Rainbow Sprites

The ponies have got new rugs.  Little rugs are expensive, the same price as it is for a rug for Wolfie.  I got these two cheap....they are very bright :-).  So what do you do when you get a new, very bright rug?

Honey got the second part of her flu/tetanus vaccination today.  She was terrified again. She leapt 4ft in the air and her legs and body were trembling.  However, afterwards she stayed beside me and let me rub her head.  I wasn't to blame this time and she was happy to stay with me.  All three were shod / trimmed today also.  Honey was excellent with the farrier, he took a fair amount of growth off this time, but she stood still, picked her feet up when asked and seemed fairly relaxed.  She is really beginning to settle now, she lets you touch her all over and is enjoying being brushed and having attention.  She's still very warey of some things, I still can't muck or skip out if she's in the stable, but her little personality is starting to come out, her eyes are brighter and she is beginning to look as though she is enjoying life.  So she will get the final part of her vaccination in around 5 months which will coincide with Wolfie and Buttons getting their boosters so I will be able to get all three vaccinated together. 

Zoe meets Honey

Susan, Martin and Zoe came to see the ponies today and took them for a little walk.  Zoe led Honey as she likes to walk at her own pace and absorb everything going on and take in the scenery.  Susan took Buttons and they had a few trots.  Honey seemed to enjoy it and she also seemed to enjoy the company and attention.  She even stood untied and let Zoe brush her.

You know when you're walking and you get the feeling someone is watching you?  I was walking the ponies through the field the other day and I had that feeling.  I turned around and the sheep had gathered together and were following us.  The sheep don't normally pay attention to the horses when you are riding, but maybe they didn't know what the ponies were.

 

I tried taking some photographs of the soles of Honey's feet, but I can't hold the foot and take a clear picture, so next time someone is free at the stables, I will get some pictures.  Her back heels are so twisted and contracted, the frog in the off hind is almost covered by the heel.  This is about the clearest photograph and it's not very good, but it gives you a rough idea.  It makes me very sad to look at.  Their feet are a history book and timeline of what has happened to them.  In Honey's case an insight into the great degree of negelct she has suffered.  She is comfortable enough walking around and I know it will take time and management to get them back.  She is becoming very good at picking her feet up now though.

Honey's coat is strange.  It is very soft and fine and just sticks up at all angles.  She reminds me of a little scarecrow.  Hopefully, with correct nutrition and time, her body will pick up inside and out.  It will be interesting to see what colour she is in summer.  The SSPCA registered her on her passport as a strawberry roan.  The only strawberry roans I have seen have been very pink.  Buttons is a true chesnut with flaxen mane and tail.  Honey has a lot of white hairs through her coat and that oatmeal muzzle and around the eyes.  When you look at the base of her coat it is very light, almost dun in colour.

I bought these for the ponies.  They are little bricks of chopped hay and straw (sugar free!).  They look like giant weetabix.  It was just to give them something else to do than eating out of their tiny holed nets all the time.  Buttons boots his around the stable, I don't think that's really it's intended purpose but it keeps him entertained.

 
Three Muskateers.  Struan, Bob and the new addition, Sam, a springer spaniel, my Dad rehomed before Christmas.

Fast Little Giants

I love watching the Shetland Grand National when it's on at Olympia, they are surprisingly fast and agile for having such sturdy bodies and little legs and obviously love a good gallop.  I'm always surprised at the turn of speed Buttons has, although he sort of looks like a blonde tumble weed when he's flying around.  There was an article in Horse and Hound this month about research that has been carried out into the genetic make-up of the modern Flat racehorse.  They found that the speed gene entered bloodlines when the Darley and Godolphin Arabians and Byerley Turk were bred with British Natives - mainly Shetlands.  And they have pinned down the original gene variant - C type myostatin - to a single British mare living 300 years ago.  As Shetlands have the highest frequency of this gene, it's odds on a Shetland was the original speed freak.  I think Buttons has always fancied himself as a little racehorse.

Things are back on an even keel with Honey and we are back to where we were prior to me giving her the wormer.  I've managed to get them out for a few walks around the fields and they have both seemed to thoroughly enjoy it.  Buttons has been charging on like a little steam train.  He loves to get out and having Honey there as company is an added bonus for him.   Honey is happy just to walk at your side.  Nothing out there seems to really phase her, I presume she's used to just fields and sheep without the interruption of noisy humans and all their contraptions.  Hopefully Buttons can get ridden again this summer, but I really want to teach him to drive.  We don't have a cart or dray, but even if it's just breaking him to harness and driving him off the lines or even maybe getting him to pull a tyre it would be another way to exercise him and give him a job to do.  Maybe we could go logging.  I don't think Honey will be doing much this year, just continuing to settle in and find her confidence.  Maybe next year, when her feet are in better shape but for now she can just pony along with us walking.   

Trust is a fragile thing

On Wednesday night I wormed Honey.  I put her headcollar on and used the syringe and paste as I had to make sure she got the correct dose and I wasn't sure she would eat it if I tried putting it in her feed.  She was very upset and wouldn't come near me afterwards.  I had to do it as she needs to be on a worming programme and has probably never been wormed in her life. Before Spring I will send a dung sample away to have a worm count done before she is wormed again.  On Thursday afternoon I went to catch the ponies in from the field.  I wasn't feeling great, had a lot on my mind and I was distracted.  I was standing in the field when my phone rang.  I normally have my phone switched off or if it rings I will switch it off until I am finished with the horses, but with the way things are just now, I answered it.  I was trying to balance the phone, put Buttons headcollar on and then Honey's.  I felt impatient, not at the ponies but just everything.  Honey, obviously hadn't forgiven me for the worming incident the night before and although she wanted to come in with Buttons, me and the headcollar could get stuffed as far as she was concerned.  Horses will mirror our feelings and maybe it was a combination of being wormed and also she is very sensitive to my body language and was sensing negative vibes from me.  I became complacent and expected too much of her.  For all she can be very quiet and willing and has been very good at being caught and has made huge progress in many ways, it is amazing how quickly she can revert back to self preservation and her little feral pony ways.  As Monty Roberts says, if you act like you've got 15 minutes it will take half an hour, if you act like you have all the time in the world, it will take 15 minutes.  Nothing like a pint sized pony to put you firmly back in your place.  Although she loves food and a little piece of carrot, she will not be bribed with it. She wanted to go with Buttons and down to the stable, so I took a chance and let her just follow Buttons.  If she had decided to wander off, I would probably still be trying to catch her, but she didn't she followed him nose to tail down from the field and into the stable.  On Friday, I went to catch them in.  Buttons came over and I just sat with him for 10 minutes until Honey eventually wandered over.  I stroked them for 10 minutes and she let me put her headcollar on.     We did the same again yesterday.  I have been sitting in the stable talking to Buttons and she is starting to come back to me of her own choice.