Shivering

BG was shivering last night and this morning, it makes me feel really mean and makes me worry.

It has been very cold and wet here, I don’t think her poor body knows what to do as Sunday was boiling hot and sunny. Last winter she was out in -10 degrees un-rugged and was perfectly fine, so I am hoping it is just where the weather has suddenly changed and her body wasn’t ready for it. She had two times last winter when she shivered, hence I bought her a rug just in case, but I really don’t want to have to use it. I like to keep her as natural as possible and especially don’t want to be rugging her now or else her winter coat won’t grow as it should.

She came down last night when we arrived. It was still raining. She had her head collar on good as gold and ate her tea. I didn’t notice her shivering then so led her out. The ground was too slippery to lunge her so I just led her up to go over the poles on the ground. She got a little tense as we approached the poles as it is where she knocked the jump yesterday, but she was walking quite nicely and went over it with no issues. I then went to take her head collar off and she had her head held high and tense, that was when I noticed her near hind shivering. I wasn’t sure if it was just nerves being in that section of the field so I led her back to her shelter.

She was still shivering in there, I went to get her some more food so we could keep her in out of the rain for a bit. She ate her food and then started to nod off to sleep. I am not sure if it is me worrying and seeing things but her tummy looked more pronounced too.

We stayed up there with her nodding off to sleep until we were sure she was okay and the shivering had stopped. When we left she watched us leave but stayed in her shelter nodding off to sleep. It is quite unusual for her, normally she only goes in the shelter to eat or in the summer occasionally to get out of the heat, so she must have known for once it was a good idea to dry off.

I think it has rained nearly all night and was still raining when we got up there this morning. BG came trotting down for her breakfast and, by the time I had her food ready, I saw her bottom vanish into her shelter as she took herself in.

She was shivering again, but in the twenty minutes we were there it stopped quite quickly and, when given the option, she went straight back out into the rain.

I think I just need to keep an eye on her, it is not something I remember ever seeing her do in her previous home. I wish I had stables and paddocks in my back garden so I could keep an eye on her. I would have made her up a hay net last night so she would stay in out of the wet, but where she is now P1 and P2 would probably have come down and they would all have fought over the net. I could have made up three, but they don’t really need the extra food, both P2 and BG are on the tubby side.

I have read a bit on it today and the common consensus seems to be to feed hay when this happens as this then warms them from the inside out and dries them out. I might look into an alternative to hay, some sort of mash or something that’ll have the same effect, so we can feed it whilst we are up there and it won’t affect the others. I want to keep the rugs off as long as I can (in fact, I had hoped not to use it at all this winter) so I will just monitor her and see how she goes.

I wish the wind would die down

I like the cooler weather and I don’t mind the rain, but I wish it was a little less windy. I quite like the wind too, most of the time, but when trying to work with BG it doesn’t help at all. I spend most my day at work meaning I don’t get much choice about when I can work with her, so to get up there in the evening to strong winds and BG being silly makes me a little upset. I just want to spend some quality time with my pony and work towards achieving something.

Last night with the wind I couldn’t lunge her. The wind catches at the lunge line and tugs it in front of her making her scared. I didn’t want to do nothing with her since I need to keep her weight under control and there was the hint of heat in her hooves which there hasn’t been for a while. So I stuck to just walking her in hand. I have been thinking about introducing some bends in her straight work, but last night it was all I could do to stop her running round and round me in the wind. I did lead her alongside the mounting block and over the little jump but called it a day after that since she was very on her toes and just getting herself more wound up. Unfortunately she knocked the jump over since she tried to jump it from a stand-still. I think I will lower it and build her confidence up more before asking her to jump that height again, I read her trotting up to it, stopping and then jumping as a lack of confidence with the task.

Monday night she had lunged reasonably nicely and I managed to get the knot out of her tail.

Then this morning I was very pleased with her. After letting us catch her in the field weeks ago, to reverting to not coming in at all and needing my husband to herd her down, she made her own way down this morning with no coaxing.

Weekend update

Having said how BG generally takes good care of herself I got up there this morning to see a long line across her bottom where she has obviously been rubbing and has a line missing coat and looking very raw in some places. I also have no idea what she has done to her tail! It is one big matted mess and looks like she’s tucked half of it up in the middle of the rest and tied several big knots in it. Her tail is tough to brush but never with knots like this. I didn’t have time to sort it all out this morning, I think it is going to be a big job for tonight.

