Everyone, Meet Cora

Cora, meet everyone.

Yes, we have welcomed yet another animal onto our little sheep ranch, and it's another free horse.

Cora came from the same place as Bill the pony. She was a working ranch horse that was deemed too lazy for regular ranch work, but her placid disposition meant she would be a good kid horse. The kids she was kept for didn't end up riding her, though, so we got a call from the boys' former teacher--from whom we got Bill--asking if we would like to take her.

This was very good timing, as all the children were lamenting the fact that we no longer have a full-size horse to ride.

Her name had been Dottie, which none of us cared for much. When I was talking to the lady about her, it was mentioned that she has a white mark on her rump that looks like a heart. "Corazon" is Spanish for heart, so I suggested calling her Cora. This was met with unanimous approval--something of a miracle in our household of rampant individualists--and so she is now Cora.

You can kind of see the mark there if you look closely.

She hasn't been ridden in about a year, so she'll need some re-training. She does seem quite calm, though, which I appreciate. She didn't even flinch at the dogs barking a foot from her face when she was drinking from the water trough right next to the fence.

The dogs remain alert for any misbehavior.

I went out this morning to find her and Bill just standing there in the corral staring at each other, and she came right over for her hay.

Tucking in.

She's a bit plump, so she'll be on reduced rations and an exercise regimen for awhile until she gets a little more svelte. Luckily, we have four young equestrians who are more than happy to make sure she gets all the exercise she needs. 

No horse on earth will be as safe around children as good old Samson, but I think Cora will do nicely. We're happy to have her, and I hope she'll be happy to be here.

Remote Living: Gifted Animals

As you might have gathered from my "Vitals" column over there on the right, we have a lot of animals. And many of them were given to us.

Most of our chickens were given to us by neighbors.

Our meat rabbits were given to us by a neighbor.

Samson was given to us by a teacher at the school.

And now, from another teacher, we have . . .

Everyone, meet Bill.

Bill is a Welsh mountain pony. I think of ponies as stocky, furry little things, but Bill really just looks like a miniature horse. He belongs to the teacher's son, who used him for his very young daughter a few years ago.

We weren't sure how much training Bill had. Turns out, almost none.

He may have been fine for leading a little child around a few years ago, but it's clear that whatever training he had then has been forgotten. It took A. fifteen minutes to catch him in the smaller paddock just to get a halter on him. It seems a safe bet that he's been running around in a pasture for the past few years with no contact with a halter, much less a saddle.

Luckily, he seems to have a very good temperament, which will help. Because A. is going to have to train him. And Cubby is going to have to ride him during the training. Bill is too small to carry A. around, so Cubby is our most experienced rider Bill can comfortably carry.

Cubby and Calvin are happy to have a more lively horse to ride, because geriatric Samson pretty much tops out now at walking a quarter mile to the post office with Poppy on his back. He's a great first horse for a small child, but the older children are ready for more of a challenge.

And I think Bill is just the pony for the job.

There's No Escaping Sheep

At least, not if you're married to A., who considers life a sad and empty thing if there aren't wool-bearers somewhere on the property.

The last sheep we had were the three ram lambs A. bought to fatten over the summer and feed us over the winter. The last proper flock we had was at least five years ago.

It was a long, sad five years for A.

But no more! For yesterday, the sheep man brought home the beginnings of his new flock.

Baa.

Those are Merinos. A. drove to the southern part of the state to get them (sleeping in the open trailer on the open range so he could be at the ranch early in the morning, but that's another story) and got them from a large sheep operation that was shipping older ewes to Mexico. There are six ewes there and one ram lamb. Most, if not all, of the ewes are probably pregnant and could have a lamb anytime in the next couple of weeks.

A good start to a flock, indeed.

Although A. and the children were very excited at the arrival of the sheep, you know who wasn't? Samson. 

Well, that's not strictly accurate. He got excited all right. As soon as he caught the scent of the sheep when A. was preparing to unload them, he galloped right across the pasture and jumped two five-foot-high fences to get away from them.

