Answering and Asking Questions...

Stephanie and Twinville both asked questions in the comments, so I thought I would tie the answers in with a new post...

Q1 - Why is it that you can't ride Rusty?

A - The vet didn't want him burning any extra calories until his weight started to turn around. When he was sick, food was going in and right back out, so he wasn't absorbing any calories (in a nutshell). Now that I think his weight has started to increase again, I think I'll be able to start easy work again soon.

Q2 - When can I ride Rusty again?

A - Officially, I'm not sure. The vet hasn't come back out to check him yet. I've been trying to contact her since yesterday... Unofficially, I'm thinking of taking him out this weekend for a light hack around the fields. I'm sure we'll just walk because he is out of shape.

Q3 - How long did the rain fall that filled the arena? (in the pictures from my last post)

A - Not very long. We have had a ton of rain this year, so the ground is pretty saturated. The pictures were taken Saturday morning and I believe it rained for an hour or two Friday night. The arena drains fairly well, I think the puddles were gone by Sunday.

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Ok - now I have a question for all of my very knowledgeable readers out there...

The vet and the nutritionist have both told me that Rusty's barn situation isn't the greatest.

- He needs to be in a smaller herd where he isn't bullied so much. The herd situation has improved, but it is still not good. Every 2 or 3 days when I go out, he has new kicks and bites. They aren't as bad as when I first put him there, but still more than average.

• He needs more forage - grass or hay - to help the ulcers stay away long term. The barn I'm at doesn't have alot of grass - it gets eaten down fast b/c there are too many horses (IMHO). He also doesn't get alot of hay because the other horses are too fat/too pushy, etc.


• He doesn't get alot of shelter because there are too many horses and too small of a shelter


• I can't guarantee that he is getting enough water, because it is under the shelter and the other horses hog it.


• The barn owner didn't have enough room/paddocks to switch Rusty last time I asked her; things may have changed since then.

So, my question is - Do I move him to another barn that has a better turnout/feeding situation, or do I leave him where he is and hope it improves???

I have a bit bigger budget now that I did earlier, so that helps.
It is tough to find a place that covers all of my needs and Rusty's needs...

Ideas? Suggestions? Words of wisdom?

The Saga of the Evil Lead Line Continues...

I'm continuing my dragging lead line work with Rusty. He continues to crack me up every time we do this.

These pictures are from last weekend - I'm just getting around to downloading them now. We had had alot of rain, so there were some nice big puddles in the arena. I actually don't mind when there is water in there, as it is a good exercise to work a horse through it. It isn't good for cantering, but that's ok. I still can't ride Rusty anyways, so it didn't make a big difference for us.

I started walking him along the rail with the lead line dragging - I have to move him on gently with a lunge whip, or otherwise he just stands there looking at me and looking at the evil lead line. As we walked toward the huge puddle, I was wondering what he would do... I was expecting him to cut into the middle of the ring to avoid the water. I was totally wrong - he saw safety in a little island in the corner of the ring....

I couldn't stop laughing at him - he walked up on to the sand and then looked back at me as if to say "now what do I do?"

I encouraged him to walk on, but he just stood there. He started to realize that there was a little bit of grass back there, so eating seemed to be a good idea.I let him graze for about 5 or so minutes then decided it was time to get back to work... I had to wade out into the puddle and smack him gently on the butt with the lunge whip to get him to leave his little oasis. I finally got him moving and we did a few laps around the ring - every time he stepped on the lead line, he would stop and try to figure out which foot to lift to get himself free. This is huge progress, as normally he backs up and panics.


Stepping through the puddles actually cleaned his legs and hooves of the nasty crusted on mud from his paddock. My leadline didn't fare as well, but I knew that going in - it is an old one. I just rinsed it after I was done and most of the sand came right out.
After one more trip through the big puddle, I let him stop and have a break. Richard likes picking him clover and grass. It took Rusty about 3 minutes to step over that close to the fence to get his treat with the evil lead line following him. I think he is actually stepping on it with his front hoof, but with no freak outs! I think we are making some progress with this little problem!

Status Quo

Rusty update: He seems to be improving - he is eating well and his goofy attitude is back. We are still watching him closely. The barn owner and I both thought he might be starting to gain a bit of weight back. We are starting to feel more optimistic about his recovery. I just wrote the cheque for the vet this morning - ouch!

