Walking the Oversized Dog

I woke up early on Sunday morning and headed into work - only to discover that I didn't work that day because I had agreed to take someone's Saturday shift the following weekend. D'oh!

So off to the barn I went.

It was a perfect summer morning. It had rained overnight and the temperature was cool enough that you wanted to do something outside but didn't have to wear a sweater.

Stitch was greatly enjoying his morning nap when I drove in. He is very much a kid who sleeps hard and does not want to get out of bed when mom says it's time to get up.

Flat out in his circus tent pj's.

I decided that Stitch and I would go for a walk down the road. I wanted to do something with him away from the arena, and since it had rained the gravel road was softer and would be easier on his toes.

So off we went.

This was the first time I had taken Stitch away from the barn and away from his fellow equids. I wasn't sure how he would behave, but didn't think there would be any issues.

Just walking the oversized dog.

I was right. He was a superstar.

He was very brave and defended me from the trained guard boulders that popped up after the tall ditch grass next to the neighbours driveway. He maintained eye contact with the leader, the biggest one, as we passed, and that boulder learned it's lesson and gave us no troubles on the return trip home.

They were very menacing in person.

Another two doors down lives a pony, quite possibly an ungelded one, who to my knowledge lives by himself, and thus gets very excited whenever another horse walks down the road. There is a line of trees between his fence and the road, so we can hear him galloping and screaming, but you can't really see him between the trees. He can cause a bit of excitement as we walk past him.

He's starting to figure out how to pose for pictures.

Stitch saw and heard him, stopped, got taller, and then walked quietly past. I didn't even have to give a yank on the lead at any time.

Work it, baby.

On the way home he called out to his friends a couple of times just to make sure they were still within earshot, but that was the only stress reaction he gave. We had lots of relaxed snorts and sighs, so he seemed to enjoy going out to explore.

Stitch's talking face.

It was a good first time going away from home experience that we will have to repeat again through the fall. I'm hoping that I will have him going enough to be comfortable to take him out into the crop field in October for a hack, but we'll see. It's too hard to walk around it on foot, I would only do it if we can ride it. 

Very Demure. Very Mindful.

On Friday Stitch saw the vet to get his teeth floated. It was the first time that he's been sedated since I've had him, also probably the first time since he lost his testicles. I am happy to say that he is a cheap drunk and it only took the initial dose of sedative to get the job done. The two grey ponies, especially Phantom, were notorious for needing extra sedation on dental days - Phantom's record was three top-up's after the initial dose at a cost of $125 for just the sedation. Stitch's sedation came to $40. Very demure. Very mindful.

The vet didn't have any concerns about his mouth. He had some sharp edges where caps had come off, but his bite and alignment were good. She recommended that he get done in another six months after he's lost more caps. That will tie in nicely with getting it done around the time that I plan to start him again after his winter break.

Stitch was even polite enough to stand quietly in a stall while he came back to full consciousness. I don't know if he's ever been stalled before. Again, a change from the grey mare who got angry at being in jail and would bang the crap out of the stall door.

I also took the opportunity for a quick bean check - didn't find anything. Didn't get my head kicked in either.

Now, if I can ever get over the lingering phlegm and snot from last week's Covid, we will be ready to get to proper work. 

Stitch's First Rider

Stitch has had his first rider onboard!

This giant unicorn and a rainbow balloon has been hanging out in one stall of my horse trailer since last summer when I had set them up for Phantom and Cisco's birthdays. They didn't deflate that much (just filled with air) and I kept them around in case I wanted to use them in the future.

Well, the time had come for them to die - I wanted the space back in the trailer. But I might as well introduce Stitch to them first! 

The kid noticed them immediately when we entered the arena, but he wandered over and gave the unicorn a sniff. No big concern, not even when the rainbow, which was slightly softer than the unicorn and didn't really want to stand up, slowly slid down to the ground in front of Stitch and softly touched his toe. He stood perfectly still, gave it the hairy eyeball, made sure it was dead, and then walked right past it without a care.

The balloons got dragged behind me as I led him around, and then the rainbow was thrown over his back. Meh.

So I popped the unicorn aboard, since it would stand upright and be a bit more imposing  above him.

The only reaction I got was a big "I guess this is my life now" sigh.

I hope I get the same sigh in a few weeks when it's me up there!

Soft Kitty

 After staying home for two days wallowing in my covid-induced misery, I felt a bit better on Friday. I was able to mask up to hit the feed store and the tack store that was having a sale.

