Fencing time?

Lost and found! While hiking through the woods to go get the mail I squatted down to look at an interesting shape on the ground. Excuse the blurry shot, it was just around sunrise and I just snapped it with my cheapo cell phone:

There is a joke in my household. I often wear odd work gloves as I seem to be able to drop one while hiking and can never find it again. I purchased some cheap and really ugly hot pink gloves a few years ago. That worked. I never lost the mates. I wonder how long this glove sat on the forest floor? I mean look at the moss growth!

When I lose a glove I try to match it up with another lost glove and then I wear two kinds of gloves. When the tips of the fingers wear out, I cut them off.

Saturday, the neighbors messaged me and said they'd walk down and help me move a mattress and do two other simple things that required the strength of two people. Justin moved this log off the fence so I could repair it. He'll come back later with his chain saw to cut it up. 

This tree top had been struck by lightening a few years ago. Each year it loses some part of its top from winds.

Over the winter the top fell. I cleaned up all the branches and burned most of what I could up. I was left with two huge logs that I couldn't cut up.

This spot needs a goat to graze it. There are things that the other equine won't eat that the goat does, so I decided with the mild Saturday temperatures, I'd make a new Goat & Pony yard. 

It sure looks confusing to anyone who doesn't understand my method of madness for rotating critters, but since I do understand it...it makes sense to me.

Three hot wires are needed to keep my little escape artists in, so I set up a temporary fence with gate handles and access for the skid steer and 4 wheeler up. Little Richard is 32" tall at the withers and used to duck under hotwires to escape. He is in his late 20's now and doesn't try to escape as often these days.

Sven will stay with Little Richard and do some very annoying things like chew on his friend's tail until the pony gets pissed and chases him. It is a love/hate relationship that only the two of them understand.

These two are together in a lot I made in 2020 to clean up behind our large machine shed:

They have done a great job! 

I'd say it was a pain to build the fence, but I enjoyed it. I'll probably keep this for a year or so to see if my weed whackers do a good job.

My mules can be sorted into rotational pastures with just one hot wire. I worked on some new sections last year and have an idea for something a bit different in the woods this year.

I do miss the small Dexters cows we had. They were experts at cleaning pastures, but a huge pain to fence in. [Just like goats are!]

Looks like I need to get out to the woods and repair the fence damage the deer did to the hot wires so I can be ready to turn the mules out to the back woods to look for goodies.

Life on the farm hasn't changed much...

There is the Burdock war...

And there was a way to get rid of them until the burn ban went into effect. Now I am piling them and trying to figure out how to get rid of them without breaking the ban.

After hiking and helping me with Burdock, raking leaves, cleaning up gardens, transplanting perennials and moving hostas...Charlie decides to nap on the Mulewings bench on the porch.

The bleeding hearts are emerging, along with the red sedum ....

And the green sedum!

The oregano is coming back too!

The Virgina Blue Bells are emerging!

Lil' Richard will be assuming his duties as trimmer and fertilizer along the fencelines and in different parts of the yard along with Sven as things green up.

The daffodils are about to burst forth with their yellows as the crocus flowers finish dazzling one area of the yard.

This photo, edited in a paint program....

Today Charlie and I are taking a break and will go to Kickapoo Valley Reserve and hike one of our favorite routes to Black Hawk Rock.
Today will be the only sunny and nice day until the next cold front passes and sunshine returns on Tuesday.

Back to cold for this next week!
It will slow the plants from emerging, however, that will give me a bit more time for my war on Burdock.

Stay well and safe.

Equine!

Well, I finished clipping the manes of the mules. Tah Dah!

Sundance is dealing with strange items resting on her ears. Yesterday we just spent an hour dealing with plastic pipes on her head, straps of leather, a cardboard tube that she thought was neat to blow into and make noise.
She takes a bridle just fine, but isn't quite comfortable with hands and objects touching the base of her ears.
I didn't force clippers on her, but used scissors instead, we will eventually work up to the clippers.

She was calm and cool yesterday and not the panicked mule that I'd had the day before. We revisited some of the things I'd done in the fall. She recalled all of that work.
I need to make time every day now.

Lil' Richard has been trimming and fertilizing the 'lane'. I dislike mowing it so I thought I'd use him to trim along the fence and the hillside. It is working out well. I have to rake his deposits out, but it works out quite nicely for the both of us.

Fred, who is now about 35 years old enjoyed some time with me in the yard after his grooming and clipping yesterday. He is still doing well for his age, but has slowed down and his hips and back are showing age as well as the grey hair on his once very mahogany colored face.

He is not one mule who likes getting caught, but he was pretty compliant yesterday.

Teslin is still here and she enjoys her time out in the yard. She tends to 'think' about wandering off once in a while. Yesterday afternoon she surprised me by playing with Sven for a few minutes.

Mica got her mane roached last night also. She was her usual quiet self. But the trim makes her long ears and neck stand out much nicer.

She has taken Fred's place as the Novice Rider's learning mule. She is much taller than Fred, but is in some ways more compliant than he was.

After supper I caught up Siera and took her out for a sunset spin.

I had forgotten how comfortable my hand made saddle was. It always felt too heavy to put on her before. Um. I guess working out has really helped with that. It wasn't much of an effort to put it on last night.

And we watched the neighbor plant corn.

It was a great equine day!

Whirlwinds...

Just this and that...

