All King Edwards Horses Can’t Make Big Fences

Today’s lesson went quite well or at least I think it did but you would have to ask my instructor to know if it really did go well, anyway I had fun. I have mostly been learning the basic stuff the sort of stuff I should have learnt at the riding school I went to but, now I know more about riding it turns out that my old riding instructor didn’t know the first thing about riding or if they did they must have just chosen to not teach it, anyway back to my lesson, I have been working on lots of things like my transitions and getting the horse to work from behind, I also used spurs today I was not exactly skilful with them but I hope that will come with time. All In all it was a lot of fun and I think I have learnt a thing or two, oh and my saddle pad has arrived to day so I will soon be able to try it out.

In other news September is just a few hours away so I thought I would share some of my favourite blogs with any of my viewers that care to take a look, these blogs are all great and are well worth taking a look at and following in the new month.

My Spotty Pony this is a great blog full of interesting posts with beautiful photographs of England and some of its most wonderful estates and lots more.

Little House in Paradise is a lovely blog full of good nice to read posts with some truly wonderful stories, read the one about bees.

All Horse Stuff this blog is a lot of fun and may even teach you a thing about riding it’s a great blog for someone interested in trail riding or just horse stuff.

Please check out these blogs they are all great reads and a lot of fun to follow with nice friendly owners that run their blogs very well. There are so many good blogs out there that obviously I can’t list them all but take a look on my side bar for more good blogs.

A Minor Set Back

I have had to stop riding Niko as recently his saddle has been rubbing him I tried him in a different more padded numnah but still no good, so I’ll be getting this funny little thing ugly I know but it is only going under the saddle anyway, it’s been designed for horses with high withers or a poor top line, Niko has both high withers and sadly a poor top line too due to my incompetence in the saddle I am unable to get him working from behind and so have a lot of difficulty building his top line, anyway I am hopeful this will do the trick and stop the rubbing as there is very little point in getting a new saddle know as I now he isn’t going to be staying this shape for long.

In other news I am having another lesson tomorrow so I am hopeful that all will go well, I will let you all know how it went in my next post.

Say Hello to the Tree Net

Look at him doesn’t he look happy, dirty yes but happy, with a nice hay net. I have almost missed filling and hanging hay nets for the horses, since we moved I have not filled or hung a single hay net, until today, and yes that is a hay net in a tree.

Since we moved the horses have been living out and I haven’t had anywhere to hang hay nets so I decided enough was enough, and now I have turned some of the trees into handy hay net holders, I had to cut some of the branches off so that the horses wouldn’t hurt themselves when they tried to get to the hay net. The trees in the first two photos were already nearly striped bare of leaf but I took off the little twiggy bits.

And here is Murphy enjoying his hay net. The trees in his part of the paddock have a lot more leaf on them so look a bit better, Murphy really loved his hay net and it gave him more to do for longer.

Pip didn’t get a chance to try the hay nets as he was busy munching the left over haylage on the ground and by the time he was done the hay nets were all empty. Niko did get to have a go as well but I didn’t get any good photos. And as you can see here Madeline did also get to try the hay nets.

And finally here is a photo of Murphy unaware he has taken some of the tree with him, funny little chap he does get quite carried away and shakes and waves his head and hay net around so I am guessing that’s how he got the leaves in his mane.

We Found Your Whorls on It

There are ways of telling horses apart just like humans, we have finger prints which can be used to identify us, but then how do we tell horses apart as they clearly have no fingers? Well you must look to your horses coat, the whorls on your horses coat where the coat hairs change direction are like equine finger prints, well sort of.

Every equine has his or her own unique whorls that can be used to identify them just like humans have finger prints, the number of whorls, where they are located and the specific swirling pattern is all relevant. Whorls must be marked on a horse’s identification papers (passport).

A Nice New Rug

Here’s Tipper in his nice new stable rug, when we brought Tipper he didn’t come with any tack or rugs so he has been borrowing spare rugs from the other horses, but now the time has come to start getting him his own rugs, starting with this lovely new rug.

I still need to get him a turn out rug of his own, I have seen one I want but I just need to get around to ordering it. I was really happy with this winter stable rug as it is suitable for use in the dead of winter, meaning it’s very warm, most rugs like this are very expensive, but we got this one for a very low price indeed, just one more plus.

