Time at the Barn

We all wore the hat on Christmas:

 Lydia

 Yndi

 Pepper

 Grendel(seen here fleeing the hat)

 Goat votes "nope" on the hat

Evil Elf me

Pepper

Driving pretty girl Pepper on Kincaid RD, The Santa Clara County Sheriff passed me and said out the window, "...smiling all day because of you. You're awesome!"

 These are old photos from September of last year and do not reflect the current hair status.

 I've also added an orange feather boa on a bicycle flag and a yellow and orange bridle plume for visibility on the road.

Long Time...

Its been a long time. I've done a lot of things. Some have been good.

The weather broke.

Yndi has been laid up with severe hoof abscesses in both fronts for most of the time. Lots of poultice and soaking. I couldn't go anywhere with Pepper because she would panic at getting left. I couldn't load her up and take her with us because standing in a moving trailer would have been torture. I bought her a goat for company, but she was terrified.

I went to The National Drive in Lexington KY and had fun driving a Gotland pony that was loaned to me. Then I went on to Virginia to visit my cousin who showed me Yorktown and Colonial Williamsburg.

I spent a week in Reno, visiting my dad for Thanksgiving.

I did a lot of batik medallions to attach to saddlepads, and had so much trouble getting blank Lam-Cell pads to put them on that I decided I had to switch. So I did some market research and decided on PRI pads for 2018. There will be a price increase because, if I don't, I lose money even faster.

Of course, Pepper lost condition in that time, and I have started getting her back. The first 3/4 mile up from our house is killer steep and she cant even get all the way up. The first 1/4 mile makes her sore the next day. So: every other day we go the first 1/4 mile. I will be ready to take her to the park for better conditioning soon, if they would just deliver the new refrigerator so I could leave home!

PS The goat's boogery nose got better within a few days of arriving at our place. We named her Grendel. I think she's pregnant.

Ominous Phemomenon

Fall is ominous for Equestrians. Winter is a lot of hard work. For people who spend a lot of time outdoors, its also a lot of dark.

For me, as a batik artist, its ominous another way. I do a lot of my work outside due to the fumes of  a large pot of hot wax which I apply to fabric.. When its cold, and the fabric is cold, the wax doesn't flow well. All work in progress must be completed soon. This is a finished piece, just so you can see.

We could still have some pretty hot weather coming up. I remember a Jessica Ransehousen clinic I rode in where the temp was 105 in the shade, on October 1st.

I have been parsing Yndi, the buckskin with the help of Ross Jacobs and Warwick Schiller on YouTube. So I have a very alpha horse, who is lacking in confidence, and is also a pony mare and 22 years old. I am recognizing the problems better, but still seem to have them.

I have been driving Pepper, but that is going slow. (I spent two days sick in bed, only to come out to a sink overflowing with dirty dishes.) If I can get past the first mile up the road, the steepness drops off. Right now, Its like weightlifting for 15 minutes.

I took both ponies to the regional park nearby. Dave helped. I took the cart in case I wanted to drive Pepper, and I did, but just around the staging area. She was a little tense. I figured as long as things were not getting worse, we were OK. It actually got better.

Yndi stood tied to the trailer practicing not losing her shit.

I was really happy with that.

Then I spent two days getting the trailer turned around in my barnyard, ready for the next trip. Its a very small space. Most of our acreage is vertical.

When I offloaded the harness from the trailer, I parked in on Yndi before getting it to the barn. She started licking and chewing when I put it on. A good sign, I think.

I think Yndi has another hoof abscess. She should have been shod all summer, even if she wasn't driving. Our ground is so unforgiving. My shore comes Thursday. She's poulticed in Epsom salt right now. Maybe I'll just put her in steel instead of plastic and keep poulticing. It might resorb, it might erupt.

Tire Rotation

Yesterday I drove to town to have my tires rotated and shop for groceries. It was a five hour wait for the tires. Add feed store, Rx, supermarket. Then I got stuck in the bay area commute. Total time away from home: ten hours.

Everybody got fed.

That is all.

A waste of a day.

