A Great Horse Day

Sometimes it's not a specific horse that touches us, but all the horses in our life at any given time. Today was a day when not a single horse touch me. Today was a day when all my horses touched me, lifting the cloud of melancholy that has filled the week.

Today was a mental health day. I stayed home from work with the sole thought of having a "Horse Day". I planned to do nothing other than spend time with my horses. I wasn't going to fix fence, prune bushes, rake leaves, or anything else that wasn't horse related. It had been a long time since I had taken a "Horse Day", so I woke in the morning looking forward to the day. My horses didn't disappoint me. And neither did the gorgeous weather.

I did do some work, like buying & unloading feed, rolling leg wraps, & cleaning the trailer. These didn't count as work though because they were completely horse related. Once I had the horse chores done, I decided to spend time with my 3 weanlings. Quite a while was spent brushing & scratching & being mobbed by the little darlings. They then followed me into a stall so I decided it was time to halter break the youngest, Mariyyah. I had managed to get the halter on her previously but it was a battle. She's been an extremely sensitive & explosive filly so I try to give her a lot of space & time. I was prepared for her usual theatrics but did she ever surprise me. The halter went on with only the slightest disagreement. She then let me move her around as if she was at the same halter level as the two other weanlings. She picked up her feet like an old pro. I wormed all 3 fillies. Then I brought out the cordless clippers. I only intended to sit in the stall & let them hear the buzzing. Carli investigated but didn't get too close. She did let me rub the running clippers over her back & up her neck. I even managed to get 1/2 a bridle path done before she started shaking her head. Ari, who I thought would have no problem with the clippers, wanted no part of the buzzing monster. She stayed at the other end of the stall, giving me the evil eye. Mariyyah is the one who surprised me. I knew she'd hide at the other side of the stall & not come anywhere near the clippers. I was wrong. She was the first to investigate, coming up until she bumped the clippers, shaving off a few whiskers. I rubbed the clippers all over her & she's sporting a very nice bridle path. The clippers seemed to fascinate her & she never did move off until the battery ran dead. Mariyyah made my morning. It was her day for a break through.

After a wonderful morning with the weanlings, I decided I was going to ride my 4 yr old stallion. It would be his 3rd time under saddle. I lunged him before tacking him up. He's a very mouthy horse & I'm tired of him biting the lead rope & reins. A few days ago I had gone through Taco Bell & brought home some of their fiery sauce just for Launi. I painted the ends of his lead & reins with fiery sauce. Boy did he get a surprise. He had the funniest look on his face, screwed up like someone biting into a lemon. Then he kept trying to spit the sauce out of his mouth. Maybe I'll let Taco Bell know there's a new use for their sauce. LOL It took quite some time to finally get into the saddle. Launi is 15.3 1/2 & I'm 5'1" so I use a mounting block. Brat that he is, Launi insisted on trying to knock me off the block (at least he wasn't trying to bite anymore). Every time he misbehaved I sent him round & round the roundpen. At last he decided it was time to behave. He stood like an angel & I was in the saddle. We walked at random with just enough guidance to keep the stirrups from banging the panels. Launi backs really well so we practiced that a couple of times. Today we did a little flexing for the first time with the bit. I was actually riding in a halter with a bridle over top so I could use the lead & reins similar to a double bridle. Launi's not ready to be ridden solely in a bit & today was the first time I asked him to work with the bit. He did really well. I was pleasantly surprised at his willingness to give & flex. Launi can be a bit of challenge & has the attention span of a gnat. Today his gnat brain was on it's best behavior. I hosed him & hand grazed him as a reward. Some days Launi makes me so glad he's mine.

I spent some time brushing Shain, my 7 yr stallion, who is the sweetest horse. He's a love who only wants to be cuddled & pampered. He's still my baby & will come running when I call Baby Shain. He very seldom responds if I just call Shain. He likes to have his head held & will also wrap it around me in a hug. Shain is the horse who fills my heart with love.

I finished my "Horse Day" by walking the pasture with brush in hand to groom my mares. I'm so lucky to have these wonderful horses. They're all so personable, wanting to be with me, following everywhere I go. They lighten my heart & mood & make everything alright.

