On the Fence - Literally

Second Post of the Day

In case you missed it, Breyer's Second Chance Sale of BreyerFest 2025 merchandise starts today at 11:00 AM EDT. 

You must be a BreyerFest ticket holder to participate so be sure you are logged into the Breyer account that you used to buy your tickets. I might try for another Ties that Bind Us to see if I can get the gold or silver charm, but I'm still on the fence about that.

Speaking about being on the fence...

Tim and Loni are home from their trip, and the first thing he did at the barn was to rotate the pastures. (Tim's barn management skills are superb.)

Not the best photo, but the new pasture is full of tiny flowers, and Sultanna's hoof was surrounded by them. It was charming!

Back to fences...

The next door neighbor is repairing his fences and I took this photo as I drove down the lane to visit Sultanna, Eazy, and Hokey. Then I noticed something that made me smile.

The hammer hanging on the fence, waiting be used!

For whatever reason, that just made me smile. It seemed so typical of life around horses and it made me feel good that I am back around horses frequently again.

Crazy, huh? But it still makes me smile.

New Projects & Watching Abby

First Post of the Day (Check back soon!)

Tim is not afraid of hard work. If something needs to be done, it gets done. Just this year he has fixed the foundation on the old barn (know anyone else who would jack up a barn and pour a new foundation all by himself?), removed all the stalls and the haymow in the blue barn so it could be remodeled, and built new fencing that allowed him to move horses into the south paddock through a neat series of gates.

His new project? Actually, there are two.

The neighbors to the southwest moved and the new owners don't plan to use the five acre pasture that came with the home.

The fencing is falling down although the posts are in good shape and intact.

They have agreed to let us use their pasture and Tim is going to repair all that fencing so that we can.

It will be nice to have the pasture, but that's going to be a huge job. I have no doubt that he will get it done, though.

The second project surprised me.

He's doing some Fall landscaping! He's bought maples, lilacs, serviceberries, redbuds, and dogwoods to plant around the property. I don't yet know what is going where, but I think it will be a nice addition to the property.

Finally, a note about Abby. There are lots of points in her favor for good health. She gets great care - she has shelter, water, food, and is checked daily. 

But, she is getting older (she's around 21-23) and her care needs are changing.

Winter is approaching, and as we head into the winter months, she is in excellent shape. She's also an Appaloosa, a very hardy breed. When it comes to shelter, Tim reconfigured the old barn so that if there is a dust up among the herd and someone gets chased out of the barn, there is a separate box stall they have access to so they can be warm and dry.

Shaking her head at a fly as she comes up to visit with me.

Still, I have begun keeping a closer eye on her, just in case. For example, yesterday when I visited her, I thought her stride looked off. Her hind legs did not seem to be reaching forward as much as they usually do but she was still moving freely and exhibited no signs of pain. Something to keep an eye on just in case an issue is developing. 

She's in her golden years, and my goal is that she enjoy life all her days. Changing her care plan and keeping a closer eye on her are all ways to ensure that that happens.

A Joy - Bringing Pasture Ornament

Since Diablo was sold and is in a self contained pasture on the property, and Sultanna is off being bred, there are just three horses in the seven pastures that Tim rotates the herd through. 

The horses cannot eat the forage fast enough - every pasture is lush and green.  (Look at how the grass in this pasture is almost up to the top of the fence posts.)

Tim is keeping it trimmed back and away from the fences; one strand is electrified and we don't want  the grass to touch that strand and ground it. (That's my "horse shoo-er" standing up for scale.)

We keep an eye on the horses when we change pastures, but they have never colicked or had loose stools when they go into a new pasture. They are out full time year round and adjust as the pasture begins its new growth in the spring. The growth starts out slowly and the horses (who are still on hay) transition without a problem.

Saturday morning the herd was way out in the north east pasture. Abby heard me call and put her head up, but she didn't come right away. (Often she beats me to the gate, coming up as soon as she sees or hears my car.)

I'd been bringing her carrots recently which she likes, but she much prefers peppermints and candy canes. I could see her trying to decide if she really wanted to come all that way just for more carrots. 

She decided in my favor and came striding up. Good decision on her part - I had peppermints in my pocket for her.

We visited a bit and I checked her over like I always do. She still has some longer hair that hasn't yet shed out, but otherwise she looks good. I patted her goodbye and then turned to walk back to my car.

And then Abby did something that made my heart swell.

She tagged along behind me as I walked down the slope toward the new barn.

She knew that I had no more treats to give her, but still she walked with me all the way back to the gate.  Sweet girl!

The forage is low there since it's a high traffic area, and that meant I could finally see her hooves. (Out in the pasture, it was so thick I really couldn't see much.) Now, I could see that Tim had given her a trim the other day, something she'd needed because she had chipped a piece out of the side of her hoof.

He didn't want to quick her, so there is still a small indentation where the chip was, but it sure looked better. Abby hadn't acted as though the chip bothered her, but I was still glad that he was able to get the trim done.

