First Haltering

I had some friends out Sunday after church and we haltered the foals for the first time. The foals didn't like it very much, but settled down after only a short time. Here's a picture of these friends leading a mom and baby and one of Doug holding and talking to the wee one.

This is what I love about raising horses. The foals are almost addictive. The disposition that my stallion puts on them just causes them to love people, and they are so smart. They learn quickly what you want them to do and they just want to please.
I feel like it's the death of a dream, however, when I remember just a couple months back when I was fighting for all I was worth to keep them alive, and I wonder if I want to ever go through that again, so I haven't turned the stallion out with any mares yet. Besides the horse market is so oversaturated, I wonder if it is responsible to breed any mares at all.
Maybe my accountant is right. I should get some cows. I have one, but she is going to the sale tomorrow. She's slightly over a year old and she weighed in at 930 pounds on my neighbor's certified scales last week. You want that kind. She started out small, and then really packed on the pounds. She has been strictly grass and hay fed--no grains of any sort and coming off a severe winter, so that rate of gain is almost unheard of under those conditions. I wish I had a whole truckload of them to sell.
I don't get nearly so emotionally invested in the cattle as I do the horses, and I just happen to have a whole truckload of what the rain has turned into cow hay, so perhaps I will get some cows.
Gremlin got to haul some kids around at the horse camp last week. He did well and the kids loved him. He was the only paint horse there, so they gravitated toward him and asked if they could ride the "pretty one." Here's a picture of him doing his thing with the kids.

The camp was a lot of work, but it all became worth it when I heard one little boy telling his friend that the horses were "the best part of the whole camp." I was shocked because they had many other fun activities for them, such as floating the river, picnics, games, crafts and "big toys," whatever that was.

Summer has arrived right on time. Temperatures are getting close to ninety during the day. At least it is cooling off at night, unlike last year at this time.

Kids and Horses all Week

This week I'm helping with a kids camp horse riding activity. I took good old Gremlin since he is my best kid's horse. I surely do wish I could clone that old bugger. He was the only paint horse there and several times, I had more than one kid wanting to ride him. Several people made comments on the shape he is in for his age. He's 24, and is beginning to show his age a little, but they didn't know what he looked like before. He still has a surprising amount of spunk for his age, and the kids like that. Gremlin likes the kids also, but he was too tired to even lie down and roll when we were done with him today. That is usually the first thing he does after being turned loose, especially if he's sweaty. He was sweaty today. The temperature was 85 when the last bunch of kids stopped riding. Summer is finally here.
Yesterday as I was gathering things to take to camp, I heard my big palomino paint gelding whinnying at me. He was at the gate all by himself, and I thought something was amiss, because the rest of the herd was not in sight. Horses are very social creatures and it's very unusual for them to leave the herd on their own. At first, I thought he was just fighting flies and wanting in the barn for that reason, but he just kept hollering at me, so I went to see. My heart sank when I saw his bloody front foot.
He had gotten into some wire apparently, cut his pastern and didn’t even want to put any weight on it, so I opened the gate and he hopped through it. I let him in the barn and put some fly repellant on him, for which he seemed grateful. Since I was heading for town with Gremlin for the camp, I called the veterinarian and asked if I could bring him in. I wasn't sure how deep the cut was.
King even seemed grateful to hop onto the trailer. He is so smart. He knew he was in trouble, needed help, and he knew where to go to find it. He behaved perfectly at the vet clinic, even when the vet gave him a huge shot of penicillin.
So now, I've got one in the sick bay and Murphy continues to hang out at my place. I have to administer more penicillin for several days and re-bandage every day for a while. Fortunately, it wasn't very deep, but it's in an area that flexes at every step, so it will take some time to heal. I listed him for sale a couple weeks ago, but now that will have to be postponed.
He loves attention and now he's getting some, but he hates being penned by himself. That's good for him, though, because it helps break the herding instinct and they go out alone under saddle more readily.

