Morning chores

The summer is definetly here. The grass needs mowing twice a week now, the mornings are beautiful and as you can see, misty dew is the order of the day before it quickly burns off in the early morning sunshine.

I had been feeding the horses in their bowls out in the field but now I've built two feeding stations inside the shelter and that should help a lot with the handling and elimination of having to find the bowls when the horses have finished kicking them around. There is always the fear of one of them stepping on the bowl and hurting itself.

Our rescue dog Beckett is pretty taken with the morning feedings. He insists on coming with me and finds it entertaining. As long as he's getting something positive out of it, then we're all ahead of the game.

I've begun to divid up the lower field. I've got 8 of the posts put into the ground and unfortunately each needs to be hand dug since the cedar spike posts are still not around. It's making for a slow go in the field setup. I did have to get a new electric device. The old one i had just wasn't giving out a jolt on the line. It wasn't an issue since both horses respect the fence line but you never know and it's just when you least expect it that there is a need.

I'm so far behind the game on the training of the horses. It's been taking all my time just to keep at the improvements. I think I'm almost caught up now. The shelter still needs some work but it is sound and dry for the horses. I've made a cross tie station so I can work on the horses without worrying too much. Tonight I had Jane out in the field seeing how Wyatt would act while I train her. As I suspected, he's a little uneasy when she's not there beside him.

Last week I had to run new water lines to the shelter. I have two watering stations but only need the one since they the horses are not competitive at all. It's a little different with the grain stations. I have two of them at opposite ends of the shelter. At least then I know they've both got a good go at getting an even share.
I've taken some advice from Jana an put down 4 bags of wood pellets and then soaked them. They're great for the shelter. It keeps it nice and dry and easy to clean out. The horses love the shelter to escape the hot sun and horse flies. I'm going to need to get some fly repellant product and start coating the horses with it to keep their irritation down some. This week Mike Arsenault is due up on Wednesday to trim up the horse's hooves. Wyatt is beginning to favour his back one so it's time to get the two of them set up.

With the summer started, the shelter in place, the horses now settled and the major work out of the way, just the fencing and the training for the horses to worry about. Well, that and painting the outside of the house in town. It's gonna be a good summer.

In and settled

The horses are in and are settled. They've gone through the first field fairly quickly with the grazing. They did that last year too. Now that they seem to have maxed out on the feed fest of long green grass, I've moved them to the second field for the summer. I've got 4 fields before I have to rotate them through again. As I learned last year, about mid-August, the grass stops growing rapidly and they can do a fair bit of rip and strip on spots. I'll be putting the feed on the grass this weekend after mowing it level. This should help keep the goldenrod plants trimmed back and allow some of the grass to shoot up through before they go back on it in a 6 weeks.


There is a shortage of cedar stakes for fencing this year. Apparently they are about a month and a half behind. That's one I didn't see coming at me! Now I have to rethink the layout of the fields. I'm certainly not going to purchase 4x4 posts... it just isn't in the budget this year.

Our newly adopted dog loves to dart around the horses and since he is a puppy mill rescue dog he can't go off the lead. This means I can't let him go in with the horses like he should be able to. Oh well. He can just go nose-to-nose with them... except when they're eating their feed.. that's not a good time to try sticking your face in their's. lol.


Without a lot of fanfair, we are getting ready to enjoy the warmth of summer here. Until now, it has been utterly cold each night and I'd love to put the bed comforter away but I'm not doing that until I've had two warm nights in a row!

Wyatt's odd hoof needs to be trimmed I see so I'll have the ferrier out soon to do both him and Jane. The Cross tie station I set up should do the trick and perhaps I won't have to be there this time.

Getting Ready for the arrival

I am a little delayed in posting this note so I'll just go from today's date.


It is June 17th and the horses arrived last weekend. My grandaughter Isabelle and I went to the Diss Hill Farm (Jessie's home that fosters Sadie's Place horses as well). Jana met us there and we loaded Jane on to the trailer without too much ado. Wyatt had already been loaded on from Jana's place at Storeybook Stables.


After a short drive we arrived at our lane leading down to the cottage. The summer fields for both Wyatt and Jane. As you can see here Isabelle didn't waste any time getting acquanted with the two. The shelter is a much better setup than last year's. It was extremely important to me that I provide adiquate shelter for these two for when they wanted to get away from the heat or rain. It is also important that they have a place to be cross-tied while they get their hooves worked on... Wyatt especially.


Jane apparently has had a good long run of being treated well so she isn't too much of a worry for me. I'll start working her in the upper part of the yard once the hay is cut in that area. Mostly I want to get to know her better and get her riding. The upper field is going to much more suited for that because the property, while being very pastural, is also very steep.

We managed to get out to Diss Hill Farm again today. It has been an awfully busy weekend but I promised Isabelle that we'd drop out. Plus, I still had Jessie's dish to return. Thanks for the Apple Chrisp, it was fantastic. I ate the whole thing myself. LOL

Isabelle is always up for horse hugging and I've already been booked to have her come to the cottage as much as I can. LOL That was from Isabelle.

