Sunshine and Changes

The end of July is here, that means I start to think only of riding. It seems that I spend the spring and part of summer tending to everything else but riding.

I had hired Molly to help me with things around the farm and sadly that only lasted two weeks. She stopped coming over and then after the lost dog incident she took off to who knows where.

[The dog was found alive 5 days later in a creek bottom about 1/2 mile from their house!]

With Rich's PT schedule which is 3 times a week, I have to rethink my whole weekly plans. 

Thankfully with the nicer weather and the yard and gardens all doing quite nicely, I turned to my other summer project. I dove into saddle and tack cleaning.

Most of our tack is kept in the horse trailer as the tack room Rich was 'gonna' build in the shed never happened. I have 3 saddles that I do use. So I keep all my gear for Siera and Sunshine in good shape.

The saddle shown below was a custom built saddle for me. It even has my 

name stamped on it. 
It is a nice mule saddle. The only drawback is, it is heavy.

My Mule Saddle is always ridden with a britchen as the places I ride are steep. This saddle would slide forward on those steep downhills. I use a crupper on the lighter saddles but am thinking of using a britchen on the other western Simco saddle too.

While I was cleaning and inspecting the gear, I tried to think of how old these items where. The britchens are well over 30 years old. The Simco saddle I purchased in 1991 at Midwest Horse Fair in Madison WI.

Anyway the Mule Saddle looks like this when being used:

Old photo from 2009 with me on Siera at Wildcat parking area

What britchens look like on our mule Mica who is fully retired now:

So I got off track with all the saddle stuff.

In the evening I caught up Sunshine and planned on taking her out and about on the ridge to visit some neighbors.

So, the little mule herd decided to run, buck, fart, and carry on when I came out to catch my red mule.

The turds! I caught up Sunshine and tied her to the shade tree just as I always do. As soon as I walked off to get a brush and other grooming tools, she brayed and started to paw and shake her head.

She calmed down when I groomed her and saddled her but was all wiggly and sketchy. 

Hmmm. I decided to do a bit of 'ground' work with her to check her attitude since this was so unusual. Her sister didn't help by running the fence line in another area and screaming.

Finally! After a few commands on a long line, she was ready to listen. I got on and sat. I explained to her that behaving stupidly was not in my best interests. 

We rode to the ridge to get the mail. Once we reached the mailbox, she was all mule business and eager to ride. 

I kept it short and simple. We stopped to watch deer.

She went back to her calm and chilled little self. 

When I got home I put her in what we call The Jenny Craig paddock. I put Siera in there too. Both Siera and Sunshine are super easy keepers and probably a bit on the fat side. If they are handy and not out back where it is harder to get them, it is easier for me to grab one for a ride. Be it a short one or a longer one.

I plan on evening rides and exercising them. 

At least, that is my goal.

[Separated from their buddies, even just by a mere hot wire, they both are now self exercising by walking back and forth. Rich said they are self lunging. In a few days, they will get over it.]

As I was putting gear away after our short ride, I saw my neighbor walking with a young couple that had a baby and a young one around the edge of the woods.

I guess the house at the top of the hill must be for sale. 

Huh.

Eventually I will have to break in yet another set of neighbors?

Changes. 

At least I still have my beautiful girls, Charlie, and of course, hubby.

Our days of riding together are gone, but I still have the memories of all of our fun adventures:

Solstice HOT

 

Here we are at the summer Solstice. I try like heck to get out each 'event' of the year and try like heck to take a photo of the sunrise at least.

Over the years I've had lots of fond memories of things done with others on the Solstice nights. At times, I've gone with neighbors and children to a spot on the ridge where we lit Chinese Lanterns to celebrate the end of the day.

Other times I've had friends stay and we've delighted in hiking in the forest with the magic of fireflies around us.

At 4:13 AM CDT, I stood on the ridge and celebrated the midsummer morning. I am weird right? 

That's fine, I can live with weird.

I'm going to borrow a quote from James Norbury's book Big Panda and Tiny Dragon:
'I wish this moment would last forever' said Tiny Dragon
'This moment is all there is' said Big Panda.

[I've always wanted to do this-- 👆 -- I did use a little

creative leeway btw. But it turned out cool.]

I had to share this moment with myself but still, it was peaceful and awesome. Even the pesky gnats agreed as they tried to feed off from me.

