Indoor Arena and Manure Spreaders

I love it when someone does your work for free. I have been slowly acclimating to the natural rhythm of this little farm and part of the daily ritual is the March of the Turkeys. There is a rather large rafter, about 12 individuals, that comes through the farm every day. Two toms, three or four hens, and the rest young. Since the turkeys have discovered horse poop, they've been around about three times a day. They scratch and spread the manure in the pasture so I don't have to! Gotta love free labor.

Meet my new manure spreaders

I went for a ride in the indoor across the street. It's a good size, great lighting and good footing. My neighbor is very gracious and is letting me hire it out for a very reasonable hourly rate. I am going to be able to ride twice a week after work and hopefully get to ride on the trails on the weekends.

Brego did very well mentally. He hasn't forgotten anything and his lateral work at the walk was really good. His work at the trot was very stiff, but since it was one of the more recent things we worked on, I was not surprised. He felt pretty even at the trot and I got some nice big stretching trots. After about 25 minutes though, he felt tired so I just cooled him out at the walk. At the canter, he did not feel right at all, so after a few strides we went back to the trot. His leg wound is still open and actively weeping/bleeding. It's not gross or infected anymore, but he's still on antibiotics and it's not close to healing over. I know it still bothers him. I just hope there's nothing more serious going on inside the joint. Since he was noticeably better at the trot today, with only a slight hitchiness in his swing through, I am encouraged that with steady, easy work, he will strengthen and return to normal.

Baby Steps in the Dark

Brego continues to adjust to a much quieter life. He seems down. It's probably not easy to go from work 5 days a week and ruling a herd of 10 to hanging out with a geriatric (read: very non playful) mare and barely any work.

So I decided that until I could get the arena situation sussed, we were going to work, in whatever way we could. When I got home from my work tonight, it was already pitch dark. But I turned on every light on the property (even the trailer loading lights running off batteries), grabbed Brego from his "sulking spot" in the pasture and put his bridle on. We were going to work on some lateral stuff in hand.

I really want to move his hind end around, asking him to stretch his inside hind under in the shoulder in, getting the hips and hocks moving in a slow, low-impact way. We worked on my driveway which is asphalt bathed in fallen leaves. We went up and down the driveway at a shoulder in, then did a shoulder in on a volte to turn around. I made sure to get his jaw moving with bending at the halt (and some bribe cookies). He was AWESOME! I have never felt him so light in the bridle.

I couldn't help myself, I grabbed my helmet and hopped on bareback and we did it all again, up and down the driveway. He was so different form the other day -- light, compliant, interested. It was not a physical workout, but I hope I stretched him and he definitely gets points for his mental exercise. Not only did he work for me in the dark, on asphalt, with cars whizzing by, but he also did some nice shoulder in to haunches in transitions with no rail (on his good side). We also had some pretty respectable turn on the forehand and turn on the haunches. I made sure he REALLY stepped under on the turn on the forehand.

I am so jazzed. I can't wait to get him into an arena and see if he really is feeling better. I couldn't feel any real unevenness while riding from his hock injury, but with all the different aspects, it was hard for me to focus. I am going to try to get him to an arena before the end of the week and see how he is doing.

Spinoff: Five Acres Enough

The formal riding season has come to rather abrupt, but aptly-timed, halt. I am now in a position to focus elsewhere for the winter and have decided to begin work on a new venture. Brego is, and will always be, the focus of this blog (and it's important to maintain focus), but many pursuits only tangentially related to horses are now demanding my attention.

I have decided to spin off a new blog detailing the cultivation of my small farm:

Five Acres Enough

For those brave souls who read this blog to keep up with my current events but have no real interest or understanding of horses, you may wish to unsubscribe and see me on the new blog instead. I will be documenting my struggle to build a sustainable, and perhaps someday, horse-powered farm (or at least horse-inspired). At the very least, it will be interesting to see whether casting Brego in the role of a supporting character is enough to keep the interest high on the new blog. It's always just about The Brego.

A Toast!

Stacey sent a toast from The Jumping Percheron. Man, every time I see a video of her work with Klein, I am more and more impressed. When she moves back to the mainland, Stacey and I are going to have to enter a pairs jumping class and beat all the Thoroughbreds! Woot!!

Ahem, anyway...

Now I get to toast some of my favs. The theme of my toast is the friends this blog has brought me. I didn't know, way back when I decided to keep an online journal of my little horse and our little dreams, that I would meet such extraordinary people. So I toast the following people, not just great bloggers but people I would very much consider my friends in real life (if befriending people you have never met over the internet didn't have such a creepy vibe to it), in no particular order -- I don't play favorites.