Hot

I went very early on Friday and drove Pepper. We went up the road and back, total round trip was less than half a mile. She has to be in good enough shape to get up nearly a mile of steep hill before the road gets more level. Then we can have a nice drive.

We went up the to "Road Narrows" sign, where the single lane becomes two. Coming down, its a good thing my cart has breaks. Most drivers advise against breaks on a cart because slowing the wheels increases the weight on the equines back. Pepper is very sensitive about too much pressure in the breeching, but she can carry me on her back at 125 lbs. (Sadly, a little, her conformation makes saddle fit difficult because her heart girth is forward of her withers and so the saddle gets pulled forward onto her shoulders. Neither of us likes the riding part anyway.)
She is fine with breaks on the cart.

Her nose wrinkle was better, but not gone completely. How "right" does a horse have to be to work? A good question. I think the heat is taking its tole. We got most of our drive done while it was still morning-cool. When it started to heat up, it went up fast.

One hundred and seventeen degrees Fahrenheit. That's 47 degrees Centigrade. Its hard to breath when its that hot.

I went out frequently all day and gave them a shower, then returned them to the shady oak trees.
Saturday it only got to 112 F,  44 C. There were pony showers, I took Yndi the the round en early in the morning for 20 minutes of walk.

Today the forecast call for 108 F, 42 C. I am going to a Rabbit Haven event in Sunnyvale so Dave is in charge of showering the ponies.

Derision, Disdain, Identity

One Hundred and eight degrees F, at twelve noon In this case F no longer stands for Fahrenheit.

So, I didn't drive as planned. Pepper did not seem right. I have always felt derision for people who found so many reasons for not riding that they never rode. One thing after another, they always had a reason. I had driven four times since Thanksgiving (3rd Thursday in November.) Is this me now?

But...

I have always felt disdain for people who worked their horse even if their horse was lame or injured or seemed under the weather. Was I going to go ahead and work Pepper anyway?

Who am I? What do I want to be? How would you feel?

What was wrong with Pepper?

I enjoyed my ponies in the cool morning. Almost needed a sweater! BUT...I did not drive. I planned to and was excited, but Pepper? She came out with a nose wrinkle. This has always meant discomfort. She had been eating so her appetite was good. She had gut sounds. I took her to the roundpen anyway and started her on her usual 20 minutes of walk. Would she walk out of it?

No. She didn't want to trot either. She isn't a very forward thinking pony, so this was not a terrible sign, but I was still concerned so I called her to the center.  She was not lame. She loves head scratches. I scratched her all over. She had one spot that was either really itchy right off, or tender. I couldn't tell if her contortion was ooo or ahh.

I did some Masterson massage and had some pretty good tension releases behind her wither, both sides, and right stifle and left dock, lots of yawning and teeth purring, but I don't think that was it. I scratched her more, and found some scabbies between her jaw bones, tick or other arachnid. That might have made her feel funky, but probably not. They were most likely tick bites. We have brown recluse and black widow spiders here, but I don't think it was that.

I walked her another 20 minutes. she still did not walk out of it. I took her back and groomed her all over, a fresh coat of Pyranha and out to the meadow. she went straight to the trough and got a long drink. She always does that. This seemed especially long. Maybe. was she getting enough water in her annex at night?

I checked out the wall mount waterer in her stall. it was full of cool water. The inside felt a little slimy so I got a cloth and wiped it all around, then bailed til the water was super clean.

Then I took care of Yndi. She also loves scratches and grooming. She has developed an allergy to oak tanin so she is itchier than normal. My vet gave me some allergy medications and that helps her. She is shedding her linty summer coat. He forelock hasn'
t fallen out yet. It always falls out in the fall.

Gah! Going to get Hot!

Pepper's scab fell off yesterday. Now I can drive her! No more worry about the girth irritating or knocking the scab off too soon and risking fly strike or a summer sore.
Going to get hot today, but not as hot as Saturday when the forecast is predicting 114 degrees F for us.
I was going to go into town that day and volunteer at a Rabbit Haven adoption event, but I need to stay home and shower the ponies.
Gotta get going this morning and beat the heat! Enjoy this video of Pepper in the shower.

