Its almost foaling time....

It has been an amazing month so far. The weather has been warm and breezy, the barn yard is slowly drying up and Daya has been loving it. She enjoyed being pampered yesterday as I sprayed a white vinegar mix on her stained spots, sponged her down with some whitening shampoo and sprayed her off. Its beyond me how to get the yellow look out of her tail... but I was very happy with the end result (Of course I didn't have my camera with me!).

She has done really well with being saddled everyday. I've had her cinched up about 10 times now, no bucking, not even a single crow hop. She still gets fidgety and unsure sometimes when I first start cinching her up but it is all still new to her so this is expected. She is really handling everything very well, especially with her being so sensitive to things. The only problem areas I'm having is getting her used to my foot touching her belly as I put my foot in the stirrup. We are taking baby steps though and she is doing a really good so far.

I do have some great updates as far as foaling! Daya's belly dropped last week and started bagging up Sunday night. The area around her tail head is mushy, her vulva is dropping a little and this morning I noticed a subtle change in the muscles around her hindquarters. I'm thinking her cervix is starting to open up! Hoping to have a foal on the ground within a week!

She hasn't bagged up very much but everything else is pointing towards dropping this foal!

3/8/10 Update

The weather has been nice, Daya's belly is getting huge, and we have been working really hard on more ground and saddle work the last few days. I've been getting her accustomed to a saddle being put on her back (no cinches yet... I've seen her in action before! lol) and she is doing great. I've only done this for 2 days and she literally fell asleep with boredom today. I’m taking that as a good sign! I also introduced her to a tarp today. She was goofy for about 2 minutes and then started trotting over it like she had been doing it for years.

Photo and video editing at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Time is flying!

Where has the time gone? Daya is getting pretty big and her belly has started to gravitate downward a little. April 9th will roughly be day 300 for her and I've been told anything after that is fair game in the world of foaling. In all, honestly, I'm starting to get a tad bit nervous over the whole thing. Ive worked with mares and foals but have never been present for foaling. So many people have given me tips on their personal experience. My game plan so far is to let Daya handle the birthing on her own and only help if I start seeing signs of her struggling or becoming too fatigued.



My farrier came out yesterday and Daya was awesome. This was the first time she has ever let Mike put all 4 feet on his hoof stand to be rasped (she usually gets freaked out and refuses to rest her hooves on it). He was happy with her overall hoof growth. She had a lot of heel that had to be taken off which is what we have been looking for. He also did some ground work with her. She was sticky when asked to yield her hindquarters but warmed up quickly when she realized what we were asking. She is still jumpy around people make sudden movements around her face so I really need to step it up and work on desensitizing her everyday.



I was talking to Mike about saddle breaking her when the time came for it and he said he didn't think she was going to be that bad if we did our homework. To prove me wrong about my doubts he asked me to run and get a saddle and pad out of the barn. So I did, I had already desensitized her to the saddle blanket so I knew that wasn't going to be a big deal, but a 40lb saddle may be a different story. It wasn't! He did a little in hand work with her, let her smell and investigate the saddle, did some pressure and release exercises with it and set it on her back. She handled it like a pro! She walked around with it, stood quietly with it on and never bulked. Even though we didn't cinch her up, he gave me the reassurance I needed that with all the work Ive done with her she wasn't going to be explosive if I just kept up the baby steps. So now I have my work cut out for me. He said he was going to come out April 13th and help me work with her again. By then he wants me to slowly start cinching her up. Ive done so much work with straps under her belly that once I get her used to having a saddle on her back I don't think she will do bad at all. I feel so much more confident after he comes out to the barn. He lets me know that I'm doing things right and critiques me on things that need to be improved. That man has become my idol. He is a true teacher of natural horsemanship.



So I've talked with my vet about the training schedule with Daya and getting her used to the saddle. She told me as long and she wasn't worked into a lather, stressed to the point of being explosive during training, that I should go ahead and start light saddle training. My plans so far are to get her to the point where she will take a saddle being thrown on her back without flinching or getting spooked and jumpy. From there I will do more desensitizing with things being put under and tightened around her belly, start cinching her up and getting her used to the girth. Ive been challenged a lot so far and I have made a few personal goals with training Daya. My number 1 goal: Start a once abused horse with trust issues under saddle that has had so much training before hand that she never bucks or explodes under the pressure! Will I accomplish this goal? I think with the help I have received from Mike I will.

Quick update and help needed!

** First few paragraphs are an update on Daya. Please be sure to read the bottom paragraph about a gentleman by the name of Dr. Heuschmann who is trying to have RollKur (aka Hyperflexion) banned from the dressage arena's! If you don't know what this is, google it, and you will be appalled at what you see.** Thanks everyone

Update: There is so much snow on the ground here that I haven't been able to do much work with Daya. Just small in hand stuff around the barn. I have been getting her accustomed to the bosal though. I figured she is so sensitive to pressure that I may as well start her in a bosal and move to a bit later. She does so well in it. She follows her nose easily and is really learning to bend with the ground work Ive been doing. She does lateral bends (foundation for the one rein stop) with just my mecate rein sitting on one finger. Now if we can only have this foal and fast forward 8 months so I can wean him we will be back in business! I want to get this girl under saddle so bad that its about to drive me bonkers.

My husband hurt his knee pretty bad about a month ago and made his first trip to the barn with me Sunday since early January and couldn't believe the change in Daya. Her belly is really filling out! Ive had to loosen her turnout blanket 3 times in the past 4 weeks! lol She still has more than 4 months to go and I can only imagine what she is going to look like by her due date.



