Proud to honor those who served.

I am just a little spotted horse, nothing too special. This little spotted horse wished to thank all of those people who have served our country and protected our freedom. I am allowed to graze in peace, without worry because of your sacrifices. I don't live in fear, have to worry about gunfire or other weapons interrupting my peaceful life. I know there are horses, people, and other creatures who do not enjoy the peaceful life that I enjoy...I wish they could.

So to all of you-human, dog, horse, pigeon, and other creatures-who protected the freedom that we have thank you from the bottom of my hooves...you are heroes. To those of you serving now, may the spirit who guards us all keep you safe and bring you home soon.

Enjoy your day and don't forget to hug your DOR

Mystery at Grumpy Old Horse Ranch

My name is Splash...Cactus Jack Splash and I am a horse detective. I have been on assignment at Grumpy Old Horse Ranch. My job-help the DOR find a hay thief.
The DOR came out to feed us and discovered this....
Some critter had made a meal out of the corner of two bails of hay. Her first thought was it was the llamas stretching their long skinny necks into the hay paddock and stealing hay. I knew better, you see I am not going to share my hay with any stinky llamas. When they come into the pasture I chase them back to where they came from.
The DOR checked for llama poop and didn't find any, I could have told her that. So she looked for another answer. I followed her closely, trying to steer her in the right direction.

Here is the crime scene from a distance. You can see it would take one skinny neck to get to the hay. Not only did the perpetrator reach through the panel, they also moved the large feed tub to do so. Another reason that it wasn't the llamas. Hmmm, what to think. The only horses that have been caught moving the feed tubs are me and Harley. I was using the small ones for soccer balls, moving the big ones is just too much work. Really why would I do it when the tubs are always full of hay? So I am thinking it is Harley, now to get the DOR to come to the same conclusion.

Well here is a photo of Harley eating his hay in his feed tub. Notice how good he is at looking innocent. Yep, he even has the DOR almost buying his act. I went over and gave him a well place nip on his neck and when the DOR saw me do that she also saw this....

Yep, you guessed it paint from the panels!

Well the gig was up Pretty Boy Harley was busted. The DOR doesn't know why he decided to steal hay. We all have our own big tub of hay. I can tell her why, because Harley is a mischief maker, that is why. He does stuff and then stands around innocently while the rest of us get blamed...well his true colors (or rather the panel colors) were showing this time.

The DOR added extra tie-downs to the tarp so Harley can't work it up. She also wagged her finger at him and told him he was naughty, like that is going to do a lot of good. Nice thing is now that the DOR knows that Harley is naughty the rest of us can pull a few stunts and he will get blamed. We won't be stealing hay though because our necks are too darn fat or short.

The DOR was telling her friend how much she enjoys us. Not only are we relaxing to be around, but we always find a way to make her smile. Hmmmm, do you think she will smile if we all broke into the hay paddock and helped ourselves? Maybe we need to plan the great hay eating festival...of course we all know if we eat too much we will get sick. We will need to come up with something else to do.

Enjoy your day and don't forget to hug your DOR

Vocabulary Sunday

FARRIER
A horseshoer; one who trim's horses feet and shoes them. Used to be called a 'blacksmith'.


FEATHERS
The long hair that grows on the horse's fetlocks. This is also called 'fetlock hair'. Some breeds of horses, like Gypsy Vanner and Friesians, exhibit long, flowing feathers. The purpose of feathers is to protect the back of the fetlock, and to direct water running down the horse's legs away from the bulbs of the heel, where it could cause sores.

FEWSPOT
An Appaloosa term; refers to a horse that has very little spotting.

FLOATING
Filing down sharp or overgrown teeth. Most older horses need their teeth floated once a year, otherwise the teeth may develop sharp edges, cutting the tongue and making eating difficult.

GALLS
Sores on the horse's body that have been formed from tack that does not fit correctly.

GRADE
An unregistered horse; a horse without papers or with no documented pedigree or background. Because such horses have no proof of ownership, they are more easily stolen than papered horses. Also, their age and background is often unknown.

GRAVEL
Common term describing drainage at the coronary band of the foot; caused by infection that migrates up the hoof wall and breaks out as an abscess at the coronary band.

GROUND TRAINING
A horse with ground manners has had ground training. Ground training involves everything but riding the horse-- leading, tying, turning, grooming, bathing, trailer loading, etc. A horse should have ground training before riding begins. A horse that has not been ground trained and is not well behaved in off-riding activities should be considered green.
Enjoy your day and don't forget to hug your DOR

I have recieved two more awards, ones that I was neglectful in posting up in a timely manner-sorry.

