I hope you all had an enjoyable time over Easter and that the Easter Bunny delivered plenty of chocolate eggs. Diva was absolutely delighted to discover I had been unable to find any bunny ears for her to wear. She so does not enjoy dressing up! In the week before Easter, we enjoyed a two-day mini heatwave, and then today – exactly one week later – we have temperatures in the minus and snow flurries.
My friend Jill came over for the first time in a while and we went for a lovely walk with Diva. I cannot emphasise just how good it is for youngsters to get out and about. We encountered vans, cars, 4x4s, cyclists, walkers, dogs, tractors and diggers. The only thing that she was nervous of was a digger parked at the side of the road. She tried to dash past it but I asked her to stand and then walk up to it. She then was happy to sniff the wheels before we walked on. Funnily enough, she didn’t bat an eye at the digger actually being used in the garden opposite. I am hoping all this will stand her in good stead when she is broken to drive in the future.
I have mentioned previously that when Jackson arrived to stay with me, he and Diva had quite a fight when put in the same paddock. Neither would back down and were kicking like mad despite both being absolutely fine with other horses. Jackson has been getting turned out in the pen, as he also decided he would walk through the electric fencing. Now, however, the field next to Diva and Mabel’s is vacant, and I got permission to put Jackson in there so that he and Diva could “chat” through the fence without risk of fighting.
So far so good. The funny little creatures are staying side by side pretty much the whole time. It is so funny when I call to get them in, as they come trotting or cantering up together with just the fence between them. Hopefully I will be able to put them in the same field soon, this time without the fireworks. Watch this space.
I find this one of the toughest topics in the horse world, as everyone does something different. There are thousands of products on the market – all claiming they can cure everything – and nutritionists are often affiliated with a feed company, making any advice potentially biased.
I can say I’ve been able to tick something off my bucket list now: I managed to mount and ride a camel – a brilliant experience. I had great fun grooming my one, named Baxter, and I think the people running it were happy they had people that were used to dealing with big animals and weren’t afraid to get stuck in.
I thought in this first blog post I ought to tell you a little bit about my horses and me, and give you an insight into what you might see from us going forwards. Firstly, my name is Emma. I’m 29 years old and I’ve been riding for as long as I can even remember.
I am currently lightly backing my three-year-old American Quarter Horse before turning him away for the winter. In my previous post, I explained the setbacks this year, and frustratingly I had to start the process much later in the year than I’d anticipated. But things were going well, too well…