Backed!

So Mercy was there to help me back Scarlett for the first time today.

I wrote about it to my sister: 

Ren, 

So I bought the Irish redhead backyard train wreck hot mess I wrote you about.  I got her in the trailer easy enough by showing her the hay inside but it took about 20 minutes to get her out at Arrowhead Ranch.  So I've been feeding her up, wormed her, trimmed off her beard and trimmed and de-matted the mane and treated the chewed-off tail with MTG to make it grow.  I've been working on her with a shedding blade because her coat is like very bad carpeting--all dull and fried-looking.  Her feet are a mess.  For the first 24 hours she wouldn't go in her stall--I'm not sure she's had that much shelter in her life. But today was day 4 and she now doesn't want to come out of her stall.  It's like she's decided she likes the diva life.   She is basically a big baby--curious and awkward.   I'm treating her as not-really-broke. She pulls back when tied.   We worked on lunging for 3 days and then today it was so warm and she was so head-down and relaxed doing w/t lunging that I actually got on (in the round pen) (with Mercy there with cell phone in hand just in case).  Then I had Mercy take the lunge line for a lap, then took off the lunge line.  She never threw a fit or bucked or anything.  She doesn't have steering installed, and probably also no brakes, but she was just walking around with her head down being all curious as to what Mercy was up to, so we didn't push it.  I stayed on for about 7 minutes of lazy wandering and then called it a day!  And I am sure the sailing will not be this easy once she has some energy and some fitness and I try to ride her on a cold morning and go outside the round pen!  

Now I have to go and read up on how to install power steering and brakes on a baby. I wish I knew what your favorite trainer (the man who trained the zebra) does….

Feel free to send advice!

 Hugs, Trace

So of course I came home with her...

....before Kevin could change his mind.  Here is a video of her getting off the trailer at Arrowhead Ranch.  My irish redhead trainwreck giraffe. (We have the same color hair! Except she has no gray.) Don't you just want to give her groceries?  (I am!) She sticks at exactly 15.2.  Body conditioning score of scary. Vet will see her March 31 and farrier appointment made for April 2 with Robert Holt.  Here she is meeting Delilah.

So I Went To See a Craigslist Horse....

Well to start at the beginning. Here is what I wrote to my sister:

Hey Ren so what do you think?

So I went to look a a horse listed in a Craigslist ad. I went because of her breeding.  Her sire is a registered irish draught (imported from Ireland)  http://www.skiesrblue.com/Seamus.html   who was a locally renowned fox hunter and her dam is a straight egyptian arabian (which I know nothing about but the dam was said to be also on site).  The ad had no pictures but was well-worded and made it clear she had sporthorse potential.

Not what I expected.  So she is kind of a backyard mess. They call her Puddles.  She is coming 5 and basically unbroken (but socialized).   She is a little underweight and very narrow--she has lived in a corral and not built up any muscles. She likes to impersonate a giraffe with her head up, tail like a flag, and back inverted.   Haltered easy but she won't cross a tiny rivulet of water and doesn't know how to lunge.   Her feet haven't been cared for in a year. Her tail has been chewed off by a yearling in with her.  She has a scar on her face from a fence mis-hap. She reared a little about leaving the other horses down at the barn.  The guy said he could jump on her with just a halter and lead rope.  So he did, and went to and jump her over something for me, and she did a 4-legged antelope jump and then  bucked 4 times and he came off.  I didn't even ride her, because after that it kinda didn't seem to matter (that, and I didn't bring my helmet, and it seemed to prudent to have a helmet).... She is your basic sorrel color, like every other horse seems to be. They advertised her as 16.1 but she doesn't seem big at all, although she does have a high wither.  She's fuzzy and not shiny even under the fuzz. She is VERY under-developed over her top line, both neck and back.  Really she is under-developed generally. 

She has a big over-track at the walk and a floaty trot. Catchy stifles. She spends a lot of time with her nose in the air like a race horse and tripping over her too-long toes, but when she stretches down I can see the potential for movement there, and her neck and head are (blessedly) very much not like an Irish Draught, but like the fine features of an arab.   I think maybe her mane and tail might be lighter colored (when they grow in) and she might just be a different and killer red when she gets glossy, and she has 3 white socks.  She is not dumb because she learned several things just while I was there. She seems extremely sensitive, a little hot, but not spooky.  Her dam is a maybe 15h flaxen-chestnut typey arabian--the kind with the pretty head and neck and broad flat back.  (She was very pregnant so it was kinda hard to tell more than that.)   The sire in no longer in NM but was classic Irish Draught build:  bulky, long legs, short thick neck.  She is not built like either of them.  She is built a little like a 2 yo TB that inherited the arabian flag tail, nice short back.  I am told the sire was a narrow, light-build at age 4 and later filled out to that, so hopefully she has some filling out to do.  

And of course she needs to be trained like from the start.... 

So what do you think?  My next project?

Trace