Horse Apples

No I'm not talking about the type that you feed to horses but rather the type they leave you to clean up. Somehow I had forgotten that horses create so much manure - any kid who wants a horse should get a job mucking stalls and get to realize that riding and exercise is just a very small part of horse keeping. Most of one's time is going to be taken up with cleaning either the horse or it's environment or producing/acquiring the fodder that gets turned into those horse apples. I have also discovered just how much 2 horses can turn even well drained ground into a muddy morass which is nigh unto impossible to push a wheelbarrow through. I do not remember them leaving this many goodbyes in the run in shelter at their former home; I guess I should take that as a compliment as to how much they like what we've provided for them. Forgive me if I wish they liked it a little less - especially when I'm trying to clean out the shelter.

Speaking of horse apples and the things that get turned into them, I've started feeding Aeolae and Samwise beet pulp which they absolutely love. They probably think they're getting royally spoiled (although they probably really think it's just their due) especially since I mix their oat ration in with it, but Aeolae's been losing weight. Some of it I think is the change in environment and part of it is that they have nothing like the pasturage they did and part of is the colder weather but that doesn't mean I have to like it. It isn't bad yet but I'd rather have my horses slightly plump than slightly skinny.

Part of it probably also is the fact that they're due for worming. This time we got the good stuff - Zimecterin Gold which takes out all the usual parasites plus tapeworms. At $18 a dose I hope not to have to use it every time but for their first worming here, and maybe the next one, which will be after the first hard freeze, it seems like a good idea.

Who's There?

A few minutes ago I was sitting here surfing and there came this strange knocking on the corner of the room. The house is in 2 sections - my father-in-law has the trailer home with it's 1 real bedroom and the full bath and my husband and I converted the 2 car garage into a bedroom/studio with a connecting hallway between the parts as a place to live after fleeing IL. The propane tank is by that corner and God forbid something should be causing that kind of a noise with it, especially something serious enough to make it knock loud enough to be heard inside. Turns out it was an errant woodpecker who had mistaken the corner of the room for a tree - I only hope it was confused and not telling us there is something worth going after over there. Thank goodness we live too far north for termites.

First Snow - Argghh!!!

Well, it finally happened, far too early in my opinion, but last weekend we had the first snow of the season that stuck to the ground. It was the first snow of the season period but most years it normally comes and goes in the same day - not this year. 10 miles down the road it hardly stuck at all but here it stayed around for the better part of 3 days. Scared the bejesus out of me - I was afraid that it was really here to stay and there still is way too much to be done.

OTOH, a real blessing beamed down in the form of my father who showed up to take my father-in-law (who lives with my husband and I) to the eye doctor for an exam before his upcoming cataract surgery. Since he came all the way up here for that, (with a dozen bales of premo hay), he decided to spend the week helping me out which was desparately needed since Mark has been unable to help. We got a leaky water trough from a friend over here to use as a hay trough since I'm tired of the horses scattering their hay all over their shelter; if there's anything that drives me nuts it's wastefulness.

From the same friend we got a really nice raised chicken house with enclosed, sheltered area and a nice long run. The fact that it is off the ground should make cleaning up the chicken pooh a whole lot easier than conventionally cleaning out a chicken house - a task well remembered from my childhood and not much looked forward to now. The dust, the smell, the feathers - ugh! This way I just have to rake out from underneath it. I have yet to put a roof on it to shed snow from the run part of it and do something about blocking the wind since it is out in the open and is way too heavy to relocate; plastic sheeting should be good for that.

Personally, I think that our society uses plastic for way too many things - it may be convenient but it's a real pain to dispose of and of limited reusability. Since the bottom has fallen out of the recycling business one can't hardly give recycleables away much less get any coin for stuff. That only covers the stuff that is recyclable - not the majority of plastics one encounters on a daily basis which either gets burned or ends up in the landfill. OTOH, >3 mil plastic sheeting is one of the great things that chemistry has produced - especially for the homestead. Ok, so maybe I'm over enthusiastic but it is useful stuff especially for keeping snow off and winter winds out.

