Equines
Paddock Paradise 5
Sunday 15 August, 2010
The boys, Smokey and Bugsy, have settled into their new field, well, the track round the field. It hasn't taken them, with some help from the sheep, to get the grass down. We decided not to strim it and risk putting the grass under stress - both ponies have grazing muzzles, just in case. So far, we haven't used them, though.
We've had some heavy rain, but the track seems to be holding up. It's quite sandy, neither pony is shod and they don't really race around. It took me 25 minutes to pick all the poo yesterday - one barrowload. That's one day's worth. Rebecca, our neighbour, picked a week's worth on Friday.
Paddock Paradise 4
Sunday 1 August, 2010
This weekend, we finished the electric fence in Sheepfold that creates the track for the horses. It's the start of our paddock paradise, but there's a lot of development to go. I've been in email correspondence with Nick Hills www.cloverroseequine.co.uk about it and hope to visit his place in the not too distant future.
Nick is a natural hoofcare specialist who has developed a paddock paradise in the Highlands. Looking at his website, ours looks a bit "soft" but Nick's happy to offer advice on improving the set up.
Paddock Paradise 3
Sunday 6 June, 2010
I'm starting to get my plan together for this project.
The field margin will have to be cut vey short. It should really be scraped to remove all the grass but we'll see how we go. The field shelter has been cleared out and is great - and it have a pebble floor, good for hoof massage!
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At the south end is a line of hawthorn - it would be great to let the horses through there but there's too much grass which can't be easily cut, so I think that will be sheep territory or maybe just a wildlife area. My only concern about the margins is the bunny holes - the soil is very sandy and the holes are well excavated. Large enough to accommodate a Tess, for example!!
Paddock Paradise 2
Sunday 23 May, 2010
Dan walked the perimeter of the 5 acre field today with the GPS - it's 600 metres long. So roughly three circuits will be a mile - sorry to mix metric and imperial - a few of those a day should do Smokey no harm at all! Or Bugsy.
I have to get down to some serious planning now. We cleaned out the field shelter on Saturday and the fencing is in reasonable order. The biggest problem is the grass, of which there is too much, and the location of the water.
Horses and pigs
Sunday 2 May, 2010
The son of our livery yard owner has just bought two Saddleback weaners. Where has he put them? In a pen next to Smokey's field. This is good in the long term, as we'll have pigs and Smokey at Dalmore, so he can get desensitised now. But in the meantime, it's a bit hairy.
There are four horses in the field; Smokey, Wallace (Welsh Section D), Jack (Welsh Section A type) and Jeffrey (large coloured cob). Jack is the least bothered; Jeffrey was dripping with sweat the first evening. I've never seem a horse sweat like that - it was dripping off him.
Weightwatcher of the year?
Saturday 3 April, 2010
My Highland pony, Smokey, has a tendency to put weight on - he's cheap to run and lives on fresh air. Two or three years ago, he had a (thankfully) mild bout of laminitis in February. At the ime he was out 24/7, but some of the other owners wanted hay in the field, so Smokey was spending a good part of the day feeding his face. After this, he was put on restricted grazing and brought in at night, so that I could control his feed intake a bit better.
It's been quite difficult - for both of us but in different ways, obviously. At his heaviest, he weighed almost 600kg on the weight tape. He's 15.1hh. Today, I put his harness on and the saddle kept slipping round, even though it was in the tightest holes. I got out the weight tape - 498kg! Now, I know the tape isn't 100% accurate but it does give a comparison. I couldn't believe it - I knew he was thinner as he now has "pointy bits" - but I was staggered at ho much he has lost. He was 470kg when I bought him as a 5 year old. I think he looks loads better and once his winter coat has fallen out, he should be quite sleek!
Bugsy
Monday 15 March, 2010
Today I went to meet Bugsy, who is a potential companion for my Highland pony, Smokey. Bugsy is a 9 year old, chestnut Shetland gelding who belongs to a friend of mine. Judy and I met through our involvement some years ago with Parelli Natural Horsemanship.
Bugsy was rescued when he was about two; he was kept with two other horses and was badly neglected and abused. The other two horses had to be euthanased after the court case. But Bugsy landed very lucky and ended up with Judy, who, with her chum Carrie, has spent a lot of time rehabilitating him.
Paddock Paradise
Friday 15 January, 2010
When we move to our new place in the summer, I plan to establish a "paddock paradise" for Smokey and his as-yet-to-be-identified companion.
Paddock Paradise is a system of natural horse boarding developed by American hoofcare expert, Jaime Jackson. Basically, it's trying to replicate the conditions in which wild horses live. Now, horses evolved in dry tundra - so that's not wet Scotland, but I'm going to give it a go.
The start point is that, in the wild, horses walk a lot of the time in search of food, water, minerals and this keeps them fit and their unshod feet in good condition. To recreate this, we create a track by putting an electric fence 10-15 feet inside the perimeter fence. On the track, we have shelter (trees or a field shelter), waterhole (or trough), feeding stations for hay, mineral licks, dust bath - and the horse walk from one to the other.
White when washed
Friday 25 September, 2009
This is how my chum Claire describes my horse, Smokey.
Given that the weather is on the turn, I decided to give him a bath while the sun was out. He suffers from sweet itch so tends to roll a lot and get very muddy, if he doesn't have his rug on.
He doesn't mind being bathed although I'm usually as wet as he is. I decided to take before and after photos, this time. Despite giving him a real good scrub, I couldn't get all the black off his hindquarters - I think it's ingrained. His winter coat is coming in - he'll be like a teddy in no time and hopefully the dirty bits will grow out.
Grass sickness
Sunday 28 June, 2009
One of our local RDA branches has lost four horses in one weekend to grass sickness and one of the horses at the yard where I keep Smokey seems to have it too. He's currently at the Dick Vet after being unwell while competing at the Highland Show. I hope he's OK but grass sickness seldom seems to have a happy outcome.