I went home and rinsed out the smaller stock tanks and gave everyone fresh cool water.

By 7AM, my friend Molly came to our house on foot rather upset. Her very elderly dog had disappeared. I calmed her down with some coffee on the porch and then we set out in the 'Ru to notify all the ridge neighbors who don't have cell phones or internet. All the farmers reported back to me after they'd done haying all day with no reports of sighting the aged dog. 

Charlie and I spent some time on our porch working on the old table.

I just grab colors that appeal to me and add them here and there. We will see if it is a disaster or it ends up neat. I have an idea for the top of the table, but haven't figured out how to get it done quite yet.

By late afternoon, we retreated indoors.

I stayed up to watch the sunset and for the fireflies to appear.

I think tonight [Wednesday] seems like a good night to go out and photograph the Milky Way and Fireflies, depending on the skies.

Pallet & Container Garden

Building this garden is turning out to be fun and a matter of using what is at hand to make things work.

The plastic under the pallets are old round hay bale covers that farmers used before they started to use the wraps. The old tubs have holes in them from being bashed around.

I added chunks of wood and a small bit of squished goat bedding to the bottom of each container. A tiny version of Hugelkultur gardening. The manure, leaves, sticks, and tiny pieces of wood break down in the bottom of the container and provide the soil with nutrients.

This is all an experiment afterall,...so why not?

The dirt. I am digging it from an old pile of Bull manure from the pen we kept our Dexter bull in years ago. Under the grass and weeds is a fine textured soil. It has been perculatin' for about 6 years, so it should be good for garden soil. It will contain weed seeds, but I am prepared for that. I haul it by bucket loads in the 4 wheeler's cart. 

Rich made a comment that I was going to use Bull-hit to make a garden.

😲

Rich also voted that I use the green bucket. It is ugly! I may go find a black lick tub that isn't so garish. I threatened to spray paint the green plastic tub but that would only make it look worse!

I'm sure I can find a black one that somewhere in the weeds behind one of the sheds. But in the end, it doesn't matter much about the container other than can IT hold dirt and can I grow a nice plant in it?

Sunday's project is to bring in two more pallets to have a fun little garden between the house and the LP tank. This is a pain in the arse to mow, so with the pallets, I can have flowers and walk through 'the garden' on the wooden slats!

It seems that my Lego People really like the pallet garden too. It is always good to have extra help.

Miss Molly dropped in [we never even heard her!] and jetted out to the shed where she promptly cleaned the rest of Sven's pen and then cleaned Lil' Richard's pen. 

Sweet! She and I fixed Sven's pen [say that 3 times fast] door so it would open properly. She visited with Rich and then helped him with the gates so he could dump manure with the skid steer and mow the one pasture we had made last week.

Today, if the timing works out, she'll come over and we will go riding together in the woods.

As it happened....

This is my favorite view in the whole wide world.
The view between a mule's ears.

Of course this is Sunshine's ears and her mane is wild and wooly just like everyone else's on the farm this time of year. I don't roach the manes towards fall as the mules need that extra insulation on the top of their heads.
Well, at least that is what I think.

Molly texted that she was coming for a visit and bringing two friends. I was properly surprised to find that one of her friends was a guy. Nope, he wasn't a boyfriend of Molly or the other gal, but they are all pals at school.

More interesting was the fact that as we talked a bit Friday night I noticed his t-shirt and asked him if Glenbrook North Highschool was indeed the one in Northbrook. He said it was. I was stunned. And then I laughed.

"I graduated from Glenbrook North 45 years ago!" We spent a few minutes discussing a few streets and I told him what Northbrook was like when we had moved there when I was a kid.
And...we both went to the very same grade school.

I had one more intramural CrossFit 'game' 20.5 to do Saturday morning and I told the 'kids' that they could clean out burrs from the mules' tails and manes if they wanted to do some bareback riding when I got back.

All the mules had been cleaned up of burrs and brushed, well, all except Fred who was his usual anti social self.

Everyone was eager to try bareback riding. Only Will hadn't done it before. I decided to just stay in the adjoining pastures. Everyone would get some more experience on the two young mules with nice round backs...and some experience riding the bony backs of Mica and Fred.

I allowed them to switch mounts to see how different each animal was. Siera behaved as expected. After a while of riding in her pasture she decided to test her riders by putting up a little mule protest.

