Author: Amanda C

Last week Henry got some annual vet maintenance, which meant a short vacation for him. That left me with plenty of extra time to torture dedicate to Presto!

First up was revisiting his ground driving/long lining skills. We’ve dabbled with this once before, very informally, with a couple of lunge lines on his rope halter. This time we upgraded slightly, as in this time I actually used real long lines. Still clipped to the halter though, because he’s just not quite ready yet to have them clipped on a bit. His outfit is a little goofy… he has to wear his very short little girth on the surcingle, otherwise it’s too big. And he’s also so freaking narrow and awkward that nothing stays in place, so the square pad is strapped to the surcingle, and then he’s wearing a cob size elastic breastplate to keep everything from sliding right off the back. Don’t ask questions, just go with it.

We started off with a little bit of long lining at the walk, just to remind him about the lines. He gave precisely zero shits. I moved around back to the ground driving position and flopped the lines around, tossed them up and down and over his back, and around his legs. Again, no shits given.

We stood under the covered for a few minutes while Hillary finished up with Inca, then ventured out to meander around and test the steering/brakes. A halter is obviously not ideal for steering, but he knows “whoa” so well by now that honestly he stops better from a voice command than he does from pressure on his nose. We walked around the arena, made some circles, changed directions, and walked over a pole. As long as he wanted to go where I was asking him to go, he steered great. Other times… well… not so much. If anything he is a little TOO sensitive, so once he started turning he’d basically just spiral back on himself. I had to get him used to the idea of turning for just a couple steps, or making a gradual continuous turn. For a big lanky baby, he is surprisingly agile.

We did succeed in making a few good smooth circles, and some successful passes over the pole, so we called it quits with that.

A couple days later was a jump day for Hillary and Inca, so I decided to tote Presto along to the jump field with us. The plan was to maybe lunge him for a couple minutes in the field, then have him stand there and be patient while Inca schooled and I set jumps. So far I’ve only lunged him in the ring (and when I say “lunge” with this horse, please keep in mind that I mean walk and trot for maybe 5 minutes), so I thought a little change of scenery would be nice, and he needs to learn how to put himself in park while I’m busy and/or while horses are working around him. I put his bridle on (this has been happening a lot lately and he is none too pleased with that particular development), put his rope halter on over it, clipped on a lunge line, and walked him out to field.

Once we got out there, Hillary went off to warm up and I put Presto on a circle around me. He was a little distracted worrying about where Inca went, so I asked for a lot of walk-trot transitions and changes of direction to keep him occupied. Then I realized that our little warmup gymnastic was totally something I could lunge Presto over, with a few changes. I moved a couple poles, put up some guide rails, brought the bounce in to make a little oxer, and decided to just try it and see what happened.

I’ve always bought horses that have never jumped before, so that feeling of not knowing how they’re going to do with it always makes me a little nervous. It’s like unwrapping a package and not knowing what’s inside. You just don’t really know how one will take to it, and how they will jump, until you point them at one. I mean… I know Presto’s parents, and I know he’s bred for this job, and I know his conformation gives him the ability to be correct, but STILL. As they’re going up to their first jump you’re always like “Oh god, please don’t suck at this. Please don’t jump like crap.”. I live in perpetual fear of the talentless or the knee-hanger.

Luckily Presto did not disappoint. He’s a little blase and ho-hum about it (that’s his general MO about most things) but I liked how he used his body over the little jump, and that he was tidy with his knees and smart with his feet. His natural instincts were good, he was very chill about it, and he seemed to understand the game. I was very pleased with both his aptitude and his attitude. Thank goodness!

So now we know how he moves and how he jumps, in it’s most raw, unpolished, uneducated form. I’m pretty excited about it, because I think all the raw material shows a lot of promise and ticks all the boxes. If anyone needs me I’ll just be over here impatiently waiting for him to grow up so we can polish everything up and get to the real fun stuff. Is he 4 yet?

I definitely got some really cool gifts this Christmas, including but not limited to:

as well as the usual money and gift cards. I LOVE money and gift cards, because I get to do a nice little Treat Yo Self extravaganza on someone else’s dime. Even if one of those gift cards is being hastily ordered at 7am on Christmas morning by the SO, because that is the kind of next level procrastination I’m dealing with here. That’s okay though, because I’m pretty sure the guilt of exceptional delay caused him to throw more money on the card than he otherwise would have. I will take that, please and thank you. I’ve already got a cart full of stuff at Riding Warehouse, including a year’s supply of fly spray and salt blocks, a pair of brown Samshield gloves, another pair of white Horze breeches, and the long-coveted green Motionlite coat.

My Amazon gift card is already half-used too, buying a new pair of casual shoes for work, because the ones I usually wear have a massive blowout. I have a very Homeless Chic vibe at the moment if you look at my footwear. Or maybe Horse-Poor Chic. Same thing.

