Not much that's exciting has occurred in the meantime - which is good from the perspective that excitement isn't always a good thing, I suppose. The ponies have been enjoying the last days of summer winding down. The nights are getting earlier, and the mornings are definitely getting darker. I'm dishing out cat food, grain and morning supplements in the granary with the help of a light, and on moonless mornings my headlamp sure comes in handy. Then it's out among the beasties in the dimness, distributing feed pans and velcroing on their fly masks.
Thankfully, the fly masks do fit under their halters so I can get those on while they eat.
Our morning parade is now made by the light of the moon - some days it's bright enough to cast shadows and Squeak looks almost yellow when springs out to attack my feet and risk squashing as I trip my way back to the barn. Not sure why, but I never seem to fall over anything on my way TO the pasture with my hooved escorts. So far the morning trips have been mostly uneventful. One morning we spooked several deer and sent them careering off into the brush. Another morning it was a cow and a brand new, still wobbly calf. We gave her a wide berth, but she was surprisingly unconcerned. The horses had all the native wildlife spotted before we started, apparently, because other than pricked ears they didn't bother reacting.
They aren't quite so blase about the newest potentially encounterable obstacle though, perhaps because it's of the equid persuasion. The cow folks have four small donkeys, which until very recently they've kept up at their home barn. For whatever reason, possibly because the (this year's) baby is getting bigger, they've decided to turn them out with the cows.
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| "Egad! I think it's moving - what in the world is it?" |
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| Small, but incredibly cute |
No riding to speak of - I keep resolving to do better, but so far it's been less riding and more other chores that need to get done. Fingers crossed that Mother Nature continues to provide us with a long fall, and maybe I'll get my list of have-to-do knocked down and get back to the fun priorities!
2 comments:
Hello! Nice to hear that you are well and still hanging in there :)
Did you get any of those flooding rains back in Aug? Was thinking of you as we drove down 35 through KS. On the way home we stopped in at my Dad's home place and visited the relatives. I sure love KS. If we move again I hope it's there. - Not to mention all the hay we saw, holy what a good year for OK/KS in the hay department. In every direction and as far as the eye could see were round bales. Wish it were that way up here. Folks are freaking out over the dismal hay crops around here and selling horses left and right cheap. Even had a gal call me last week saying she had a haflinger cross yearling that she bought for 4grand that she didn't have hay for and she'd give him to us. I said thanks but no - as we know there is no such thing as a free horse.
You, too! We didn't actually get much of the rain. We're in the drier end of the state, and most of it went around. Alfalfa crops looked pretty good around here, but grass hay is a different story. Still, it sounds as if we're in slightly better shape than you guys. Hope you've been able to round up enough for your herd!
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