Riding and stuff

I rode River on Sunday.  For more than 30 seconds.  He is such a good boy.  We rode with another horse in the ring for the first time.  He only got jiggy once, when one of the horses in the pasture started running around hollering.  I carried a whip (pink and sparkly!), to which he responded well.  But I didn't use the running martingale, which was a mistake.  Not that he's really bad without it, but ask him to trot and his head goes up like a periscope.  It's rather awkward.  He doesn't seem to get this whole "trotting under saddle" business.  On the longe, he moves like a champ.  With a rider, his head is up, his neck short, and he moves very oddly.  I really need to get after him to move forward in a real trot.  I'll have to see if someone can longe him while I ride.  Hopefully that will help him figure it out a bit better.

The round pen has been more or less reassembled, so as long as the weather stays nice, Riv will spend nights in that with his alfalfa and grain.  He's a pokey eater and will share with at least one other horse, so this way he has all night to eat without interruption.  His weight is slowly but steadily improving.

A few pictures from yesterday...

His "ner?" face:

Ah, that's a bit more dignified:

Seriously, isn't his head strangely shaped?

Princess River

River is a princess.  Not a palace-living, tiara-wearing, throne-sitting princess.  A "princess and the pea" princess.  Now, he is apparently very sensitive to bugs.

Um, yeah.  Ew.  Pictures can't really convey how gross he is.  He's all lumpy and yucky.  He looks like an extra in a horror flick about zombie horses.  At least he's putting weight on and regrowing hair... 

I had previously mentioned his Donald Trump guard hairs.  This isn't a great picture, and the effect is somewhat diminished because his regular coat is regrowing, but you can kind of see what I meant:

Also, it's a nice shot of his lumps and bumps.  Imagine those random looooong chestnut hairs scattered on bare black skin.  Picture them blowing in the breeze, like amber waves of grain.

Yeah.  Princess River gets laughed at a lot.

Also, blogger changed the layout for posting and stuff and it's really annoying.

Speshul River

Can we get a close-up of that?


How did he do it? We have no idea. My poor BO goes out every day in fear of what she's going to find. How did he injure himself today? Is it a minor scrape or is he missing a pound of flesh?

On the bright side, he is so stinkin' sweet. He's like a big dog, just sweetly affectionate and loving. I'd like to bubble wrap him so he stops having issues, but oh well. My BO adores him, even if he is going to give her an ulcer from stress!

Also, we've decided that his balding is due to seasonal alopecia. He's regrowing hair, even if it is baby fine. Of course, he's still in the process of losing hair, so we're not quite on the good side of this yet.

Only River...

Also, I'd just like to point out that my cost to buy River was $20 I pitched in for gas money to get him home. He goes through a $22 bag of Ultium every 5 days (or a little faster). Yeah. My horse costs more to feed than he did to buy.

Happy birthday!

Happy Birthday, River! Saturday was Riv's birthday, he is 12 years old.

Alrighty, update time...

He's been on 10 pounds of Ultium a day for a few weeks now and he's slowly gaining. He's also on a round bale, so he gets lots and lots of food. He's out in a herd now, there are a total of 6 horses together. It's great because they all have their friends, but they don't get crazy attached like when it's only 2 or 3 together.

Because he's gaining, I decided to throw him on the longe the other day to see how he is. He was pretty frisky! I saw him canter for the first time! I had him go over an elevated pole a few times, which he did like a champ. Here are a few stills from a video:




Loooooove his trot!

And here's the video:


Here's a fun picture:

LOL! River didn't care at all, and Chicken stayed up there for a few minutes before fluttering down. Chicken comes running when she sees me because she knows I have grain. She's probably getting fat from eating River's food.

River with a couple members of his herd.


Yes, he's still having some hair loss.


Poor guy looks ridiculous.


The hair loss situation is progressing... the places he lost hair first are growing back, but new places are going freshly bald. But he is regrowing hair, so I'm not really worried about it. For now he just looks stupid.

He has a halo!


"Can I have more peppermints?"

You know how nice I am? I found a bag of individually wrapped peppermints and gave him a ton of them for his birthday, instead of candy canes. Because he likes the individually wrapped ones better. Silly boy.

Also, isn't his head really weirdly shaped?

Oh geez.

I've been really neglectful.

Um. Okay. River is gross right now. His weight isn't where we want it and he's missing a bunch of hair on his face and neck. It's kind of embarrassing. Talked to my super-awesome BO about his weight.. there's only so much she can feed with what I pay for board, so I'm providing Ultium. He's been on it for not-quite 2 weeks and is at about 10 pounds a day. It's hard to tell if he's putting anything on yet, but goshdarnit he will OR ELSE. They also got round bales again.. yummy alfalfa! He needs to pack on those pounds. The walk-trot show we were going to is off, obviously.

Also, he's a dumb boy.

Exhibit A: They've been getting hay up near the front of the paddock. Now that things are drying out, BO put hay further back. River stood at the gate waiting for his hay to be delivered in front of him. He had to be led over to the hay for several feedings. Each time, he was like "I want food! I want food! Where's my hay? Where is--oooooh, there it is!!" Idiot.

Exhibit B: It's been River, Gryffin (another FLF OTTB), and Irish (my mare) in the paddock for a few months. We decided to rearrange and put Irish out with the other girls because she and Gryffin are just way too attached. Yeah. She and Gryffin were mostly fine. River stood by the fence gazing longingly at Irish. For like two days. My BO finally caved and put Irish back with the boys because Mr. Dumbass wasn't eating.

Oh, and while Irish was away, BO attempted to put another gelding in with the boys. Other gelding is kind of a jerk, so hey, put him out with River because River's an asshole and he won't take any crap! Um... River got his ass handed to him by an older 15hh gelding. Well, it was a good try.

So, in summary, River is a dumb boy who needs to fatten up.

Mother Nature needs to go into rehab.

Monday it was 10. Wednesday it was 65. Today it was around 30 and snowing. Next week, 50s-60s. We've had 4 seasons in 5 days.

It was so exciting to take blankets off and put sheets on.

See how excited he is???

Being a thoughtful horse, he shares his grain with Chicken.


This morning I had to run over before work and throw a liner on under the sheet. His blanket is just too gross, I don't want to use it unless I have to. *shudder* I think it's going to soak in a trough for a day or so before I try to wash it.

Sorrysorrysorry

I've been neglecting this, I know.

Let's see...

1. Weather has been ridiculous. Monday morning it was 10. Today it's about 60. WTF?
2. Mud. Ewwwwwwwwwwwwww. River is gross and his blanket is grosser. I don't even want to think about it.
3. I joined an MMA gym. I've only been to a couple of classes so far, but I'm loving it! It's a killer workout and it's going to be awesome for riding.
4. I finally got around to calling River's trainer to ask about getting his paperwork, so that should be here soon. I just have to get him a Rabies vaccine. Normally I would have my dad do it, but as my dad does not know about River, I'm going to have to pay a vet to do it. Gr. But I did tell Riv's trainer that he's wonderful, I've ridden him 4 times, 2 of them bareback, and he's loving life being kicked out in a field.
5. Um. I think that's about it.

OH!

The super duper very exciting thing I mentioned before? It's looking good!! Nothing is guaranteed yet, but there's definite progress!