Our first boarder has moved on. Carrie helped guide in the trailer.
Madeleine came to collect Kitty.
The original plan was Kitty would leave in May. Madeline is a senior at UVA and was going to graduate and move on! She's still planning on moving away in May, but the plan has changed slightly.
Madeleine has two horses in the area. Her main ride is at Mimi's (where Madeline trains). Kitty, her side project, was at our barn, because there wasn't room for her at Mimi's.
Due to the pandemic, there are open stalls at Mimi's. We're cheaper, but Madeleine's parents thought it would be wiser/worth it to consolidate all the horses at one barn and cut down on Madeline's driving time.
Lorelai was very concerned. She went from stall to stall to keep Kitty in sight and they 'talked' back and forth. They've become quite attached.
Madeline was originally going to move Kitty a little earlier, but Carrie offered a free bag of sweet feed and not to charge her for board if she delayed a few days. Lorelai's pony friend was just moved and Carrie didn't want to take both horses Lorelai liked to in one fell swoop. We're hoping Lorelai will attach to Maddie or at least has become comfortable with her being around.
My job was to distract Lorelai with food as they loaded Kitty into the trailer.
It took a few tries, but Kitty was loaded up. She didn't sound too happy as she pulled away!
Lorelai looked confused when she brought her head up from the food bowl. She stood in the dry lot and kept looking into the barn to see where her friend went.
Maddie paid no mind to any of the proceedings. She stayed out in the field eating. Lorelai eventually went out and tried to stand next to her.
Carrie took Lorelai out on the lunge later to give her something else to think about and get some energy out.
Lorelai's been sad, but she didn't do anything crazy like hop a fence to look for Kitty. She'll have to adjust.
Carrie was a little melancholy, too. "It's our first boarder to move on," she said.
A few weeks ago, I was wondering if Madeleine would leave the area later due to the pandemic and we'd have a horse logistics problem with Nibs coming home from training.
Instead, Kitty's gone early. She ate the most of anypony, but the board would have been nice. We went from 6 horses, to 8, and back to 6 all in the span of 8 days.
A lorrie pulled up at 7:48 AM. It was slated to be a busy Saturday.
Loki wanted to eschew all social distancing and run outside! I barked a laugh when I saw he jumped up onto a stack to get a better view.
Then I shooed him down, because he was on my laptop!
Two horses arrived after driving overnight from Massachusetts. Lorelai poked her head out, but refused to come down the ramp.
Her friend, Aquilla came down when she wouldn't budge.
Aquilla and Lorelai belong to Emily. Her parents brought them from their farm by driving 11.5 hours overnight.
Shane was in the same boat as Loki. He really wanted to run outside and greet everyone!
It was busy enough out there without throwing more into the mix.
Emily, her boyfriend Brian, her parents, their dogs, and Carrie let the horses out, took them for a walk, and helped them get situated.
Loki had to stay inside, but I did bring Shane out when the horses were stalled and people were spread amongst the barn. I told him "No shaking hands," but that he could say hi.
So we did. I wanted to say, "Hello," myself. I haven't got many chances to be social lately!
Not that I wasn't being cautious. I was hanging out with Maddy while people were in the aisle!
Here's the one selfie I took to prove I was present at any of these pictures!
Shane and I stayed on the fringe of things, but he got to meet the new boarders. The pony seemed high spirited (and maybe in a bad way). I thought it was funny when he wanted to share Lorelai's hay instead of eat his own. He's remarkable flexible, too. He could pick up his front hooves over his head. It would have been funnier if he wasn't swinging them aggressively at Kitty in the next stall over.
Shane didn't have any problem finding 4 leaf clovers in our yard! He found a bunch!
He was looking around as people packed up to head out. Emily's parents were doing a crazy turn around! They drove through the night and they were ready to drive 11.5 hours back to Massachusetts? That's hardcore!
When they left, they took their dogs with them and Loki got to come out and help Shane look for clovers.
Aquilla and Lorelai went out to the mare's pasture. Aquilla immediately become very possessive of Lorelai and would flatten his ears and charge at Kitty to keep her as far away as possible.
