Thank you to those of you who nominated me for the Sunshine Award, including TBA and Thee Ashke.
The sunshine award is for people who 'positively and creatively inspire others in the blogosphere'. The nominee of this award must do the following, thank the person who nominated them, nominate 10 bloggers of their own, answer the 10 questions given to you, post them, and add the Sunshine Award Button to the blog.
1. Mares or Gelding? I have always been a gelding person. All three of my horses are geldings. In fact, all the horses currently living with me are geldings, right down to the minis!
In my experience, geldings are easier and more straight-forward to teach. They tend to be willing to please and are easily influenced and persuaded.
I joke that I can't stand mares and that I don't recommend getting one, but the truth is that I've known some really wonderful mares. In fact, I worked with three excellent mares yesterday alone.
The one thing that somebody told me once is that a gelding may be easier to train, but a mare will never quit on you. I've heard from several people now that once you gain a mare's respect, you'll have a lifelong partner, and I believe it! I'm just not convinced I want to deal with the hormones in the meantime!
I'm getting a little bit off topic now, but the stand-out mare who broke my no-mare rule was Rayzer, who I competed briefly, but successfully in 2011.
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| Riding Rayzer in Maine. |
2. English or Western? I am an English rider at heart. I always have been! I adore dressage and get a kick out of jumping. I also ride English when I do endurance. With that said, I do both for work. My clients are split about 50/50 between English and western. I still feel like I'm just an English rider in western tack, though.
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| English with CP last summer. |
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| Western with Wink. |
3. Do you prefer younger or older horses? Most of my early horse history involves young horses. I spent a long time working at a breeding farm, bringing foals into the world and teaching them about being domesticated horses. I halter-broke babies and prepped yearlings. I love watching them learn and play and interact with each other. I also spent years working at the track, where the majority of horses were under five years old. They were handled daily, but a lot of things were still new, scary, and confusing.
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| Nothing more endearing than a baby horse! |
I love, love, love working with young horses. There's nothing better than a blank slate and I love laying down a good foundation, from manners to early rides. I love the look of wonder on a greenie's face the first time he goes trail riding. I want to get into this sale horse thing a little more seriously mostly so that I can give youngsters a good start and see them go on to be successful.
However, I also have a great appreciation for older horses. The wisdom, gentleness, and graying faces melt my heart. Some day, I want to have my own property and bring in a couple old, non-riding horses to live out their retirements. Working in rescue gave me a soft spot for the oldies, and I wish I could keep them all on a pasture, safe and happy until the end.
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| My friend Sandy's 45 year old gelding lived the best possible life right until the very end. |
4. Have you trained a horse from ground zero? Yes. I have brought various horses through all the phases of training, from halter-breaking to lunging to ground driving to saddle-breaking, and up through competitions of various kinds. Many of my client horses are ones that I start from scratch.
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| Romeo the first time anybody sat on him. |
I have known Ozzy since he was a yearling. I was involved in all his early training at the track and helped break him to drive. I also taught him about bathing, clipping, having his feet handled, etc. I started him under saddle before he was mine and did all of his training myself. He has done everything from endurance and parades to jumping, dressage, and even cross country. I'd say Ozzy and I have gone through pretty much all the training steps together, and I learned a lot from it.
Currently, I am starting Booger from the ground up. She was basically feral when I started her. As of yesterday, she is ground driving figure eights at the trot, free-lunging like a pro, and wearing a saddle and bridle like a real riding horse. I'm excited to throw a leg over her in the spring and see where our journey goes.
In case you haven't figured it out, I get a kick out of bringing horses along!
5. Do you prefer riding or groundwork? I enjoy both. I think people under estimate the importance of ground work and how it affects everything about riding. I do significant ground work with every single horse I work with. I think it's unfair to expect a horse to do something while carrying the weight of a rider if he can't do it without a rider on board. I rarely do traditional lunging unless it's for conditioning and muscle-building purposes. I love round pen work and liberty work, and I can't count how many times a client has been thrilled with the difference just one good ground session can make in a horse's training! I also feel that ground work can often be a much safer way of working with horses who have major holes in their training or severe behavioral issues.
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| Liberty work with Ace. |
6. Do you board your horse or keep him at home? Before I started my own business, I kept Ozzy wherever I happened to be working, which was very convenient. Since then, I have acquired more horses and sort of taken over a farm. I board my horses because we don't have a farm of our own. However, I have always been in charge of their care, and am currently almost-leasing the farm they are at. I make all the decisions about feed, turn out, medical and hoof care, blanketing, etc. After hearing the drama other people go through with their boarded horses, I cannot imagine having it any other way. In fact, I'm dying to get our own property so I can really run things 100% my way (and be able to look out my window at my horses instead of driving to see them).