From the cash I got, a large chunk of it went to the barn worker. I was going to give him a Christmas tip anyway, so it saved me a trip to the bank. He’s been working 7 days a week for months now, he’s definitely underpaid, and he always makes sure my boys are very well taken of. He deserved every bit of what I gave him. The farrier got his tip a few weeks ago when he showed up at 7am to tack a shoe back on Henry before a show. I had to hide it in his truck for him to take the money from me, but I succeeded. As far as the vets go, considering how much I’ve spent on Henry in the past 6 weeks between teeth, shots and coggins, and his annual injections, they’ve gotten plenty of my money lately (damn Henry feels AMAZING though). And Presto is getting gelded sometime in the next month, so there’s still more money coming to them.

Most of the rest of the cash is already spent too, upgrading to a new vest. I’ve been eyeballing a new one for most of the year now, and I finally used this as a good excuse to pull the trigger.

To back up a bit, up until a couple days ago I was still planning on buying the Airmesh. I already have an Airowear that I’ve been really happy with, and the Airmesh seemed like a good next step. I was kinda grumpy that it didn’t come in navy though, and I’ve never really stopped window shopping vests in the UK, since they have so many more options than we do. I found myself on Redpost looking at a helmet cover for my new Champion skull cap (you’ll hear more about that later. And the first person who asks how many helmets I have now gets punched in the throat.) and naturally I clicked over to the site’s body protector page.

I’ve looked into the Dainese brand before, because they have such a good reputation for their motorcycle safety equipment. A lot of the same technology that they’ve used in that market – especially when it comes to being comfortable, flexible, and lightweight – has been applied to their equestrian body protectors as well. Their most popular is the Balios 3, a BETA 3 approved vest that’s made from little hexagonal tiles of memory retention foam. In all of my online stalking of reviews and British forums, everyone seemed to unanimously agree that it was more comfortable, lighter, and breathable than either the Racesafe or the Airowear. To make things even more tempting, Redpost had the navy on sale. With the VAT removed, it was about half off of regular retail, which was too tempting for me to pass up. You can’t buy the Dainese in the US, so I took a bit of a leap of faith with it, but hopefully it fits and hopefully I like it! It’s definitely not like anything I’ve ever seen before.

Henry’s Christmas present was new blankets. Last week Horseloverz put the HUGs on sale, and at first I was going to order some for Presto for next year since he will definitely not fit in his current 72 by that point. But then I figured he’d probably fit in Henry’s 78’s next year, so why not give Henry’s old ones to Presto, and Henry could get nice pretty new ones! So he got a new navy sheet, blanket, and neck cover for a grand total of $130, and I’m happy because I don’t have to look at those ugly teal ones all the time now, since Presto isn’t blanketed much. Plus if he destroys those I won’t really care, since they’re already 3 years old.

As for Presto, well… he didn’t really get anything. He has everything a baby horse could possibly need, and since his current nickname is MOUTH, he’s been banned from treats for the foreseeable future. Hillary’s new horse moved into the pasture next to him though, and I can already tell that they will be great friends. As soon as Presto is gelded and Inca goes back home, they’ll probably end up being pasture mates. So there… I suppose he got a future friend for Christmas.

Hope you guys had a great holiday and maybe even got a few cool new toys, too! Tell me everything, you know I love horse stuff.

Merry Derpmas and Happy Holidays from my weirdos to yours!

Ah, the good ol’ pre-purchase exam, a thing that strikes fear into the hearts of buyers and sellers alike. I feel like I’ve been talking and/or reading a lot about PPE’s lately, with several friends horse shopping and the recent discussions on facebook that seem to have been spurred, at least in part, by an EN post that mentioned the term “American vetting”. I’ve heard the term before from friends that import, but this is the first that I’ve ever seen anyone publicly talk about it, and it’s definitely sparked a lot of conversation in my circles.

My English Unicorn Hunter is also responsible for arranging vettings and knows which vets will do a good job and understand how to put potential horses through an “American Vetting.” I vet all my potential horses as they would be vetted by a buyer in the USA; this means a full set of X-rays including back and in some cases scopes and ultrasounds. Many horses with minor issues which I am confident won’t be a problem, I have to pass on, as I know they will not be acceptable in an American vetting even for a low level job.  – Justine Dutton, The Truth about Imports

I will admit up front that I’ve really got no skin in this game. I have owned 14 horses in my life and vetted precisely one, and that one I did not buy. Granted, I bred 2 of those 14, and the highest purchase price among them (aside from my very first horse, who was 5k) was $1500. I’ve always bought low dollar projects that were meant for short term re-sale. If I was spending a lot of money on a horse or looking for something specific, or to keep for the long term, I would probably approach things differently. With my history, though, usually if I’ve found myself involved in a PPE, it’s been on the seller’s side of things. These days I don’t do the project horses anymore, and I’ll probably never have the budget to buy something that’s already going, so PPE’s aren’t something I’ve spent much time thinking about. Thus, watching all of these conversations unfold lately has been relatively fascinating.

