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Warning: if you don’t want to hear me talk about how wonderful my baby horse is, you should back away now.

Still here? Ok good, let me tell you about Presto’s weekend.

Hillary and I made a plan last week to take Presto and Dobby to Garey Park. Neither of us had been there yet but I knew the trails were mostly pea gravel and there was river access and it wasn’t super far away, so it seemed like a good first adventure for Presto. I hadn’t ridden him since last weekend, and my intention was to ride him on Saturday before we went trail riding on Sunday, but I pulled him out on Saturday and he just looked… so gross. He always grows a thicker summer coat, and he was super sweaty and just looked kind of miserable all around. So I aborted the riding plan and grabbed my clippers instead. 

I was not at all prepared for a body clip and didn’t have an extra hour to bathe him and wait for him to dry, so it was… not my best work. I had a semi-dull blade on my Lister’s and a semi-dull blade on my Andis. His coat was so icky that the Andis wouldn’t even cut into it, I had to start swiping with the Listers and then come behind with the Andis. I did him in chunks in case my blades went completely caput, but managed to get 90% of him before they gave up the ghost. Look closely and you can see a still-hairy belly. And I didn’t clip his head. But whatever, he’s definitely much cooler and happier with less hair. I was not his favorite person by the time we were done, but he was pretty patient overall.

I had the brief thought on Saturday night that maybe I was a total idiot for wanting to go trail ride a 3yo who has only 12 rides, hadn’t been ridden in a week, and hadn’t been on a trailer in like 8 months. But… meh. I was pretty confident that he would be fine.

On Sunday I got to the barn, loaded all my stuff in the trailer, and grabbed Presto out of his pasture. He has always been easy to load (he’s been trailering since he was 2 days old, so that’s fair) but he hasn’t left the farm since we moved over here, and I wasn’t sure how he’d feel about being pulled away from his two Pasture Lyfe BFF’s and loaded up alone. But he walked right in the trailer, I went around and shut the ramp, and he was already eating from his hay net before we even got out of the driveway. No neighing, and didn’t seem concerned. Even Henry screams when I haul him out alone, and he takes a good 10-20 minutes to relax enough to eat his hay. The 3yo is showing him up.

We drove 40 minutes to Hillary’s barn to pick up her and Dobby. It was a quick stop – she tossed her tack in, dropped the ramp, loaded Dobby up (Presto’s reaction? “OH HEY FRIEND, WELCOME TO MY TRAILER!!!!”), and off we went. 

We got to the park, unloaded the boys, and tacked them up. Presto was looking around in a interested way, but not nervous. He’d take a bite from his hay net, survey the parking area, and then repeat. No dancing around and no screaming.

There was a little arena near the parking area, so we decided to get on in there and make sure the boys seemed to have their brains in. I had stashed a lunge line in the trailer just in case, but Presto seemed pretty quiet so I decided to just go ahead and mount up. We walked around the arena (as a girl chased her horse around the adjacent round pen while cracking a lunge whip VERY LOUDLY) but they both seemed okay, so we headed out.

He was definitely a little looky at everything at first. No actual spooking (like Henry’s favorite teleport maneuver), but he was checking out every rock, bush, cactus, etc. This was his first real trail ride… I’ve hacked him outside of the arena a couple times at home through our fields, but this was obviously very different in a lot of ways. I was happy to let him go slow and look at his surroundings, as long as he kept going forward, which he did. In the beginning he was very much just following along with whatever Dobby did. Presto was brave enough to want to walk just slightly ahead of him, but definitely kept a solid eye on Dobby and what he was doing.

