I took advantage of a recent sunny day to build a hay feeder I had been wanting to do for a long time. It’s made from a piece of hockey barrier netting about 10′ x 12′, a few plastic coated cup hooks, three 2x4s and a sheet of exterior grade plywood. The posts had been put in my the barn owner in preparation for a shelter.
It is filled from the back without opening or closing anything. It will easily hold a small square bale, maybe even more. For now, I’m having them fed their usual meal of two to three flakes each. I may try going back to 24/7 free choice at some point. I’ll have to wait for the roof though, so the hay doesn’t spoil.
I had planned to split the net and have half hang to each side. That would make two separate feeding areas, so that a dominant horse wouldn’t monopolize the hay. I may still do that, but for now, Beau and Lily are sharing nicely.
I could see feeding stations like this in a couple of areas of a paddock paradise track, with an A frame roof off the two poles. It would provide a bit of a rain and wind break, along with a feeding station, without having to build a full shelter.
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I have been researching his pedigree. Bowdrie was bred by Kim Kingsley of the Horse Head Ranch in North Dakota. Beau’s sire was an accomplished endurance horse. His AERC winnings must have been 1989, as online records only go back to 1996 and he’s not listed there. I can guess that he competed in AERC rides in 1989 as a 14 year old and went back out in 1999 as a 24 year old in UMECRA rides. If anyone can correct me on this, I welcome it.
Chief Half Moon SMR 607
1989 & 1999 winnings include:
MNDRA Grand Champion Lwt. Endurance
UMECRA Reserve Champion Lwt. Endurance
UMECRA Top Ten High Mile Horse (925 Miles)
UMECRA 2nd High Point Endurance Stallion
UMECRA Endurance Rookie of the Year
AERC Midwest Region Lwt. Grand Champion
AERC Midwest Region Overall Reserve Champion
AERC 1000, 2000 Mile Award Recipient
AERC 3rd Place Jim Jones Award Winner (1300)
AERC Top Ten National Senior Mileage (1250)
AERC 9th Place Horse & Rider Team
Blue Northern SMR 1709 photo by Mike Turnock
That is the only photo I have of Chief Half Moon. It is from the old Horse Head Ranch website that is no longer up. I received photos of his dam tonight from the past webmaster of the Horse Head Ranch website. Thank you, Mike. As far as I know, Blue Northern was a broodmare. She has five get registered in my copy of the SMR studbook, two full siblings and two foals by Bandit. There is also a five year old gelding by Black Arrow, out of Blue Northern. He’s trained and for sale, by the way. (follow the link) She would have been 18 when he was foaled. He may have been her last, as I hear that she died 3-4 years ago.
Blue Northern SMR 1709 in 2005 at the age of 17 photo by Mike Turnock
You can clearly see that he got his bay base color from his sire and the ‘frosting’ of classic roan from his dam.
The other notable thing about Beau’s pedigree is that he is linebred Chief Pushmataha, having him for a grandsire on his sire’s side, great grandsire and great great grandsire on his dam’s side. Chief Pushmataha was said to go back to Choctaw Indian family breeding. He was registered in numerous Colonial Spanish/Spanish Mustang registries as well as the ApHC. I’ll end with these photos of him…
After a week of sharing a fence line with Riley and Sonny, we tried Beau in with them today. I have to say that this was one of the calmest introductions that I’ve ever seen. I had my camera with me, as these situations usually yield some pretty darn good shots. This was the best action shot I could get this time around.
Most of them were more like this.
Beau deferred to Riley and all seems to be going well. During the day, the geldings get access to the barnyard, the pastures behind Lily and Sasha’s paddock, and the alley in between. Most of the best grazing is in the back pastures. Sonny and Riley moved from there to the their pasture (with the shelter and water) a few times. Beau spent most of his time hanging out in the alley near the girls.
He and Lily spent a good amount of time grazing along the fence nose to nose. I think that they understand what I told them earlier this week. That they will both be with me for a long time and that they need to get along. Lily doesn’t usually make friends very fast, but she seems to be warming up to Beau.
I am glad that Beau can have more horses to hang out with. I left him eating dinner with Riley and Sonny.
Time for an update. I hope to keep up with my blog more this winter. I’m planning on posting horse stories here and not spend so much time on FaceBook.
I got in two short rides in before my trip, a ten minute bareback ride and another in the round pen.
Then I was off to India a few days later. I was gone for two and a half weeks. Then I was sick for another week and a half after I came back. I feel like I lost the entire month of September.