At least she was easy to catch this morning. She said hello to my husband in the field when he went to tell her breakfast was here, then walked straight down, into her shelter and head collar straight on. Last night she was not so good. She took a lot of herding to get away from the others and down to her shelter. When she eventually walked in she then refused to have her head collar on. To be fair to her it was windy and there are lots of noises from tractors working near by, but she can’t get away with it. We resorted to the hoof holding and lead rope round the neck trick again. I think she would have let the head collar go on just with one of us holding her hoof, but we did the lead rope round her neck too as I think it is safer for her to pull away from that than with someone holding her hoof. Head collar went straight on once I had a lead rope round her neck. From that to being perfect this morning….she is a funny girl.

Saturday I unfortunately didn’t actually get to spend much time with BG, and the wind was up again meaning there would have only been a little I could do with her anyway. I did some in-hand work on the Friday night with her in the wind but she was a little on her toes.

Sunday morning it was still so it really cheered me up to think I could spend a good chunk of time doing stuff with her.

She had a very thorough groom and was glowing afterwards. She really is beautiful even if I do say so myself. Unfortunately there were so many flies up the field the fly spray didn’t seem to be having much effect.

I lunged her, she was good but not as perfect as she was earlier in the week. The sun was beating down and her sides seemed to be heaving a lot, so we only did a bit of it in trot. Then I tried some positive association with the mounting block. BG eyed it with distrust and snorted as I led her round it. She got closer to it than last time and I led her up to it and halted her alongside. We ended as before with me stood on it giving her a treat, and she was quicker to overcome her fear and take the polo than last time.

The daft thing is I could probably just use another object as a mounting block and she wouldn’t have the fear association, though she would still be nervous of someone at a higher height than her.

Perfect pony

I was thinking about BG the other day and how she is the perfect pony to own (besides being a pain to catch and un-rideable)!

She has been scratching her head so I was putting Sudocream on it. She didn’t like it much and tried to pull away, but it is the first time I have put any on her face for rub marks. P1 and P2 have both been rubbing themselves raw, whereas BG is just missing a bit of her coat where she has rubbed it.

So I was thinking how lucky I was to own her since she didn’t rub as much as others. Then I was thinking about when I put her in on box-rest. Some horses get upset being in and, although she lives out 24-7, she is perfectly calm when she is put in a stall. She adapts to her surroundings (except humans) very calmly. She doesn’t get too upset if other horses are there or not. She doesn’t need to be rugged or shod. If you put up an electric fence, regardless of whether it has a shock in it or not, she tends to steer clear whereas P1 and P2 will go through, under or over it – whichever one they fancy. If I am doing something quickly I can just put the lead rope over her shelter entrance and trust her not to try pushing on it.

She is a tough, independent little girl and so the perfect pony to own from a care point of view. From my point of view she is the perfect pony to own in all ways anyway.

Reasonably positive start to the week

Luckily BG has been easier to catch this week before work. She isn’t coming straight down but she seems to have got over her fear of her shelter, there is only occasionally the slightest hesitation before entering, and a slight hesitation as her head collar goes on her nose. She has been lunging beautifully too. She used to collapse in on the circle but now she is carrying herself right out on the edge of the circle (I think she is trying to pull my arms off) and has become very responsive to my voice aids.

I tried to introduce trot to halt and halt to trot transitions a little while ago, and it was taking quite a few strides to do the transitions. Last night she was perfect, and did them straight away when asked. I use ‘steady’ to warn her that I am about to ask for a downward transition and ‘come on then’ to warn her I am about to ask for an upwards transition. These are like my vocal half halts, to tell her I am about to expect something of her and to listen.

She is better on her ‘bad’ rein at the moment, she has a tendency now to turn in on the halt command on her ‘good’ rein, but even that was better yesterday.

Unfortunately, just as I was coming to the end of lunging her on her ‘bad’ rein P2 was brought back into the field and BG turned round to see what was going on and after that refused to lunge on her ‘bad’ rein. It has been a long time since she refused to do that.