Murphy Moved In

Murphy has come to live at my ranch this spring. I keep trying to kick him out but he doesn't want to go, so whatever can go wrong, has gone wrong. Today I attended the funeral of a friend who served as my spiritual mentor these many years since I made my decision about 20 years ago. She was only 69. That's not old enough. This community still needs her. Carolyn had the red phone to God. When she called on Him in prayer, she never got the "busy" signal. God heard and answered her prayers. I don't know who will take up her mantle now.
Carolyn always had a sweet smile and an encouraging word. She was a 4-H horse leader for many years and I never saw her be critical. She coached the kids by praising what they did well.
Tommorrow I have to attend another funeral for a friend with whom I worked in the oil field. He was 70, and, like Carolyn, a great prayer warrior. Seems like God is mustering His army.
Right after the big rainstorm that caused me to struggle with my foals and cost me a truckload of hay for the lack of $100 worth of tarps, I went to flush out my swamp cooler and get it ready for summer use. The motor is seized. I replaced the motor about 12 years ago, and could replace it again, but the rest of the cooler is almost shot. I think it is as old as the house, probably. Besides, I don't like the humidity it puts into the house. Then my washing machine quit. What else can go wrong? Murphy, you've got to GO. Somebody close the gate behind Murphy as he leaves.

Going Home

I had the pleasure of returning to a piece of my past this past weekend. Some friends who own the ranch I grew up on invited me to their cattle branding. I took Turkey, the horse, to ride, and my niece with her gray and white paint horse, Jack, to ride along with us. Here's a picture of Wendy on Jack.

As we drove past the house I grew up in, I couldn't help but slow down to gawk as memories flooded my mind. Then I remembered my niece was behind me with her truck and trailer, so I sped up. She said she had been doing the exact same thing. As we rode by on horseback, she remarked that she almost expected to see her grandmother, my Mom, come out on the porch and wave her apron. I could visualize that, also, and almost heard her voice. I should have taken a picture of the old place, but I didn't.
The creek that runs by had flooded, as did the creeks almost everywhere in Wyoming during the recent rainstorms. I remembered the floods we used to have almost yearly there on Middle Bear Creek when I was a kid. We could go out and play in the water if the current was not too rapid, but sometimes one couldn't cross in a vehicle for a day or two, because the water would drown out the engine, or there were big washouts you couldn't see under the surface of the water. This year's flood was substantial, like the ones I remember from my childhood.
The creek was still running and we had to cross it several times in the course of following the cattle back up the pasture to the branding corrals. Although Turkey has to put his feet in Lance Creek every day to get a drink, he thought he had to leap Middle Bear each time we crossed it. That was making me upset, but it was too beautiful a day to be upset. The sky was blue, the creek was running, the sagebrush and the pine trees smelled heavenly, I was back in my element, amongst people I know and love, and I was happy.
Gathering went off without a hitch and we didn't even spill them while trying to get them into the corrals, although the owner said he thought we might have missed a few down in the trees. There weren't as many riders as there usually are. It is getting harder and harder to find help to do the annual spring and fall cattle work on the ranches. High school and college kids no longer want, nor do most of them know how, to do it.
There was plenty of help this day, however everyone had a job. I'm not sure how many we branded, but we finished up just as the Boss Lady and her helpers brought in lunch. (The Boss Lady reads this blog because she was my high school English and Journalism teacher and now a publisher, and close as a sister, Hi Nancy!) Lunch was out of this world delicious. It always is. Nancy and her daughter knock themselves out cooking. They spread the feast out on the 20-foot bed of a gooseneck trailer. There was barbeque beef, bean salad, coleslaw, lettuce salad, scalloped corn, several jello salads, potato salad, carrot cake, chocolate pie, and peach cobbler with lots of iced tea.
Another highlight of the day was when two other of my nieces and their families showed up. I didn't know they were coming, and it was a great surprise. I gave a weanling filly to one of the niece's sons about five years ago, he started and trained her himself, and he had her there. Here's a picture of Layne on May. Layne has done a nice job with her and is, justifiably, very proud of her. That's the way I was hoping it would work out. There's nothing as good for the inside of a boy (or girl) as the outside of a horse.

Here are some general pictures of the branding activities, mostly the ropers who are the stars of the show.

