Ever owned a picky horse? One that takes delicate sniffs of the meals you serve them, and disdainfully turns their nose up at it? One that WANTS to eat that food, but thinks it tastes ucky? One that carefully takes bites, and then spits them back out with the yucky face? I never did until now. But Imogen takes the cake - she is genuinely suspicious of any food that isn't already on her safe-to-eat checklist, so you can imagine things with supplements and herbs in them are mighty yuck to her.
She WANTS to eat them. There's no question there. She mills around by the bowl looking pitiful, taking bites and making sad, sad doe eyes at me, wondering why I would possibly want to kill her with poisoned food. She usually eats about half of her breakfast, and then finishes the rest for dinner, but that's about the only way I've been able to convince her that the stuff in the bowl is actually appetizing. Switching her over from a lifelong diet of sweet feed and oats is not to her liking, I suppose. (Who can blame her? Who wants to eat their vegetables when all you've been eating forever is candy?)
She snarfs her hay up, at least. She thinks piles and piles of delicious timothy and orchard grass are the most wonderful things she has ever tasted. And once she stops curling her lip and making bleugh faces at her little handful of grainfoods, she does eat them as well. But still... I'd like you to finish it in one setting, mare. It really is only about a handful!
But she sure looks snazzy in the blanket, no? :) She has gone in two days from total blanket panic (she apparently didn't remember how blankets worked) to almost letting me toss it onto her last night. (I say almost... I'm not quite ready to start throwing it up there yet, I think I might get trampled in the process.)
Lunging is going better and better every day! Yesterday she wore a surcingle and POLOS for the first time!! Going to the left, she got a bit rushy and pulled on me some, but going to the right - her harder direction - she actually was a very cool cucumber and stayed on a very light contact the entire time. Once you turn off her RUN FASTER button, she is super level headed and willing.
And it is about time to pull off the catch halter and get her a real one of her own. None of mine fit her!
And.... Tailmasta has begun the taming. There's a long way to go, but I'd say this is a mild improvement!
My horse Stampede won't eat his grain for days if I change something, so at least she doesn't do that. He's also a hard keeper, so he totally freaks me out. He also gets tired of his grain so I have to switch brands every couple years. Horses!
ReplyDeleteThat is a huge difference in the fuzzbutt that was a tail. Great job at the taming!
ReplyDeleteTailmasta, please teach me your ways!! My TB mare's tail is the bane of my existence. I finally get it even and looking decent and she rips have out. What do you do??
ReplyDeleteThat tail is looking GOOD! I keep Pongo in his rope halter all the time too when I am handling him. It reminds him of our groundwork rules!
ReplyDeleteMy OTTB is a very picky eater, but luckily not an overly hard keeper. Left to his druthers he would eat enough to keep himself at his eventing weight - more fat than when he raced, but visible ribs and very lean, looking ready to go gallop x-country. That's not enough weight in his case for building muscle as we do in dressage, and once I figured out how to get him to put on weight he started getting stronger amazingly quickly.
ReplyDeleteMy secret is feeding him like a hobbit. He gets only a small amount of alfalfa as it makes him jump out of his skin to the point he does silly things in his pen like forget to stop before running into fences or forgetting to slow before turning and wiping out dramatically. If he weren't so self-destructive on alfalfa I could just give him enough of that for weight, but no such luck. He always has bermuda in front of him should he want it, and he gets beet pulp and strategy in addition to some supplements. Luckily he loves strategy and will eat most supplements (but NO bute) in it... but the beet pulp is a challenge. By getting beet pulp alone in one meal (last dinner in summer, first breakfast in winter) he has it for hours to return to and take a little bit of at a time. It gets mixed with strategy for the meal at the opposite end of the spectrum if there's still any left; strategy and his full amount of beet pulp mixed together doesn't always work because he gets so much more beet pulp.
Were he a hard keeper, my horse would still be thinner than I want. But 5 meals a day with a lot of variety (he won't eat enough of any one food to keep himself alive except the alfalfa) is the only thing which keeps him actually eating at each meal. He goes to my trainer's and gets 3 meals a day, same quantities fed, and quickly drops weight from refusing to eat it all. Little pain in the... :)
She is just so cute! I wish you knew her breeding. Adorable Mare-face!
ReplyDeleteShe's becoming so...civilized! I say toss a handful of O+M or sweet feed in with her supps. A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down! And her tail is looking so fab - love the rabicano silver streaks =)
ReplyDeleteKlein is a grain dumper. I guess it just tastes better off the ground? Even when it is hooked on the stall door she still knocks the bucket right off the door.
ReplyDeleteImmy is looking gorgeous getting all dressed up!
I need to take tail lessons from you. Now that I have a horse that has a damn tail I have no clue where to start with it. I'm so used to Klein's "tail."
Whoa, I'm totally not used to this new rate of posting! Since you've brought Miss Immy home, the posting rate has gone up by like a factor of three! Not that I'm complaining :)
ReplyDeleteThe tail looks worlds better! How did you do it? I'm in envy of your tail taming skills.
ReplyDeleteI really love her brand, it's a good reminder of where she came from.
ReplyDeleteTailmasta will have to do a post on what she does to keep tails nice ;)
ReplyDeleteLove this mare, she's just lovely! So pleased she's all yours now! :)
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