Mules generally don't like doing the same thing over and over so it was no surprise. Plus Siera felt she could get away with refusals.

I explained to Will and Sonya that these were not 'lesson' animals like they had at their school. These mules were more into trails and doing difficult things, not an open pasture where walking was boring to them.

Everyone enjoyed themselves and I imagine there may be some sore butts and legs this morning.

I brought out their cell phones after the ride was over so they could all get photos of themselves on mules to share.

I'd requested the phones be left in the house before riding. You should have seen their faces when I said that! Shock! [Well Molly wasn't shocked]

All in all we had a fun time and Molly's friends got introduced to mules.

What have we learned?

Saddle view from Sunshine's Back

Molly and I went for a 'sunset' ride on Tuesday night. Monday evening we worked with Sundance in the round pen.

Monday night Molly learned an important lesson. While working with Sundance she dropped the dog food bag that made crinkly noises between the back legs of the mule. She immediately bent to pick it up.
Sundance was startled and swatted with a hoof as she darted away.

No real harm had occurred but Molly did get her arm brushed by a hoof edge. We talked about that for a moment and Molly said she understood that she should have just stood for a moment and not tried to grab between Sundance's legs.

I had Molly lunge Sundance around the pen and placed the very very scary dog food bag in a spot that Sundance would have to eventually go over.
I told Molly that she wouldn't mess any training up at all. But since Sundance suddenly had an issue with one thing that was going on, we wouldn't saddle her until she figured out that the dog food bag wouldn't eat her.

Molly worked with Sundance who first jumped the bag, then later trotted over it, and lastly Molly got her to stop with a foot on it.
Lots of praise.
While working, Sundance did show the classic signs of thinking about what she was learning. Molly showed an uncanny ability to work with Sundance.
This young lady had never been in a round pen before.
We ended the session with more grooming and a bit of grazing in the yard. I let Molly handle her for all of that.

See. Sundance had been pretty much handled by Rich for most of her young life. She was to be Rich's mule. And Sundance could be a handful at times so I sort of backed off from handling her until this last fall when I realized that Rich would probably never get back to working with her.
The changes in this young mule have been astounding.

The small herd can be in the forest and all I have to do is start a series of whistles. Sundance comes at a trot or lope to my whistle.

She literally begs to be caught and worked with any time she sees me in the yard or her pasture out back.

 

Sunshine is not quite as attentive, but I must say that the red headed sisters are very people oriented. There was a time when Sunshine [the older sister] didn't want to be caught. However since I have been constantly doing things with all of the mules ... it seems all are eager to be handled.

So Molly and I saddled up Sunshine and Siera for our sunset ride. Off we went along the back roads on the ridge. The biggest challenge for Molly and Siera was to not leave Sunshine and I too far behind. Siera is gaited and walks as fast as Sunshine can jog.
Molly did a great job. A few times I told her to let Siera go ahead and stretch her legs but then turn around and come back or make Siera wait for us.

Molly did...

Not a great shot by any means. But you get the idea.

We sat and watched the sun go down where the gravel road meets blacktop. Then we turned towards home.
I could hear machinery that sounded like a large tractor just over the hill. It sounded as though it were coming towards us.
I asked Molly to bring Siera into a hay field and turn her so she could watch the tractor from a 'safe' distance.
Siera has had issues with loud machinery before and I wanted to avoid any accidents.

I lined Sunshine up next to Siera and sat still. Sunshine glanced up at the huge monstrous tractor and dipped her head to sample the hay under her hooves totally unimpressed by the size of the tractor and the large flatbed of round bales it was pulling.
However, Siera's eyes kept getting rounder and larger, her neck tightened and she started a bolt. I held my hand up and amazingly she collided with my open hand and stopped wide eyed.
Molly sat the bolt perfectly without losing her balance and calmly brought Siera back to watch the tractor move off.

At that moment, I felt that Molly was going to be an amazing rider some day. This was her fourth time on a mule and she'd had no prior experience. I do not believe I've ever seen anyone as talented as her at her age. Yes, I have really good animals for her to learn on, but she never lost her cool or her balance.

The rest of the ride was rather quiet and colorful.
Molly and I unsaddled the mules and treated them with some grass from the yard.

