Thursday, October 2, 2014

What a week!

What a week for Princess Fancy Pants. Again we worked on trailer loading. Loading is no problem - she walks right on. I want her to stand quietly and comfortably before I take her on a ride again. To make it a sweet deal for her I put alfalfa in the hay bag. She enjoys alfalfa snack time and this time didn't try to back up against the butt bar after I closed it. I let her eat for 5 minutes or so, then I had her back off quietly, then walk back on, then back off, then get on, then back off, then get on, then back off. She goes on and off very quietly. Her reward - aside from the alfalfa - is going to graze afterward.

Her eyes have been runny so yesterday the vet came out. Miracle of anatomy, those tear ducts are! Vet gave her an eye exam and everything looked healthy so he flushed her tear ducts. Have you ever seen that? It is pretty cool! I had no idea there was a convenient little hole in their nose that was the bottom of the duct - it is like a perfect engineering mechanism! When he flushed the right nostril, some gunk came out of the duct by the eyelid - pretty neat! I have an ointment to put in her eye for a couple days. And just in case you think that Princess Fancy Pants likes that, well, you'd be wrong. It is not much fun trying to wrestle a pony who doesn't want to have stuff put in her eye. The good news is that she's not tall enough to get away from me!

And today I got Freedom Feeder hay nets in the mail! I do my best by feeding the horses four times a day, but thought that the nets would be good to slow them down so that they don't go too long between meals. I set them up right as soon as I got them and put them out in the pastures. I took a little video of the horses trying to figure them out. The did a good job - especially Princess Fancy Pants who somehow figured out how to break they hay up better so it comes out more easily. I think maybe she started throwing it around or something.



Anyway, I'll follow the protocol of still having loose hay out while they transition to using the hay nets only. I'll probably buy more nets, too, so I can always have some filled and some in use.

That's the news from Farm Woe-be-gone, where all the mustangs are strong, all the TBs are good-looking, and all the ponies are above average! (well, really, they are all strong, good-looking, and above average!)

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