We Are Back!

Poor Stinker had a very busy weekend.  I think I actually managed to make him tired for the first time ever.  For the most part he has been in no to very light work.  For a large portion of it, he wasn't self exercising as much as he typically does because his foot hurt.  He was standing around and porking out most of the time.

These birds love sitting on the horses

First we hauled up to trainer's place instead of the fancy barn where we usually lesson.  It is just under an hour to her place.  He had a bit of a meltdown on the trailer and was dripping in sweat when I pulled him off.  Thankfully that took the edge off the dragon.

Cowboy was looking for cookies, but I was playing with my phone instead

He is actually most excellent in new places.  The stallion was screaming and raising hell but Stinker calmly started eating his hay and stood like a champion.  In the ring he was all business.  Several of the problems I had been having was me.  I felt like he was leaning really heavy on his left shoulder, but in reality I was pushing him onto it with my rouge right hip.

As soon as I got my hip out of his back, he felt great.  We ended up cantering a bit and the left lead transition was beautiful.  Zero drama.  He just stepped up into it like he is an actual trained horse.  The right lead wasn't as smooth, because he was anticipating and his idea of anticipating at the moment is hollowing and trying to zoom into it.

Best fuzzy little ears

The next day I took him out on the trails.  I wanted to get him climbing, but I also wanted to keep him out of the rocks to protect the frog that is still healing up.  That left one option that has several steep climbs and very deep sand.  He wasn't entirely sold on the whole climbing thing, but I let him take his time (and he was actually taking care of himself for the most part) and made it through the four big climbs.

Success AKA OMG Can't Walk

I managed to suck it up and make it through 30 miles.  Despite doubling up on aleve, my legs paid dearly for it.  Tuesday was the first day I could go up and down stairs without wanting to cry.  That might be a tad dramatic, but my legs were so freaking sore.

Apparently I am hooked because I already agreed to do another ride.  Honestly don't ask me why.  Maybe pain induce sanity?  I guess that will be my story and I am sticking to it.

PC: Gore/Baylor Photography

Cola was fabulous and I learned a lot.  Not going to lie, waiting for the final vet check was so stressful.  You have finished, but that doesn't matter until the vet signs off on your card.  In the end we got all As and Bs on the vet card.  Some of the Bs were related to her age (20 years), but the pre ride vet check and post ride vet check grades were quite similar.  Hopefully, I can capitalize on the learning experience and do better the next time.

I did pretty well with taking care of myself, but I need to see if I can ride with longer stirrups.  I kept mine pretty short because Cola is tiny and if my stirrups get too long I can't grip with my calves and end up pinching with my knees instead.  I also really want to get caged stirrups because riding in tennis shoes and my MDC stirrups aren't the safest combination.  I have a few weeks to figure all of that out.

Status Go

It’s official. I sent in my entry for the LD ride. The first little grey mare I was going to borrow got beat up badly by a pasture mate. She is supposed to make a full recovery and the attack is going to have surgery to fix the source of hormone imbalance that is believed to be the cause of the attack. So I was offered another horse by a different person. Cola is a tiny (I keep forgetting when I hop off and slam myself into the ground) grey mare.

Cutest little mare

The best part is she is three blocks from me so it has been relatively easy to schedule several training rides. At first I was nervous that she wasn’t in good enough shape to pack me, but last weekend she really hit her stride and trucked along to keep up with the other mare when I wanted to hang back with two other horses.

Unicorn farting rainbow socks

I’m not sure how well I am going to come out of the ride, but I think she will be great. Plus it doesn’t matter if I’m unsound at the end as long as she is. This week I’m frantically trying to get myself ready. Because I also got the bright idea to take a dressage lesson Friday morning before I leave for the ride. The good news is it means Stinker is sound and I got his saddle fit fixed. I can’t believe how much he has changed. Hopefully I’ll be better about blogging next week so I can cover all my adventures.

That Escalated Quickly

Originally I was supposed to help riders without crew at the endurance ride.  It was a short hold (20 min), so not all of the crews were coming to the hold.  When I showed up they needed an out timer, so after a few instructions I plopped down in the out timer chair.

Not a bad view for a few hours

I must say scribing for dressage tests is way more difficult than any of the jobs I have been given at endurance rides.  The hardest part was not losing papers to the wind.  Not to mention endurance riders are super friendly.  I had multiple people that drove past and stopped to thank me for the time.

There was one rider that had a mishap early on and was almost an hour behind the other riders.  I was talking with people while waiting and one lady told me she had nine horses and if I wanted to ride one I could.  I said I would think about it and immediately wondered how crazy you are to offer a horse to someone you hadn't ever seen ride.

Teeny little grey ears

I had friends point out that all horses aren't special snowflakes and some are even ok with all kinds of riders.  So after some pondering, I added her on facebook and asked if she was serious about her offer.  We met up on Sunday and I rode a fun little grey Arab mare named Cam.

She is such a steady get the job done mare.  I was cracking up when we were leading them down a fairly steep hill.  The plan was to jog down the hill, but it was steep and I am not the most coordinated person in the world.  I was kind of sort of half jogging half sliding and she was trotting next to me like a perfect lady, except she kept looking over me with mare glare.  Apparently my speed did not suit her.

Porky Little Princess

It was such a fun ride, and now I have the option of doing a 30 mile ride with her.  If I don't chicken out and I can swing it with my work schedule, I am hoping to do one in October.  I am excited but kind of terrified.  It is a bit of a toss up who ended up fluffier from Stinker's long break, so hopefully I won't die.