Molly came in the house afterwards to tell Rich what she had learned. The two of them talked about mules/horses/training/riding and skills.

The farriers came out yesterday to trim the herd for me. Sundance used to have a habit of not wanting to stand quietly for them. She also would not put her foot on their stand to allow them to rasp her hoof.

I'd been working on that for a while now. Every day I catch her and clean her feet and have her bring her front legs forward while I pretend to rasp them.

When finished with the red heads the farriers did comment on how nice Sundance had behaved.
What did I learn?
Hoof work pays off.

This month has been a whirlwind of mule riding and training between all of the other things I have going on.

I'm diggin' it. It has been nice to have my interest in working with the animals sparked again.

However leaves on Monday to spend the rest of the summer before she heads off to college at her Grandmother's. Can I say that I am going to miss her?
Oh yes.
I will.

What have I learned?
I still love riding and training.

Wonderful Saturday

The morning started like any other except that Molly had asked if I wanted to go riding.
Well, of course I did! Mornings are the best time to go for me on the weekends. In the afternoons there are guys that race around with loud 4 wheelers and I just don't think mules and loud machines would mix well.

Not a great shot, but I just took the camera and pointed behind me. Molly's mount is Mica. She used to be a roper/heeler and team penning mule but has now retired into a life of quiet trail rides. We didn't use her for about 5 years and I pulled her out of retirement and found that she was excellent for novice riders and as a rock solid dependable mule in all situations.

I rode Siera. Molly wanted to ride her. But Siera can be funny on her first trips away from home. She can be obstinate and when it comes to black sucking mud, she will sometimes prepare for a down right refusal to move through it.
Putting a newer rider in that situation is not a good idea.

And I knew my chosen route had mud sucking holes that the 4 Wheelers had created. [No photos of the mud sucking route nor the creek crossing that was similar to the swamp of Sorrows ~~ Movie reference to The Never Ending Story]

My hands were totally full of convincing Siera she would survive the black muck holes of death.
We had to cross the valley floor but the 4 Wheelers and made deep ruts in the already saturated valley. Instead of trying to cross to the other side, I walked Siera upstream on solid ground to the snow mobile crossing.
Less stress for her and probably safer too.

We finally made it to my favorite destination. The Back Valley, The Lost Valley...well, the 4 Wheelers have beat down a trail there too. However I took Siera upstream and she didn't mind at all. At one time it would have been a bit of a fight. Not any more. In fact she was being Miss Perfect by this time.

Maidenhair Fern Hill

I was pleased as this was her second ride away from home this year. Too many variables in my life had to get straightened out before I could take the time to ride again.

As we left the Back Valley we had a steep slippery trail to go up. I told Molly that these guys could do it easily, just let Mica have her head and lean forward, keep your balance, and trust her to do the proper thing. 

It was a hard incline for both mules, but once we got on the old logging trail, we let them catch their breath.

Mica is aged but in much better shape than she was in last year. Both mules are a bit soft in muscle and endurance but that is because they don't get ridden enough. I am aiming to fix that.

We eventually made it back to the first valley. The Black mud sucking valley of ruts and black water and muck. 

When I crossed the creek I offered Molly the opportunity to ride Siera. She didn't hesitate. We swapped mules and I rode Mica the rest of the way home.

Siera knew the way home up the camp road and was not going to offer up any resistance.

Molly had met Siera the first day she came to visit and fell head over heels for her. I have two other teens girls who have done the very same thing with her. Siera is that kind of mule. She loves attention. 

Molly beamed all the way home. 

I took Molly home and told her that around 3pm I'd be taking Sundance out for her next training session. We took a vote and decided to start calling her *Sunny*, Sundance and Sunshine are just too much of a mouth full.

Sunny, it is.

The funny thing is with Sunny and her sister, it that they are the two that were born on this place and raised here. Both out of my slightly nutty but fun mare Cheyanne who is no longer with us. Both mules are extreme people mules.

In one respect it almost makes it a bit harder to train Sunny. She doesn't want to trot around the round pen. She wants to hang out with the human.

Trainers like those that they can force into lunging and moving. 

Sure I can lunge her. But then I can also work with her a bit differently and use her human trust in other ways.

Put strange things on her back. Toss balls around. Ask her to follow me over killer tarps. Kick a ball.

All with a curious attitude at first then a Ho Hum attitude.