Today was a great horse day.

Wraini-Where Have The Years Gone?

DC Kobayashi Wrain

(Khemo Thunderr x Mandy)

Registered 3/4, grey arab mare, born July 2, 1991

As I was putting blankets on a couple of horses in anticipation of a major storm the other day, I realized that Wraini is now my oldie. That realization made me pause & wonder where the years have gone.

It was a rainy October day when I first saw Wraini. I had seen a flyer at the local store so decided I had nothing better to do than go look at horses in the rain. She was a wild, 4 month filly with a halter already growing into her face. It had been put on the day she was born & the owner hadn't been able to touch her since. She was cute, firey, & floated across the pasture, running from us with her dam. I wasn't really interested in a filly that couldn't be caught. I was really only a looky-loo that day. But as I chatted with the owner I gave her my number so we could get together for some trail riding.

A couple days later I got a phone call that said the mare & filly had finally been run into a stall & that if I wanted the filly, to come get her. How could I pass up that deal. It took some doing to get the filly caught, even in the 12 x 12. Because I knew we wouldn't get her into my two-horse trailer, we loaded her into the owner's stock trailer & she delivered her to me. I already knew I was calling her Wraini, spelled with a "W" because I wanted it spelled like Wraff's with a "W", because it was a rainy day when I saw her. The Kobayashi came from Star Trek, where the Kobayashi Maru was an un-winable test. I knew I had some work ahead of me in handling this wild filly. That first night I sat on a hay bale in her pen & watched her charge me with teeth bared. When she got her first vaccinations she came at my friend & I with front feet flying. Beware those hind feet because they were some of the fastest at kicking that I've ever seen. It really was a good thing she was only 4 months old when I got her. At least I was bigger than she.

When Wraini was 18 months I started taking her with me on trail rides. She loved running ahead, flying up hills, & crashing back down a la Snowy River. By the time she was 4 yrs she was being ponied on all manner of trail, including the cliff's edges along the American River. She was as sure footed as a mountain goat & very careful where she stepped. She was almost 5 yrs when I first rode her. You would never have known it was her first time. I rode her all over the 15 acre pasture, walking & trotting. Just a few rides later we were out on the trails out of Auburn, riding across No Hands Bridge. We went alone that day because no one wanted to ride. The bridge was being closed for an undetermined length of time & I wanted to go across the historical bridge on Wraini in case it never reopened (it was repaired & is open today). To this day we've never ridden in an arena.

Wraini is a little mare at 14.1 with fine bone. I really never saw myself riding her much because she's small & I like bigger horses. But what a ride she's been. When it came time to back off on endurance competition with my over 20 gelding, Wraff, I decided to give Wraini a try in between Wraff's rides. She was a natural & loved flying down the trail. She was so much fun because she never wanted to walk & would dog-trot up & down the trails. When she walked it was most often a running walk. She's the only horse I've ever had that gained weight over a 50 mile weekend. My promise to her was that she could eat all she wanted as long as she carried me down the trial. That first 50 miles saw her consume an entire bale of hay, 25lbs of bran, 25lbs of grain, 50lbs of carrots, & grass & more hay along the trail & at vet checks. She was & still is an eating machine. It's such a shame that non-riding injuries ended her endurance career before it really began.