Rusty and I are still working on the dragging lead rope problem. We spent about 30 mins on it on Saturday morning. We ended the session with him stepping on the rope and stopping, instead of stepping on the rope and losing his mind. I'll consider that a bit of progress. I laugh at him the whole time we are working on this - he will back up or walk sideways with his eyes glued to that crazy lead rope. He was even grazing backwards to avoid it. lol

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Nothing big happening around here - just trying to enjoy the few sunny days that we have had lately. I spent most of the day volunteering at a local club horse show - it is always fun. The youth classes - 8-13 yrs old - were interesting to watch. The kids and the horses were all wound up. There were several near wrecks and 1 kid ended up getting bucked off. The judge was awesome, she excused the horse and rider for the rest of the day. She wasn't willing to put up with unsafe practices in her ring.

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I'm riding some of the barn owners horses for the next month, until Rusty gets the ok from the vet. I was going crazy not riding a little bit over the summer. Fall is short around here, so I didn't want to wait. The barn owner has a decent lease program, with 3 horses that I could ride. They are all older and well-trained. She takes that very seriously. I think it is good to get out an ride other horses as well, so I'm hoping to get in 3 rides/week that way until my old man is ready to start work again.

8 things to do before I die...

Wow - two posts in one day - how exciting. *yawn*

I thought I'd do another meme - it's what all of the cool kids are doing. I picked this one up from the lovely ginger-haired Shauna over at the Amazing Adventures of Diet Girl.

This one is simple - just post a list of 8 things you'd like to do before you bite the bullet. A little gloomy perhaps, but hey, it's Monday morning and about to RAIN AGAIN. At least I'm stuck inside at work.

1. Learn to jump well enough to go the local hunts and/or try the hunter paces. I would love to take a paint or another kind of non-traditional horse to an event that is steeped in tradition - there's a teeny bit of rebel in me. Not that paints aren't everywhere these days...
2. Take a horse riding vacation somewhere exotic - like Peru
3. Spend a season in Europe - spring in Paris or summer in London or maybe a small village - just to experience life there for longer than a week. Too bad we sold the family chalet in Gstaad. (har har, I kid.)
4. Cycle around Italy - not sure why exactly, but it seems like a good thing to put on a list like this.
5. Have a baby - whoa - that's a big one eh? Thought I'd slip that in to make sure everyone is paying attention. I'm turning 34 soon, so I'd better get on this one in the near future. Preferably not while I'm learning to jump. ;-p
6. Okay - this one is cheesy - make sure to enjoy time with the hubby every day and not take our great relationship for granted. Who knows what the future may hold, so I want to make sure to enjoy it as much as I can
7. Learn to manage my finances and save $$ so I could actually have a chance at affording to do some of the things on my list!
8. Another tough one - lose weight and get back in shape so that I don't have to worry about getting the things on this list done right away. I owe it to myself to take better care of my health - that is a long-term (hopefully) plan.

Ok - I don't really like tagging people, so I'll tag a couple and the rest of you, consider yourselves tagged if you want to participate...

Cdncowgirl and Twinville always seem up for a good meme! :-)

Odds and ends...

I was a little slow in picking up the award that Cdncowgirl left for me a few days ago... Sorry Cdn! Thanks for giving it to me. I think most of my reads have been awarded this one, so I might hold off on passing it around for now...THE ARTE Y PICO AWARD

The designer of this award has asked that the following be passed along with it: The origin of the Arte y Pico Award

This prize has arisen from the daily visits that I dedicate to many blogs which nourish me and enrich me with creativity. In them, I see dedication, creativity, care, comradeship, but mainly, ART, much art. I want to share this prize with all those bloggers that entertain me day to day and to share this prize with those who enrich me every day. Doubtlessly, there are many and it will be hard to pick just a few. The people I will name today deserve this prize, as do the very long serious list of bloggers I also enjoy to read. But I will name the first 10 and leave the rest of the work to all the bloggers that visit other's blogs and are nourished by them."Here are the rules, if you decide to pass the award further to remarkable blogs in blogosphere worth to mention.

The rules:
1. You have to pick 5 blogs that you consider deserve this award through creativity, design, interesting material, and also contributes to the blogger community, no matter of language.
2. Each award should have the name of the author with a link to their blog.
3. Award winners have to post the award with the name and link to the blog of the person who gave them the award.
4. Please include a link to the

“Arte Y Pico” blog so that everyone will know where the award came from.

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Rusty update - he is eating like a horse (har har) and seems to be acting more like his old self. He is still on 2 types of meds, probably for at least another month. His weight is still low though, so hopefully we get the ok from the vet to start pumping more grain into him.

I was telling my friend about Rusty and she suggested I call a friend of hers. This lady is a registered dietician (for people), a competitive rider and also has a degree in animal nutrition. So, I emailed her last night and she thinks she can give me some suggestions for Rusty. I'm pretty happy that she might be able to help. I'm finding that vets don't always know alot about nutrition and there isn't much info online that I trust. Sooo, I'm hoping that this new contact can at least help me sort out what is true and what isn't in the wild world of equine nutrition. I'll do a post on it here when I have everything sorted out.