Depressing Heat Wave

Yes, Its hot. About 10-15 F hotter than San Jose, CA. So the ponies go out in the meadow, covered in Pyrhanna, and come in each evening. They are fat ponies and they are not complaining.

I wish I was doing more with them, until I step out of my air conditioned house.

So, from the world's worst blogger, I will confess that Yndi has been refusing to halt. If I insist, she spins around. This is very dangerous with a driving horse. The cart can create a balance problem and result in a bolt or fall. A bolting driving horse can easily take a turn that is fine for the horse, but too tight for a cart-the wheels get hung up and rip off. Then you get a frightened horse dragging a broken vehicle that continues to break up.

The solution, then, is to stop the spin. That makes her rear. When a horse rears, you send them forward quickly. See 'bolting driving horse' above, or do a YouTube search: "Youtube carriage horse bolt." It's a S%&$t show.

This whole scenario also plays out if she thinks it might ahppen and starts to drift sideways and then I try to correct her. She knows leg yield. she doesn't like it. When Merrie told me to practice it in long lines, I did. I ended up with ponies who don't follow their heads. they now require a higher level of finesse.

Yndi is a hot horse. Small and pudgy and cute, but hot. I think what she really needs is to go out on the open trail and just trot until she can hardly breath enough. There are bees in her hair and she has to get them out. Sadly, the level area of my property is too limited and the first mile of road out of my driveway is very very steep. Know this: turning a cart around on a slope is not a good thing to do. One shaft becomes much higher than the other when the cart is sideways on the slope. This can push/knock a pony off their feet, really, and the cart flips at the same time.

So this is a hot mess. Its a difficult but possible trip to a wilderness park that allows carriages, but, hear we go, Yndi is a poor traveler. She would not be safe to hitch single if she were isolated in a strange place. She is not safe to hitch pairs to Pepper who is too inexperienced  and not big enough to just hold her in place.

So, now I wait for fall and cooler weather for lessons, like I waited for the '16 Holidays to be over and the terrible winter to be over and the road wash out to be repaired.

I have loaded my trailer with grass hay pellets and water, and packed a go bag for each animal as for myself. Its wildfire season. I am ready for evacuation, just in case.

There has also been batik. I am getting ahead of that batik phase of a few collections so that I can work on the indoor sewing part when the outdoor weather is too cold for batik wax to flow well.

I've also been in a funk as a self employed artist, I belong to an online art marketing forum. I asked for help with social media and got a bunch of website critiques. I make art saddlepads and someone said "I can't tell if you are selling the saddle too.(she doesn't know there is a major price different between the custom saddle shown in the photo and just a saddlepad) "Maybe you should show aerial photos of the horses." (Yes, I will rent a crane, buy a case of tranquilizer and take out a two million dollar insurance policy.) as well as the suggestion that I study color theory(Who Tastes Fish?) and pick more neutral colors(black and white ARE the neutrals for saddlepads and you all are wasting my time answering questions I didn't ask and ignoring the one I did ask.)

Heavy sigh. Back to
work!

Today's Programming Will Be Interrupted by a Puncture Wound.

I was going to write more about the Yndi puzzle today, but I returned home from town yesterday to a huge swelling in Pepper's armpit. Hot and soft on the surface, hard underneath. A wound about 1cm, the right size for a rattlesnake bite but not distinct fangs, more of a cut with a serous scab. She didn't care when I poked it. Applied Vetericin.

Good morning from Pepper.

This morning I went down to check it, not as hot, more swollen, softer. She didn't care when I felt it, she is not lame. Applied Vetericin.

Looked up, Bob the Barn kitten is on the trailer wheelwell drinking my coffee. Bob flees as I approach, I throw throw the coffee onto the ground and put the cup back on the trailer. Five minutes later, I look again: Bob and Lydia Dog are licking spilled coffee off of the dirt.

I will get a photo of the edema next time I go out. Should have taken a camera with me, but my hands were full of coffee cup and egg quesadilla. My priorities need adjusting.

behind her elbow, where the girth goes.