As a 3 yr old Wraini got a leg caught between a fence post & the gate during a raging storm. I found her the next morning. Even the vet thought she was lost. At best she might live but never be sound. Her front leg was layed open from chestnut to fetlock, looking like everything had been scooped away. For 5 weeks I cleaned, doctored & re-wrapped her leg daily. Finally it started to heal. What I hadn't told anyone was that she wasn't lame at the walk. When the bandages were finally removed for the last time & she was turned back out on pasture, I held my breath to see her first trot. She trotted SOUND! On Christmas day when Wraini was 10, another mare kicked her left hind leg. The next morning the vet was out for x-rays & ultrasound. I knew it was going to be bad. The ligament was torn from the impact & as it tore, it pulled a chip off the top of the sesamoid bone. Added to that was a fracture through the center of the sesamoid. The vet said her prognosis at best would be maybe pasture sound. She was on stall rest for a month & then I could begin walking her the length of my driveway twice a day. Her 2nd round of x-rays & ultrasounds was amazing. The chip had seated back in place & appeared healed. The fracture was so faint it was hard to find. The tears in the ligaments were healing well. I continued hand walking. By April, just 4 months after the injury, the vet told me to start riding at a walk. He could only shake his head in amazement that Wraini was sound. 18 months after her injury I took her to an endurance ride. If I'd known how hard the ride was going to be, we would have stayed home. It was rocky, had massive climbs, little water, & many riders opted to pull. Wraini finished looking like she hadn't started.

The myth is that cats have 9 lives & horses are only suppose to have one. Wraini must have been a cat in a former life because she continued to beat the odds. When she was 13 she got the teeniest cut on a knee while riding in my aluminum trailer. I didn't think much about it & we went for a 10 mile ride. Later that day I remembered the cut & went to put Swat medication on it to keep the flies away. What I found was yellow ooze running down her leg. I knew it was joint fluid. For the next month Wraini was on & off antibiotics. She was sound & had no swelling when taking antibiotics, but would be lame & swell within 24 hours of going off them. I decided it was time to take her to UC Davis so made an appointment. When I got there the vet was confused because Wraini was sound & there was no outward sign of a problem. She said they thought I was bringing her in to be euthanized because no bone infection can go that long without going systemic. X-rays showed infection in the knee & at the top of the joint. The vets started discussing the possibility of surgery put weren't optomistic of the outcome. Next we went for ultrasounding. Everyone was shocked at what was found. It looked like a thread thin lightening bolt had entered the knee, piercing the joint. I have to say that by this point I was beyond crying, I was sobbing. The infection had traveled to the bottom edge of the forearm. By now there were 3 vets & a handful of students studying the x-rays & ultrasounds, all thinking Wraini was lost. They couldn't give any odds on survival even if she had surgery. Then in walked the emergency vet who said she thought maybe there was a chance if I was willing. She felt that since Wraini had maintained, & was sound, for a month on an antibiotic that normally has NO effect on bone infections, there was a chance that mega-antibiotics might work. I left her at UCD for the next 2 wks, where she underwent joint perfusions, IV antibiotics, & IM antibiotics. No one could believe Wraini's progress. I was allowed to bring her home on an antibiotic that comes with warnings of causing aplastic anemia. When the shipment arrived from the pharmacy it was only 1/2 the precription. I called & was told that because it was such an expensive drug, they only shipped at 1/2 because most horses didn't survive long enough for the complete prescription. I told them to ship the rest NOW! I can now look back & appreciate their not wanting people to buy expensive drugs that wouldn't be used. It was over $600 for 15 days. But I KNEW Wraini was going to be ok.

In the 5 yrs since the joint infection, I've elected not to ride Wraini any more. She's sound & no one would ever know she's had 3 injuries that should have taken her life. She's given me 2 wonderful fillies that I cherish. Before this year's filly was born I had already decided this would be her last foal. At 18 years old, I don't want to take any chances & risk losing Wraini. She's earned her life as my Pasture Puff.

NDL Emblem- Wraff's Little Buddy

NDL Emblem (*Enoss x *Etyka)

Grey, arab gelding, born 2/16/84

In the fall of 1990, my friend Laurie realized she needed a new horse to ride endurance. As luck would have it, another friend of mine had the perfect horse for Laurie.

Emblem was a wonderful, pure Polish gelding that my friend's son had been riding. He'd already done some endurance & was honest on the trail. He wasn't a very forward horse, but he would steadily trot on down the trail. Laurie went to look at him &, realizing he was just what she was looking for, bought Emblem.

