Why I'm happy to have dirty horses......

Since moving back to the UK there is one thing about the horses that I see here that is really noticeable. They are pretty much all rugged, all of the time. Even when, as it was this last weekend, the weather is sunny and mild and in fact temperatures have been as high as 18 degrees C. We haven't had a cold winter at all, just a very wet one, and that I suspect is a large part of the reason for the extra layers.

When it rains and we get wet, we get cold. Horses don't though. Mine have nice thick waterproof coats that prevent the rain from actually getting through to their skin. You can see in this pic of Gandalf that the white clean bit near the skin is actually dry.

This was taken after weeks of rain. They don't have a field shelter, if it gets really windy the go and hide in the hedges. At night they have to come in to a yard with an open sided barn attached since the landowner doesn't want the horses on the land 24/7 in winter. They are always wet in the morning if it's been raining overnight so clearly don't take shelter in the barn. Unlike the cows they share with!

The other thing about the rain is, well, the mud. Here's how muddy our field has become this winter....

And I reckon this is the real reason for that nice waterproof jacket people seem prepared to spend sometimes hundreds of pounds on. Cos underneath that rug, he'll stay "nice" and clean. Nice for the owner, that is.

But do these owners stop to consider how that horse must be feeling under his rug when the sun is out and the day warms up? When he's losing his winter coat and would love to roll as it's so itchy? Or how he must feel when it's been raining so long the rug is saturated and he can't dry out once the rain stops?

 

Horses don't care how dirty and muddy they are, in fact for Gandalf it would appear the muddier he gets, the better......

 

It's just the humans who care.

 

Someone (who clipped, rugged and stabled her horses) once told me I shouldn't call myself Chevalblanc on the forum we used to frequent as my horses were never white. It would seem that for some people appearance is more important than a horse's wellbeing. Spending a load of money on rugs with pretty patterns on them must make these people feel better, same as tucking their horse up into a nice warm stable at night does. Shame it doesn't make the horse feel better. If you still doubt that, check out this article......

 

Oh, and my horses are white, but only in the summer ;-)

 

 

 

TRECing on.......

So last weekend we decided to enter a TREC competition at the local stables where the girls have been having lessons. It was part of the Kelly Marks TREC Winter Series, sounded a bit official, but they assured me that it would be a fun thing, so I signed Ali and myself up.

Sunday morning dawned......wet and windy, but we had high hopes of at least having dry horses to start with as they've been coming in at night recently to the modest little residence they share with the cows - a yard and a big barn - but no, they'd clearly spent the night in the open munching on the haylage in the feeder. So we had to get the towels out to try and dry the saddle area at least, and resign ourselves to most of the mud staying where it was (just for a change).

Off we went, armed with a map, the stables is about 4 miles away from the yard. Most of the way is small country roads although we did end up in the middle of Cam on a Sunday morning being stared at by the locals going out to fetch the paper. Came across an interesting road sign on a residential road, never seen that one before!

Maybe because of the incredibly wet conditions they are expecting a surge in amphibian numbers this year?

After an hour or so of getting rained on and blown about, we arrived at the stables, and managed to get let into the indoor school where the competition would take place to have a look around. Sky, predictably, was a snorting idiot, staring at herself in the mirror, baulking at going round the arena, and generally refusing to listen to Ali.

Gandalf just stood in the corner, cocked a hindleg up and had a snooze. So I led Sky round to show her nothing bad was in there, then we went into an outdoor arena for a bit of a look round. Sky once again initially refused to go away from the gate, then decided to trot off and investigate the horses in the adjacent field, stopped dead at the huge puddle down one end and tried to tear off back to the gate. We did eventually get her settled enough to attempt to practise for the Control of Paces, but there wasn't really a lot of control involved......

 

By now some of the other competitors had started to arrive in nice shiny trailers, and they all looked awfully clean and dry compared to our two....

But never mind, we went and lined up for our turn to compete. Ali went in first, Sky argued all the way through the COP so nuls points for that. Then it was on to the PTV, she wasn't too bad with some of it, but standing on her own for the immobility was too much to ask so she decided to go and stand with Ali and lose all her points......

Then it was my turn, Gandalf couldn't stay in canter round the corners but that's not unusual so I wasn't expecting points for that. We did OK on immobility and mounting (they provided a mounting block, how civilised!) and somehow even managed full marks for our jump (!) but we messed up with the gate which was one of those flimsy plastic jobs and was actually more difficult than the pole at Beaumont....

And one of the obstacles was to sidepass over a pole on the ground which I have never seen before and will definitely require some practise! So we certainly weren't in the ribbons, but it's all good experience, especially for Sky.

After our rounds we had a little picnic provided by the back up team. Sky was very interested in the sandwiches....

.....then it was time to set off back to the yard before dark. Cue more wind, rain and just for good measure, some hail, which was so bad we just had to stop and let the horses turn their backs to it until it let up! Thanks to the local knowledge of the staff at the riding school, we did find a nice track to go back on to avoid the frog-infested streets of Cam ...

...although what you can't see from the photo is that just to the left behind the hedge is the M5!

So a fun day despite the weather and our poor performance, apparently they're doing a full TREC comp there in the summer, hopefully that will involve less mud and rain....

En Angleterre......

Well, here we are on the other side of the channel and so far so good. Got a text on Tuesday from Loraine, the new YO, saying the horses were expected to arrive at around midnight, then another one to say they'd actually arrived at 3am! But were fine and calm and not too stiff :-)

We came over on Thursday, arriving at about 1am, so first thing Friday morning we went down to see them. Predictably they were right down the far end of the 16 acre field.....
Sky was limping a bit and it looked like she's been kicked, why am I not surprised that she'd be the one to try and get bolshy? Hopefully she's learned her lesson.....