Earlier in the week I jumped her too. It isn’t a big jump but big enough that she has to make an effort. I have popped her over it a couple of times, but this time I am not sure if she was trying to tell me something and that she didn’t want to do it for a reason. She tries to run out the side of the jump, and after the first attempt she was on her toes and trotting round me in circles. Quite often I interpret this as enjoying it, as her eyes prick up and she trots towards the jump. For a brief moment this week though she turned her back on me and stood there, so I am not sure if this was supposed to be a message. In case it was I did only a couple of jumps (it is all quite new to her anyway so I don’t want to over do it).

Then this morning BG saw the car pull in and was reasonably near the gate so actually came over to meet us, the first time she has done that for a while. Then she followed me round and peered at me as I prepared her breakfast. I’m happy she was happy to see us.

Daily routine

I put a little yesterday about my morning routine. It will vary in the winter months but our current routine is something like this:

Weekdays: Morning visit around 8am for half an hour. BG has her head collar on and her breakfast. Then she has hooves picked out, watered, quick groom, fly repellent all done when needed. Some mornings (like this morning) she has none of these done. I check the waters, tidy up the bits I used and then muck out the field.

Evening visit is normally around 7pm and an hour at least. One day of the week she has nothing expected of her so the visit is shorter and mimics the morning routine. Otherwise BG is head collared and fed. Hooves will be picked out and fly spray applied as and when necessary. She might get a thorough groom but I try not to over-groom her so her coat keeps it’s natural oils. Then she will have some ‘work’ done with her; it might be in-hand leading, the saddle popped on, a walk out on the lanes or, as is the case most of the time, a lunge. Then the waters are checked and the full mucking out of the field is done if the other owner hasn’t beaten me to it.

Saturday the routine is similar but breakfast is at 9am. Then Sunday I might work her in the morning instead.

Of course farrier visits, vets etc. are all outside of this normal routine. I have done extra trips up for other things before as well. Then there are all the additional things you find yourself doing when up there, as well as saying hello to P1 and P2 and making a fuss of them and quickly checking them over.

In winter there are hay nets to do too, and mucking out by torch light. We will have to wait and see how the winter routine develops this year.

A better morning

It has been very windy here. As people know this often upsets horses even more so adds to my worries about catching BG. Then in the morning we allow half an hour to see her on our way to work. This involves giving her breakfast and a quick check over. She will have fly repellent, hooves picked out, water put on hooves etc. as needed. The water buckets are checked and I will do some mucking out of the field, although this depends on how well everything else goes.

Yesterday morning it was over half an hour to catch her though, so you can see why my hopes weren’t up.

My husband went over to see her whilst I prepared her breakfast. (It is only Happy Hoof but I water it down well to prevent incidents of choke). BG immediately started to walk away when she saw my husband, then saw me with her food bowl and trotted over to see me. I do like it when she trots towards me, makes me feel like she is actually pleased to see us. She went straight in her shelter with only a brief stop and the head collar went straight on despite the wind howling outside.

So that was a huge positive (and I got to clear the whole field of muck too). Now I need the wind to die down so I can exercise her tonight. Although I can see her reverting and being a pain to get in her shelter again. We will have to wait and see.

Slow process

For some reason BG has decided not to like her field shelter any more. I don't know why but I can go to collect her from the field, she sees the head collar and moves away so I herd her down to the shelter. She will get as far as the entrance and then just stand there, coaxing does not seem to persuade her to go in. P1 and 2's owner tried with extra strong mints this morning with no luck, and I have tried with apple cruchies. The only way I can manage it is to leave her food bowl in her sight (having got her to the entrance) and then walk away so it is just her and the food bowl. Then she will tentatively make her way in and eat, and lick every last bit in the bowl.

I don't like doing this as it means she gets her food before having her head collar on. Luckily I have then put another handful of food in her bowl and she has had her head collar on perfectly. I wish I knew what had suddenly made her dislike her little 'safe shelter'. She is fine once she is in there, it is all just a little odd.

I was going to lunge BG this morning, as a return to normality after last night's antics. I took her out to lunge her but the wind caught the lead rope and pulled on it which worried BG. She turned round on the spot and looked at me for confidence that nothing was going to hurt her. I didn't want her getting upset again so I got a brief trot out of her before calling it a day. It is a pity as I really wanted to spend time with her working her and she did trot beautifully when asked. Tonight there were some jumps set up in the field too and I would have loved to take her over them as they were only low, but I didn't want to risk it (still very blustery).

