There are more advantages to living in the country than not, but some of the ‘not’ can catch you off guard and show you what you’re made of. I love the open space of the country, but it sure makes it harder for people to hear you when you yell for help.
Being a new rancher I know that I still have years of learning as I go, but I am up for the challenges because I am living my dream. I have always loved nature and horses.
One of the challenges that I took on is raising ‘baby’ horses when I have only been around adult horses already broke.
When the opportunity came to buy our ranch we considered raising a baby horse because ‘they are so cute’ and, now is the time if we want to do it - we aren’t getting any younger. And it certainly has been an experience. Jason bought Suede, a buckskin Filly and I bought Legend, a Tobiano Colt – both Tennessee Walking Horses.
At first, it was sweet. They were small and they were learning things I could teach them. But not being an avid trainer there was so much I didn’t know.
Lesson one: small horses are still big and wearing boots is a must. Lesson two: do not play hide and seek by the big oak tree in the pasture no matter how cute your colt is… he will believe you are his playmate and as he grows bigger he will challenge you.
The first year I learned a lot. After Legend grew taller than me and knew his strength, he would paw at me or push me around and I became afraid to handle him. We also had an electric fence in which ‘tightening’ it would no longer help and, the wood posts were rotten in the ground. Legend learned how to get through the fence in the back of the pasture by the creek and he would go down into the creek but find his way back into the pasture after he had his fun.
We didn’t know this until I saw a gash on him and we saw hoof prints passed the fence leading to the creek. We immediately began a costly new fence project but one pasture at a time.
When we had the opportunity to have four new horses that were grown, broke and great trail horses, I had thought of selling Legend.
I hated to, but I really thought this horse had something wrong with him mentally and even though I was as green as he, I felt it was too late to change his mind about me and he would disrupt the behavior of my husband’s and son’s horses and the new horses.
I was wrong. As the new horses have gotten to know their new home, Legend and Suede have matured into a new season and I think watching the other horses has helped them learn to behave better.
Suede was never much of a problem, but I can tell she listens better. However, Suede can be a stubborn girl at times and today was no exception.
I have been able to handle Legend again and gain back my confidence. This took time, the swish of a crop, and leadership over fear.
While Legend had his nightly creek excursions before we got the new fence, he had gotten his mane tangled in tree limbs and brush and he was sporting dread locks.
I tried to comb out the messy strands, but I knew it was likely that I would have to cut his pretty white mane. I was able to bathe him and we had a breakthrough – he lifted all four feet for me! That was something new for us. He lifted his front feet last year but was shaky about it. Now he was lifting on command and trusted me, but I still take one thing at a time and try not to do too much at once with him.
So, today I wanted to attempt to get that gnarled hairdo of his under control and I went out in the pasture to catch him. Catching a horse can be tricky depending who it is, but Legend always comes when I call him and allows me to halter him every time.
He did so well with letting me give him a bath last time that I decided I would use the cross ties at the wash rack beside the barn, to hold him so I could groom his mane.
As I led him out of the gate Suede decided to come too! Normally, I put his body in the way of another horse getting through, but Suede is a lanky, thin teenager right now and can slide through with all her stubbornness!
When she got out, I had Legend on a lead rope in one hand while holding the gate with the other hand and trying to block the way to pass me and get loose, but the barn door was open on both sides!
Thankfully Legend followed as I pulled him close to the barn door so I could close it, but my reach was not long enough to hold the gate too, so Cleo (our big draft horse) decided to come out and that …was when I began to panic a little inside.
Standing maybe fifty feet from the ranch house where my son lives, I hollered as loud as I could for him to help. My good little (and big) horsies were just grazing the grass in the area I allowed them, but if I moved to do anything other than block them, they would be able to go around the barn towards the road.
The big barn fan was not helping my voice to carry across the yard to the house, nor was the air conditioning unit at the house.
I found that I could yell louder – but it hurt to yell that loud and Queen Cleo did not like my voice like that. She moved her big 1,350 pound body over between the barn and the wash rack. Hoo-boy, it would be fun trying to get her out of that spot, but at least now I could maybe coax Suede back into the pasture.
Andrew was not coming to my rescue. Thoughts of bombs going off during my son’s time in Iraq made me realize he may never hear me (nor would anyone else in the house because he probably keeps the television pretty loud in order to hear it).
Just then, Rocky Top and Liberty came through the opened gate and I was now blocking five horses and had only two hands to hold the gate and my colt. Getting the horses back in the pasture at this point was not a one person job.
So I screamed at the top of my lungs and the bottom of my diaphragm with reverberating vocal chords. I was sure even neighbors would hear me … if it weren’t for the construction guys with their loud bulldozers fixing the culvert nearby.
I was literally screaming for ten minutes for my son or anyone to hear me and come to my rescue. I felt like Marie Osmond’s character of the ‘damsel in distress’ in her 70s variety show in which she lay across train tracks yelling “ha-a-a-lp!”
And then I began laughing with God.
I knew as well as He did that I am not a damsel in distress. After all that He has brought me through in life I knew my strength, my wit, and my courage was much more than for me to cry “HALP.”
And so, I used my noggin. I unattached Legend’s lead rope and let him graze with the other horses in that one spot by the wash rack. Then I took the lead rope whirring it in the air to coax Rocky Top and Liberty back into the pasture. It worked!
Now, I only had a stubborn filly (who caused all this trouble to begin with) big Cleo (who was still stuck in between the wash rack and the side of the barn) and Legend to get back into the pasture. Rocky Top and Liberty wanted to come back out, so I had to keep swishing the rope toward them to keep them behind the open gate that I was using to block the way towards the road.
I let go of the gate and thought by slapping Suede on the rump I would get her inside and then I’d deal with Cleo and Legend.
It didn’t work.
When Cleo saw there was hiney-smacking going on, she decided to miraculously turn her hiney around as I watched the wash rack move slightly but stay intact and she tried to get passed me. She is such a good horse, she listened when I motioned her backward and she moved inside the wash rack where Suede was grazing.
New plan. I would just put Legend back in the pasture and maybe Suede would follow.
Suede didn’t, but Cleo did! After all the horses were in the pasture except for the one who caused all the chaos, I closed the gate and quickly grabbed a bucket of treats from right inside the barn door to entice Suede back into the pasture and I locked the gate with all the horses back inside.
Whew! Just then Andrew opened the barn door to see if I ‘needed anything’.
Now when I panic inside as I handle a problem, the minute it is over all the adrenaline comes spilling out and I could hear my shaky voice and hot tears coming to my eyes as I told him what happened.
Ellie Cheyenne was with him and that sweet little thing tried to come up with all the reasons why they must not have heard me. Realizing my emotions caused her to feel guilty, I assured her that I did not blame anyone for not coming to my rescue and that God and I handled it fine.
While I had Andrew there, I took Legend back out while he held Suede back and to hold Legend as I clipped his dreads. I wasn’t going to go through the pandemonium of five horses’ great escape without accomplishing what I had first set out to do!
Legend wanted to know what the scissors were, but as I conditioned him to the sound of the scissors and rubbed them against his body, he then let me clip away at the mangled mess.
Instead of looking like my free spirit horse of color with platinum mane flowing in the wind, he looks more like a precision cut show horse (well, maybe not precision on my first try) but at least now it is manageable until it grows back out.
And, I learned that just because I have my son living at the ranch and it may be easier to have his help – I am capable of using the wit, strength and courage that God gave me to handle any adventure of life He thinks I should handle on my own.
And …He knows I love adventure!
jen@jenjeffrey.com