Monday Ramblings

This weekend I talked with my big hay supplier. It sounds like may hay is ready whenever I am! Eeep! I need to do some major cleaning. When I bought the small squares I stashed them in the hay shed. Unfortunately that's right where I need to put some of the big squares.

So now I have to figure out where to put all my big squares. I dont' want to move the small squares since they were baled so loose. I pulled one down last night for feeding and it split open on me. Of course fowl words came flying out of my mouth.

I have room for 32 bales in my hay shed and another 22 bales in the hay barn. I put my request in for 70. That's right 70 big squares. I am afraid to know what the cost is going to be. This isn't just ditch hay. It's dairy quality hay. That means weed free, no dust, superb hay. It's the best hay I've ever seen and I get to write a HUGE check for it. But the horses seem to thrive on it. And with the weird weather we had this year it was tough for them to get a good cutting where there was no rain. They assured me that my hay didn't get rained on. Ssssheeew!

I guess I'll be cleaning out the big red shed and we'll stash the rest in there. I'm a bit worried since by the time I need those bales it'll be almost spring. We'll be dealing with mud and such and it will be much harder to manuver around with the ol' Massey. I guess we'll make due. We always do.

I talked with someone who said that they were going to pay $60 a ton. I'm sure to pay way more than that since this isn't ditch hay. I'm guessing I'll be looking at $100 per ton. I paid $110 a ton last year.

Hopefully I ordered enough. I'm right at the brink of not enough. One bale, per horse, per month. That's how it normally works. Except that Maverick eats a ton. Well, maybe not literally but he eats SO much. That's why I wanted the small squares as a supplement but I'm already digging in to that stash so I'm not sure what to do. I can't touch any of the big squares until at minimum November. I was hoping I could hold off until December but the pasture doesn't look that way. It's been overgrazed.

Enough about hay and on to more fun topics... Zeke. I took some pics of him last night and will post more as I learn more about him. I really wanted to see how my saddle would work on him. I think the same settings I have for Rain will work for Zeke. I wanted to change my cinch but the buckle was rusted shut. So I just left everything as it was for now.

I need to get a bridle that actually fits him. The one I threw on was WAY too big. I may try to find one here tonight. I did decide I wanted to see how he would handle. Without a proper fitting bridle I wasn't willing to risk it. So instead I lunged him. He did really well. In fact, when I hollered WHOA Zeke stopped and walked up to me. Yeah, he's trained.

I couldn't get him to lunge for very long. After a few circles both ways and "whoaing" he decided he was done with it. I didn't want to push my luck so I went to see what he was going to be like when I acted like I would mount. I was warned he doesn't stand. Nope, he doesn't stand. Not sure yet how to fix that but in time it'll be fixable.

I'm hoping to ride him tonight. If not, I need to ride Maverick. Ok, I need to ride Maverick no matter what. So maybe I'll saddle up both Maverick and Zeke and ride in the small drylot. If they are both standing waiting to be ridden I'll be more gunho about it. Then I'll feel like I'm actually doing something with the horses other than letting them become overgrown couch potatoes.

I also need to work Rain and Chaos before this weekend's ride. Not real sure how it's going to go. I need to take some spunk out of Rain before we go on a ride. I have Friday off so if the hay doesnt' come Friday maybe Dad and I will go for a ride.

I'm also trying to work on my "todo list. I realized yesterday that I only had one item marked off. Oh that made me mad. So I got cracking on a few different items on my list. Of course, nothing got completely finished so I could mark it off.

But I did get the stalls cleaned out in the barn. I need to do some additional cleaning so that it doesn't look like a total pigsty. Note to horse: It's a barn not a pig pen!

I also cleaned out one of the box stalls. It has been awhile since I cleaned it. I'm afraid I couldn't get everything up so I have to take an ice pic to it. oh well. At least now we can actually get to where I want the stall and maybe get a permanent stall built instead of using corral panels. Mike left the tractor there so I could clean out the other box stall.

We also tried our hand at putting in some fence posts. Unfortunately the ground is SO hard that we couldn't get more than about 1 1/2 feet deep. We poured some water in the whole so hopefully we can get a bit deeper. I want a wood fence between the barn/leanto and the chicken coop. This portion will be the main entryway for the mare pasture. It's also the main entry to the poop pile and burn pile. I'd feel better if we could have that fence up. Then I could put the ponies on the west side of that fence and just throw up a bit more electric and have more pasture!!

I'm hoping that we can maybe get some fencing done this week. I'm not sure that this weekend's ride will last very long. Last year the Sunday ride was done early and we were able to work on stuff at home. My hope is that we can get done early with the ride and go back to fencing. Maybe I can talk the parents into helping??

So that's it for now. After being at work all day I'm ready to go home and hug the horses and enjoy some good quality time with them.