After last night I am wondering if she will ever be rideable. I would like her catchable for a start. It is a slow process to get her in and head collar her at the moment. She might well be missing her breakfasts this weeks as I won't have the time before work for her to take things slow.

She can run!

Thursday night off seems to have helped BG's mood. She also had Friday night off too. It was tipping it down and she was sliding in the mud when I just led her out of her shelter, so any attempt at work would have been a waste.

So she has had a couple of days off and seems to be happier, so I guess she was just having a bad day on the Wednesday. She is still being a pain to catch though, she does not seem tempted by food so trying to get her in her shelter to eat is hard work. I guess the nice grass is far more tempting. This morning she just stood by her shelter door looking in and did not seem at all inclined to enter and eat her tea.

I have actually increased her meals a little, they weren't even covering the bottom of her bowl so she wasn't really getting any sort of reason to come in. Shes still enjoying her Happy Hoof though when she does come in as she licks the bowl clean every time and then tries to chew on the handle and throw it across the shelter.

She is getting better about the head collar again too, and has had it on in the shelter a few times at the first attempt recently. I am expecting her to pull back as I put it on her nose each night but that is now just me being silly and not her as she has been perfectly, time for me to get over it too now.

I lunged her tonight. She went beautifully, really striding out. She is now better on her 'bad' rein at standing when asked than on her 'good' rein, on her good rein she takes longer to respond.

We then put the saddle on her. BG wasn't happy to see it but had it put on with no issues, even with me adjusting it and playing with the stirrups and saddle flaps. She planted herself when we asked her to lead out so I just walked into the shelter with the lunge whip and she went straight out.

She did not want to walk anywhere, just swing her hind quarters round when asked to move. If I tried to move behind with the whip to encourage her forward she would swing round more so she could see me. Once my husband had led her away from the shelter she did walk along slightly better.

I thought I would try lunging her with the saddle on as I have managed it before and thought BG might respond better to it. No. She planted herself and would not move at all despite the whip behind her and voice commands, even with my husband walking near her head she wouldn't have it. She just planted herself and would not move.

Then she suddenly started moving! Unfortunately something had set her off and she charged forward. The lunge rope gave me rope burn, I thought she would stop before she got to the end of the lunge rope length but she kept going so I had to let go.

Off she went! She can run! She did a lap and a bit of the field and then stood there heaving. She didn't actually seem too upset by the saddle, which had stayed in place and she hadn't tried to buck at all, but she was eyeing the lunge line on the ground.

Luckily, once she stands still she does let me approach her and sort her out. So I unclipped the lunge rope, removed the saddle and then she got lead around until she calmed down.

I won't be trying to lunge her with the saddle on for a while. Just leading her with it I guess, although my husband believes it was something else that upset her.

Just a gentle lunge for her tomorrow morning I think. Luckily she doesn't seem to be holding this against us as she was perfectly keen to be fussed over afterwards.

Something not quite right....

Something is not quite right with BG at the moment, as if there is a little niggle annoying her.

She was okay on Tuesday night. I went to catch her in the field but, since she had the head collar incident a few weeks ago, she wouldn’t let me. Unfortunately she doesn’t seem to mind me approaching her with the head collar all the time and sometimes will just stay grazing – but how do I then get her head in whilst her nose is stuck to the ground. BG has always been good at putting her own nose in the head collar to have it on, and when she was being superb the other week and letting me catch her in the field she would raise her head and walk towards me to have it on.

So I couldn’t get her in the field but herded her down to her shelter and caught her in there. Then we just did some in-hand work which involved backing her up through poles without touching her which she did very well at, and leading her past as I got on and off the mounting block. She wasn’t so keen on that, she tensed and her ears went back whenever I stood on it, but we ended with me stood on it and her approaching me till she was close enough to have a treat.

Last night something was wrong though, I wish I could ask what it was. I again had to herd her down and then she wouldn’t have her head collar on at the first few times of asking. The head collar went on eventually and she ate her tea. I gave her a groom after and she stood there like a stone statue, ears pinned back. She didn’t move away, she didn’t stick her head out the shelter door to see what was going on outside like usual, she just stood there.

