Come on my Evening Barn Check with me…

After spending the day thinking about our Bucket Fund horses… I wanted to go out and hug my horses.

Doesn’t that happen to you? When you hear sad stories of horses being dumped, don’t you want to go sit with your horses?

I do… so that’s what I did. Except I took my camera (and you) with me tonight.

C’Mon! Come share with me!

TONIGHT’S EVENING CHECK!

I go down to the barn every evening to check on MT and make sure she has all of her needs met for the night. Usually, she is totally splayed out, tummy full after dinner, snoring away.

Tonight was no exception.

I awakened the Queen from her slumber. She was half asleep here and had just gotten up on her sternum when she heard me enter the barn. (I keep her flymask on at night because the shavings sometimes scratch her corneas if I don’t. But, I take it off whenever there aren’t any flies.)

In the barn’s large pasture, the two boys, Rojo and Bodhi were munching away together. Rojo is a BLM mustang who I adopted out of the Prisoner Trained Adoption Program. Tiny Rojo is the Boss of the entire 12 horse herd. He is the youngest and the smartest. Bodhi is Hubby’s horse. He is half Percheron and half Welsh Cobb. We looked high and low for him… Everyone falls in love with Bodhi. He is a charmer. .

Can you see the three horses here? The mares, Remi, Sam and Gwen are eating together in the back pasture.

Here, this image should help… That is Sam. Sam (blond) is an estray horse (mustang not collected by the BLM) who was gathered in Nevada and run through a feedlot sale – pregnant. I bailed her and then adopted her7 years ago. Sam is perfectly behaved, but prefers not to interact with humans often. Remi (bay with pink lower lip) is a branded BLM mustang that was rescued up in Oregon off of a feedlot. She is a very bossy mare but incredibly loving. Gwen (brown) is Mama Tess’ first foal. Gwen, 20, was my riding horse for years. Now she is retired but she has the distinction of being the best trained horse on the property.

This is Sally. She is one of the resident barn kitties. Tonight, she was demanding attention. Sally and her brother were shelter kittens – feral. They aren’t feral any more!! Total love kitties.

This is Hubby’s dog, Shiva. I think he was waiting for me to leave so he could eat the cat food.

I headed up the hill and of course, Wrigley was the first to notice me. He is such an aware boy! Wrig is Mama Tess’ last foal. I have MT’s first and last foals here still.

Finn is angry with me because I took off his flymask to take this photo. Finn loves his flymask… Or, I guess I should say, Finn HATES flies. Finn is my #1 trail horse now. He is avery sweet and funny (I swear, he is a jokester) Tennessee Walking horse.

This is Wrigley saying HELLO!

BEAUTIFUL GIRL, always so sweet. She is a full sister to Finn. I purchased them both (Finn and BG) from their breeder and they are my current riding horses.

Sally followed me…

So did Shiva.

On my way over to the ponies, I found this turkey feather.

This is Slick. I’ve had him for 20 years. He was a 3 year old teasing stallion at a large Thoroughbred farm. They were upset with him because he kept getting out and running wild – so I took him. I adore him. Yes, he was gelded 20 years ago.

That is Norma Jean, my donk. I’ve had her 20 years, also. I bought her from a 90 year-old retiring donkey breeder. She needed a home and I fell in love with her at first sight. Norma, not so much… It took her a while to heal from leaving the old man. She was attached. Now, Norma Jean loves her Shetland ponies, Dodger and Slick. That is Dodger moving too quickly to be in this photo.

This is gentleman Dodger. He was older when I bought him at a feedlot auction for his meat price ($26.75). Dodger was one of those ponies that gives kids rides in a circle that you see at a County Fair. Evidently, he had a very ill fitting saddle and therefore was not a good pony. They dumped him at the feedlot. To this day, Dodger hates kids. I’ve had him 20 years (I brought them all home at around the same time), so I think he is in his early 30s now. Anyway, Dodger also loves his flymask and was upset with me that I had just removed it. I should have gotten that eye goober. Sorry!

Look who is right there… calling to me.

Then I went back into the barn and found MT up and scrounging around for illegal hay scraps. Sigh. She would rather eat every single scrap of the hay the other horses get before she will eat her dinner.

And there she is… never giving up. Sally walked with me back up to the house. I gave her a huge rubdown…

Thank you, Universe, for sending these wonderful souls all around me.

THE STARFISH STORY…

While walking along a beach, an elderly gentleman saw someone in the distance leaning down, picking something up and throwing it into the ocean.

As he got closer, he noticed that the figure was that of a young man, picking up starfish one by one and tossing each one gently back into the water.

He came closer still and called out, “Good morning! May I ask what it is that you are doing?”

The young man paused, looked up, and replied “Throwing starfish into the ocean.”

The old man smiled, and said, “I must ask, then, why are you throwing starfish into the ocean?”

To this, the young man replied, “The sun is up and the tide is going out. If I don’t throw them in, they’ll die.”

Upon hearing this, the elderly observer commented, “But, young man, do you not realise that there are miles and miles of beach and there are starfish all along every mile? You can’t possibly make a difference!”

The young man listened politely. Then he bent down, picked up another starfish, threw it into the back into the ocean past the breaking waves and said, “It made a difference for that one.”