Our main objective was to ride down to the river, and on our way we got a nice variety of things thrown at us, including hikers, dogs, a stream crossing, a low water crossing, and other horses. And hills… lots of little semi-steep but fairly short hills. That’s EXACTLY what I want, to help him learn how to manage his feet and his balance, so I just stayed out of his way and let him pick his way up and down. Dobby wasn’t too sure about the low water bridge (in his defense it was spooky AF), which made Presto a little unsure, but we gave them time to figure it out and they crossed within a couple minutes. At the stream Presto decided that the only clear solution was to LEAP over it (and just about face first into a tree) so we took our time there again, going back and forth and moving forward one step a time so he could calmly figure it out and cross it more confidently. I was glad that he did what I asked and got across, but I wanted him to not just blindly leap over it like a banshee. We had the luxury of time, so we spent a few minutes letting him figure out the question. 

When we emerged down on the river bank there were people sunbathing, swimming, and having picnics. It was visually kind of a lot – the big wide open river, people, screaming and running kids, strollers, etc. We stopped a little ways away and again just let them look and assess everything before asking them to move on. We slowly made our way down the bank and into the river.

Where we were at was nice and shallow, so you could ride quite a ways down the river itself. We stood for a while and let the water run past their feet before we started moving, walking about 100 yards down the river. I have to be honest, the thing I was worried about most with this trip was Presto trying to lay down with me in the river. He got a drink, and he splashed a tiny bit, but mostly was just content to stand there and observe his surroundings.

By the time we came out of the river it was getting pretty hot and we’d been riding long enough, so we just headed straight back the way we came. It gave us the chance to do a couple more repeats over the stream, and it was much better. Neither of them hesitated at the low water crossing this time either, and by this point Presto was no longer looking carefully at all the bushes. I could tell he was definitely starting to feel tired… while we stuck completely to walking, this was still definitely more work for him than he’s done so far, especially with the terrain. He was content to take a solid lead on the way back though, not worrying about relying on Dobby to hold his hand. I put him on the buckle and let him walk along however he wanted.

Once we got back to the trailers we hosed the boys off, gave them some water, and loaded back up to make the drive back to Hillary’s barn. This was the second thing I’d been worried about – what would Presto do when we took Dobby off the trailer and he had to continue his journey alone? As we pulled out of her barn he looked around the trailer a bit, seemingly confused about where the heck Dobby had gone, but he didn’t get upset. He went back to alternating between munching his hay and propping his butt against the ramp to nap. I was really really proud of him for that, because Henry for sure would have been an idiot. Presto showed a lot of maturity for a 3yo. 

He unloaded quietly at home and I took him straight back out to his pasture, shoving like 6 cookies in his mouth. I was pretty confident that he was ready for a day like that, but still he really blew me away and exceeded every expectation. I was so proud of the intelligence he showed all day. He never once came anywhere remotely close to a meltdown, and I threw a lot at him in one day. I mean, I thought he’d handle it fine, but you never really know for sure until you try. Gold star for the little boy, he really put on his big boy pants.

He did chip up his feet a little bit though, so I think I’m going to buy Presto his own pair of hoof boots for trail riding. While he’s got good feet, there’s no getting around the fact that it’s really freaking rocky in this part of the world, so it seems like a worthwhile investment if we’re gonna keep going on trail rides while he’s barefoot.

Many thanks to Hillary for being willing to come along on this adventure and helping Presto with his first trail ride, and of course for helping document it with pictures. Hope everyone else had a good weekend too!

What’s better than pics of baby horses? VIDEOS OF BABY HORSES. But, ya know, uploading like an hours worth of baby horse clips might be a bit much to wade through, so I’ve taken some highlights and turned them into quick and easy GIFs. Think of them like little boosters of happiness – a whole lot of cuteness packed into a short little snippet.

These GIFs cover a wide range of time, all the way back to when Remi was just a couple days old. I tried to give each kiddo as much equal representation as possible, although Ellie maybe got shorted a bit, mostly because she’s the youngest and there just isn’t as much video of her. There also might be a slightly higher proportion of Ollie video to choose from because, well… he’s the class clown.

But I tried to at least give them equal representation as much as possible, and give them all a chance to show themselves off the way I think they’d like to. For instance, they all thought it was really really important to show you their zoomies. Zoomies R Lyfe.