Really there are 3 parties involved in the PPE – the buyer, the seller, and the vet. In the modern age of knee-jerk litigation, it’s in the vet’s best interest to go over a horse with a fine toothed comb, pointing out every bump, lump, and pimple. I don’t blame them at all for trying to be thorough. It’s the buyer’s job to sort through those findings and figure out what they can live with. But are most buyers’ expectations unrealistic? If they’re expecting every film to look perfect, they’re probably never going to find a horse to buy. It seems that some buyers think that any little finding means there’s something wrong with the horse, or that it automatically means the horse isn’t suitable for whatever job they had in mind. Yet horses don’t know how to read xrays, and many issues may never actually cause a problem.

The more realistic expectation is for the PPE to show you what’s there so you can determine if it’s something you can live with or not. I think of my horse, and all of my friends’ horses that have been competing for a while, consistently and with general overall soundness. Would any of them have a “clean” PPE? Probably very few, if any. I know horses running 2* with chips, or Advanced with kissing spines, or Training with a roar, or running Prelim with arthritis. Horses that, with some care, have no issues performing well in those jobs. I’ve found myself wondering – if I was the person vetting these horses, would I have bought them?

Some of it comes down to experience, of course. Knowing what you think you can manage and what you can’t. And then some of it just comes down to pure luck. Anyone who’s ever been around a horse for more than 2 seconds knows that they just love to up and die (or get hurt) for no actual reason. You could have the cleanest PPE in the world and the horse could still go out and permanently maim himself in the pasture tomorrow, while the horse with a terrible PPE could still be bopping around Prelim at age 20. I think all of us could probably think of examples.

If you listen to the folks who sell a lot of horses, they think that the PPE process and expectations have spiraled out of control. Hence the birth of the term “American vetting”. Do we have an unrealistic expectation of perfection in this country? I wouldn’t find that too hard to believe. This post from a popular and successful OTTB re-seller is very interesting to read.

Of course, it’s easy to see it from the buyer’s point of view too. If you’re laying down whatever is, to you, a large chunk of change, on a horse you intend to keep for a long time, of course you’d like to go into it with as much information and as few issues as possible. Wouldn’t we all like the unicorn with a picture perfect vetting and a lifetime guarantee? So how do you decide how intensive the PPE should be? Do you xray every joint, all 4 feet, the back, ultrasound the legs, scope, etc? Does the price point make a difference? Does the intended purpose make a difference? Some people seem to have their vetting practices down to a science. Other people, maybe those who don’t buy horses very often, often just seem wide eyed and overwhelmed by the whole thing, unable to process what the vet’s finding actually mean for their own situation.

So where do you stand on the PPE issue? Do you think it’s gotten a bit out of hand with buyer expectations? What do you look for in a PPE, and do you know what you can live with and what you can’t, or do you expect a “clean” vetting?

One of my favorite things about this time of year is Tracy’s blogger Secret Santa gift exchange. She is organized and systematic, qualities that I definitely do not have, and I really look forward to it every year. Mostly because I feel like it’s kind of fun to try to figure out good gifts for a horse person that you probably don’t know in real life, but kinda “know” via their blog. It’s a challenge and I like it. Plus buying stuff for horse people is way more interesting and easier than buying stuff for normal people, let’s be honest.

This year my gift showed up before I’d even gotten the last item for my own recipient, which left me feeling extra good at this whole adulting thing. Some of y’all are seriously on top of this. It’s admirable. Mine won’t get there until the 22nd (says USPS, if you care to believe those dreamcrushers), but hey… at least it wasn’t late?

Anyway, my own gift arrived last week and I considered waiting until Christmas for about .5 seconds, but then nah. Grem was very excited to help me open it and examine the contents – peppermint SmartCookies, a navy surcingle belt, and some lotion. All very solid gifts! Especially considering that I know I’m challenging to shop for, and I was 0% helpful when filling out my secret santa form, just putting “Surprise me!” in there. I’m the worst.

My Secret Santa was Ashlyn at Pembrokes & Ponies, which was totally fitting since she’s a fellow corgi owner. She did a great job picking out stuff for us, and we love everything. Henry has already mowed through half of the treats

and I wore the belt foxhunting last weekend!

It’s possible that Grem absconded with the lotion and I lost it under the coffee table for a few days, but it’s been recovered. For now. Who knew tubes of lotion could sub as cat toys?

Thanks Ashlyn, you nailed it!