Showing posts with label filly. Show all posts
Showing posts with label filly. Show all posts

Tuesday, May 26, 2015

Setting the Bar

Lots of things to catch up on, but as always, I'm trying to set the bar high.

Also known as trying to eat an elephant.

I am scheduled to go to a dressage schooling show this weekend.  I am glad it is just a schooling show, as who knows how things will work out.



I am just bringing Chili.  However, I am planning on showing two horses owned by a friend.

One is Alex, the amazing auction horse who is previously mentioned on this blog.  I will try and link back to him. 

The other is Madison, a horse that deserves her own blog post.  Suffice it to say, I had an adventure a couple weeks ago, which culminated in a new horse for my friend's program.  She is very sweet and I hope it will be a great show!

Madison, Alex, and Symphony.  I will be showing Madison & Alex
So far this is my plan:

Show Schedule
Intro A (Chili & Madison)
Training Level (Chili)
Dressage Equitation (Chili)
Western Dressage Trail (Alex)

Doesn't look too bad on paper.  Too bad there are three patterns to memorize! 

Wish me luck as I keep setting the bar high!

Thursday, February 26, 2015

[Pictures] Looking Back







Sometimes it's pretty incredible to look back at the years spent with your horse and see how far you come.  Pretty awesome!  I love this filly and I am hopeful at what this year will bring. 

Wednesday, July 9, 2014

Growing Up Filly Part II

The filly as a young horse was a bit...opinionated. 

Things she liked:

-Treats
-Scratches
-Running

And that's about it.

Things she didn't like

-Everything else
-Things that made weird noises

For a bit, while she was young, I thought I'd own the only horse that when I went to halter her, would flip over and lay down on the ground and not move. 

Seriously.  Imagine this irritated, angry filly just laying down on the ground.  Once, she decided to throw herself backwards through the gaps in the fencing to prove her point.

She was not a fan of fly spray.  Or blankets.  Or fly masks.  Or being caught.  On the plus side, she was pretty inquisitive with new things as long as it didn't make too much noise.




Funny how much they can grow up and change in just a short period of time...

Stay tuned for more Growing Up Filly ;)

Tuesday, July 8, 2014

The Beginning

As requested from a reader, let's go back.

Way back.  OK, she's only three years old, so there isn't that much to tell. ;) 

Since I bred the SFF, let's share a little bit more about her past & beginnings.



This is the SFF's sire.  He is a national champion in native costume and has other titles in english pleasure, sport horse in hand, and halter.  His national championship was won with a junior rider.

Dang crazy Arab stallions being ridden by kids.  

I chose him because he was athletic, strongly built, and kind, among other things of course.  His pedigree is filled with strong athletes top and bottom.

Pregnant SFM


The SFM has been a broodmare in the past.  She has had five other foals, other than the SFF, including one gelding that has (I believe!) 10 national titles right now.  He is a pretty cool show horse.  I didn't breed him, of course, but I knew the potential was there.  :)

After a long period of waiting (ok, not so long), the SFF made her appearance after 329 days on Mother's Day at a reasonable hour in the morning with most of the farm there present at her birth.  Apparently she wasn't a shy mare that day.




Stay tuned for more "growing up filly" ;) 

Saturday, June 28, 2014

Taking It Easy

It may be a little bit ridiculous, but I haven't ridden since before vacation. 

The SFM has certainly enjoyed her vacation.  Lots of green grass, a gelding to heckle, and her daughter to boss around.

My expensive pets this afternoon


My goal: Ride both horses Monday.

For real. 

If it's not like 90 degrees and 99.9% humidity.  

I can do hot.  I can even ride in hot, but the humidity just makes every pore ooze ick.  I also haven't felt very well since the horse show and that's sapped the bit of non-existent energy I have.

However, I did do barn chores today and that seemed to go fine.  I helped a friend with clipping her young foal (yahoo!  he's a spunky one!) and then decided I should probably do something besides pretend to own some expensive field art.

I grabbed the SFF, brushed her down, gave her a light bath, and decided to go see if I could find something in the arena to play with.  There are lots of objects but the first one I found was a pool noodle.

Now the SFF has seen a pool noodle as a young weanling, but I don't really think she's seen one since.  I had her walk over it, look at it, wear it, and poked her in the butt with it.  As long as it wasn't moving too quickly, she seemed cool with the endeavor.  But then I think she got a little bored, as she went ahead and was trying to take giant chomps out of it and stomp it to death.

Point taken.

So I put the pool noodle away.

I then found the hula hoop.  She has definitely seen a hula hoop before, but hasn't always been thrilled about the noise that it makes.  I can't hear the noise, but I assure you, my horses do.  

We practiced dragging it around.  I like to drag and object in front of the horse and have them "chase" it a bit to gain confidence.  Eventually I would like to actually have her drag it, but for now, chasing is fun.

She caught the hula hoop and wanted to stomp it and gnaw on it.  What kind of beaver are you, horse??  


I also went ahead and decided to put the hula hoop on and off of her.  The SFF isn't thrilled with things by her ears, whether it be reins being slipped overhead, a flymask, clippers, whatever.  But today's thing was a hula hoop.  I rubbed the hoop on her, let her sniff it, and then went to go put it up.  She wasn't thrilled with the idea, but let the Crazy Human do whatever and I was able to put it on and off pretty easily.  

Pool noodle vanquished and the hula hoop not as interesting, I called it a day and put her back outside.

From show ring to hula hoops, I am glad that my little Arabian filly seems happy to take it in stride.  Poor horse.  Doesn't know her owner is really a bit of a weirdo.  :)


Saturday, March 8, 2014

One Trick Pony

Still working on feeling better.  Did barn chores today and it was uneventful.  Compared to the last time I did barn chores, I will definitely take uneventful.

I didn't have enough energy to ride the Semi Feral Mare, so I went ahead and grabbed the mini me version instead.  Her eyes have been weeping, so some medication for her.  Lucky pony.  She was thrilled.

I went ahead and let her loose in the arena.  She seemed more interested in following me around again, so I decided to drag some "obstacles" out for her to look at.  Hey, if I can't ride the horse yet, I might as well introduce some more crazy things for her.  Who knows, maybe this one will be the least feral horse I ever own.

I put down a few ground poles, which are a non-event.  But to increase the level of difficulty, I wanted her to voluntarily go over the ground poles herself.  This is where the SFM would fail.  She would rather hide in the corner than go over the poles.  The filly on the other hand, seemed happy to trot over the poles.  

I drug out the tarp and put that between the poles.  OK, now I had the "what are you thinking" look.  She knows tarps and has been on them since she was quite young, but it doesn't rank in her top five favorite objects.

However, I stood on the tarp in-between the trot poles and I soon had my own personal stalker hanging out with me. 

Personally I think she just wanted to see me trot those poles over that tarp and laugh first.

When she was younger, I introduced the barrel to her and on a line, she would push and sniff at the barrel a bit.  I wanted to see if she would remember doing any of that and volunteer to do it loose.



I think she passed that one.

One of our most routine ones is for me to stand on the mounting block and to have her line up.  I tried to get video.  Not sure if anyone else can see anything.  Let me know.  Now I just have to convince her to line up the other direction.


So folks.  More insight.  What else should I teach this trick pony?