I've been hunting Morels like a mad woman.
Well, that and mowing the yard, trimming with the little mower and using the pony and goat for those impossible areas to get to.

Sven is in this photo near the light colored mule on the outside of the fence. He is trimming what I couldn't get with the mower.

I've been going to see MIL in the nursing home. She is sure that she is going home the very next day. She is fairly non compliant with the things she needs to do for her leg edema which is getting worse as her legs are starting to leak.

Our visits have been good, but it just means I need to pack more into the latter parts of the day.

Rich has been okay sort of. He is maintaining an slightly better attitude. I feel badly because I am running around like a mad woman outside doing as much maintenance as I can to catch up on these dry days.

This includes taking Charlie and Sven on Morel Hunts.

In two days I've gotten enough for two meals and have dehydrated some for use this winter.

I have been crazy busy this week.
But spring is quickly changing the woods...

And I have to remember to stop and take a breather and enjoy it once in a while....

And....
I'm off and running again...

Lil' Richard Part Two...

Yesterday, it was not my intent to take Lil' Richard out again, but it was still soooo muddy everywhere that I thought I'd just take him out for about an hour and ride him to get the mail.

The day before the temperature was nearly 70 here.  Yesterday, it was only 50 with a bit of a cold breeze.  I got Lil' Richard out and took him to the round pen. He rolled and then got up and bucked tossing his head.
This is his normal routine before I curry him and work a bit with him.

After a few minutes of a refresher course, I tried a different saddle on him.  It is super light weight. He really had to sniff it all over as Siera had been the last one wearing it.

It met his Majesty's approval and we saddled up and then worked on trying the bit out again.  I let him wear the bridle for a while and then swapped back to using a rope tied to his halter.

It was a good thing I'd used the saddle.  Lil' Richard enjoyed the fresh cool air and was a LOT more lively.  He pranced and bounced when we went outside.  He was not ready to listen quite yet. We had to stop and go back to the basics.

So we did a bit more of walk, trot, whoa, on a long line and then he stopped and sighed.
He got to spend a bit of time at the thinking tree in the yard too while I changed coats.

We proceeded to ride up and down the driveway and take the challenge of going through some muddy areas.  
Funny, he has no problem running through mud and puddles on his own, but with a rider ... the mud looks like pony swallowing muck!

He wanted so badly to just take off and run up the driveway, but I convinced him that he needed to turn around and listen to me.

I could see it in his arched neck that he was full of it. One of the mistakes people make about ponies is that they assume that all ponies are good for kids.  
This pony will never be a kid pony. 

His rider will always need to know what they are doing and have good balance.

We did ride to the ridge and get the mail, but on my terms, of course.  We rode past screeching children, a barking dog that ran under his belly and all sorts of noises.
He actually ignored them and had his eye on the ridge.

Funny, I think he believes he is going visiting each time we ride up there.  He is extremely willing to take on the long hill.  He never fusses either when we just stop and get the mail.

Since my driveway is so steep, I lead him back down.  I didn't want the saddle to slide up on his neck.  

Lil' Richard is just a fun little project for me and we won't be doing long hard rides.  He just isn't big enough for that.

Hubby came out and I asked him to take a photo of me and The Big Guy.

I have to admit, he is a fun little moped!

He probably would be fun to have on a cart, but I have no harness and no cart so we shall be content on getting the mail, and little fun yard rides.

Just look at this face?  Doesn't it say..."Look at me!  I may be small, but I have attitude and cunning! I'm a bit of a devil!"

Happy Trails.  And many adventures getting the mail.

Yard Pony

Lil' Richard has been with us I think since 2002.  That makes him somewhere around 16 to 17 years old.  Most of his life has been at leisure.

He has guarded our driveway.

He has lounged in the yard when he was supposed to be on weed and grass trimming duty and Guard Duty.

He is the farm comedian and Morris's good buddy.

He has been a frequent escape artist. He normally just goes to our neighbor's place up the road to visit with her horses.
She shuts him in the barn and feeds him breakfast, then gives us a call.
We usually just drive over and take him home like this.

We got him because his prior owners could never keep him in an electric fence.  He'd lay down and roll underneath it.  So we tie him out in the summer time and in the winter he gets a pen.

So this fall I was thinking about how he might make a nice little moped of sorts.  Instead of being of being a lazy weed whacking, grass mowing, 'guard' pony, he could 'get' a job.

I could use him to ride up to the ridge and get the mail.  Or if I wanted to go berry picking, I could take him.  He is easy to get on and off.
I put a leg over him once just to see what he'd do and he did a little buck.

Well, I took him inside to the round pen on Saturday and decided to see what we might learn together.  I wanted to see if Lil' Richard has any smarts.

His first reaction was to buck and rear then run like a ninny around the round pen as hard as he could.  It probably felt good after being cooped up in a pen.
After he started to slow down I began to work with him.  
He didn't want to look at me, he didn't want to pay any attention to me at all.

He acted as if he'd never been handled before and that was okay with me.

After about 15 more minutes of ME telling him when he should move and when he should whoa, he listened.
I stopped him then and groomed him.
He did one right thing in 15 minutes and that was good enough for me.

I didn't want to over work him as he is out of condition.
He did however enjoy his grooming session and stood like a statue.
He has always been good while being groomed.  At least we have that as a good starting point!

With the mild weather I'll be able to do more work with him.  I hope to get him to moped status in a month or so.

If nothing else, it will be an exercise in seeing if I can train an old horse/pony to do new tricks.