I am passing these awards on to everyone who checks into my blog, after all if you showed up to read about me you must be a great place.

Enjoy your day and don't forget to hug your DOR

Here's mud in your eye

The photo is of a member of my support crew during one of his horsemanship lessons. His teacher is working with him on cleaning out his horses hooves. Notice it is a nice dry summer day....not so today.
Yep, it is muddy and all of our hooves are delightfully packed with pooh, pieces of hay, and mud. It was a bit like the mixture that Mike Rowe of Dirty Jobs used when they were building pooh houses-if we had time to bake the bottom of our hooves in the sun we would have had some good building material. At this point the stuff was just plain nasty, that is where the fun came in.
The DOR decided that we all needed our feet cleaned...oh goody! The thing you must know is that the first horse the DOR owned as a child loved to kick when you are in range of her hind feet and she was in "a mood." So the DOR has been dealing with a bit of hind hoof fear. I worked with her on this over the summer and she is now comfortable cleaning all of my feet, she doesn't worry at all. She is still working on not being "hind hoof shy" with the other horses in the herd. So she has been picking out the other horses front feet at liberty and their hinds when they are haltered and being held. She will do all four of mine at liberty, after all I am her teacher and she trusts me.
The DOR came out with a hoof pick and no halter, so we all knew that only front feet were being cleaned on everyone but me. She started with Harley, front feet and a good back scratch. There she stunned the pretty boy by asking for his back feet...Harley was so shocked that he just gave them to her with no problem. She cleaned his hinds getting only a bit of mud on her sleeve. Hmmmm, looks like she is going for the gusto today!
She came over to do my feet, I was going to continue being a good teacher so I didn't give her a bad time. I did however manage to have to stomp my foot in a mud puddle and splash her with mud, darn fly! She was still pleased with herself and not a bit upset about the mud.
Freedom was next and he can be a tough cookie at times. She asks for his front feet and he makes her have to work to get them. He is being a bit of a brick wall, pretending he doesn't have a clue what she wants-he also figures if he keeps refusing she will leave him alone. Well the DOR believes that brick walls exist to keep out the people who don't want something bad enough and she really wants Freedom to pick up his front feet. She stuck with it and Freedom finally cooperated. Then she went to his hinds. Woo hoo, Freedom is thinking he is going to sit on her and she will land face first in the mud. The DOR lines him up to the panel and gets between him and the panel. When he tries to sit on her he ends up landing his hip on the panel...smart DOR! She goes to the other side and doesn't even try to line him up to the panel. She picks up his hind foot and when he tries to sit on her he runs into her elbow that she has up like a chicken wing. The old guy blew a few marbles and stood like a good boy the rest of the time.
Salty was last, he had plenty of time to plot his strategy. Now remember we aren't doing this to be naughty, we are trying to make a better horseman of the DOR-all of this is for her own good. Salty did some dancing around, it was a great way to ensure that the DOR had plenty of mud all over her. She got him to stand still and then she surprised him by starting with his left hind, moving to his left front, and the proceeding to his right front. Salty's right front is his bad leg and he will act like he can't pick it up. Salty thought that he would try teaching the DOR about toe stomping, he forgot she deals with Hank the Tank and could see that one coming. He then picked the hoof up but kept it so low she just about had to stand on her head to see what she was doing. She then went to his right hind, this is the hoof that Salty is really giving the farrier a bad time about. So she asks for his foot and he refuses, she tells him she wants the foot and he says "Nope, no way." So she starts kicking his hoof with her toe, he decides that he will lift his hoof and when she reaches for it he takes a gentle swipe at her. We all suck in our breath, we figure that will be too much for her. That it will send her right back in time, back to her first horse the "kicking queen." We watched to see what she would do and we were amazed. The DOR took a deep breath, rolled her shoulders, and started humming the "horse lullaby" her grandfather had taught her. She reached to the offending hoof, picked it up and finished the job.
If we had hands we would have all clapped for her. I am so proud of her! She was smart, cautious, dealt with her fear, and went out of her comfort zone. She had mud and poop all over her and a big old grin when she was done. I often wonder if the DOR knows how hard we work to help her learn and to make sure she is pushed out of her comfort zone, yet making sure that she is successful.
I am thinking that the DOR needs to get an English saddle now. She rode English for a bit in her younger days, but got a bit of a scare when the horse she was on had a major "fall apart." She decided that a western saddle was felt more secure. Wish me luck...I am going to have to do some work on this one. Maybe if I act like the western saddle hurts my back she will give it a try.
Enjoy your day and don't forget to hug your DOR