In other news I had my lesson as planned, I rode a lovely warm blood called Spike, I had a lot of fun and felt that it had helped a lot, the coach was very nice and helpful, plus they had a microphone so I could hear all they were saying loud and clear, so I was very happy with it all and have booked another one for next week.

Worming Time

Yesterday we wormed all the horses and ponies, here’s Madeline having hers she was ok but didn’t really like the new wormer I think it must have tasted worse than normal as she did try to waste a lot of it.

When we are worming the ponies we have to give them a smaller dose so as not to harm them.

And here is Murphy taking his wormer like a good boy, no fuss from him, but we did have a bit of trouble with Tipper which is why there are no photos. He wasn’t bad it’s just he is scared of syringes, so when he saw the wormer he ran away, but he got over it after a buck and then let me catch him and give him the wormer.

Niko took his wormer very nicely as always and we had no problem with him, he is always happy to stand and let you get on with it.

Here’s another one of Niko taking his wormer, he is showing what a good boy he is and that he has taken all his wormer, well apart from the stuff round his lips but that was soon gone too.

And finally here is little Pip he was so easy to worm and so nice about having it done. All in all it was very successful, Madeline did scrape my hand a little bit which I was slightly worried about at the time. I am not sure why Tipper is scared of syringes probably more mistreatment from his former owners. But he really is starting to trust me which I am very happy about.

Oh and in other goings on I am having a dressage lesson tomorrow, with an instructor I have never had before, and I have not had a lesson in long long time so this should be interesting.

Pearly Whites

Like planned the vet arrived on Monday to take a look at Madeline’s teeth, we don’t know if Madeline has ever had her teeth rasped before but she was still very good about it all. She has had quite a bit done on her mouth now, but will be seeing the vet again in about two weeks time to have a finish up done, we didn’t have it all done there and then because we didn’t want Madeline getting too stressed out, she was good about what she did have do so we were very happy with her.


In other news Niko is now sound in all gaits, touch wood, as you can see he wasn’t too impressed with me tacking him up and then standing there taking photos, and to show his distaste he is doing his seaside nag impression, but despite the look he was very good for me when I did ride.

So all is going pretty good.

Horse and Pony for Sale in the USA

Today’s post it a little different to my normal rambling, as a fellow blogger is selling two lovely equines in the United States. To start with they have a beautiful Chestnut Gelding called Hunter, he stands at 15.2hh, and is a very talented jumper, with a fantastic jumping form, he will make someone a very happy horse owner, click the link to visit Hunter's for sale page for more information.

And here is their other equine, this sweet pony will bring you a lot of happiness, she is a striking Blue Roan Mare called Bella, she stands at 14.2hh, and is the prefect show pony, she is flat work only due to an old injury, but don’t let that put you off she has beautiful confirmation, and would be very well suited to a child or learning adult, click the link to visit Bella's for sale page for more information.

Please do take a look at these two lovely equines, they are both registered, and for a very reasonable price.

The Weird and Not So Wonderful

Warning this post contains images you may find disturbing.

Here’s a slightly longer post to make up for the short one. I have encountered lots of odd things revolving around horses, like the time I was poo picking when Pip was being kept on his own and I found a dead mouse smothered in a poo. Now that has to have been a very good shot or a very stupid mouse, whatever happened it was a big shock to me. I did not take a photo of that one.

And the time I found a bird’s leg in the water bucket, how it got there I don’t know, I think a bird of prey must have been flying over and dropped it by mistake. I wondered why no one had drunk from the bucket, well there was my answer.

And last but not least the time we went to throw away the rubbish left over from the haylage and found this little chap. It was quite a pleasant surprise considering the other things. This toad had made his/her home in the rubbish so we had to leave it and wait for them to move on, and then throw it away.

If you have any weird or funny animal related stories feel free share them.

Vet’s Appointment

Just a quick one today. Madeline has been booked in for the vet to come and see her on Monday, the vet’s going to be taking a look at her mouth, and may be rasping her teeth, as we have seen a slight swelling on her Masseter which we believe is related to some form of mouth problem.

Photos That Were Nearly Left Behind

I take many photos but in the scheme of things I use very few of them on my blog, so here are some of the photos that were nearly left behind.