Besides getting the trough for hay, and the premo hay, the horses got a much larger paddock. It would have been almost impossible to do an effective and efficient job of running the electrical rope fencing by myself but Dad and I got an approx 400' perimeter area fenced in in one afternoon. The process would have gone faster except Samwise was trying to be sooo helpful. Never-the-less the horses seem to like their new area and I arranged for useful gates to the old logging roads into the woods and to the round training pen that i still have yet to build. Like I said, way too much to do and not nearly enough time; the last thing I need right now is snow coming and sticking around.

Doctor Burt's Res-Q Ointment - Good For What Ails Ya

Or at least what ails your skin. Normally I'm not one to plug a product but this has given me such great results that I think anybody who is around anything that can scratch, cut, puncture, bruise or otherwise assault your skin should know about it. Doctor Burt's Res-Q Ointment is a natural salve made of sweet almond oil, olive oil, beeswax, cocoa butter, wheat germ oil, tocopheryl acetate & tocopheryl (vitamin E), lavender oil, comfrey leaf and root extracts. Anybody familiar with plants and their medicinal properties will recognize the properties of many of those ingredients. I've noticed that it makes my bruises and wounds heal twice as quickly as usual and things like Neosporin can't hold a candle to it. Stings like everything for the first second or two when applied to an open wound but after that is soothing and even the oils get absorbed pretty quickly; I'm one of those people who doesn't like a greasy feeling on my skin. Did I mention it does a great job on bug bites too? Beats Calamine lotion all to blazes both in how fast it takes effect and the fact that I normally don't have to reapply it.

What really wowed me though is the effect it's had on Samwise's scars. Because he was so badly burned on his face he doesn't have much hair there and he's been doing something lately that has made the halter he constantly wears rub at certain points; who knows what he's been up to when we're not looking. (I don't need kids, I've got critters. lo)l The other day I didn't like the look of one of those spots and had Res-Q Ointment in my purse so I thought 'why not?' I know it's worked well on cats that had a really bad allergic reaction to a type of flea collar and couldn't see any reason why it would cause Sam a problem. I also applied it to an old scar of his from the burning that doesn't seem to want to heal and I have been amazed at the reaction. The rubbing spot has scabbed over and is well on it's way to healing and the scar has quit weeping, lost it's scabbiness and the skin around it has a nice healing pink color to it. He's reacting even faster than I do and when I applied it on the second day he didn't seem to mind. The only problem I'm having is that he keeps trying to eat the tin out of my hand. LOL

Good Horse

Aeolae was a most excellent horse today. She actually let me put the rope halter on her with a minimum of fuss - didn't have to catch her or anything. She wasn't thrilled about it and by the end of the session was really trying to ditch it (didn't help that it was a little large for her Arabian head) but for being as high strung, normally stand offish and untutored in manners as she is, she was great. She likes to play hard to get and for the last few days I've been trying to get Aeolae jealous of the attention I've been showing Samwise; basically trying to give her the idea that wearing a halter and allowing herself to be led around/worked with means getting more attention. Not that I've been ignoring her - we've been playing the friendly game with the lead rope and halter so that she doesn't think they're evil and I've been giving her scratches just to keep her interested. Not that I can blame her for not liking halters since one was left on her long enough to cause scars. I am sorry that they are so attention starved that this works so well but I'll take any edge I can get at this point.

Mark took Sam and I took Aeolae today and she really worked well with me which is really cool as she does prefer men. We didn't do much except with walk with them, teaching them to give us appropriate space, not run through us (which Aeolae is really bad about), back up, turn and other apparently basic things which look easy until you try to get a 1000 lb critter with an attitude and a communication problem to do them. Separating them has been something that has been concerning us, especially when we thought we were only getting Aeolae, but we were able to get them as much as 100 yds apart today without them getting too edgy. It was neat to see their joy though when we did cross paths again.

