a constant thing.  I learned to deal with it and so did Peebs.  He wasn't colicky, kept weight on great, and was otherwise completely fine.

We're gonna need a bigger bucket

Over the summer I had the chiropractor, TS, out to work on him a couple of times.  She's a vet, and had also offered advise on our poop problem.  She has a client in the Bay Area whose horse had the same problem and they did a full work up at Davis.  They switched the horse to a completely pelleted diet, no hay, no grazing. And that worked.  The plan for that horse was to leave him on the hay pellets for a while (not sure how long) and slowly try adding hay back in to see if he could handle it.

The second time I had TS out this summer Peebs was having a bad poop week and had actually lost some hair on his butt and hind legs.  TS read me the riot act and told me to either try the pellets or take him in to the vet school for a work up. Since taking him in for a work up sounds expensive I started him on the hay pellets.  I slowly switched him off the beet pulp he was getting to the pellets, then started adding more pellets and less hay.

Approximately 6lbs of soaked timothy pellets in a standard water bucket

We got up to 6lbs of soaked pellets and one flake of grass hay twice a day, and our poop problem stopped. It was amazing.  His butt and hind legs looked normal for probably the first time in the year and half I've owned him.  It made me sad thinking of how long I let this go on before doing something about it.  Since he was doing ok on half pellets/half hay, I left it at that and never fully put him on straight pellets.

Thank god he's an easy keeper

So Peebs is currently on the 6lbs of pellets and a flake of hay twice a day.  Once a day he gets his Horse Guard vitamin/mineral mix and Omega Horseshine. No other grain, no grass, just some cookies or carrots. The theory is that for whatever reason, his GI tract can't handle too much long stem fiber, but is ok with short stem, aka pellets. We did have a relapse a couple of weeks ago and I was pretty upset until I found out a barn mate was trying to be nice and feeding him a flake (or two) of hay at lunch when she fed her mare.  I felt like a bitch when I had to tell her not to do that, that he can't have any extra food. Knock on wood this keeps working and we can officially end our poop problem!

Stress City

The past month has been Stress City.  We had a big accreditation site visit for work and have spent every moment getting ready for it.  And of course, the week before, our internal review board said they wanted to their biannual inspection before the visit, instead of during the visit like originally planned.  So our time frame was suddenly shortened.  But both are over now and hopefully things can return to normal.

Still as cut as ever

To keep my sanity, I've mostly managed to keep riding during Stress City. Peebs, for the most part, has been good.  We've started putting the jumps up a bit to a whopping 2'3" and even a 2'6" fence.  And added in oxers.  I'm nervous about them, but Peebs don't care.  As long as I don't get handsy, and keep my hands down, he just goes with the flow and jumps from where ever I put him.

One of the easiest horses to ride through a gymnastic

We did our last show of the year at the end of September and while it was a bit of  a hot mess (apparently Peebs doesn't like waiting in the rain for his classes to go and got a bit spicy) I'm happy with how I handled it. He wanted to run, but at the same time was spooking at whatever and trying to go sideways.  We mostly trotted fences and I tried to keep my cool and not let it affect me.  Which I did, and we did improve with each round. In the past if Buddy or Phoenix pulled something like that I would have been in the fetal position crying and not able to push through and keep going.  So while we didn't have the show I wanted, it was worth it in terms of showing how far I've come as a rider. And the mental victories like that are worth more than ribbons any day.

I swear I'm not that pale in real life

There have been a couple big splurges, because we all know Stress City is best dealt with booze and retail therapy. I dropped my GPA on the concrete tack room floor a week or so before International Helmet Awareness Day, so of I made lemonade out of lemons and took advantage of the sales.  CO's and Samshields don't fit my head and the tack shop I went to didn't have any GPA's in my size and I was wary about ordering another with out trying it on first.  I liked how the Kask fit and it's pretty comfy so we went with that.  You'll have to wait for another post to see the other big purchase.