Ode to Chester

I have to tell a story about my friend who raises horses and is wheelchair-bound. It was his colt I struggled to save during the rainstorm. The colt died, by the way, but that's another story. This friend (I won't mention his name) lives in Texas, but maintains mares, foals and stallions on some land that is only about 40 miles from my ranch.
He planned to drive from his home in Texas to Wyoming, arriving late Friday. He had bought airplane tickets for a woman horse trainer to come help him load and haul a mare he wanted to take back to Texas. This college-aged woman, went out on the town with friends on Friday night and wound up spending the night in jail, thus missing her flight to Denver and leaving my friend with no help on the return trip.
Don't you think most people confined to a wheelchair would have abandoned the plan? Not my friend. I hardly believe he did this myself, but he hooked up his trailer, loaded the mare and headed back to Texas, driving non-stop except to fuel his van. He said he found some nice people at a gas station that helped him water his mare partway through the trip.
The alternator went out of his van about 30 miles from his destination!
I tried to drive straight through to Mineral Wells, Texas, when my daughter lived there, but was unable to make it. I had to pull over and sleep a while. My friend continues to be an inspiration.
Now, about the dead colt--the little guy had problems from the start. His mama didn't want him, and he started following another mare that had lost her foal, but had already stolen another foal from another mare. Now the "robber" mare had two foals following her. We corralled them and paired the colt back up with his dam. She still really didn't want him, and had to be haltered and made to stand while he nursed as she tried to bite and kick him. My friend thought they would mother up in a few hours, but that wasn't happening. I needed to get home, so I offered to take them both back to my place and continue the process there.
The mare did start accepting the foal more and more, but something just didn't seem right with this foal from the start. He was not jittery as most are, and was not aggressive about nursing, either. Then he was straining to eliminate. I thought he was compacted, so I gave him some mineral oil by mouth. Nothing happened. I called my daughter, who has a Master's Degree in Equine Reproduction, and she said to give him an enema. This was a new one for me. I had never given anything an enema before, but here I was giving a colt an enema! Still nothing passed.
He got a little stronger for a few days, and then the rain hit in. Over half our annual average precipitation fell from the sky in two days and three nights. My corrals turned to soup, so I had to shut him and his dam in my tiny little barn so he would have a dry place to lie down. After I confined him to the small area, I noticed he was eliminating, however, his urine was dribbling out in a strange way, so I looked under his belly, and there were no male parts, to speak of. He had a little nodule with a couple little holes in it where the urine was coming out. I called my daughter and my friend in alarm. My friend asked me to inspect his apparatus to help pinpoint the problem. It felt like he had a penis, but it was turned inward and encased.
He was becoming weaker and lying down a lot of the time, only standing to nurse occasionally. Then his hind leg swelled. I thought the mare had stepped on him. By now, there was no possible way to get him to a vet because the creek was flooding and my road was so muddy, I could not have gotten to the county road with my trailer. My friend asked if I had any Bantamine and I gave him some of that. That seemed to help a little, as the swelling subsided and he was able to stand better. My daughter said the swelling in the leg and joint was probably rather related to the waste material going throughout his body than to his being stepped on by the mare. I'm sure she is correct. My friend thought that since he did have some urine coming out and it seemed clear and not cloudy, the situation might solve itself.
"Chester," as I had begun calling him, gave up his fight for life on Saturday night. I fully expected to find him dead that morning, but it still hit me like a ton of bricks. I cried as if he had been my own colt. I couldn't go to church Sunday because I knew I would be crying like a baby during services and everyone would think I was a lunatic. All this just makes me know I should not try to run a horse breeding operation.
Chester was nobody's fault, just a freak of nature. His dam knew all along and that is why she tried to reject him. Horses just know. Yet it tore me up to lose him after I had fought so hard to save his life. RIP, Chester. You were a good little colt, and I know I will see you in heaven. Somebody close the gate while I wipe my eyes again.

Oh Lord, I think I want my drought back!