The one exciting and not so pleasant thing was Aeolae getting spooked when I tried to lead her past our 2 yo over exuberant husky that we had tied outside the pasture. All Daphne wants to do is PLAY but all the horses see is PREDATOR!!! sigh. Anyway, Aeolae pulled the rope out of my hands . . . I'm just glad she didn't run over me when she bolted. I'm also very glad that I was using the type of lead rope used for natural horsemanship and wasn't holding it in a loop as I have a bad habit of doing. I've got a little bit of rope burn but nothing like I would if I had been using a lead rope one can find in any old feed store. She didn't go far though and she came back towards Mark and I, just within Mark's reach, trembling all over like she was going to be punished; needless to say she wasn't other than some stern words. It's amazing to me that in less than 2 weeks, working with them no more than an hour and a half a day, we've gotten their trust and they are following commands so well. All in all, a really great training day.

So The 'Barn' Isn't As Sound As I Thought

The best laid plans of mice and men . . . often have leaks in them. Ok, so that's not how the saying goes but it fits the situation and stays within the spirit.

When we moved up here in 2002 we were fleeing like refugees (read the story here) and were able to get not only enough land to insulate ourselves with (55+ acres) but a house we didn't have to build and a storage building that was obviously once used as a 2 room house which, now that it's acquiring livestock and asssorted acoutraments, I'm dubbing the 'barn'. On one end of that building is a very nice large shelter that looks like it could have been made for keeping livestock; that's going to be Aeolae and Samwise's run-in shelter. What's really nice is that there is a door from it into the 'barn' which will make it easy to keep feed, tack etc. nearby but out of their reach. The plan is for it to also hold as much hay as possible but right now it's stuffed with stuff which has to get condensed and hopefully a lot of it moved into the loft which I still need to build. Fortunately that's nothing more than putting boards on the rafters but the braces come down at wierd angles. Arrgghh.

God knows how old the building is but at least it's still sound with a good floor. That is except for about 5 leaks in the roof that I've found so far which is kind of depressing. That's not counting Aeolae's and Samwise's shelter which we didn't really pay much attention to before; there's only 1 really troublesome leak there though. There's still some old tar paper rolls around here that we repaired the roof with a few years ago but they don't seem to have held up real well since there's leaks now in some of the old spots. It's a miracle things have held up as well as they have though with the winters we have and how much the building has been ignored.

Now to figure out what to do about those leaks since enough boxes of stuff have been ruined already in the 'barn' by being leaked upon. Having stuff in the loft will keep the hay dry but is hardly satisfactory. Having it re-roofed is out of the question this late in the season and dealing with the set up expenses of the horses. If we had 6 mo it would be do-able but I doubt God will see fit to cancel winter this year. If any of the tar paper is still good and if my dad can come up (Mark and I don't do heights) we'll probably do that again to get us through this winter; if not . . . well, improvise, adapt and overcome. Thank goodness for rolls of heavy plastic we picked up for some reason years ago and various tarps. Believe me, when you're moving in a panic, tarps are your friend since they do something to keep the elements off your stuff. We probably have enough large ones to cover the roof and have friends to help get them up there but the process is liable to be interesting and I have no idea how well the plastic/tarps will hold up although the snow will probably slide off quite marvelously. If it's too much of a hassle we could just put the hay outside on pallets and under tarps, a fairly common practice around here, but I'd really like it to have more protection and to not have 300 bales of hay cluttering up my yard. The work involved in clearing the 'barn' though is daunting especially in a time crunch - the sooner we can get the horses moved the better. Too much to do and not enough time.

They've Multiplied!

