Mustang Saga

I caught a picture of Scout being curious yesterday.  He was pretty cute, sneaking up on the mower to see what it was.  If she saw this picture, my mom might be a bit worried he'd eat her motorhome, but he didn't.  I was watching.  I did have to catch him and put an end to his wandering when he got too close to the burn pile.  There are nails in there.

 

While I was letting Scout wander and eat dandelions, Bella was getting her fly spray treatment.  She's such a sweet girl.  She doesn't really like fly spray but she stands still for me anyway.  I had to spray it onto cotton balls and really work it into all of their ears.  We have these little biting gnats that we've never had before.  They're awful.

Joseph got to go out into the less secure pasture for a while.  It's only got one strand of electric for part of it so I haven't left him out there when I'm not home.  I think he'd be fine but I need to be sure before I leave him unsupervised.

He can't help but be handsome.

As I was sitting admiring my horse, it wasn't long before I had company.

They were hiding behind me, also admiring Joseph.

Then Joseph came to say hello.

Then Blue came up doing his ingratiating smiley dance.  I had already told him to stay out of the horses' area, but I'm a pushover when he's acting like a goof.  And he wasn't bothering the horses.  But then he stuck his nose on the electric fence and yiped all the way back to the house and wouldn't talk to me for a long time.  He thought I had something to do with his poor nose getting shocked.

Today we did some very low key ground work all over the pasture.  I've decided to slow down the progression to riding.  He's still so flinchy about stuff touching him.  He gets over it when we really concentrate on it, or at least he seems to, and then next time he's defensive again.  So he's obviously not really getting over it.  We have plenty of time.  I think he needs more time just hanging out, having things be relaxed and friendly.  With some low-key saddling and relaxed schooling too.  We just did circles at the walk all around the pasture, then worked on some trot transitions, and finished up with walking again.  He really relaxed and seemed to enjoy moving his feet in a way that wasn't complicated or scary.  He misunderstood a few times (or more likely I mis-cued him) and got a bit flustered, but I just calmly redirected him and he relaxed again.  At the end he was happy and relaxed.  He looked proud of himself and he was being open and curious.  Very cute.

Here he is about halfway through our work.  He's adorable.

The donkeys got a bit of a hoof trim today.  Pedro is living life in the "fat pen" where he only gets a tiny bit of grass and hay twice a day.  He thinks it's terribly boring.  I tried to put him out on the pasture a little bit and his hooves got sore.  He was laying around more and hardly braying at all.  Looking at the nice tight hoof wall he grew over the winter, I'm really kicking myself for trying to put him on grass again.  I'm sure there's going to be some new evidence of a founder episode when his hooves grow out.  Live and learn.  Can't fudge on his diet, I guess.  Bob, on the other hand, is doing great out on pasture.  Just what the old guy needs, I think.  They're so sweet.  I wanted to take my ass for a walk today but ran out of time, and it's just too darn hot. 

And now for softball!  The girls are doing pretty darn well lately, and they're playing the best team in the area tonight.  It'll be fun to watch.  And nice to just sit for a while.  :)