Day 27 ~ Oh Domesticated Life

Well we spent our first day in the barn today. Lindsay has been staying outside in her paddock, but I've been wanting to get her adjusted to being in a stall as well. Not that she'll spend the majority of her time there..and in the long run will be out on pasture, which I know will make her very happy :).. but I wanted her to realize the stall is a safe place to be. She was a bit nervous walking into the barn, but she was brave and over came her fears walking on in the barn and then into her freshly bedded stall. I turned her fan on high b/c it was a hot day and gave her some hay and let her settle. She was a bit anxious at first, but much quieter than many babies I've stalled for the first time. After about 30 minutes I came out to find her standing square in front of her fan with that salt n pepper mane blowing in the breeze! So happy to see that :)She stayed in her stall in front of her fan during the heat of the day then around 7 pm once it was cooled down I pulled her out.

This time we groomed in the barn aisle...we have been doing all this in the round pen...She wanted to be fidgety a little initially, just wasn't sure what was going on, but I encouraged her to ground tie and stand in the middle of the ally way and she obliged quickly. I curried her well and picked her feet out. I also went ahead and gave her a trim today. I did not touch her w/ the nippers, didn't need to..just used the rasp. I rounded her front toes a good bit as they were getting a little long. I had balanced out that high inside wall on her front right the other day. It appears there is an old abscess growing out and that side just took off growing w/ that abscess. She does not conformationally load the inside of that foot and really watching her travel does not make me feel like she has any reason to have a higher wall on the inside, it was like her body knew it needed to get that old abscess grown out asap so it just speed up growing! So, I rounded her walls up and rolled her front toes. On her back feet she needed a little balancing on her right as well, so I leveled it and rounded the wall softly, but did not back or roll the hind toes as much. I really like the way her hind feet are naturally shaped (as well as the front for that matter) and I felt like if I backed her toe up it would cause her to knuckle over to much when she stops. She is Really liking putting on the brakes and using her hind end gears, do not want to discourage that!

We then fly sprayed and tacked up and off we went. I hopped on her cold turkey this time, no round pen work, and she stepped off like a pro :) We did some flexing in the small ring first and started to initiate some shoulder yielding. She has been a bit more flexible and malleable tracking right from the start..this was apparent at liberty in the round pen, but she is becoming much looser tracking left as well. We worked a lot on moving her shoulders away from my rein and leg. We then worked in the big arena and cantered some big circles both ways. She was a very good girl. Once we finished up we cooled down by walking all around the barn yard and where Mike's tractor implements are to see some new things. We even worked on picking up a rope off of the post it was hanging on. That did scare her at first. So far I have always introduced new objects to her from the ground, never have I picked up something while sitting on her... but after she thought for a moment she really seemed to realize all way ok and settled back down. We picked the rope up and hung it back up numerous times and finished our ride by riding up and into the barn. (Our aisle has quite good clearance to do so)

I rinsed her off and we loaded on and off the trailer a few times, practicing having her wait for me to unload and she was quite the good girl so we called it a day. It's amazing to me we haven't even hit the 30 day mark and she is already reminding me of a domestic horse in many ways..she even likes to try and get a scratch as I am pulling off her sweaty bridle LOL She still remains more sensitive and "in tune" to me than most domestic horses though and she is maturing into quite the fabulous ride :)Love her more every day!