**Rollkur / Hyperflexion Ban **
I am a subscriber of fellow blogger Wolfie @ What Was I Thinking.......?. (She has a great blog about her life with horses and everyone should check her out and subscribe). Today she has a great post that needs every ones help. There is a link in her article to a help a man put an end to Hyperflexion in the dressage ring. If he succeeds this will be the beginning of a wonderful movement that will hopefully get through to the dressage world and stop the abuse the horses are receiving to "look" pretty. Just click on the Wolfie's link above for the article that explains why this is so important and sign the petition. All it takes is a name and email! Thanks everyone!

Snow + Rain + Snow = Flood!

Well, we have gone from one extreme to another last week. We started out with about 4-6 inches of snow on the ground and temperatures that didn't make it over 15 during the warmer days. I didn't like it but I knew I better enjoy some of it before it melted and turned everything around the barn into a swamp. Last Tuesday the temps slowly started creeping up, I was ecstatic when it hit 30 degree's and was ready to a happy dance. Then it kept getting warmer and warmer! By Friday we were in the 50's and I was surrounded by mud! The round pen looked like a rednecks kiddy pool, turnout paddocks were waterlogged, and everything was a mushy mess. Daya was happy to be out of her turnout blankets and free to get as muddy as she wanted. I wish I had my video camera at the barn with me. Ive never heard a horse grunt and sigh as much as she did when she was able to take a good roll for the first time this winter without a blanket on. So I'm cleaning up the barn aisle, re-bedding stalls and cleaning water buckets when I hear the evening forecast on the radio.... RAIN! and lots of it for the entire weekend. Great, just what we needed.

So it rains, and rains AND rains! I woke up Sunday morning to this:

Yeah... Luckily for us the flood only got into the hay field a little. Its never got close to the barn or pastures and I'm so thankful for that. But the weather drama doesn't stop there! Nope. There was a nasty cold front that came through last night. Temps got back down in the 20's and when I woke up this morning what did I see?? SNOW! about 2 inches in the ground. So now I have slop covered in slick snow and slush, muddy hay fields with sticks and drift wood that have to be cleaned and I get to go back to freezing my butt of while doing it! I can't win. Welcome to Ohio I guess. The only place where you can use your a/c and heater on the same day!

Merry Christmas Everyone

We got a good amount of snow here this week. I would say around 3-4 inches. Daya loved it and was very eager to play outside. I haven't done too much work with her this past week. The ground was frozen solid and I didn't want to take chance on having her slip/fall or making her sore from the hard impact in the round pen. I did get a pair of new Elites though and really like them so far (early Christmas present from the hubby). I got bored last night and edited some pics of Daya and her goat buddy Lloyd . I planned on uploading some videos as well but am having trouble with uploading them. Hope you enjoy and Merry Christmas!!!

Its been boring around here... but Im not complaining :)

Not a whole lot has happened the last few weeks. Daya got her feet worked on last week and did so well. My farrier couldn't believe it was the same horse, I think he is more excited than anyone to see her started under saddle. He breeds his own horses as well and told me I should go ahead and start getting her accustomed to saddle blankets, cinches and saddling. I just might go ahead and see how she does. She should be about 150-170 days along now and Im sure she will tell me if Im pushing her to hard. She has been a pretty good girl considering how she reacted to things when I first got her. (Her belly is getting a little bigger and Im hoping to get some good pictures soon.)

I have had to keep a close eye on her front feet but nothing major. Her heels aren't built up as much as we would like and she has small frogs so she has been having little bouts of thrush on and off. She also has rain rot on her belly! lol Poor girl is so itchy it isn't funny. I swear she would let me stand there and scratch her belly for hours on end. Her pasture has been so muddy and sloppy this year so I shouldn't have been surprised.

One thing that is bothering me about her is her winter coat. She has the thinnest one Ive ever seen. Most appaloosa's Ive been around have huge thick coats but not her. Im actually going to call my vet and ask if it could be a mineral/vitamin deficiency where she is pregnant. If her coat was like this in previous winters I don't know how she made it. I know her previous owners didn't have blankets for her and she only had a 3 sided barn to get in out of the weather. Poor girl. I got an amazing deal on a 1200D High Neck Turnout Blanket by McAlister . I got this from horseloverz.com. They usually sell cheap crap but this blanket is anything but cheap. I love it!! I think I got mine for $40 +12 shipping on their ebay site (link to actual ebay site). These blankets would make a great christmas gift too.

I also wanted to share a great product I foudn this week! I bought Olive Oil Nourishing Sheen Spray for myself the other day and didn't like it in my hair so I took it to the barn to try on Daya... HOLY COW this stuff is half the price of show sheen ($3.99-$4.50)and 10 times better. It does have an oily feel if you use too much (a little goes a long way) but this stuff made Daya's mane and tail shine like a rock star. I couldn't believe it! Its so hard to get her white mane and tail to actually look shinny and silky but this stuff did it instantly and I didn't even wash her mane first. It made her hair unbelievably soft and helped with tangles as well. This stuff would be amazing for showing and a lot cheaper too. And it smells great.Reminds me of the Pepi Coat Conditioner Spray. You can get it at Walgreen's and Sally's Beauty Supply stores and who knows where else. I bet this stuff would be good to spray hooves this winter to keep snow from sticking too... might have to try that soon.