I now officially declare the seven-year drought over. Five or six inches of rain, one flooded creek, water in the basement, and mud everywhere testifies to that fact. What wild weather. I haven't seen anything like this since I was a kid. That's a long time ago. My friend from Texas just asked me if I ever had to worry about the creek getting up to the house. I told him only every 50 years or so do we have a flood that would threaten the house. This must be the year.
The weather service predicted it, as it was coming in almost a straight line down the center of Wyoming starting on Wednesday, May 21. As I drifted off to sleep, I watched a phenomenal light show going on outside my window, and the thunder literally rocked me to sleep. Unbeknownst to me, the lightening was as close as to strike a tree down on the creek about a quarter mile from the house. It knocked a big chunk of the tree to the ground and set it on fire. Fortunately, the rain put the fire out. Two or more inches fell that first night.
I went out the next morning to check my babies and see if they weathered the storm. They did; luckily, we didn't get the hail along with it that other areas got. The corrals had turned to soup, and there was not a dry place for them to lie down, as I had a colt belonging to a friend in the sick bay, my barn. The storm continued all day Thursday, Thursday night, and Friday. I hovered over the sick baby in the barn and prayed for the storm to end and the baby to live. The rain finally stopped early Saturday morning. Everyone is still alive, including me, but just barely. This seems like a never-ending nightmare. My fence washed out in only one place where the creek crosses it, so I'll have fencing to do when the water recedes.
If I live to be 100, I will remember the winter and spring of 2007-2008. Here are some photos of the creek flooding.

Sick Babies and Me

After my marathon foaling, I jumped on a plane to head to North Carolina to visit my other baby, my six-month old grandson. I had to scramble to get thing arranged so I could be at my son's for Mother's Day. Friends from church volunteered to keep my stallion at their place to keep him out of trouble. A neighbor would check the rest of my livestock on his way by every day. I had to build some fence to be sure there would be no wrecks. The storm and the foaling, along with getting ready for the trip had so stressed me, I came down with a terrible cold.
It was horrible on the flight. I was coughing and sneezing and blowing my nose until I thought my seatmates would ask for a particle mask. My grandson already had a cold, so I didn't worry about infecting him. He was all smiles. What a good baby. The only time he fusses is when he is hungry. He watches TV already, and not just glances. He watches intently for up to 20 minutes at a time and he actually giggles when something funny happens on TV. One of the children's DVDs his parents have for him has a duck puppet that reaches out with its beak to grab a dog puppet's nose and then there is a honking noise, and that baby giggles every time he sees that. Here's a picture of him watching TV from his "office," a little place for him to sit that has a swivel seat with stimulating toys surrounding him.

He's not crawling yet, but did learn to flip from his back to his stomach while I was there, then his first tooth erupted a day after I left. I knew he was teething, not because he was cranky, because he wasn't, but he was slobbering and chewing on everything in sight, including his toes after his bath, as in this picture. So I was there, basically, for two "firsts" in his life.

My cold got a little better on Saturday and Mother's day. My daughter-in-law took me for two "firsts" in my life on Saturday--a professional manicure and pedicure. This was quite different, because my feet are so ticklish, but the results were great. Not sure I would ever do that again, however. Too urbane for this country chick.
The cold came roaring back on Monday just in time for the flight home. I was very ill when the plane touched down in Cheyenne. My friend insisted I stay the night with her, and I was grateful, because I didn't think I could drive the three hours home with every part of my body aching--even my teeth.
When I did get home, I had sick babies here, of the equine variety. I had turned the mares and new foals out on the meadow and two of them had foal-heat diarrhea. The palomino paint baby was the worst. She had it so badly she should have died. I corralled the mares and foals and went to doctoring them, even though I should probably have been seeing a doctor myself. I poked some large doses of Pepto Bismol down them and cleaned the paint filly's behind so I could put some ointment on it. The acid from the diarrhea had already eaten a lot of her hair coat off and the skin below her tail dock was just raw.
I went and retrieved my stallion then fell into bed, seriously thinking I might die in my sleep. Although I'm not afraid to die, I didn't know how long it might be before someone missed me, so I said some prayers for both my fillies and me. The good news is that all of us are better, although the cold is still with me. Palomino paint was feeling so much better today, she even struggled a little when I gave her more Pepto. I followed that with some plain yogurt, as recommended by my daughter, to replace the good flora in her stomach. She rather liked the yogurt, I think. She swished it around in her mouth awhile before swallowing, probably to get rid of that bad Pepto taste. I don't blame her, I don't like Pepto Bismol, either, but it works.