No Patience

I have been waiting not so patiently for the farrier to come back out.  Because Stinker had the pad on, I couldn't see how anything was healing and it was making me crazy.  I had no way of knowing if I was keeping things clean enough or if I needed to be doing more.  I had myself half way convinced that his foot was going to fall off when the pad was removed.  #nologic #justparanoia

Thankfully, everything looked good.  It is slowly growing back, but he didn't show any sensitivity on it, so the pad was left off.  I have mixed feelings about that, because he is stepping short in the trot which means it is bothering him, but at the same time I like being able to see it.

I guess I will see how it goes.  I am still waiting on the new head plate for my saddle so I can widen it.  Once that comes in we can start doing walk rides (sadly no trail rides) to start building his fitness back up.  In the meantime I am hoping that I can sneak in a couple of rides on some borrowed horses.

It totally blows my mind that endurance riders are like SURE COME RIDE MY HORSE!!!!  I guess not everyone has particular weirdos that mind strange riders.  Either way it will be good for me to ride other horses and hopefully I don't make a fool out of myself.

Holding Steady

Stinker is mostly standing around and getting chunky, which isn't the worst thing in the world for him.  I got a new toy to help keep him in shape since he isn't really rideable, but I have been so busy with work that I haven't had time to play with it much.  Eventually I will get around to using it and write about it.

I gave up on getting the saddle fitter that comes through this area to fit my saddle.  So I sent pictures off to my old saddle fitter (she is a total wizard), because I thought I may as well do it when I am not riding in case I have to ship my saddle off.  Turns out that he just needs a different head plate in the saddle (which I am fine swapping out), so that is coming in the mail.

Shockingly, I really haven't been too much of a tack ho.  Probably because even that seems like too much effort.  I almost bought the long Kerrits coaches coat, but I have two of the shorter ones (one barn and one work).  I really need to buy some boots for winter.  My old pair have split at seam on the heel.  I haven't bothered with it because it has been dry, but eventually there will be snow so I do need to do something about that.

I am also casually looking for a trailer.  The old stock trailer gets the job done, but eventually the age will catch up to it and essentially any repairs on it would cost more than the trailer is worth.  I can't really decide between a two horse and a three horse, so it will probably end up being whatever falls into my lap.

I am helping with an endurance ride this coming weekend, so maybe I will remember to take pictures and write about that.  Life is pretty dull without lessons and riding.  Next week the farrier will be back to see how the foot is healing.  Fingers crossed that everything looks good, because I am going a little nutty not being able to see if I am doing ok at keeping it clean.

Leave It To Stinker

Last spring I started feeling something a little funky in Stinker's hind when I was riding.  I was unable to see anything from the ground, but it just didn't feel quite right.  Eventually I had the vet out to do a full lameness evaluation on him, but she also couldn't see anything.  A few days after the vet was out he came up super lame and proceeded to blow out a massive abscess.

I chalked the funky feeling up to the abscess coming on and then he proceeded to have a couple more at fairly regular intervals.  I justified those with the thought that it was because the previous one hadn't grown out and that provided an opening for another one to start brewing.  I finally got everything grown out and thought it was all good.

Then he acted like he had another one, but I never saw it open up and the soundness resolved.  I started getting worried, but decided as long as he was sound I shouldn't freak out.  A couple of weeks ago the same thing happened.  There was zero reason for him to have an abscess and even less of a reason for it to happen in the exact same place.

My farrier thought that he had deep thrush in the central sulcus.  I didn't understand how that would result in thick whitish pus repeatedly (the farrier never saw the pus).  Regardless, we both agreed that I should get the vet out.  I was super happy with the vet.  I sent her a short text asking for an appointment, she called me back quickly.  Then immediately called the farrier and we had a time set up for everyone to be there.

After the initial poking and prodding without many ideas, we snapped a couple X-rays to see if any space or foreign bodies showed up.  Thankfully, nothing showed up.  The next step was to start opening up the frog and seeing what was there.  The end result was at some point he had severe central sulcus thrush and it eroded the connection between the frog and the digital cushion.  When it healed the tissues were unable to reform that connection.

This left a gap between the frog and the digital cushion and that space continued to abscess.  The best way to rebuild this connection was to remove the frog until it was connected to the digital cushion and then allow it to grow back naturally.  Poor Stinker had the majority of his frog cut out (which he was a total trooper for and was really good for the farrier).  It was then packed and we went with a leather pad for protection.

It is going to take quite some time for his frog to grow back and he is quite sore.  But he is fine at the walk and can have his normal life.  So right now he is getting a bit of a break and I am only doing groundwork to keep him from being too bored.  Sadly he isn't going to be able to go on the trails for quite awhile (until it is totally healed because there are so many rocks) and hopefully in another week or so he will be ok to ride (vet said its fine to ride now, but I want to wait until he is fine trotting at liberty).

The good news is since we took x-rays of his one foot I asked the vet if she saw anything of concern. I have always been concerned about his right hind (foot in question) and I figured it wouldn't hurt to ask.  She said that she did not see anything concerning and there was the possibility of maybe kind of sort of something in the fetlock, but without more views she couldn't say anything for sure.  She followed that up with "I really wouldn't worry about it.  He looks better than he did in the spring, and he looks way better than a horse with his conformation should.  The best thing for him is to keep doing what you have been doing."

So we will keep on keeping on and hopefully be right back at once he heals.  I am hopeful that this will clear up the lingering funky feeling I got in the hind end.