Short Summer Vacation

I don't have any news on Rusty - I went to check on him last night and guess what? It was RAINING. *sigh* It wasn't just sprinkling, it was pouring so hard I could barely see the road. The horses were out on grass, waaaay down at the back. I spotted Rusty, counted 4 legs, a head and a tail, so I'm guessing he is ok. I'll be out tomorrow (with rain gear) to pull him in and give him a thorough checking over.

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Here are a few pictures from my family trip this year. We spend a few days at cabins on a river in Quebec. It's about a 4 hour drive from our place. The area is beautiful - part of the Canadian shield. It is rocky and hilly, with lots of beautiful trees (that are sadly being heavily logged)

We stayed in cabins that belong to a hunting and fishing club. The cabins and main house all have hot/cold running water, fridges/stoves and showers. You can't drink the water, but it is safe for other uses.

(Note: I wasn't too thrilled with my pics this year, so I used a couple from last year...)

You are very happy to see this sign signalling your arrival - after almost 2 hours of driving up bumpy, dirty logging roads and rickety bridges.

They fly the Canadian flag, the Quebec flag and the US flag. There are a lot of members that come up from PA, MA and NY to hunt and fish

The main lodge - you can rent bedrooms here. This is the original farmhouse that was built in the mid 1800's. Every time I see it I wonder how those poor people survived all the way up here by themselves. There are no neighbours.

The view from our cabin, looking over a wide part of the river. This is where we swim, boat, etc.Not much wildlife visible (which is good, since there are bears around) - but there are hummingbirds...

...and cute little chipmunks scrounging for left-over bird seed

This year there were 2 special guests - Jack and Jill, my father-in-law's mallard ducks that he hatched in an incubator and imprinted...

They would go for walks with him and follow him down to the river. Max, my big tough bird dog retreiving boy, was afraid of them. Yes folks, my dog is afraid of tame ducks.

My father-in-law, in addition to being a duck whisperer, is also a pilot. He has his own float plane that he brings up every year. My husband Richard is also a pilot - he only gets to fly a few times a year, so flying up here with his Dad is quite an opportunity. I may not have a cowboy, but I have a part-time pilot, that must count for something!! lol Here Richard is prepping and untying the plane to take off...

Watching the plane take off (pictures below) is exciting, watching a landing has my heart jumping in my throat.

The taxi for take off from a different angle...

We spent most of our time down at the dock, my nephews loved swimming and playing with the dog.There were these scary creatures in the water. :-)

The ducks would swim around you sometimes - when they weren't busy eating bugs.
Max, being a good sport and wearing this cowboy hat. He is so cute...
There were lots of wild raspberries around. Picking them was a bit hazardous because of the bugs. We stuck it out because my mother-in-law made a pie. It was worth it in the end!

My brother-in-law's dog was obsessed with the chipmunks. She spent 99% of her time staring up this tree at them, while they chattered away at her, just out of reach. Too funny.
This picture doesn't do justice to the beautiful sunsets up there - but you get the idea. Props to anyone that read down this far! lol

Back to the grind

I'm back from my short vacation. As much as my in-laws can be a bit trying, I would rather be down at the dock with them instead of at my desk!

This is just a quick post - I'll update more with pictures tomorrow.

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Rusty update - don't have much. I'm going out to see him tonight. There were no messages stating otherwise, so I'm assuming he is ok.

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I spent about 30 minutes on the phone with a local boarding stable owner who (apparently) is a horse nutrition expert. She explained a lot about feed and made a lot of suggestions for Rusty. She was familiar with Rusty's story as my vet contacted her to track down a contact of an equine nutritiontist vet. I'm going out tonight to buy some stuff for him, so let's hope he is feeling well enough to eat.

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The weather here has been the pits. It is nice all day - sunny, not too hot, nice breeze. Then it starts to rain about 4:30-7:00 pm - just when us suckers with desk jobs try to go out and do stuff. It's getting a bit old, Mother Nature.

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I'm very grumpy about being back at work. *sigh* I need to just suck it up and get back in the groove. I like the lifestlye to which I am accustomed, so I need to quit being a whiner about it. Although, there have been several part-time and full-time job postings at local stables. I have been tempted to take a sabbatical and work at a barn for a year.

More details on everything tomorrow. Going to spend tonight getting caught up on everyone's blogs!

I'm outta here!

Heya gang - I'm outta here for a few days. I'm hoping it will be relaxing, but I'm going to be trapped in the remote woods with all of my INLAWS!!!!!!!!!!!!! lol. They are fine most of the time, but after several days trapped in the woods, we all might be a little squirrely!

Here is a teaser picture from last summer. Y'all have a good week!