Cockleburs, Grain, and Easter

Last night while I had Bo “captive” eating in the barn, I thought I might as well tackle his tail. He’s impossible to groom if he’s not distracted with food. Lucky for me, he gets a mix of beet pulp, calf manna, and sweet feed so it occupied his time for almost the entire time it took for me to pull cockleburs. Oh how I hate those prickly little burs. Luckily, Bo only had one or two in his mane. I also decided that I might as well go after Zeke’s tail too. I swear he specifically rolls in the worst spot where the cockleburs grew last year. Thank goodness for show sheen. I sprayed Zeke’s tail down in showsheen in hopes that the cockleburs wouldn’t stick as bad when he rolls right after I let him out of the barn.

I had thought about saddling someone up but I wasn’t feeling all that great and decided I’d do some grooming instead. I kicked Zeke out of the barn and haltered Bo and Jim. Everyone except Jim has at least had a curry comb over them within the last week. Jim is just so standoffish that it takes a lot of patience to convince him to stand long enough to walk up to him and even more patience to groom him if he’s not haltered. I figured since he was in the barn, I might as well get the cockleburs out of his mane and tail. He has such a full mane and tail; I knew it was going to take a long time.

I haltered Bo up and tied him to the trailer. Bad idea. There is some bad history with Bo and being tied to a trailer. I’m not sure if he just gets excited because trailers mean he gets to work or if something bad happened. I put Jim right next to him but Bo still wouldn’t settle down. Bo’s ground manners have gone to pot too (not that they were all that great when we got him last year). Guess we’ll be working with ground manners and desensitizing him to the trailer. He gets worked up whenever I put him in the trailer too. Poor guy. Instead of stressing him out during his grooming (and me having to worry about getting stomped), I moved him over to a different spot and he eventually settled down. He’s shedding but not like last year when he was losing tufts of hair. It’s amazing what a year will do. Bo is still too thin for my liking. When the weather got nicer, I cut back on everyone’s grain ration. Bad idea for Bo. He dropped more weight than I like so he’s back to full ration of grain. Once I get Flower’s vet bills (yes, that’s plural) taken care of, I’ll haul Bo back to the vet to get his teeth checked and see if there are any other underlying problems we missed.

I expect that Ivan is part of the problem with Bo’s weight loss. Ivan, as laid back as he is, has decided to be a bully with Bo. Any time Bo finds a pile to eat from, Ivan wanders over and pushes Bo out of the way. Now don’t get upset, I have lots of little piles so that when someone moves from one pile to another, everyone doesn’t always have to shift to a different pile. I have about five or six extra piles of hay just so there’s always some place for everyone to go. And all the hay is strategically placed so that no one gets cornered or gets too close to someone they don’t get along with.

I think once Bo gets out on grass, he’ll pick the weight up pretty quick. I will start hand grazing him to get him used to grass a little bit sooner than the rest of the herd. Hopefully that’ll help some with the ground manners and the weight gain. But we’ll see what the vet says too.

After I finished grooming Bo, I tackled Jim’s ample mane and tail. He has the thickest tail of any horse I’ve ever met. Luckily he wasn’t too bad but I know he got bored standing there. I showsheened the heck out of his tail in hopes that the burs just fall off. I know better than to expect such a thing, but I can always hope right? (He already had a large some of cockleburs this morning.) Jim really is a good horse even if he is standoffish. He’s a workaholic but I’ve put him into semi-retirement. Oh sure he’s only 24 years old but he too has become a bit of a hard keeper. He’s on my watch list and will always require beet pulp. But Jim doesn’t let his age get in the way. He acts more like he’s 14 than 24 some days.

I am a little bit more concerned about Queen. When Flower had her accident, I pulled Queen out so that Flower wouldn’t be alone. No need to stress her out more than she already was. I had them in the pen by the barn. Of course Flower had to lie down more but I noticed that Queen picked up that habit too. I’m glad to see her resting more but when I put her back in with Thor, she continued to follow that same habit. She used to never lie down so it’s a bit of a concern. I don’t know if her arthritis is really acting up or if she’s just come to enjoy a soft place to lie down. Babe works pretty hard to pull out the hay from the round bale to make a bed for Queen.

While I was pulling cockleburs and grooming Bo and Jim, Thor let me know in no uncertain terms that I was late in getting to his grain. He kept whinnying to me. At first, Thor’s whinnying would set Babe to whinnying too but she soon figured out I wasn’t coming right away and settled back down to devouring the round bale (and making Queen a new bed to snooze in). But through the entire grooming, Thor wouldn’t let up and would whinny every five to ten minutes telling me how disgusted he was with me not serving him immediately. He is such a love. I’m glad he’s finally adjusting to his blindness. He’s been completely blind now for a year. He’s still skittish when anyone touches his face (even if you talk to him and let him know you are near). But he’s adjusted pretty well and uses his nose to “see” everything. I sometimes forget that he’s blind.

When I did finally get to graining Thor, Babe, and Queen, I tossed their dishes out and proceeded to get other chores done. I still put beet pulp in with Queen’s grain. Last year Queen lost some weight and I don’t want her to go downhill. When I came around the corner, all three had their noses in the dish with the beet pulp. Queen had taken to sharing her grain with Thor but apparently she’s given up all hope of keeping her grain to herself and let Babe in on the treat. I so wish I would have had a camera. Imagine three noses (one being pretty big), in one of those rubber dishes. Not a lot of room but they all seemed to get along and enjoy the food and company.

We need to make a grain and supplement run this weekend. Rabbit is almost out of her antihistamine medicine. She absolutely HAS to be on an antihistamine. Lately I thought it wasn’t really working. Well, it is. The other day I threw just a handful of hay over the fence for her, just some loose hay. Within seconds she was coughing like crazy. But that was before she had taken her medicine. After her medicine, she wasn’t as bad. She still coughs after taking her antihistamine and still wheezes so that’s why I thought the meds weren’t working. Apparently they work but she has, what I could consider, a bad case of heaves. Luckily she’s retired from all riding and making babies. She can just focus on breathing. Having asthma myself, I totally understand how she feels. So I want to make sure that she never runs out of antihistamine…ever. I’ll be glad to get her out on pasture but we’ll keep her on the antihistamine year round.

I can’t believe it’s already Easter. Easter last year was pretty late in April. Easter weekend last year was when we rescued Savanna, Sahara, and to our surprise Sir Prize (now affectionately known as Jett, who is growing like crazy!) It’s amazing to think how much has happened in just a year. Savanna has come a long way in that year. I’ll have to snag a few pictures of Savanna now so you can all see her. Or check her out on Gentle Spirit’s Facebook page. She’s got a totally different look on her face now. Not a look of sheer survival. It’s a look of question. She’s come a long way in the last year and I expect it’ll take her another year to get further. I can’t imagine what she’d gone through in her short life but she’s probably seen more bad than most of us have in all our lives. I’m proud of her and of Gentle Spirits for all the hard work they’ve put into her. I expect within the next year, she’ll really come out of her shell and she’ll shine like the diamond she is. Or maybe she’s more of a black pearl, rare and treated like a precious jewel. Whatever she may be, she’s come a long way. I’ll also have to get pictures of Jett so you can see how much he’s grown. It’s hard to believe that he’ll be a year old next month (May 10th to be exact)!

And I was able to snap a few pictures of Bo last night. I’ll post them here and on our Facebook page this weekend. You’ll see what I mean when I say he’s still thin. We’ll see what the vet has to say and hopefully the grass will help.

If I don’t post again before this weekend, have a great Easter.