So, I was afraid of snakebite and being in denial, also worried about a puncture wound because of infection and Pepper, my chronic hindgut ulcer pony does not do well with antibiotics.

Dave went back down to the pony place with me, we walked around in the meadow and found the culprit. An old abandoned horseshoe pit. We removed the stake that had been hidden in the grass. Pepper apparently rolled onto it as she rolled from her right side to her left side. It isn't a puncture wound, its a minor abrasion on the surface and a major hematoma underneath.

Small surface wound.

Arnica.

Its under her girth, so no driving.

Loss

Yndi, my retired broodmare, has been a challenge. I remember a time when I was overcoming and progressing, I remember that I loved her deeply and she loved me back. I loved to drive her groom her and touch her and just be with her. I remember her affectionate gestures. I had Janow from the time he was 4 until he was 22, and thinking as he aged that I had waited for years for this horse to age and become this great, settled, easy to be around guy. With Yndi, I felt that I had skipped ahead to the good part.

It all fell apart a year ago.

My husband and I are living the dream, in a way  that we hadn't really planned. It's hard to say that we bought acreage in the mountains and built a house by accident, but it sort of kind of happened. Last summer, we finished(lots of sweat equity,we couldn't have pulled it off otherwise). The ponies came, both of them. The actual move was not well planned or executed. There was a problem with my 20 year old son that involved yelling and threats and the police, the safety of my bunnies and me, spending the night on the floor with them to keep them safe and getting them out the next morning. I had chest pains from the stress. I crashed a U-Haul into a tree.

There was a perfect storm: connectivity to cell towers and internet problems, communicating with the rattlesnake removal guy and the potential rattlesnake den next to the level spot for the round pen, no roundpen, no arena, a road too steep to drive far on with ponies not yet conditioned for it. A barn with a design problem due to  a misplaced door and rerouting the fence because of a rock, a huge rock. This worked with the personalities of my two ponies now cohabiting for the first time to make stressed out ponies. I tried to keep driving, I was determined. I should have quit and said it should take a year to get the kinks out and settle in. And I had an experience with Yndi that was scary and made me want to sell her, sell Pepper, sell the harness and carriages, retire from horses, make art and kiss bunnies.

Does it help to know that Yndi is a hot potato? She comes from Swedish harness racing bloodlines. Her dam has been awarded elite status by the Swedish registry. Yndi was foaled in Stockholm and imported as a yearling.

Swedish Registry

I knew I needed professional help. The driven dressage instructor is 4.5 hours trailer ride from here.

Yndi with me, in a lesson with Merrie Morgan

But the Holidays came, and then we had a horrible winter, and then the road washed out. Not really washed out as much as fell 200 yards down the mountain. I couldn't get my ponies out for three months. Then it was hot and the trainer was busy with horses in full training until 100 am when the temp passed 105F. Now we are waiting for fall.

My big excuse: The road washed out, I can't get to lessons. Excuse? Or reason?

Harry Councel of Gilroy, Yndi hooked on the right, Pepper left.

Harry and me, Yndi right, Pepper left. Gilroy

I tried ground driving and long lining Yndi. She is dangerous. Its scary. I have become better at long lining very fast, but no longer want to do it.

So there is a Clydesdale breeder/driving instructor in Gilroy, 2.5 hours trailer away. His client/competition schedule is less demanding.  Possibly, with the driven dressage trainer, I have let her teach me that I need her and only her to progress correctly. I have always disagreed with trainers who teach dependence on their lessons. Have I fallen victim?

So I email the Clyde guy, I've had lessons with him before, so he knows me. Sadly, it is hot in Gilroy too and he is booked in the mornings. Waiting for fall again,but his emails are encouraging. Yndi and I are back to the roundpen, patching holes. I found a big one. New fencing has been added so the girls are not cohabiting anymore. (Hubby dug twenty fence post holes by hand for me!)  I am getting the relationship back. To me, that was more of a loss than the driving.

With Yndi, at the Milpitas boarding stable.

Yndi and the Big Boo-Hoo

Yndi is one of my Gotland Pony mares. She turned 22 this year.

