Wordless Wednesday - Dreaming of Summer

Lions and Tigers and Bears, Oh My...Again!

I'm exhausted this morning. We went to bed shortly after 10 last night. I got up again because Courtney kitty wanted in shortly before midnight. Shortly before 2 AM this morning one of our outdoor dogs started barking...incessantly, until JB got up to see what he was barking at. He came back to bed and said he didn't see anything. But Bandit kept barking so JB got up again, went out on the deck to the north of the house with a flood light and came trotting back to the bedroom to get dressed. There was a BIG bear sitting on the split rock near the tractor, acting like he was going to go up the tree there. I got up, got dressed, grabbed my truck keys and JB grabbed the rifle, a flashlight and the flood light. The flood light is BRIGHT but it overheats and quits without warning...not a good thing if you're out there in pitch black with a bear! So, we went out to the truck together and JB headed off for the girl's pasture with rifle and lights in hand and I started up the truck and headed out behind the house and up north to shine the headlights up the hill to the north into the male's pastures. We never did see the bear again so after JB went through every pasture and counted heads we headed back in and went back to bed. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to fall back to sleep when the adrenaline is pumping like crazy through your body?!

This morning when I went out to feed the horses, I discovered the 30 gallon trash bin where I keep all the rabbit food dumped over, ripped open and the food containers were spread all over the ground. I always use a bungee cord to hold down the lids on all the feed bins if I leave them outside so the bears and deer cannot get into them - at least as easily. JB came out and found the carton of oats sitting on the split rock torn open and half eaten. I cleaned up the mess and dragged the bin to the drive so I could figure out where to put it (somewhere inside) so the bear doesn't come back. While I was cleaning this up, Handel kept giving the alarm call and looking up the hill towards the Barn Shed. Puff, the 29 year old POA mare kept rounding up the female llamas and putting them in the interior corner of the pasture. She refused to come down the hill to eat her breakfast in the corner where she normally eats. I had to take her breakfast to her. I was as nervous as a long tailed cat in a room full of rockers! I had Annie, our mini Aussie out with me to do chores and she was sniffing around like crazy but wasn't growling or acting like there was anything close by so that helped calm me a bit. I kept stepping back and looking up into the pine trees before I walked under them, just in case Yogi Bear had shimmied up a tree for the night.

After feeding the horses and llamas I started filling water tanks and as I was going through the pastures checking everyone out I discovered a pile of bear scat right in front of the Barn Shed. Nice...that's always a fun discovery. Thank goodness I didn't step in it...ewwwww! I dragged the rabbit feed bin into the Barn Shed and I hope the bear doesn't decide to attempt to break in to get to it.

I hope Yogi doesn't come back again tonight because I need my beauty rest. When I don't get my full 8 hours of sleep I get up feeling really ugly in the morning. He will not want to mess with me if he wakes me up again tonight!

First Rain Storm of the Season

We got our first rain storm of the season last night. It started out as a light rain and quickly turned into slushy hail with lots of rain driven by winds. We really needed the moisture, especially since lightning started a fire across the road behind our house right before the rain started. In fact, last week a fire started across the road, lasted for four days and burned over 30 acres. They even brought in a slurry plane the first night of the fire - the fire was headed straight north towards a new home built at the top of a hill. The area across the road is now a gated community with 35 to 40 acre lots that start at $250,000 just for the lot. Right now there are 3 houses built on those lots and they are all huge expensive homes. The lake is actually Wrights Reservoir and the water rights are owned by Canon City, a city about a mile southeast of here. Fishing is allowed at the lake if you belong to a sportsman's club (which is very expensive - at least for our budget). And a rancher to the south of us grazes her cows in that area around the lake.

The photo is of Pikes Peak as the sun was setting. The eerie coloring only lasted for a few minutes and I managed to get a couple of photos before it disappeared. The horse in the photo is Puff, our 29 year old POA (Pony of the Americas). She was completely unphased by the storm and continued to munch on hay throughout. The llamas, on the other hand, were very upset by the storm because they couldn't find a dry spot to kush in. Llamas generally lay down during storms - ours usually lay down under one of the pine trees in their pasture. But, that means they are covered with splattered mud after the storm ends. Today they are all dry and have rolled to remove the mud caked dirt from their fiber and are out happily grazing this morning.

Meet my Magnificent Maggie Mae!

I have finally found "The One"! Her name is Maggie Mae and she is a beautiful bay 10 year old Appendix Quarter Horse mare. Maggie Mae is gentle, sweet, level headed, respectful, smart and pretty much everything I was looking for in my dream horse. My Peruvian Paso, Tango, passed away suddenly right before Christmas in 2007 and I wasn't sure whether or not I wanted to get another horse. I even debated selling our Arabian mare, Jazz (who is hubby Jim's horse even though he bought her for me - Jazz and I don't see eye to eye since I don't put up with her Diva BS!) and not having any horses except for our 29 year old POA mare who has earned her right to a forever home here, but that's a story for another post! Over the past year I have browsed the on-line horse selling sites, the main one being AgDirect where I signed up to be notified any time a horse matching my search criteria was listed. So far, nothing looked even remotely interesting and certainly all far from my "perfect horse". I had a budget to stick to, too, which made my search even more difficult. Long story short(er) I finally stumbled on to CraigsList for Colorado Springs and found an ad for a trail horse and clicked through to the CL ad which had another link for Equine Partnership where I then found two horses - one of which was Maggie Mae. I showed the link to Jim and after he watched the videos of Maggie he told me to call them right away and ask if she was still available (this was Super Bowl Sunday mind you). I called Erin and made arrangements to head down to her place right away - turns out she only lives an hour south of us. We spent over 3 hours visiting with Erin and getting to know Maggie Mae. I had not ridden Tango since October 2004 when I took a really bad fall that sent me to ER and then I was on crutches and hobbling for weeks - with a sprained butt (who sprains their butt for heaven's sake?!) I was very nervous on Maggie Mae but she was a perfect little lady - did I mention she can be ridden with nothing but a halter?! We made the decision that Maggie Mae was indeed "The One" and put a deposit on her that day and picked her up the next weekend.

I can highly recommend Erin Howell of Equine Partnership if you're looking for a horse (Erin acts as a broker for others wanting to find new homes for their horses) or if you're looking for a riding instructor. Erin is a Certified Therapeutic Riding Instructor who believes in building a partnership with your equine friend. She very graciously offered me a free lesson on her horse, Jude, the day we went to pick Maggie Mae up. She helped me to get past that mental block I had after suffering the injuries on my last ride and feel comfortable in the saddle again. I still need to work on building my confidence but Erin told me " You are a good rider, with impeccable balance and position" which made me feel so good about my basic riding abilities. Her beliefs and training methods are so similar to what I use myself when working with our horses and llamas, I was immediately drawn to her. Here is a link to her website, you should check her out: http://www.equinepartnershiperin.com/

So, I will be sharing more pics of Maggie Mae and updates on her and our journey together. I'm even thinking of starting a new blog just for Maggie Mae - Me and Maggie Mae's Magnificent Journey - or something to that effect. I have no plans for competing or doing anything amazing with Maggie Mae, I just wanted a horse that I could love and trust and ride without fear of being dumped and injured. And Maggie Mae fits the bill...perfectly.

Wordless Wednesday

Equine Bliss