We also have some very high quality bouncing going on. Expert bouncers, this lot, particularly Oakley and Remi.

 

Some of them also wanted to show off how Capital-F Fancy they are.

There are a also a few special hidden talents to be found among the group.

But the babies also thought it was important for you to know that, despite all the highly impressive, expert zoomies and bouncing, they’re still good citizens.

Hopefully they’ve provided you with some entertainment to start your weekend, and they know that now you’re super impressed by them. Especially their bouncing. Sooo top-notch. Like… Olympic level basically (nobody tell them bouncing isn’t an Olympic sport).

Next week hopefully I’ll have a “Where are they now?” edition ready to go by Friday. I know lots of people are interested in catching up with some of the past WTW foals in their current homes (myself included).

Happy weekend everyone!

Ok, I’m not creative enough at the moment to write an ACTUAL proper lyrical ode for Quinnie, but she really deserves one.

First she spent most of the winter being Henry’s emotional support animal extraordinaire. She’s the only horse he’s truly gotten along with in years, and the first horse I’ve ever seen him genuinely LIKE. Usually his opinion on other horses lies somewhere between outright disdain and casual indifference.

When the rest of the horses came back from Florida, the living/turnout situations shifted a little bit and Quinnie went to live out in the front pasture again with the two babies. I was a little worried that Henry might get his soul crushed, but they share a fenceline and I have caught them over there still grooming each other over the fence, so… they seem ok with the arrangement.

Now her title has shifted from Emotional Support Animal to Head Nun at the Reform School. The cool thing about Quinnie is that she’s just so damn smart. She’s older, she’s been around the block several times, she knows what she’s supposed to do, when, and how. She likes law and order on her farm, and she insists that those in her care adhere to the rules as well. So not only is she a good girl, she makes the other horses be good too. Which, as you can imagine, is especially important with Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum(b).

Quinnie has no tolerance for bullshit and poor behavior. Presto and JB are like the two kids on skateboards outside of a punk concert sporting fauxhawks from Supercuts and Anarchy t-shirts. Put them both together without any “adult supervision” and it’s just mass chaos and destruction and naughty ideas. It’s not a matter of if they’ll find trouble, it’s a matter of when and how much.

Within a week she had provided structure at feeding time. Each of them has their own private space in the shed where they can walk it and eat, but you know what that’s like with JB and Presto alone? Annoying. SUPER ANNOYING. They don’t go where they’re supposed to and they definitely don’t STAY where they’re supposed to. They had to be wrangled and supervised.

Under Quinnie’s rule they now all walk up, file into their appropriate spaces, and wait for their food. They stay in their own space and eat their own food until meal time is over, at which point they file back out. There is no stupidity and there is no carnage.

Well, except for the carnage she doles out herself when someone gets out of line. Presto is wearing his list of transgressions.

Before you feel too sorry for him, they’re all his own fault. He loves to push the limits and doesn’t know when to quit. Quinnie gives many warnings before she actually doles out any punishment, but Presto just doesn’t know how to take a hint. Sometimes he chooses to learn the hard way.

Having her back in the fray has really changed the dynamic in the babies in a much more mature direction. I mean, don’t get me wrong, there’s still yeehaw gallop laps and games of bitey face and she can’t be EVERYWHERE at once, but the shift is undeniable. When it’s just JB and Presto, Presto is the top dog, and that’s just never good. Now he’s solidly, undeniably, unequivocally occupying the second place position, which is a few lightyears below Quinnie’s #1 spot, right where he belongs.

Thank you Quinnie. Clearly you are the glue that keeps my two idiots’ brains together, just in very different roles. You deserve a raise, a bonus, and a paid vacation. And this is why I give her cookies every time I go out to her pasture… at this point I’m forever in her debt.