Crinkly Mule Eating Dog Food Bag. At first it was a mule eater. After a while it was a grooming tool. Legs, stomach, ears, back and then a neck decoration.

HO..Hum.

Finally. A saddle. And a jug with rocks in it to make annoying noises as she walked.

Reaction?

Look at the jug, walk, listen to the jug. 

Stop.

Look.

Ho Hum.

I let her trot the pen with the saddle to feel the back of it bouncing around. I'll use the back girth next so she can feel that. Then add a breast collar and crupper and perhaps a britchen.

I stood in the stirrups on each side and laid across her. She just sighed.

And that was the end of the session.

I was pleased. I recalled watching a video of an old mule/horse trainer who commented that in truth training the animal should be as about boring as watching paint dry. You don't want snorting bucking and challenges every step of the way. I agree, but to me it isn't boring. It is more about watching her reactions and body language to everything we are working on.

I put things away and she followed me.

...as if to ask...

What's next?

Admittedly, this was to be Rich's mule to train and I kept holding out the hope that he'd get interested in her again.

But she is doing so well.

I am simply awed by her calm attitude.

Let's hope it eventually translates to trails!

Meet Molly

Molly is 18 and just graduated from High School.

In the fall Molly will be starting an Equine Science program at a Tech School in Iowa. How I wish they'd had a program like that when I was her age! She says she will learn to ride, train, AI a horse, collect from a stud, be present at the birth of a foal...and many other cool things. When finished with her program I hope she will be able get a great job.

A few weeks ago I was lying on the ground trying to clean grass gunk out from under the riding lawn mower. I was full of grass goo, dirty, hot sweaty, and frustrated. I'd just learned to change the oil in the simple little mower and had wet juicy grass to unclog under the large mower.

Molly came walking down the driveway. When she walked up to me, she smiled and stuck out her hand to introduce herself and let me know that she and her family had just moved in on the ridge to the house that had been empty since last spring.
I stuck out a gooey hand and we shook.

Molly explained that she'd heard there was two people on the ridge who owned horses was I one of them? I laughed and said I had one horse, but I owned mules.
She commented that she'd never met a mule and that her dad said they were stubborn and mean.

I laughed and immediately took her to my mules. She was surrounded by the red headed sisters and Siera, all who were curious and wanted to a pet.
I took an instant liking to this 18 year old and decided to ask her if she wanted to learn a bit more about equine before she went off to school in the fall.

Last week she came out and helped me curry some winter coats. I introduced her to some of my basic safety rules to have around the mules. We quickly went over body parts and I showed her how to saddle Siera.

Sunday morning she arrived along with my neighbor farmer Linda. Linda had been checking her field for planting above our place on the ridge when she'd seen Molly walking and offered her a lift.

We visited and then got to work.
Molly hadn't forgotten her saddling lessons, she did everything properly. I explained what a crupper was and why we used both a crupper and a breast-collar while riding in our hills. Most flat work doesn't require it, arena work doesn't require it... but we were not going to be on the flat or in an arena. I was going to show her a different aspect of riding.
Hill riding. We first worked in the relatively flat area of the pasture in front of the house.
Molly had learned mount and dismount and how to softly drop into the saddle. She had to combine that with making sure that Mica didn't walk off while she was mounting or dismounting.

Mica can be a 'creeper' when she wants to.

Her posture in the saddle was nearly perfect. And once we worked out all the commands, I took her on a small trail ride. Mica had been a roping mule at one time and she was a 'heeler'. She'd also been my husband's team penning mule as well as his speed event mule. 

I didn't take any photos of us down in the woods other than a view from the top of Sunshine...who really needs a trim on her mane! That will be one more job that I will inherit. Rich says he won't be able to do it.

We ended up doing a bit of brush busting so I could locate the path that takes me to the neighbor's ridge top and snowmobile trail. I hoped to take Molly on a ride through the neighbor's land one of these times.

I told her that what I was introducing her to would be a lot different than the riding she would do in school so I hoped I was not teaching her any bad habits.
I also told her that she can share her knowledge that she gains!

Since Molly works part time at a Dairy Farm, she will now have Fridays and Saturdays off. I know she has duties to be done at home but we are hoping to spend a bit of time each week to work with Sundance and some riding.

I'm pretty happy that Molly came walking down my driveway.

What a great young lady.