I bought Yndi sight unseen, on the internet, December 3rd, 2011. The things leading up to that are what I call "The Big Boo-Hoo." On March 24th, I put down my horse Janow at age 22, after 18 years of looking after him daily. He foundered, again. I suspect some well meaning but ignorant person was secretly trying to fatten him up. I laid on his body until it was cold.

Janow AKA Siglavy Destina I

With Janow

Suspecting that my instructor would help me shop for a driving pony that he could receive money for training and possible talk me into letting him compete (He promptly did this to one of my friends), I decided to make a journey from California to Kentucky to buy a pony that was already trained. That was Kokovoko Magnolia, a Gotland pony mare who arrived in California during an EVh-1 outbreak and multi-stable voluntary quarantine. When she left Kentucky, nobody saw this outbreak coming. My boarding stable found a quarantine space for her way up in the hills, and I visited her every day.

Maggie in quarantine, eating wild artichoke plants

I rode her a few times, but only got to drive her once before she colicked. I did what I swore I'd ever do and had colic surgery for her. She almost died. She was in the hospital 80 miles away and I visited her every day for 10 days. Soon after she got home to my boarding stable, she had an infection in the incision and almost died.

Maggie with me at the boarding stable

The surgery had a 3 month recovery period before she could begin work again. She was days away from the getting to work when she colicked again. On October 3rd, I watched her die, thrashing in agony, falling and rising over and over while the vet was stick in Bay Area commuter traffic. I will never be the same.

So there I was, two loses in seven months. I had "shot the wad" on colic surgery that turned out to be more than two times as expensive as the average colic surgery. Horseless and bereft.

The next pony had to be a Gotland, it had to be a mare. I had never before specified a breed or gender in my horse shopping, and I couldn't afford to ship another from Kentucky. I bought the only Gotland Mare with driving experience on the west coast. She was "afraid of whips." I, too, was rather fragile.

Not only was she afraid of whips, but she was afraid of ropes, lines, reins, strings, veterinarians, horseshoers, paste wormer.... and her teeth were so neglected that the hooks prevented her from biting off grass or chewing hay.

It was a really long journey to this:
 

Hi Snaffle Squad and Welcome to Laughing Mare

Thanks for the welcome, TheSanffleSquad! I'm a little different from most of you: my goals are in driven dressage. Its the same but different.

I live here.

As an introduction to your facebook blogging group, I'll tell you a little bit. My name is Cara. I live in the mountains in Northern California with my two Gotland pony mares, Yndi and Pepper. I am having serious training issues. Moving to the mountains last fall created a perfect storm, and then we had a very severe winter. and then, and then, and then.

The Girls in Winter.

My first big goal is the get the Carriage Association of America Driver proficiency Level 1. I have to drive a 20 meter circle in both directions. To the right is good, to the left is The Spiral of Death. I belong to the Northern California Driving Club and the Gotland Pony Preservation Society. I volunteer frequently for Carriage Driving Events. It takes many volunteers to run a CDE, especially for Marathon, the driven version of cross country.

Pepper waits for Breakfast.

I have house rabbits, a bonded pair: Kasey and Pierre, and I have a foster rabbit for The Rabbit Haven: Carisma, AKA Rizzy. I do some volunteering for The Rabbit Haven. Then there is my little dog Lydia, a housecat named Whiskers, and a barn cat named Bob. Bob was feral when he arrived, but totally domesticated when he emerged from his acclimation cage two weeks later.

Lydia

My husband is semi-retired and my son is 21 and lives in Sacramento. My Dad lives near Reno, NV and I visit when I can, which is where I am now. I will have to add photos from my phone later.(I just
figured out how to do it with Google Photos.)

Yndi, rhymes with Windy.

I have a handmade business making art saddlepads, so I have a lot happening at the same time. I am the artist, the purchasing department, the shipping and receiving department, the marketing department and manufacturing department. I am the entire sales force, and last but not least, the janitorial department. I am enrolled in the Handmade Titan University and the Pinterest Academy. #zbesties

Sometimes I wish I was an octopus with eight hands to get everything done!