I lunged her for fifteen minutes and she did everything as asked, but she just didn’t seem to have any spark in her. I need to find something she really enjoys so I can do that with her, but I can’t think what off the top of my head. Tonight she is going to have a night off; just have her head collar on and her tea. Then hopefully she will be better on Friday and it was just that she was having a bad day.

Happy to be back

Last Monday and the farrier visit seems a long time ago now. I am very pleased to say that BG did not go lame after the visit, and the cut on her leg from where P1 caught her is healing up nicely and staying clean.

I was away for the weekend so P1 and P2’s owner took care of her. She apparently behaved herself and they groomed her and picked out her hooves with no issues. I forgot to ask if she was nervous of the grooming or okay, as last time the owner went to stroke her in her shelter BG moved stubbornly to the back and hid.

I do worry when I go away as no one else currently catches BG, incase anything was to happen. Luckily care wise she is quite a hardy little girl so it is not like she needs lots of food, constant checking, rugs changing etc. You could probably turn her out on the moors and she would survive perfectly well (you would never be able to catch her again though!).

I am glad to be back, and see her again (she didn’t look overly excited by the fact I was back). I fed her, gave her a brief groom and a lunge. She was very good on the lunge, very responsive to the voice commands and didn’t try to collapse in on the circle at all. Afterwards I mucked out the field and then just sat in the field for a bit, and was very happy that she gradually made her way over to me grazing on the way.

I am feeling quite positive this week about achieving things with her. Lets hope I can keep the positivity up.

A couple of firsts and a worry

So on Sunday it was wormer time again. If anyone ever reads my previous posts you will see that last time the wormer was an issue. We put it in BG’s food and would she eat it – no. No matter how much food we added to dilute it, it took several meals to go down which I doubt is a very efficient way to give wormer, and then she still spat lots of it out. So I decided I would have to master the normal, syringe in the mouth, approach.

I have never done this before. I have seen it done a few years back, on a 17hh grumpy horse who threw his head around and attempted to spit loads out so the owner was trying to keep his head held up. I went on YouTube for some tutorials just to ensure I was remembering the method correctly.

I thought about trying a syringe with something tasty in so she would learn to like it, but never got as far as trying it. Sometimes it is better to plunge in the deep end.

So BG had her tea and then I gave her a while to get most the food out of her mouth. Then I moved her into a corner of her shelter so she would have less options to run away or spin around, and got my husband to hold her.

The syringe went straight in! But she pulled away before I had a chance to push on the plunger. BG was by now throwing her head up or turning away and at one point pulled around so we had to reposition her. Despite that it was all much easier than I thought it would be with her. The syringe eventually went back in, (how can you tell if it is over their tongue when you can’t see?) and I pushed the plunger as quickly as possible before BG could pull away.

She didn’t spit any out, although I held her nose up for a bit just in case. She obviously didn’t like the taste and it took a while for her to get over it, pursed lips being pushed up in the air as she made the funny snorting noise horses make when they do that. All in all an achievement I think, lets hope next time goes just as well.

This morning’s first was that I took BG for a walk out of the field on my own. I have only ever gone with other people and my husband tends to lead her most of the time, but today I just felt was a good time to try. We could have done with P2 getting upset and running around on the other side of the hedge. BG got a little on her toes from this, of course just as a car came past. Luckily the grass verges are quite wide there and BG stood nicely behind me as it went past.

I did head back then as I thought this might not be a good idea with P2 upsetting BG, but he seemed a little calmer so I tried again. I didn’t go too far but we did it – our first trip out on our own.

BG had the farrier this morning. We had her hooves trimmed in the field rather than the shelter and she stood perfectly. Hopefully she won’t be too sore tonight, the farrier didn’t trim them as short as last time since I mentioned she had been sore. Unfortunately the farrier doesn’t reckon the crack on her near-fore will grow out any time soon. P2 didn’t stand so nicely for the farrier, he is a little kid that is still learning a lot of things. With his head in a food bowl he was better than the previous times I have seen though.

And the worry, there is a rumour the farmer we rent the field off is going to sell it, and there isn’t much other grazing around.