So there you go some of the photo that nearly never appeared on my blog, hope you like them.

Third Time Lucky… Or Not

Today I had another go at plaiting Niko’s mane, so to start with the humiliating part and I mean humiliating for Niko, but I did such a poor job it is a bit for me too. Anyway as you can see I started by dividing the mane into sections, I was then going to put a product on the section I was plaiting to make it easier to plait, but my spraying head thingy on the bottle broke, so I had to do it without the help of Chestfields, not off to a good start.

But here is the finished result of my hard work and Niko’s patience, even if he did bite me, the polo made him do it. As you can quite clearly see it is far from neat which is sadly sort of the point of plaiting your horse, the plaits are mostly different sizes, they are meant to all be the same, and traditionally there should be an uneven number of plaits in the mane but I forgot about that at the time.

And here is his mane looking all curly and messy after I took the plaits out, so all in all not so successful, but I guess practice makes perfect, or hopefully it does. This was my third time plaiting a mane up so I have a lot of practising still to do.

New Blogs Report

Not too long ago one of my family members started two new blogs, the first is called Pip’s Pony Club, and yes that is our Pip that I have often posted about, Pip’s Pony Club is a good starting point for anyone interested in equines.

Next up we have New Horse Owners, this blog can be a lot of help to a new horse owner as it is full of useful information, and has plenty of links to helpful sites and sites you can buy some of the items shown on the blog from.

Please note I do not run these blogs.

Stopping a Cribber

Niko hurt himself recently, we think he must have pulled something in his shoulder, I don’t think it’s anything too serious, however he has been cribbing and making it worse so not long ago, we went to get something to stop him.

Yep that’s right Cribox, we have tried Cribox before with little success, but having said that Niko had not been living out before, when he is in a box he is surrounded by things he can crib on like the door and parts of the walls, but when he is in the paddock it is a much larger space, so he has longer to walk before he can crib.

So I set about applying the Cribox paint to the tops of the fence posts and a little of the way down the post, I really had to use a lot of Cribox for the first coat to give it a good covering and let some of it soak into the post. I now give them a quick do every day to make sure the post has a good covering of Cribox, if the posts are not repainted frequently the Cribox will not be strong enough to stop the horse cribbing.

And here is the finished result of all that painting, I have given the post a thick coat of Cribox on the top where he will grip the wood with his top set of teeth, and a slightly thinner coat down the side were he sometimes touches the wood with his bottom jaw, this has been working well so far.

It has been working so well that I haven’t see Niko crib once since we started this, and he looks to be pretty much sound, not quite right yet but almost there. He has also been spending more time searching for food and is getting a nicer shape to him, so all in all it is working out quite nicely.

Getting To the Root of It

If you were to walk though our paddock you would probably notice that lots of the ground has been dug up, but who or what is digging up the paddock, rabbits maybe, or a dog perhaps dogs dig holes right, but no it is none of those things, so what is it?

Oh why did I not think of the pony, yes that’s right little Murphy has been caught red handed digging up the paddock, but why would he do this you say, well I will explain, sometime ago I did a post about stinging nettles and how the horses enjoy them, well it seems they have a taste for the roots as well.

Murphy will spend lots of his time foraging and digging up stinging nettle roots, the roots contain lots of minerals that will benefit Murphy’s health, plus he seems to be very content wondering around digging up roots so I have no problem with it.

Here is a photo of Murphy with his prize, a tasty stinging nettle root, Murphy works hard digging and searching for the roots and I think this is a treat well earned.

It’s Worth the Smell

We have been feeding Honeychop for quite sometime now and it has never failed to please, we had been feeding the Honeychop plus Apple which all the equines loved. I do love to try new products and different feeds, so I thought it was time for a change, so I chose Honeychop plus Garlic it sure is smelly but it sure is good.

As well as being something different to Honeychop plus Apple for the horses and ponies to try Honeychop plus Garlic also contains a higher protein level, and is great for the summer as the garlic helps to repel flies.

As you can see the new feed goes down very nicely, all in all the Honeychop plus Garlic is a very good feed, it helps to keep your horse in good health, and keeps the flies away, if you are interested in feeding Honeychop click the link to visit their website.