1. Funder - You are so great. Down to earth and charmingly Southern (do I sound like a Yankee, yet?).

2. Maybe Mae - My cyber twin, your love of pumpkin beer sealed your fate as my bestest intraweb friend EVER.

3. Stacey - Back at ya, babe. Remember Brego and I when you are taking your victory lap at Aachen.

And to the rest of you:

"I don't know half of you half as well as I should like; and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve."
-- J. R. R. Tolkien

Grumpy Brego

Watching Brego cart my dad and that cute-as-a-button third grader around, you get the feeling that he is the sweetest, calmest horse on earth. And in general, Brego is a good guy. But he is also exceptionally dominant. He's so good natured that most of the time he goes along willingly with whatever adventure you can conjure up. But catch him when he is in a bad mood or hopped up on acorns, and he is downright aggressive.

Brego is not convalescing well. We are at day 4 of the ten day antibiotics and his leg is now normal sized. The gash has stayed open and is healing, no longer smelling so bad. Brego has been pretty much out of work, and pretty much overfed (in an effort to put weight on my TB mare who dropped about 100 pounds last month, they've been on free choice hay). He also has discovered acorns. In small amounts, the tannin is not too dangerous, but they are very high in fat and protein. So Brego is hopped up on feed/acorns/hay, cooped up in a 1 acre pasture, missing his herdmates from the old barn, and today we got a cold snap.

Enter fire-breathing monster. I couldn't even tack him up in his stall, he was literally bouncing off the walls. So I took him out and longed him in a 20' space in my front yard. The usual bucking, rearing, head tossing, threatening ensued. I kept him going walk/trot/walk/trot until he transitioned obediently and without any attitude. I had a big whip and was not shy on using it when he entered my space. He doesn't want to be a bad guy, but he is just too big or dangerous to budge an inch when he is in that mood. Then we tacked up and went for a ride.

Once he got out on the trails, he was fine. Ready to go, but not dangerous. We travelled to the next town on some pretty amazing trails. The retired, ex-engineer neighbors have way too much time on their hands and way too much excavating equipment. You could canter down these trails, they were as wide as a car. We crossed a brook and found ourselves on a gravel road nestled between white plank horse fencing of gorgeous farm after gorgeous farm. Truly horse country.

We rode for about 2 hours, mostly walk, but some trotting and even a little cantering. He is definitely not "right" with that hock, and even when longing it looked hitchy too me. And he was short on it. But the boy wanted to go, so we went, and I let him go fast where the trail was safe. He came home sweaty and loveable and much happier for the ride. On such small turnout, he needs more consistent exercise, wounded or not. And I have definitely cut his feed back. He's been like this before, during the move from Texas, so I know what to expect.

He's trying to look all innocent...

This evening, we also met another set of neighbors, the ones with the indoor arena aka my new best friends. :) They are very kind and their arena is available for hire over the winter, so I can keep up with all my dressage aspirations. I have one more set of neighbors to meet, the dressage riders with the outdoor dressage arena. I am hoping to get along well with them as well. I figure a few bottles of wine, maybe a few dozen free range eggs in the spring, and I can avoid building my own arena for a couple of years. Good neighbors, and horsey-knowledgeable folk at that, are priceless.

First Hack

Today was warm, but no rain so I decided to go ahead and go for our first hack around the property. It was also our first ride since the big fall, but I was surprisingly unconcerned. It was also the first hack since the kick. Brego's leg looks almost normal, but the hock is very tight. He's been favoring it for some time now. So a slow walk through the woods and up and down hills is exactly what he needed.

It was nice to be back in the saddle again and Brego was eager to go. I can tell from his goofy, expressive personality that he is feeling better these days. We explored the back of the property, getting thoroughly lost, for about 40 minutes and then hacked down the road to the fairgrounds/farmers' market to work on bending on level ground. The boy was stiff and I was not much better. Between his leg and my knee, we were quite the walking wounded. Four good legs between the two of us.

It was quite warm so the walk back home up the steep hill got him sweaty. He got a nice cool down, a little in hand work to stretch his neck, and a snack in his stall before going back to his main job: brush hog.

This whole crazy adventure just might work out. The barn is pretty small and definitely not built like Fort Knox, but since I won't be storing food in it, I think the stalls will hold Big Brego. The property is pretty wooded, but the place across the street is drop dead gorgeous pasture, so I know what is possible. Of course, I can't afford the drop dead gorgeous property across the street, so I am pretty lucky to have what I have (as we all are in these crazy times).

Thanks for all the kind compliments, everyone. Seeing Brego out the window in the morning makes the last year and the big move from Texas worth it. I couldn't afford a place like this in the Austin area. It has been hard leaving my friends and familiarities behind for a better horsey life. And people definitely talk "funny" up here. But everyone is friendly, our neighbors are gracious and kind and it's starting to feel like we've finally come home.