Title Page has gone off for saddle training for his new home and I can't wait to see how he does. I know Jane has had some training but I think she too could use a month's worth of work as well. She's great now but I'm sure getting her 'trail' ready would make her a prime canidate for being adopted. After all, everyone wants a horse that is bomb proof and that only comes from lots of experience on the trail and plenty of training hours.

Rescue dog meets Rescue horses

Today we went to Diss Hill Farm. It was Sunday so I knew Jessie would be off to church and it would only be Beckett and myself working around the horses. At first we went down into the first corral area and when I realized that Beckett was excited about seeing these new potential playmates I knew I couldn't keep him in with the horses. Not because there would be an issue, the horses were used to dogs because of Jessie's chocolate lab. It was because Beckett is on a lead and can't be set free. There was too much of a possibility that he'd get under them and tangle up in their legs. No sense in pressing my luck!

So we went outside the gate again as the horses reached up with us. As you can see, the introduction had Beckett all in a flutter. He bounced around behind me as the horses reached over the gate to see what he was all about. Eventually he just crept up to the gate and started the 'smell me and i'll smell you" game. LOL

It was comical to see him do his 'bounce' to try and get the horses to play too. It worked well with dogs but these big guys just didn't seem to know how to play! I managed to get some video too but I'll have to download and put on the jumpdrive tomorrow while I'm at work.

The horses are much more well adapted that this dog is and it's because they've had great care while at Jessie's. She loves them very dearly and spoils them with the care and rest they badly need. It's a great stop along the way for a rescue horse. After seeing these horses come in and the change that happens when they just get to hang together rather than have to work, it's obvious that they need to be detoxed when coming from a track atmosphere.

So in the end, we did a little barn work, we did a little horse play and as i was leaving Jessie arrived home and was kind enough to supply me with a few of her great muffins. LOL.. one of the benfits of showing up at the right time I guess.

New Year, New News

Diss Hill Farm

It's been a long winter of snow and cold and here it is March already. Tonight time changes and I'll take that as a time for change on a number of fronts. Yes it was tough to say goodbye to Apple last year but in hind sight she had a great last summer and didn't have to survive through too much pain before she left us.

Since then, I've met up with a great person who boards the Sadie's Horses at her place in Clyde River PEI. Jessie is some type of woman. She's got more 'spit and vinigar' than most people in their 20's. LOL. She and her husband are retired and run a B&B out of their home called Diss Hill Farm in PEI. Jessie herself is a great supporter of Sadie's Place and even boards 4 of the foster horses on her property. Because of her generous offering to board the horses, I too offer my support to help her when I can and in any way I can.

So, here is the list of fosters at Jessie's but please excuse the poor pictures but I'll work on getting much better ones in the hear future.

On the left you have Title Page and he is in the middle of getting his new forever home. He's a great calm horse with a wonderful sense of self-awareness.

He seems to know when to be his mom's horse and when to be the lead horse. Page, as he is commonly called, immediately endears himself to you with his warm approach and calm personality. He is well on his way to enjoying the rest of his life with his forever home this spring. I wish him nothing but the best of experiences after having earned his retirement life beyond the track.

Jake came to Diss Hill Farm in the fall at the same time time that I did and he was NOT a horse I thought would become something ready to go to a home anytime soon. He didn't know how to socialize with the other horses and so was the low horse of the pack and picked on by all of them. He just didn't have any experience of being within the herd. Page seemed to be the best thing that could happen to him. Page is bossy but at the same time he seems to be teaching Jake the basics of pecking order and social cues. Jake was the jumpiest thing and was so far beyond that I wouldn't put myself anywhere in his stall that I didn't have an escape! Today, he was up snuggling just like Bandet had when he was at our cottage this summer. I can't wait to see how he reacts to being on the lead and training with a saddle on later this spring.

• 
  And here we have Jane. Jane came into the barn a little later in the winter after being at Jana's place for a spell. She's a little standoffish but soon comes around if you have a treat or two in your pocket. Apparently Jane has been trained under saddle a bit and isn't too bad. I may be getting her on the cottage property and if possible before that I hope I can ride her if nothing else on a lunge line and perhaps Darrin helping. I'm not a seasoned rider by any means so it would very much be the blind leading the blind on this one. I feel more comfortable doing ground work but hope to add riding to my skill set.
  

This is Lily. I have saved Lily for last because she has a special ability to make you realize how warm and loving a horse can be. She has a fantastic curiosity and lacks a lot of the fear that many of the horses I have met exhibit. Sometimes she could use a little caution but for the most part, she should be a fantastic horse for someone. I really hope I get to do some groundwork with her too. She'll either be a pain in the butt to train or she'll be very trusting and allow me to do whatever she needs to do.

I don't have a picture of Jessie yet but will. She's great to be around when spending time at the farm. Her humour lightens the day and her devotion to the horses is out of complete love for the welfare of these animals. They show their appreciation by trusting her in many ways. Sadie, Jessie's chocolate lab is a constant charmer in and around the place. Just be careful that you don't step on her because she's always right there next to you looking for a kind hand and a warm heart.

I'll start collecting more information on each of these horses and posting it in here at a later date.