I had met Laurie at a ride in Feb 1989. At the time she was trying to get into endurance on a horse not suited for work. We only rode a few miles together that day but we instantly became friends. To this day Laurie is my BFF. When she started riding Emblem we did a lot of conditioning together. It wasn't long before Wraff & Emblem became BFF's as well. We rode a lot of endurance rides together. We endured all types of weather, all manner of footing, easy & hard rides. I'm sure Wraff & Emblem got tired of hearing us sing The Ant Song umpteen times over the miles & years.

Emblem was a lazy horse, preferring to stay home & eat instead of going for long rides. He really didn't like the work involved in endurance riding. But he was also a very easy going & wanting to please horse who did the work because Laurie asked it of him. He was a tough little horse with a huge heart. He kept up with the bigger horses & even finished ahead of many because he was so steady. He might not have had the biggest or fastest trot, but he'd hold that steady trot all day long. I was there when Emblem carried Laurie through the ride of her dreams, Tevis. The granddaddy of all endurance rides, 100 miles in one day from south of Truckee to Auburn. It's some of the most difficult trail in the world. More than once that plucky little gelding finished Tevis, a ride many horses never manage to complete. Emblem also finished the Virginia City 100 more than once. He really was a little Energizer Bunny on the trail.

Laurie & Emblem were with us the day Wraff slid in the mud on his belly, me tangled in the infamous yellow slicker. We were together in the sleet & freezing weather of the Scotts Flat 50, me using my down vest to keep Wraff warm while I turned blue. We rode in the rain at Derby Ditch, the heat at NASTR, & in the dark on many rides. It was with Emblem that Wraff decided to show me that I could NOT ride him in a halter, even after 50 miles. Those 2 boys were in a trot away race with Laurie & I hanging on. That was the last time either of us tried to ride in just halters. Emblem was there when Wraff finished his 6000th mile. Together the buddies were at shotgun starts, crossing rivers & climbing mountains. As Wraff aged & I slowed him down, I could no longer camp next to our BFFs. I had to hide Wraff so he wouldn't see his little buddy at the start of a ride.

The ride that sticks in our minds as the best testament to the bond between Wraff & Emblem was The Mustang Classic in San Jose. Laurie was going to ride faster & I was going to ride Wraff with the plan of taking the entire day. He was in his 20s & needed to slow down (or at least that's what I thought). What a bronc Wraff was that morning. In a temper tantrum he even threw himself on the ground, me still in the saddle, scaring riders behind us. We kept going, compromising on a booming trot instead of an all out gallop. As we were coming in to the first vet check I saw our BFFs coming out of the check, up the hill toward us. I jumped off Wraff & threw my shirt (I had a t-shirt on as well) over Wraff's head, hoping he wouldn't realize we were passing Emblem. It still cracks us up at all the riders that day who thought I had come up with an ingenious way to lower my horse's pulse. A few miles out of the vet check we caught up with our BFFs. Laurie said Emblem was dogging it, not wanting to go, acting like he was tired. I said Wraff was on fire & hard to control. But once they were together they settled into their buddy system of going down the trail. We rode the remaining 30 miles with happy horses.

Eventually Emblem started to have some slight metabolic problems. Sometimes it wasn't much more than knowing he just wasn't right. He had some problems with lack of gut sounds at rides, which can lead to catastrophic colic. His sheath would swell to massive proportions. Finally his disposition changed. Wraff's little buddy shocked him one day when Emblem attacked with heels & teeth. Laurie & I were shocked. This just wasn't right for sweet Emblem. Finally she took him to UCDavis. They ran tests & determined that he had raging testosterone. WHAT? He was a gelding. Upon palpation they could feel what they thought was a retained testicle. When they performed surgery what they actually found was swelling on the end of the severed cord. They had no answer for why this was but they did determine he wasn't a cryptorchid (a stallion with a testicle retained in the abdomen). They could find no reason for the elevated testosterone levels. He retired from endurance in 1996, at the age of 12. He had completed over 2500 miles, covering some of the roughest terrain in endurance.

Emblem went on to be the companion & pet of a woman battling terminal cancer. No horse could have asked for a better retirement. He had a new barn, grassy pasture, lots of treats, & someone who doted on him. He was her light, & reason for being.