I went in with the intent of not spending much money, and I managed to stick to it. The planned purchases were Vetrap and horse cookies, and potentially a glittery saddle pad that I had seen previously and was on sale for only $30.

This wasn't the first time I considered buying this pad. The glitter doesn't come through well in the picture, but trust me, it's there.

In browsing through the store, making sure that I really didn't need anything else, I saw the Hands On grooming gloves. I have a pair but the rubber nubby bits on some of the fingers are falling off. The gloves were about the same price as the saddlepad, so I told myself I can get one or the other.

I'm sure that the saddlepad would look great on Stitch, in it's dark blue all-over glittery glory. But he really seems to like a good scrubby grooming, often swinging his butt towards me when I get to his hind end with the curry.

The gloves came home with me. I might forever lament the lack of glitter in my saddle pad collection, but watching Stitch's upper lip stretch while he got scrubbed with my gloved hands confirmed that I made the right decision. 

After hitting those two stores I had just enough energy in me to head out to the barn. I popped Stitch into the arena for a play. He's still learning that free arena time is play time, but tonight was the first time he had any sass in him. Enough that he even let out a few bucks. That was the first time I'd seen him do that.

Good news - he did not miss his calling as a bronc horse. His back end got sufficiently high, but his front end didn't get very low. His neck kind of stayed level and long, it should be easy to sit if he ever tries it under saddle. 

Didn't get any video of it because, well, didn't expect it.

But I did get lots of pictures of Stitch checking out Jerry, one of the barn cats. He's seldom in the arena, but for some reason this night he meowed his way into the middle of the ring. 

Forget about the glitter. Enjoy the cute.

I'm Blaming the Oncoming Sickness

It's a good thing that I lunged Stitch on back-to-back days Monday and Tuesday this week, because not only did the wildfire smoke come in at hazardous air quality levels, after 4 1/2 years of avoiding it, I finally succumbed to Covid on Wednesday. Mid-way through my week of vacation.

That's a definite positive.

So far, I'm either too hot or chilled, have a cough, and all my joints and problem areas ache. It's only been about 30 hours so who knows how the next few days will go. I've had four vaccinations so hopefully they work their magic and keep the symptoms minimal.

Anyhow, on the Tuesday I tried to capture the lunging using my new Pivo Pod X. This is the one that I Kickstarted back in October 2021 and it finally shipped this spring. After I didn't have a horse to ride, of course. 

I tried it once just after it arrived without reading the instructions and didn't have much luck. I thought I'd try it again, knowing that lunging wasn't going to be the best option to test it.

The Pivo Pod X is the one that moves on an x and a y axis. Meaning that it can tip up and down as well as go sideways to keep the selected item in focus.

I'm currently 0/2 on using it.

The first problem is that I didn't put my phone in landscape mode, which is required for horse tracking. If I had bothered to check it after a couple of minutes I would have seen the message saying so, but I did not.

When I put my phone onto the holder in portrait mode, it was angled up towards the rafters. I thought that once it found the horse it would self-adjust, but for 80% of the video the top 3/4 of the screen is rafters. For some reason it did adjust down towards the end, so I've got the couple of circles seen here.

I don't think lunging is easy for the Pivo to keep the horse on the screen as it has to be set up outside the the circle. I'll try it again though, and see if the problems were all user error.

I also realized I can try the Pixio. If I attach the tracker to the saddle then it should track the horse while on the lunge. I can pop it in a case of some sort before clipping to a d-ring.

So, here's a whole 40-some seconds of Stitch on the lunge.

His left lead is the stickier one, and this might be the best transition he's done so far. He's starting to find some balance at the canter and I'm happy with how quickly he relaxed into it.

He wants to fall out to the right when tracking left so I try to use the walls to encourage him to stay straighter. The sessions are very short because homeboy has zero fitness. Not necessarily bad for a baby horse for the first few rides!

One More Thing Sorted Out

I've got the bridle sorted out for Stitch (Phantom's Ps of Sweden bridle and a Herm Sprenger Dynamic KK eggbutt) - now it's time for the saddle.

Earlier this summer I used the Wow saddle gauge on Stitch to determine which parts for a Wow saddle would be needed for Stitch. By which I mean would I be lucky enough that my existing Wow saddle that I had for Cisco could also work for Stitch?

