Amigo, and Kahlua's Adoption

Yesterday, I had the immense pleasure of working with Amigo, our one and only "child-safe" rescue horse. I'd heard nice things about him, but frankly had not been all that convinced about his manners due to the ugly ugly faces he makes at mares and how pushy he can get during feeding. In spite of the fact that Kahlua won't walk by his pen if he's anywhere near the fence line, the barn manager suggested that we use him as the babysitter for her first trail ride.

Kahlua's adoption is almost finalized, and her new mother, Cassandra, has been meeting with me every day for the past week. The barn manager recommended that I evaluate her riding (part of adoption policy for rideable horses) and after that first session, Cassandra decided that she wanted a few "lessons" with me before finalizing the adoption. Normally, I would have said no way! I'm not a trainer and I don't pretend to know enough to be one! Still, Kahlua isn't a normal horse and I have been able to make some huge strides with her thanks to having trained a similar horse of my own before, and I feel good sharing what works and what doesn't with her new owner. Monday night we had a great break through with Cassandra getting Kahlua to bend both directions and pick up the correct lead on a circle, and I'm thrilled that they are getting along so well!

Anyhow, Cassandra would like to, eventually, take Kahlua on some trail rides. Kahlua gets very nervous outside the arena. So this is where Amigo comes in.

As Cassandra warmed up Kahlua in the arena, I pulled Amigo out of his pen and went to tack up. He was so excited to get out, and very vocal about it! We have a no-tie policy, so we don't have a hitching rail. Amigo is thus tied to the fence (NOT the gate) in the below picture because he actually does know how to stand tied! Hoorah!

He loved getting brushed off, picked up his feet easily and held them up with no weight in my hands. He got excited and knocked over a trash can that I thought was out of reach, but did not spook at all! He stood quietly while I put the saddle etc on, and lowered his head to take the bit. Somewhere in his past life someone took a lot of time with this horse!

Under saddle, he was a total winner! He stood at the mounting block and waited there until I cued him forward, and went into a nice Western frame before I'd even touched the reins! In a 4H or local open show, I'm confident that Amigo would win any pleasure class you put him in, with just about any intermediate rider! Cutest jog I've ever seen! On the trail (well, in the hayfield) he walked right next to Kahlua and stayed calm even as she started to get antsy. I "lost" a stirrup and shifted my weight funny a few times and he instantly shifted his own body to get me back in the correct position :-) Total babysitter, but also capable of more advanced work if you ask for it!

Everyone, we need to get this boy adopted! Details here on most of our adoptable horses (I must admit, it's a random selection... clearly the website needs to be updated more often!).

Mustangs as of Tuesday, Mr. Mewton

Kitty enjoying some cuddle time

One week after arriving, the babies check out the board president as she cleans out their hay trough. If they look skinnier, it's because their worm bellies have gone down and they're starting to lose some of that fuzz, not because they're losing weight! Looking at their legs and backs, you can see the beginnings of putting weight on. The little white-faced colt is standing more comfortably and even showed off a tiny maybe buck when one of the dogs walked by! He's getting brave, too- I was chatting, leaning against the fence, and he came and sniffed my arm a few times, even mouthing it once!

The bay colt is still too shy to let anyone touch him and is very aware of his space. Where the white-faced guy will lightly rub against into people in his pen, the bay has his eye on you at all times. His skin is in worse shape, too, as you can see here from where he's rubbed the hair off the side of his face. They both are in desperate need of a medicated shampoo bath, but the vet's orders are to wait to handle them at all until they're put a bit more weight on. As they shed, it's getting clearer just how skeletal and weak they really are!

Vet also re-evaluated ages: The White-faced colt is 3-4 months old, and the bay is 9-12 months old. That's more the ages we were expecting, and it feels like we've been given back those many months before they "should" be able to do basic things. Not that we're expecting them to know the things a domestic handled-from-birth foal might be able to do at their ages, but by the time they're 2 we can have them handled enough to do the basics.

The Horses: An Introduction

Yesterday I got to thinking, why don't I have more pictures of the horses? Well, aside from the fact that a wonderful photographer donates her services and we have lots of pictures around, I always have my hands full while I'm there! So after running to town to pick up a couple things, I came back and took some photos. I'd like to do a post on each horse, but here's a quick intro for all the horses currently up for adoption!

Sadie is a small gaited mare in her teens who's been here about a month. She had a few years off of work, but she's sound and we evaluated her under saddle on Sunday. I don't know much about her history except that she stopped being ridden after backing her way home on a trail ride. She tried to back into the gate multiple times during her test ride, but our wonderful young rider kept with her and eventually had her going on the rail at a variety of gaits...

This is Hope. She's been up front for three days now and seems very sweet, but a bit shy. This is not the best picture, but you can still see how underweight she is even after several weeks of proper feeding. I think she's been here about a month as well, but spent longer in quarintine thanks to some skin parasites. I don't know how old she is, I think late teens.

Meet Kahlua, the awesome paint mare is who I've been working with lately! She has a club foot but stays sound with proper shoeing and is learning to work calmly at the walk and trot in the arena. Some of the other riders think she's squirrely, but I think she's a smart little mare who will give you the run-around if she thinks she can get away with it! She'll be a fine trail horse for a calm, confident rider. She's only 7 or 8 and hasn'd been working under saddle very long.