In any case, our first ride on my return was at Elijah Bristow State Park. Beau was pretty high headed for most of the ride and got a bit excited by other horses running around. It was still a great first ride together. It was really nice to know that I could take him out and just ride. I found that he loves water. He walked right in and took a nice long drink. I had to keep him moving when he started to paw, as I felt his knees start to buckle! I didn’t want to take a swim myself.
This is one of my favorite shots from the day, even though it’s not entirely in focus. My good friend, Candee, took it, along with all the other photos of me riding so far.
Right after I mounted up.
I had signed up for a Connected Riding clinic with Diane Sept months ago. It was last weekend and I decided to take Beau. Aside from some trailer loading issues, he did really well. He seemed to like being in a stall. I wasn’t sure how he would take to that. The clinic was a good opportunity to try both my saddles on him and experiment with different bits.
He definitely needs his teeth done, so I’m just riding him in what he seems most comfortable for now, which is two reins, one off the cavesson and another on a Myler, ported curb. He sees the vet for his teeth a week from Saturday. After that, it will be easier to make some decisions on bitting. In the video below, I was trying a Myler comfort snaffle and you can see that he is chewing on it pretty consistently.
I took him into the arena Sunday morning before the clinic started to get a bit of time riding alone. I am going to use this video as a baseline. It will be interesting to compare this to how he is in six months or a year. This was our first canter together as well. We rode for a few hours later in the day. We were both tired at the end of, but it was definitely worth it. I learned new things and reinforced stuff I used to know.
Needless to say, I am very happy with Beau. I look forward to working with him and seeing how he muscles up and develops. I also hope that he and Lily get along, as they will have years together. They are sharing a fenceline for now. I moved Beau to my boarding barn just last night. He is temporarily in a paddock behind Lily and Sasha. He was trying to snake the mares through the fence. Sasha was flirting with him and Lily was telling her to stay away in boss mare fashion. Lily is very good at making snarky, mare faces, which she continued for most of the time I watched them.
This evening, I put hay on both sides of the fence, so that they could spend a bit of time together. Beau reached his head over very carefully, as the top wire is hot electric. He had a bunch of hay sticking out of his mouth. I don’t think that he realized it was there. Lily was reaching towards him, but not to say “Hi”. Instead she grabbed the hay and pulled it from his mouth. Beau was startled and spun away. After than he was very deferential to Lily through the fence. I think that they’ll be okay together.
This deserves a blog post and not just a FaceBook update.
Meet the newest Eugene resident…
In early June, I found out about three SMR horses who’s owner wanted to surrender them to a rescue or rehome them in some way. He preferred for them to go to homes that knew what they were. So I started networking to make that happen. One was a 20 year old mare with a bit of a sway back. The other two were teenage geldings. They were a family unit, dam, gelded sire and son.
After much organization, they arrived in Eugene late last night. This morning the mother and son left on their way to northern California. The younger gelding will be making one young lady very happy. He will be Maida’s first horse after her two small ponies.
The older gelding is staying in Eugene. His registered name is Bowdrie. He was bred by Kim Kingsley and lived in eastern Oregon and eastern Washington most of his life. I understand that he has had quite a bit of trail experience, but hasn’t been ridden in the last couple of years. I can tell from the morning that he has a lot of power and go.
Here is Maida going out this morning to catch her new horse. He’s the dun roan in the front. He came right up to her.
The hardest part was when Bowdrie was left behind. I had him on a lead while the others were being loaded. After they left, we walked around the property, met the other horses and did a little work in the round pen. He was good with all that. Taking him back to the paddock that they had all stayed in last night made him realize that they were really gone.
I stayed with him a while longer. When he had settled some, I removed the halter. He continued to follow me around. He’s a smart, sensible horse and it will be fun to see what he knows. I won’t have an update for a month or so, as I’m headed off on a trip. I had hoped that they could have come earlier, but they didn’t. I trust that this all happens they way that it’s supposed to.
Funds are still needed to cover the costs of this rescue for the California bound horses.
Checks should be made to Anne-Marie Pinter, (Director) with WHF in the memo.
Mail to: 6061 Summit Drive, Garden Valley, CA 95633
Or donate through PayPal: ampwwr@yahoo.com. All donations are tax deductible retroactively by the end of the year.
THANK YOU to those who have helped with funds already, including The Lido Fund (a great place to donate ongoing) and also to those who will donate in the future. And special thanks to those directly involved, Maida, Anne-Marie and Candee. Without very deep pockets, it takes a coordinated effort to make this sort of thing happen.
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