Finding time to ride two horses during the week right now just isn’t happening, so pretty much all of my Presto time is relegated to the weekend. Which is fine, he doesn’t need to do much anyway besides eat and fill out. And good news, so far his cheaper stop-gap corner feeder solution has been working just fine. It’s high enough to where he can’t get his feet in it (yet), and it’s bolted down really well so he hasn’t been able to tear it off the wall (yet). I mean, I don’t trust him long term, because… Presto. But it’s working for now and he’s actually getting all of his food, so we’ll call it a success.

Since I spent a lot of time on Saturday setting up my new jump course, I saved Presto’s ride for Sunday. I did get him out very quickly to try my two new bits on him just on the lunge line to see what his reaction was. For those who don’t remember, he’s shown some classic signs of disliking tongue pressure (chomping, trying to get his tongue over the bit, etc) so I wanted to see if a tongue-relief bit made him happier. He didn’t seem to care for the Bomber right off the bat, but the Trust looked more promising, so I put that one on his bridle for the next day.

On Sunday I got him out, tacked him up, and got on in the arena for his official ride #12. We walked around there for a few minutes and he seemed pretty settled in his mouth. I was feeling encouraged. We walked out to the grass arena and walked over some poles, and practiced steering, I let him look at the new jumps – he wasn’t impressed. During this time he chomped on the bit a little, and leaned on it it a little, but he seemed to want to go down to it, which I thought was an encouraging sign.

And then we trotted, and it kind of all went downhill from there. The more we did, the fussier he got about any kind of remote hint of contact, even steering. By the time we cantered he completely flipped me the bird and just about planted his poll into my nose. Message received. He made it abundantly clear that this was not the bit for him and it wasn’t going to get any better, so I went back to walk, ended on a good note with some wee baby leg yields, and aborted the mission. Although he was a little chompy and fussy in the Myler, he was nowhere near THAT. So, baby horse has spoken. Back to the Myler (the loose ring comfort snaffle) we go. That’s been his favorite so far.

Even though the bit situation was relatively tragic, there was still some positive. He walked and trotted over the poles out in the field like they were no big deal. His trot rhythm continues to improve. He was brave among all the new stuff out there, which is more than I can say for Henry who had snorted and spooked his way around the field earlier. And to Presto’s credit, even as he got more wound up he never quit going forward or actively tried to plant me into the ground. I appreciate that, because he definitely could if he tried.

It’s almost time for their 6-month vaccinations so I will have the vet check his mouth again just to make sure nothing has changed since the last check. Given the variety of bits we’ve tried and how he has reacted to bitting for… well… his entire life… I think he’s a naturally sensitive, fussy-mouthed horse that just doesn’t quite get it yet. Still, I want to be totally sure there’s nothing in there that needs attention. At this age his mouth is still changing a lot, and changing fast. I want to be sure he is as comfortable as possible.

I’m going to try to make time on one weekday per week to lunge him for a few minutes in the balancing reins, just to let him continue to figure this out on his own a little bit. They’ve been really helpful to him so far, and now that I’ve answered the “is tongue pressure bothering him?” question (nope) I can go back to that with more confidence and consistency. We’ve got all the time in the world, so if he needs to figure it out on his own and at his own pace, we can totally do that. He’s good at telling me what he needs, so I just need to listen.

I’m still trying to figure out exactly when his first trail ride experience will be, haven’t firmed up the plan yet, but SOON. I’m itching to get out with him and see what he thinks of the big wide world. He’s still really fun, even when sometimes he isn’t.

God, what a time to be alive guys. 2020 has been a flurry of emotions to the point where I don’t really even know how to accurately identify what I’m feeling anymore. The past week especially has weighed heavily, and it can’t help but feel like things are coming to a head. I haven’t said much because, quite frankly, I simply don’t feel that I can do the topic any justice.

But I have been reading, and watching, and paying close attention. This is an important moment in history for all of us. What we do right now, every single one of us… it matters.