This cute fellow is Badger. He and his penmate, Billy, are both very late 20s and have been living together for at least a decade. They came in together with a couple other horses who had been starved more than once on dude strings and are not up for adoption due to their repeated bad luck. They get used a lot for group demos like massage and basic horse health because they're calm and love having lots of people paying attention to them!

Princess is the fattest mini on the face of the planet. See my previous post on her if you're curious as to why...

Mattie is a nearly 3 year old registered Quarter Horse mare who was bought from the kill buyer at the last possible moment by a kindhearted woman who was there picking up a mule she'd bought at the auction. Mattie had strangles and was severely underweight, and this mule had apparently been standing over her and refused to leave without her! We initially thought she was a yearling, she was so tiny! After her long stay in quarintine, she's put on tons of weight and grown several inches! We're still learning a lot about her past...

Winston is a five year old, 17+ hand Quarter Horse gelding who has injuries in all four legs from a jumpping carrier that began at 3, way way way too early!

Romeo got his name from that heart-shaped spot on his shoulder. He's an Arab in his early 20s, mostly sound, likes going on the trail.

Winston and Romeo think they're so studly!

Bella has had pretty much every neurological disease possible, and thus has permanent nerve damage to her back legs. Lots of dedicated people have worked to get her sound and happy, and last month she was even able to hold up her own back feet for the farrier!

Honey's a black Thoroughbred mare with a long history of bad homes. Her hing legs are covered in scars and she came to use with abcesses in three of her hooves. I think she's been her over 6 months, and she's a different horse now that she can move around comfortably! She was such a great sport getting her feet soaked those first few weeks, it was hard to believe a horse that wary of people was letting us mess with her so much! I think both Bella and Honey are late teens.

Oh, Bailey! 42 years old, mostly blind, mostly deaf, completely spunky! She's SUCH a love!

I've talked about Isis before. She's 8, has terrible ringbone, and was beat nearly to death by a kill buyer. After a few years here, though, I'd say she's looking pretty damn good!

Codi was a barrel racer back in her prime, and at 33 she's still got plenty of spunk! She has cushings but is otherwise in pretty great shape for the shape that she's in! This is a terrible picture of her being disspointed that I wasn't bringing her anything delicious, but she has the cutest face and it always so excited to see people, she's one of my favorites!

The little hackney pony in the foreground is Jack, and Storm is the Morgan in the pen behind. Jack came in this fall with a big Saddlebred gelding, both nearly skeletal. His eyes were bugging out of his head and he cowered in the back of his shelter for weeks, but an equine eye specialist, dental care, and haycube/ beet pulp/ Triple Crown senior soup three times a day made all the difference in the world! He's very skittish about people, but we hear he was quite the looker as a parade horse in his prime! He's 26 years old.

Storm belonged to an older gentleman who owned him for all 20 years of his life. They went trail riding every single day, and we did our best to help him keep Storm but in the end we couldn't help him out enough to keep up with the rising cost of hay. He's a total love, and I do hope his old owner will make the difficult trip out here to visit him sooner or later!

Finally, we have Amigo. Aside from being a butthead around mares, this 18 year old quarter horse is a total champ! He had a long carrier as a reining horse before being used in lesson programs for begginer riders. He's sound, reliable on the trail, and takes care of his rider. I would love to see him go home with a little boy who will love the snot out of him! I mean, this is the sort of fallen-through-the-cracks wonderful horse that people wish they could find at a rescue! Now that he's in good weight, there's no reason for him to still be here!

The Nebraska Babies

I went over this morning to check out the weanlings, or as it turns out, yearlings that we took from the Nebraska mustang disaster.
(See also here).

They're surprisingly curious about people, and I think they both have sweet eyes.

They're clearly enjoying the perks of life at HPL: All-you-can-eat grass hay and a clean trough of water!

Isis, an introduction.

I volunteer as a feeder at the horse rescue across the street from us. I started last winter, since the highway out here sometimes closes in the early mornings when it snows, and the horses get fed at 7am. It takes about 3 hours, in winter, to slog the golf cart full of hay around to all the pens, mix feed, and slog the now bucket-laden cart back around, then rinse the buckets in freezing hose water, and prepared the soaked feeds and throw new bales into the cart for the night feeders. It's hard work, but it's so peaceful. I love it.
Last Thursday I called the barn manager and asked if I could help out in any way with groundwork. I don't really care to ride, but I do miss the interaction and a lot of the horses at the rescue could use some more mental stimulation. Turns out, she started a 'handlers' program last Sunday and I had missed the e-mail! Two of the more challenging horses, however, were not being used because none of the volunteers were experienced enough for everyone to feel comfortable about it. So Saturday I met with Emmie and we started talking about Isis. I don't have time to give her story now, but I will write it up later. Suffice it to say, she's a 7 year old mare who's pushy and occasionally bites, and she would be having a wonderful riding career right now if people didn't suck so hard.
So, I spent a couple hours with Isis, working through some personal space/ boundary issues and giving her a good grooming. She's such a love, all she wants is to be in your lap. But she does get bored easily, and she expresses this boredom by pacing, pawing, biting, and physically knocking her handler around. I'm looking forward to having a horse to play with on a regular basis, and I really think some tough love will go a long ways towards getting Isis into more amiable behavior patterns and thus upping her chances of being adopted.

I intend to write about how much I loathe PETA later, so stay tuned!