Welcome Home, Brego

Moving is hell. Anyone who tells you differently is trying to sell you cardboard boxes. It's been one week since we closed on the farmette, our little 6 acres in beautiful New Hampshire. And I finally have time to sit down and at least take a deep breath. In the past week, all my belongings have been loaded on a truck from the storage facility, offloaded at the new house, the barn has been renovated, the fencing strung, appliances purchased, more barn renovations, the horses brought home, the trailer backed down our tiny driveway and one emergency vet visit. I am beyond exhausted and very, very poor and my bad knee has long since blown up like a balloon and given out.

But! This is what I see when I stand on my back patio:

Doesn't look like much yet, but it's going to be breathtaking.


Let's start with the barn. I mentioned before it was a former shed and just big enough for two small stalls and a small front aisle way. It's not ideal, but considering that Brego has lived out all his life and would again this winter in New Hampshire, I think he is lucky to have it. We got it cleared out and brought a pallet of stall mats in.

Before...

Before...

First we laid the mats. I had to run to the hardware store to get a circular saw big enough to cut though those mats. They are insanely huge and heavy. I opted to double them up in the stalls, so it was two layers of fun cutting those devil mats. We also got the kick boards and the center divider installed at the end of day 1.

End of Day 1

One day 2 we strung the fencing and got it wired up. I opted for the Jurassic Park-sized fence charger/energizer because Brego has been known to, er, disrespect fencing. This puppy could power a small New Hampshire hamlet. We only fenced one kidney-shaped acre. There are three more acres to clear in the Spring beyond the fencing. We added chew guards and the hardware to the stalls to round out the day.

On day 3, we brought the stock panels from the old barn home and the hope was to use the 10 foot gates as stall fronts. The barn turned out to be 4" too narrow so I had to do some quick rough out of stall fronts and run to Home Depot. My years of training as a structural engineer came in handy. We also brought the horses home on day 3. There was no rain in the forecast and the fence was "activated" so it was time, even if the barn was incomplete. It was during our departure from the old barn that the emergency vet call came about, but more on that later.

On day 4, we finished the stall fronts, and bedded down the stalls. This barn was finished out with my two horses in mind. Both horses are very respectful of stalls and each other, so I opted for the most open design I could, knowing they would feel confined in the smaller spaces. The only bars I put up were over the glass windows, for obvious reasons. Otherwise, Brego can hand his head outside of his stall to help him feel less cramped.

Finished at last!

Brego's stall

Just room enough for two

Center divider with board stiffeners and chew guards

Cute little barn

Pardon the blur, horses in the barn

The barn has electricity but no water. However, right next to the barn is a year-round spring/drain of clear, cold water from the top of the hill. We contrived a great plan to harness this water in a trough so the horses can get water and 1) we don't have to run a hose and 2) it doesn't come from our well. We sunk the trough in the ground to benefit from some geothermal regulation during the cold winter so we can save on deicing. We surrounded the trough with gravel to keep mud down. We can also dip buckets in the trough to fill their heated stall buckets.

The spring-fed trough next to the barn

View of the trough from the barn door

Redirecting the spring into the trough

The horses really like the water and have been drinking well. Now I only have to run a hose to hydro Brego's leg.

Which leads me to the not-so fun part of this week. During the move, I was a wee bit busy and Brego was a full hour away so I only got out to see him once a day to blanket, and sometimes not even then. So when I arrived to pick him up, I was alarmed to see that his left hock was the size of a volleyball. I ran over to him and put my hand on the hock and felt wetness. When I pulled my hand away it was covered in, well, puss. Nasty infected seepage out of a gash above Brego's hock. The infection was so bad, I could smell it. I called out that I needed a vet NOW and my wonderful barn owner called one for me.

I immediately hydroed the leg and it responded to the water, so that was some good news. The vet arrived in about 45 minutes and we jogged Brego. Luckily, he was sound. Stiff, but sound. The vet was somewhat amazed that he appeared to not be too bothered by this raging infection and then examined him. The cut was not deep but it was several days old and the result of a kick from a rear-shod hoof. Poor guy went unnoticed because my attention was elsewhere. The good news is that the joint was not affected from the original trauma and the infection had not entered the joint capsule. Thank goodness for small blessings. Brego is on 10 days of antibiotics and twice daily hydro treatments. His leg is responding, but I can tell it still bothers him.

So needless to say, the New England Hunter Trials are a scratch as is most of the remaining hunt season. We may come back and hilltop towards the end of November, but I am not eager to run hard and fast. Brego has lost a lot of conditioning his week, both from no work and the infection making him more sedentary. I think we're going to just take it easy and explore our new world. There are trails that come off the back of my property that go for miles between the small towns in the area. It's a perfect way to leg him back up, get him to stretch his legs, without taxing the hock. We got lucky with this injury, it could have been MUCH worse, so I am in no hurry to rehab him. We have all winter to relax and leg up before we start speed work again in the spring.