A few final pats for my girl and I headed home. She may just be a pasture ornament, but I don't care. She brings me great joy.

Take the Long Way 'Round

In the eight and a half years that I have had Abby at Tim's, I have never walked out to the western edge of the property and along the fence line. When I bought her, I was 100 pounds overweight, I'd recently had a hip and both knees replaced, needed a spinal fusion, and absolutely did not feel well enough to hike back there.

A lot has changed since then. My spine has been fused and now I can stand and walk for long periods of time. In 2019 I lost that excess weight. I was sidelined last summer with pancreatic surgery and then this summer with some repairs to that first surgery, but now I feel great. It was time to walk around that perimeter.

It started with the notion of just getting a close look at the hay that we got from my sister's field.

A friend who cans a lot of produce from her garden said that when she's finished for the day and sees all those jars of food cooling on the counter, that she feels ready for winter.

I feel the same way when I look at a row of round bales or a hay mow stacked to the rafters with hay.

Tim made pallets to keep the hay off the ground.

The round bale feeder that is used in this section of the pasture. There is another hay rack by the old barn where the square bales are fed.

The northwest pasture is temporarily divided into two pastures. You can tell that right now the horses are in the pasture that I am walking through - look at the difference in the heights of the growth.

As I walked along the perimeter and then back up towards the new barn, I came across this pretty flower in the lane.

I'd seen it in the past but didn't know what it was, so I took a photo of it and ran it through Seek, the naturalist app that my daughter-in-love, Emily, recommended I use.

I had to laugh - how ironic to have Horseweed in a horse pasture!

Seek is a free app and a lot of fun to use to figure out plants, insects, and other wildlife.

I highly recommend it if you've ever seen something that you wanted to identify. 

A much healthier me with my girl (who has her tongue out - again!) happy that I feel so good and am able to do more than I could just a few short years ago.

I took the long way 'round the pasture today, but I've also done so health-wise. Both were worth it.

Lush!

It's the end of June and summer is in full swing, but the weather conditions in Indiana have been favorable to growing, and so the pastures are deep and lush.

 In some places, it is knee deep on Abby!

You can get a sense from this photo of Trouble and Hokey enjoying the loafing shed as to just how well the pastures are flourishing.

My favorite Hoosier wildflower, Fleabane, grows along the fence rows. I can't help but smile whenever I see it.

Tim has about nine acres divided into eight pastures with two barns and a loafing shed. Even with six horses on site, that is plenty of room to sustain the herd without supplemental feeding of hay or grain.

There are other areas, like the lane to the new barn, that could be temporarily fenced should the need for more pasture arise.

But in the six years I have kept Abby at Tim's, that has never happened. Summer after summer, with Tim's good management skills, the pastures are able to sustain the horses.

Abby could not be in a better place.

Some Abby Time

Despite the busy-ness of preparing and hosting Happy Trails, I did get out to the barn to see my girl Saturday and Sunday.

It doesn't matter how far out in the pastures she is, Abby always comes when I call her.

 She is looking good.

Hokey, Trouble, Abby, (Diablo, barely seen behind Abby), Sultana, and Snickerdoodle.

The pastures are in excellent shape as we have had enough rain to keep the grass growing. And, Tim does an excellent managing them - there are six or seven that he rotates the horses through so that they get fresh grass in the pasture they are in while the others grow and recover.

Happy Trails is over and I am wrapping up boxing up my things in my classroom, so by the end of the week I should go full on into summer mode and begin enjoying retirement. Longer periods of time with Abby factors into my plans!

At Last - a Barn Visit!

Yesterday afternoon I finally had the energy to go visit Abby. As soon as she saw me, she hurried up to the gate. The problem was, Tim had put the babies in the small paddock by the new barn with Hokey as a babysitter, and I needed to cross that paddock to get to her.

Normally, that's not a problem. But right now since I'm post op, I am sore, moving slowly, and under restrictions for lifting. Snickerdoodle and Sultanna are very social, but they're also babies and sometimes crowd me. Or, they nip at each other and get things stirred up, making it so I have to quickly dodge out of the way. I'm just not up to that right now.

I went back to the car and got my pig whip out of the trunk. I usually use it to keep Trouble away (he's just as nosy as the babies) but they, too, know and respect it. (I don't hit them with it; it has a snapper and so I shake at at them when they come too close. They don't like the noise and back away.)

It worked like a charm! Sultanna, Snickerdoodle, and Hokey stayed back so I could visit Abby. (I do think it's funny that they stayed close and watched me chat with her. Like I said, they're very social!)

Abby was really happy to see me. Since Tim is rotating pastures, she, Trouble, and Diablo are together in a smaller field by the old barn so the others can grow. Because of my post op restrictions, I couldn't lift and wrestle the gates to get in with her and I am just too tender to duck between the wires. So, I had to be content with a visit through a partially opened gate. (Tomorrow I'll go down the lane to the old barn. I can get into the pasture she's in from up there.)

Looks like the other four pastures are growing well! I'm not sure which one Tim will rotate into next, but this one with the loafing shed is looking nice.