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| The front pasture at the farm (where Dancer and JR are currently). |
7. Do you use all natural things or just commercial stuff (the products you use)? I don't really use 'things'.
I am very big on natural horse keeping. My horses live turned out 24/7 (unless they are sick or injured). They don't get blanketed. They are all barefoot (even the thoroughbred). Dancer gets grain, but everybody else is on grass-only in the summer and free choice hay in the winter. Nobody is currently on supplements or medications. I don't consider myself a hippie horse keeper, but I probably sound that way to some people!
With that said, there are times when horses need supplements or medications. For the most part, I use commercial things when that happens. Bute, Adequan, thrush medication, antibiotics, etc. With that said, I believe in homeopathic remedies for certain situations (I know some mares who do well on herbal supplements when they're in heat, for example).
8. All tacked up or bareback? These days I ride mostly client horses, and therefore ride tacked up 99% of the time.
I have been known to go 'naked' from time to time, though...
9. Equestrian role model? I don't really have one. I have been to a lot of clinics and demonstrations by various trainers, both traditional and natural horsemanship. There are many trainers who I admire. I love watching upper level riders compete in their various disciplines, but I don't follow any specific sports closely. I know of a few farms whose horse keeping practices are on par with my own and who I look up to for their horse knowledge, dedication to the animals in their care, and willingness to do right by the horses.
I guess if you twisted my arm about it, I would pick Steve Rojek, a well-known endurance rider from Vermont. Not only is he extremely accomplished in the sport, but I have met him on several occasions and he is down to earth, kind, and very approachable. I have also had the pleasure of riding at his farm and all the horses were well-kept and beaming with joy and energy, not to mention the place is just plain gorgeous.
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| Steve Rojek on Cougar Rock during the Tevis Cup. Photo courtesy of Mary Watkins. |
10. What's your one main goal while being in the horse world? To help as many people as possible gain a better understanding of their horses. I started out on my own to help horses, and that remains my goal. The more time goes by, the more I see that a horse issue is very frequently a human issue.
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| Getting to the root of Willie's problems. |
My 10 nominees:
1. Mare at Simply Horse-Crazy. Talk about a girl who is wise beyond her years and always willing to do right by her horse! I've had several in-depth conversations with her on topics ranging from the breeding of paint horses to feed choice, and I always forget how young she is because she is so mature and with-it.
2. Sprinkler Bandit who is approachable, fun, and posts gorgeous photos of the progress she makes. She is currently bringing along a young OTTB named Courage, and their journey has been an impressive one already!
3. Kate at The Adventures of Lucy is someone I have met in person when she generously gave us a place to crash with the horses in 2010. I admire her for her ability to juggle life and horses, now more than ever! Her journey with Lucy hasn't been an easy one, but she has always put her mare's needs first and gone above and beyond to provide for her beautiful, but sassy mare.
4. The Hoge Homestead who posts the most beautiful trail riding photos on a regular basis and manages to make me jealous even when I'm actively trail riding myself! She is a blogger who leaves me supportive comments always, and who is easy to talk to and fun to follow!
5. Debra at A Peace-a-Bull Assembly is someone I found through the Team Unruly blog. It turns out we have an eerie amount in common! They had a mostly white pit bull. This year, a homeless black and white pit bull unexpected joined their family... and his name is... wait for it... Julius!
6. Amanda at Love Me in Focus. Her journey has been a heart-breaking one at times. This year it really hit home when she lost her soul-horse, Image, to mysterious neurological issues. He was way too young and their time together was much too short, but she handled his passing with a grace that is inspirational. Get the tissues out for this beautiful blog.
7. Morning Line is the blog of a talented photographer who works in the world of thoroughbred racehorses. I have followed her since my DeviantArt days and she continues to wow me every day.
8. Stephanie at the Nie Nie Dialogues is a living miracle. This blog is completely different from my normal reads, but totally worth reading from start to finish. The short version is that she and her husband were in a small airplane crash a few years ago and Stephanie was burned over 80% of her body. She survived, but her life was forever changed. Her strength is something I can't even fathom.
9. Sue at Sue's Daily Drive posts everything from delicious recipes to fun anecdotes. I go there every day for my daily dose of trivia and it never gets old!
10. Jess at The Spyder Standard is a friend and client of mine who is taking her pacing-bred, opinionated standardbred gelding and turning him into an eventer. She is always up for an adventure and has worked tirelessly to overcome Spyder's long list of attitude quirks! Her determination to progress with him and her dedication to the breed really make her stand out in my mind!
(Geez, I can really ramble, huh?)