Poor Kitty spent much of her time running around or pushed into a corner of the dry lot. The little pony bullied her around.
We had to close the pasture off, because Aquilla and Lorelai have not been on grass yet. They needed to be weaned onto it and Carrie had wanted some proximity to help them acclimate to each other faster (Preferably without anyone running full speed into a corner).
It was funny to see all of the horses try to crowd together and get to know each other over the fencelines.
It almost looked like Maddy was holding court. She made a motion and everyone shooed!
You tell 'em, Pony!
The day wasn't over yet, though. Ellie met Carrie brought Magic to the barn a little after noon.
When Magic stepped through the door we were 'Magically' made full!
It turned out that Heidi knew Ellie!
The reunion wasn't strict social distancing, but it was heartfelt!
Apparently, Ellie's daughter loves Heidi's horse!
Magic was antsy in his stall. We brought Eddy in to chill next to him since they already knew each other. Of course, Sam butted in (Really, he was probably curious if there was going to be food served).
Aquilla and Lorelai poked their heads in, too. Most horses are nosy about newcomers (even when they're new themselves!).
Loki was a pain. He wouldn't keep his nose out of Buddha's privates. "He's turning his p____ into a pacifier," Shane said.
Conversation and topics I really don't want to deal with at this age in a barn full of women. Darn pervert dog.
I was able to switch topics and put Shane to work getting water for the dogs. He loves to play with almost anything water related and as long as the bucket fills I'm happy.
I took Shane and Loki inside to let things calm down for Magic.
Laura and Amy showed up to love on Eddy while we were at the house. With all the gelding owners gabbing together, they decided it was time to introduce Magic to the herd. All the boys were stalled and then Magic and Eddy were turned out together (it was a known success). Once those two were re-acclimated, Ernie was put out into the mix (We thought he'd be calmer than Sam).
Ernie and Magic went side by side and were huffing each other as everyone watched and commented. They weren't fast friends, but they weren't exactly enemies either. There were some half-hearted kicks and posturing and we had to shoo them off into the field so they won't crowd us or get trapped under the lean-to.
It was a lot of watching, waiting, and hoping. There's not too much you can do once they horses are on their own. At around 0:20 is where Ernie comes running in from the field and they start huffing in each other's scents again. Should be some funny noises by 0:30.
There may have been one factor in all this we didn't account for: Maddy. Carrie said she was in heat. She was flirting it at all, but the boys (Especially Ernie) kept along her fenceline rather than going off to eat.
Things took an exciting turn and we lost a fencepost.
Our fenceposts are pressurized wood and sturdy, but it snapped in a moment. I clearly saw it go down, but I still said "Did it go down?" out of pure shock in the video! You'll have to watch if you want to know which horse was the culprit (looked like it hurt him a little, too).
The horses were all worked up and Eddie even launched a kick in Carrie's direction. It was shoulder to head height and thankfully not truly aimed at her (It still came within a couple feet! I didn't get it on camera, but it was an explicit reminder to be careful around big animals!).
Carrie had the post fitted back together well....until I pulled it up for a picture. It didn't fit back quite right afterward.
We stalled all the boys and hammered a t-post into the ground to brace the broken post on.
Then duct tape.
We let the boys all out again including Sam. Sam didn't even realize there was a new horse, at first. He shoved his head back into his stall and asked for more grain!
When he did notice Magic he ran right over. The joke is Sam has two words in his vocabulary: Friend and Food.
"Friend?" Sam asked.
"Friend!" Magic replied.
"Food!" Sam said.
"Friend and food!"
And that was that. We never imagined that adding Sam to the mix would calm things down! We're lucky he's a kind (and oblivious) alpha.
The boys paired up and became a happy herd off grazing before too much time had passed.
If you watched the video, you're aware Shane came trotting down while all this was going on. He wanted me to play lacrosse with him.
It was a busy day! We got what we wished for: A full barn! We'll see how it all plays out. Carrie had some small food breaks, but she was busy from roughly 8 AM to 8 PM. I was out for at least half the day, but I had to go back and forth to be on Shane duty, as well.