Twenty-three-year-old horses are NOT supposed to do that.

Luckily, we live in a ghost town, so he can run quite a ways before he gets to anything. What he did was make a beeline for one of our neighbors about half a mile away to visit her horse. A. went after him and brought him home with no trouble, and thankfully no injuries from his athletic endeavors.

Then A. spent some time in the pasture with Samson and his halter, feeding him hay, patting him, and reassuring him that his new pasture-mates were nothing to be afraid of. He's fine now.

Don't even think about trying to leap that fence again, Samson.

I have no idea why Samson freaked out the way he did. He's been around plenty of cows, but I guess the scent is different. Luckily, the sheep are accustomed to both horses and dogs, so they were perfectly placid.

Anyway. The current menagerie stands at four chickens, two puppies, one horse, and seven sheep, and who knows how many lambs to come.

At least it's never boring around here.

Waiting on the World To Change

It is currently 31 degrees, dry, and windy. But when I get up tomorrow it will be snowing. And it will continue snowing most of tomorrow and tomorrow night.

I was not dreaming of a white Thanksgiving, if only because it makes animal care so much more difficult. They still need food and water, even if their hay is covered in six inches of snow and the outside tap is frozen. And even if the power goes out, which is a distinct possibility.

So I took some measures to ensure that no matter what happens tomorrow, I can feed and water our growing menagerie without too much aggravation.

First I placed a large tub in A.'s office--which has a door leading directly into the shop--and filled it with water. That way I'll have plenty of water to put in buckets for the horse, chickens, and dogs, with or without a functioning tap or water pump.

No one needs to go in and out of that door anyway, right?

I used some rocks to secure a tarp over part of Samson's hay in the pasture, because it's not under cover and if it snows as much as they think it will, he might have a hard time getting to it. I might have to dig the tarp out a bit, but at least once it's moveable, I can just flip it off to uncover the dry hay underneath.

For the chickens, I cooked a couple of the greenish pumpkins from the volunteer plants. They'll probably stay in their coop for a couple of days, and having food for them to peck at keeps them from pecking at each other.

And finally, for the humans, Poppy and I made chocolate chip cookies.

I suppose we could eat some pumpkin, too, but cookies sounded much more appealing.

Okay, Mama N. I'm ready as I'll ever be. Bring on the Thanksgiving snow. (But not too much, okay? Thanks.)

Introductions Are in Order

So.

As of yesterday, we have a horse.

Everyone, meet Samson.

Samson, meet everyone.

Samson was given to us by one of the teachers at the school, who also co-owns a ranch down the hill and runs the quarter-horse breeding program there. Her family has had a horse operation for generations, and to say she knows horses is a great understatement. Samson was the horse her own daughter, now grown, learned to ride on and won many competitions with.

Samson is now 22 years old and has bad teeth, which means he can't just graze on pasture like all horses do here. He needs special senior horse feed, which is expensive and requires someone to actually feed him twice a day. 

On a large ranch, this care quickly becomes burdensome and impractical, as well as expensive. So Samson really couldn't stay where he was, but they didn't want to just put him down, because besides his teeth, he's in very good shape.

So she thought of us. I had asked her about riding lessons for the boys when we first moved here, and she thought maybe we would like Samson.

We would.

Samson is an exceptionally calm and well-trained horse, which is just what our children need. According to the lady we got him from, who taught her own two daughters to ride on him, there is no safer horse for children. Good thing, as I know exactly nothing about horses and wouldn't know what to do with a horse that isn't basically like a huge, well-trained dog.

His implacable nature is also useful given that Jasper--who apparently has a deep distrust of horses--spent all day yesterday by the fence, barking at the horse.

Samson was unimpressed.

Samson is living in half of the back pasture with the chickens. It's a little louder here than what he was used to, but it doesn't seem to bother him.

Welcome to Crazytown, Samson. We're so glad you're here.