Been going down to check Sky's leg every day. Fun and games getting her out of the field with loads of other horses running about, G gallantly trying to fend them off and Tari thinking it's a huge game and charging around with her tail in the air. Think they'll settle down slowly. Sky is very interested in the resident stallion and calls to him every time she's up in the yard......

She's still limping and not too keen on me cleaning her wound (probably because I'm using TCP and it stings) but apart from that she's her usual self and eating fine etc so I'm not too worried. 

(On the hill in the background is the Tyndale Monument in North Nibley, the village we lived in when I was a kid. William Tyndale was a 16th century reformer who translated the Bible into English and got burned at the stake for his pains and the Victorians decided to build him a monument......)

The rest of the herd is still largely ignoring them, apart from telling them to get lost, although the little coloured cob, Murphy, is sort of hanging out with them and another horse is starting to look interested so bit by bit they'll integrate.

Gandalf REALLY likes the local mud and only has a few white bits left......

Kilometrage

So far this year we are doing quite well on the distances, 130km for Gandalf, pretty much all on the roads as it's so wet, so his hooves are getting a good workout. He's very footy on gravel and stones as his feet are softer than usual thanks to the lake in the field, but he's fine on the tarmac.

Have started using a new app to track rides, it gives you all sorts of interesting data but the calories burned bit seems to be wildly inaccurate (unless of course it means calories burned by the horse)!

You can check it out here.

This time last year we had only done about 30kms......

The girls are doing well too, Sky's done less than Kinna with 45kms....

 

....and the big eared one has clocked up 70 odd kms.

Yesterday she went off lead rein for the first time and was quite happy to bog off into the distance, she can move a lot faster than Gandalf!

So we're doing pretty well at keeping everone exercised in spite of the weather. I actually managed to ride six days out of seven last week, unusual for me.....

 

Not doing so well at keeping everyone clean, but they clearly don't want to be white horses, do they? ;-)

 

 

Chilly day at Beaumont

Took Ali up for her first session of the year at Beaumont today, very chilly!! Didn't hang around long at the stables, took the SNO and dog for a walk to warm up......

By the time we got back, the faffing to get the horses ready and out had just about finished....

 ...so we watched the lesson for a bit, but didn't get too close to the rail as the wet sand and mud was flying everywhere!!!

Then we headed off for lunch and when we came back to pick Ali up, Isabelle said she should be OK to do some jumping competitions this year. One very happy daughter......

Stairs? No problem......

Took Sky out for a little walk again today. This time we went right through the middle of the village and across the main road, she didn't seem to be bothered by fast cars rushing past.....

....nor a rattly tractor in the woods, she was more concerned about keeping out of the puddles, she's not worried about them like Gandalf but prefers not to get her feet wet!

Éowyn and Choccy had no such concerns, they appeared to be competing to see who could bring the most mud home with them.....

On the way home, we went past the passerelle over the railway and I just decided to see if she'd attempt the steps......

....didn't actually expect her to go all the way up, what a good girl!

Seraphina and Maverick go out.....

Took Seraphina out again yesterday, Jane rode her and I rode Maverick. She was fine, didn't even mind a cyclist (unlike Mav ) which is good as some of our route to Naulet is along a cycle track.

 We found a muddy puddle and she liked that!!

And when we got back she gave Jane's friend's little girl a pony ride!

A very soggy Sunday.....

Went to feed the troops this morning and they were looking decidedly sorry for themselves.....
They soon cheered up when the hay arrived though!

Poo picking was a bit of a challenge, but Ali did a good job!

Chester seemed to think he needed more food though.....

...and Kinna was happy to wear hers.

Boys will be boys.......

It was a bit cold this morning so the boys were playing to warm themselves up whilst I was warming up nicely cleaning out the disgusting mess they'd made in the box during the night......

At one point Maverick obviously felt he wasn't muddy enough so he stopped for a roll. I think he secretly always wanted to be a black horse........

All four together

Brought the big boys down here yesterday as Jane's off to England and it's much easier for me to look after them here.

It was raining, we got soaked.

The girls didn't seem too impressed to see them either!!

It's rained all night, they boys are a nice black colour this morning.........

Have had quite an eventful day today. Started off with a phone call from Jane to say the big boys had gone AWOL during the night.....so we had to go running round the village in the rain to find them but luckily it didn't take long, thanks to Aliénor's sharp eyes we spotted them munching away behind some of the new houses in the village, with the occupants just watching them not having done anything useful like phoned the Mairie to say there were a couple of loose horses about....
Anyway, because they are not in the usual pasture they share with Buffalo and Ross, which is currently totally inaccessable due to the road outside the gate having been completely dug up to install mains drains, you can't even walk past it let alone lead the horses past, and there are lots of big digger monsters everywhere, so we had put them in the paddock across the road from Jane's but the fences in there are not brilliant. We spent time yesterday putting in new wooden posts at the place they got out from last time, but then they escaped through another bit As Jane only has one stable, I decided to ride Gandalf down to my place, that way she can bring Maverick in at night and not worry about him.
So I had a freezing cold hour and a half hack but it was nice to get the chance to spend some time on my own with my horse, he wasn't too keen to leave his friend but soon settled down and we saw lots of horses and a few donkeys on the way so he wasn't too lonely......I promised him there'd be a nice surprise at the end of his trip and there was:







Skyfaxa seemed pleased to see him!!



He seems huge next to her though....He had a nice roll and got filthy straight away and seemed right at home.



So he'll be here til we get the fences properly sorted out up in the big field. I am looking forward to taking them out and about together, hopefully he can show Sky that the world is not tooo scary a place!