While I still don’t think that I can do the topic any justice whatsoever, I have enjoyed reading what everyone else has to say, both inside and outside of the equestrian realm. A few bloggers have tackled the issue well, and I particularly enjoyed Nadia’s perspective. The Chronicle published an column on white privilege, which I thought had some good thinking points. Eventing Nation made a light mention yesterday of the existing racial divide by linking to a piece published by Heels Down back in April. But what really got to me was reading the facebook comments to these articles, particularly the COTH one… it was enough to make me want to walk away from social media for a while, to be honest. It proved just how deep the problem really goes, and just how alive and well racism really is even in the horse world. It’s ugly when you peel back the curtain. What people were saying made me feel a strange (to me) combination of outrage, devastation, and extreme discomfort.

But that’s part of the point isn’t it? We SHOULD be feeling all those things. Our society is broken and what we’re seeing now is the result. It is upsetting, and it is uncomfortable. Many of us, like myself, are privileged enough to where we don’t have to sit with that discomfort 24/7. We have the option to put down our phones, log off of our computers, and ta-da it pretty much ceases to exist. If that’s not the very definition of privilege, I’m not sure what is. Large groups of people never get to turn those feelings off.

So what have I learned so far in these past few days?

I’ve learned that there are A LOT of people (particularly horse people, it seems) who don’t understand the difference between financial privilege and racial privilege. And to those who say “anyone could work hard and do what I did” – clearly you are not paying attention to the myriad ways that our society has been designed to suppress and exclude minorities.

I’ve learned that what I was taught in school about our history, particularly during the Civil Rights movement, was incomplete at best. Boy did they conveniently leave some things out of our curriculum. Boy did they sugarcoat and idealize a whole lot.

I’ve learned that 1) you should never haul anywhere without Waze on, particularly during a period of civil unrest, so you can avoid putting yourself or your horses in a bad situation, but 2) if you do happen to find yourself stuck with a trailer in the middle of a crowd of devastated, outraged people, perhaps brandishing a firearm and trying to force your way through should be your LAST resort. We really should be taught as a society how to deescalate situations… the American way seems to be brute force and a bigger gun, and clearly that ain’t working very well for any of us. (tends to be true with horses too, perhaps we are more like them than we think)

I’ve learned that a surprising number of people didn’t have a word to say about the murder of yet another black man, but have a lot to say about protesting.

I’ve learned that for as much as I want to unfriend or unfollow people who don’t see things my way, it’s important (to me anyway) to not just shut myself off from those who think differently than I do. I need to understand why they feel the way they do, because I think the only way forward is to understand how we got here in the first place. Where have we gone wrong? How do we fix this, once and for all? Granted, I admit that I have a limit. If you say “black people get killed by other black people more than they do by white people” or “if they weren’t so lazy they could have what I have” I just freaking cannot and yes I’ve unfollowed a few people because of those exact statements. Point of view is one thing, morality is another.

But at the end of the day most of my social media friends are equestrians, and I’ve learned just how damn out of touch many of us really are, myself included, likely because of our privilege. Most of us live in a different world, and it shows.

The real question is what do we do now? Truthfully I don’t know. I think this looks different for everyone. Some people may be out there on the front lines of the protests. Some people might be donating to worthy causes. Some people might be sharing their experiences. Some people are standing in virtual solidarity and anxiously awaiting election day. Some are doing all of the above. I don’t think there’s a wrong approach, as long as you’re doing something.

For as tempting as it was yesterday for me to just put all my devices away and hide from everything for a while, I’ve forced myself to stay with it. I’ve forced myself to keep scrolling and reading and watching. It’s important, to me, to bear witness. It’s important, to me, to understand as fully as I can. It’s important, to me, to acknowledge my privilege and figure out what I can do with it. It’s important, to me, to be uncomfortable and upset and outraged and to sit in all those feelings. I don’t have the answers, but I’m here to learn. I don’t know what to say, but I know that it feels wrong to say nothing at all.

If you have any good links or causes (or books or documentaries or podcasts – anything) that you’d like to share, please drop them in the comments, I would love to see them and have a collection of resources in one place.