In theory, it looked like all the parts should be the same. He needs a flat tree and wide DXWG panels. Instead of the 5U headplate that Cisco went in Stitch is currently narrower and needs a 3U, which I also happen to have (I think I used it for that one week when Cisco was actually skinny). 

I'd popped the saddle on him a couple of times and hand-walked him with no concern on his part. Last week, I decided it's time to lunge him in the saddle. He's been ground driven a bunch with a surcingle on, but that's pretty well just at walk and trot. He might tun into a bronco at a canter.

For the first lunge, I didn't want to risk damage to the expensive saddle so opted to sacrifice my treeless saddle instead. He knew it was on him, but other than initially giving it the hairy eyeball when it continued to follow him around there wasn't much of a reaction. Even after I dropped the stirrups and let them dangle.

The saddle definitely slid forward through lunging. I had used a shaped Total Saddle Fit girth, and thought maybe that I didn't need that style. Didn't really matter, this was a one-off with this saddle.

The sacrificial saddle is a no go to be ridden in.

On Monday, I popped on the Wow saddle. The goal is to get this saddle girth setup sorted out this week because there are a bunch of sales this weekend, so if I need to buy something new, now is the time.

Look who isn't super bum high this week. I didn't think that he had a forward girth groove until I looked at this picture. (Also, I must say that I missed having a shiny horse. Gray horses just don't get that shine.)

I didn't think his girth groove was all that forward and that I wouldn't need the point billet. I tried it with the TSF girth while tacking up, but didn't like how it fit. The billets were definitely sloping forward which meant that the saddle would move that way once he got going. I swapped to the h-girth, still without the point billet, and lunged him - it still ended up on his shoulders.

The saddle pad stayed in place, but the saddle was pulled forward.

So point billet it is.

I don't typically like to lunge on back-to-back days, but I was on a bit of a time crunch to sort this out before the weekend sales and it also looked like the forest fire smoke was going to blow in this week. So Stitch thought he was going to die for the whole 12 minutes that he lunged, at least half of which was walk.

An obviously lucky to be alive pony who's saddle seems to have mostly stayed in place.

But the saddle seemed to stay in a much better position. So this is what we are going with. Happily, it doesn't cost me any money. We just need to play with the Flair panels.

And then sort it all out again in the spring. 

Hand Me Downs -Take 2

My attempt at salvaging Phantom's old Rambo fly sheet to use this summer on Stitch was a fail. The mesh started shredding along the bound edge on his butt. When I stitched the binding on, I didn't do anything to the edge of the mesh which is where I think I went wrong. I think that the mesh edge needed to be rolled or folded first so that the binding would have something to grip onto and not just pull away.

Oh well, it only cost me $5 and some time. I was going to try to salvage it once again and finish the edges differently, but since there were a couple of spots that the mesh was shredded a couple of inches I don't think I had enough fabric to work with as his butt was already poking out.

So, on to the next hand me down option.

The circus tent fly sheet.

This one came from Greenhawk last year. It's a textilene sheet that was on sale for $50 or $60. My motto for horse clothing is that the cheaper it is, the prettier the colour gets. But I still think it looks like a circus tent.

It's probably about 2 sizes too big still for Stitch, but since he's filled out quite a bit and now has boobs and a butt (not much yet, but way more than he did in the spring) it didn't completely hang off of him around the neck. I can deal with the extra length over his tail, but because of that length it hung a bit low around his hind legs. 

I just made a couple of temporary adjustments to the blanket to render it wearable. A dart in the neck closed it up enough in the front. Don't try this at home kids unless you have a beast of a sewing machine! Six layers of webbing and three layers of textilene pushed the limits of my heavy-duty machine - thankfully it only needed about an inch of stitching that I could baby it through. 

To solve the length around the hind legs I chose to just fold up the corners and stitch around the edges. It will keep the excess from hanging too low, and next year I can take the stitches out and the original shape of the blanket will be restored.

I might have to deal with a bit of poop on the leg strap clips, but that's minor.

So far this has worked out much better than the Rambo. That one survived only a couple of days before shredding, and Stitch has been wearing the circus tent for a couple of weeks with no issues.

The other hand me down that has been getting use is Phantom's PS of Sweden bridle.

It fits Stitch nicely and looks great on him, though I have to change the browband on it - that was Phantom's for a long time.

He seems happy so far in the Sprenger Dynamic KK bit that I tried first so we'll see if that ends up being the bit we start with. His teeth will be getting done next week and then we can get serious about learning big boy things - the countdown is on to be sitting on him in September!