Those years of miles & trails riding with our BFFs were the best of times.

Shirleys McCoy

Shirleys McCoy (Little Prince x Streamline)

Grey, 3/4 arab mare, born 2-6-1979

I bought Coy in the spring of 1982, when she was just 3 years old. She was a very pretty, already almost white filly who hadn't been started under saddle. I had seen an ad for her at the local tack shop & since she was stabled just a couple miles away, I went to see her. I wasn't really looking for a new project, but she was just too nice not to buy.

Coy was one of the easiest horses I've ever started. She fit the category of "born broke" because the first day I put the saddle on her was also the first day I rode her. She was such a nice filly, wanting to please. It wasn't long before we were wandering the trails of San Juan Capistrano. Nothing upset or spooked her. Well, maybe one thing did. A group of us were hanging out on our horses one day when Coy reached down & grabbed a mouthful of wild squash. As she raised her head the horse-eating squash came with her. Boy could that little mare spin. I don't know how many times that vine chased her in 360s, but I do know it was long enough that I could feel my old torn knee starting to give. Lucky for me Coy managed to step on the vine, pulling it from her mouth. She stopped spinning just before my knee gave so I didn't hit the ground that day. Every now & then I think of Coy when my right knee acts up.

Coy was one of those wonderful horses that anyone could ride. She was always solid & honest. By the time she was a 4 year old I was using her to give lessons. She was a favorite of the young girls at the stable. There were many shows where multiple girls rode her in various classes, always placing. One day one of my students asked if she could take Coy in the Follow The Leader jumping class because her horse was lame. Coy had never jumped but I told my student she could try. This class was set up so that each person jumped one jump at a given height & anyone knocking it down or refusing was eliminated. The jump was raised after each round. It was unbelievable to watch Coy continue to go over that jump. It started as a pole on the ground & had gone to 3'6" before she knocked it down. She finished third, not bad for a horse who had never jumped before.

Coy was a true all around horse. I played broomstick polo on her, team penned cattle, rode english & western, & took her to parades. She even did a couple of 25 mile rides (now called Limited Distance rides) competitively. If anyone was needing a spare horse for any type of event, Coy was often called upon to fill it. It didn't matter what it was, she was willing.

I had one adult student named Carol who was actually afraid of horses. She had always loved them from afar, but had never been brave enough to get close. She decided one day that she needed to face her fear of horses by learning to ride. Coy was always extremely patient & quiet with Carol. There were a lot of lessons just brushing & leading before Carol was ready to ride. Once she learned to ride she knew she loved horses & decided she wanted one of her own. In the meantime I agreed to 1/2 least Coy to her so that she'd get the experience of ownership. I eventually had someone I knew put up a really safe mare for sale so Carol bought ChooChoo, a grade QH type mare.

ChooChoo was really the perfect horse for Carol because she was as docile & calm as a horse could be. She was very well trained but content to just plod along at the rider's level. Carol continued to take lessons on her new horse. Even though ChooChoo was perfect in doing everything asked of her, I could tell that Carol was never comfortable around her. I couldn't see that there was a problem but knew that something wasn't right. If Carol wasn't taking a lesson, she didn't ride. I eventually asked her if ChooChoo was giving her problems but she said that wasn't the reason she didn't ride. She said she only felt safe with Coy. She told me that Coy was the only horse she really wanted. She said she trusted & loved Coy & just didn't feel the same way about ChooChoo. She asked if she could go back to 1/2 leasing Coy.

For the next couple of days I did a lot of thinking about Carol & Coy. While I really liked Coy, Carol loved her. With me Coy was an extra horse &, while never lacking for anything, I knew she'd thrive as someone's only horse. I didn't want to sell her because she was such a great all around horse. But I also felt I owed it to her to let her go to someone who would cherish her. So when Carol's next lesson came, I told her I would do better than 1/2 lease Coy to her. I told her I would sell Coy to her. Not many people get the chance to see someone's face light up like Carol's that day. While I missed Coy when Carol eventually moved from the area, I knew in my heart that I had done the right thing for both of them.