No, Aeolae wasn't pregnant but now it looks like not 1 but 2 horses will be moving in within the next few weeks. A little more than a week and a half ago the idea of having a horse around here was nothing more than a pipe dream we took down occasionally, dusted off and re-realized that it wasn't going to happen anytime soon. My, how life can change quickly.

Aeolae's companion, who was known as Blaze (we're changing his name), originally was going to go home with a friend of my friend but unfortunately life has dealt her a bad hand and she can't take him anymore and my friend's husband is afraid of her acquiring too many critters to look after. She's got fibromyalgia like me and although sometimes those who care about us irritate us by trying to take care of us, which sometimes comes across as interfering and a lack of faith in our abilities or knowledge of ourselves, we had to agree today that we do appreciate our menfolk trying to take care of us and not let our expectations of ourselves as superwomen get out of hand. She's got 2 llamas, a horse and lots of Angora and other long haired bunnies, whose fur she spins aqnd weaves, so she might be close to hitting critical mass in what she can take on while working 2 jobs, training 2 horses andtheir people and pursuing her multitude of hobbies. Those of us with fibro, and probably people with other chronic pain/fatigue conditions, have to keep busy though otherwise we really feel the pain and tiredness and it truly runs us into the ground. In fact, the worst time for me is at night when I stop doing stuff and try to go to bed and really ache. One can only take so many pain meds. But I digress.

Back to Blaze or rather Samwise as we're going to call him. My friend asked me yesterday whether we would be interested in taking him. It would make life easier in many ways - the 2 horses are herd bound and it was going to be time consuming and difficult to get them separated without them grieving for each other which would cause problems; fall is soon to be upon us (if it's not already here) with winter hard on it's heels this year. Also there's the fact that where they are now is not exactly on the way to anywhere for either my friend or Mark and I and both of us are burning a bit of gas going out there; moving them within the next couple of weeks would save on gas and make training easier. Means I have to get my butt moving though to get their accomadations ready especially as they'll be ready to move much sooner than Aeolae by herself would be. Way too much to do; I could really use the rain to hold off.

Samwise (pictured above) is a Quarterhorse cross gelding approx. 15.2 hh (~62" at the shoulder). He's a chestnut roan (white hairs mixed in a reddish brown coat) with a white blaze and stockings. Although Blaze is a good descriptive name for him, he needs a new name since he bears several scars and almost no hair on his face from the trauma he suffered at the home he and Aeolae were rescued from; the one before where we're getting them from. Aeolae has white lines on her face, scars where the straps of her halter were way too tight, and we are told that the scarring on Samwise comes from the family's disturbed child soaking a rag on a stick in gasoline, lighting it and pushing it into his face. I suppose we could call him Socks or Buddy for his other prominent markings or personality since he is so friendly, but something more dignified seems in order.

Buddy made me think of friend and the phrase "speak friend and enter" from the inscription on the west gate of the Mines of Moria in the Lord of the Rings jumped into my head. Mellon is the elvish word for friend which sounds kind of cool if you put the accent on the first syllable but I know that too often he'd get referred to affectionately as a melon-head or something similar which kind of shoots the dignity objective. Anyway, Samwise in LOTR is a very homespun character who has great heart, loyalty beyond measure, and no small number of smarts; not a bad description of this horse. I've probably really over thought this but names are important.

It didn't hurt Samwise's chances of us taking him any either that he is a bit more bidable and less willful than Aeolae at this point which, although he definately needs training, means he just might be useful this fall in helping around here. The fact that he is a larger horse than Aeolae and prefers women to men also means he'll make a better mount for me as I am not what one would call petite and frankly I was getting a little jealous of the attention Aeolae was lavishing upon Mark while I'm putting in at least as much work as he is working with her and getting her home ready. In any case, I couldn't see Samwise facing the same fate Aeolae was of getting put down because another home couldn't be found. I don't see him as being that much more work but this is going to be something of an adventure and a bit more of a strain on the budget than we planned on. It's all a matter of what's important though; hay vs going out - is there really any question?