2009 A New Year and more surprises

Wow, time has flown, I have not had time to write my blog but my horses are all loving life!

November 2008, we lost our herd matriach Jazz to colic.  She waited for me and told me in no uncertain terms that she was unwell as soon as she saw me.  I had come back from Equitana in Melbourne eager to get out and see them.  She was waiting under her tree, she didn't come up to me like she usually did, my intuition told me all was not well here.  She tried to come up, then turned and looked at her belly and then dropped on the ground groaning.  I ran to her, checked her and then ran inside and frantically put calls into the vet and a lovely friend of mine.  The vet for medical help for Jazz and my friend for moral support for me.  2 hours later Jazz was taken by the angels and died in my arms.  There was nothing I could do to save her.  I felt so helpless.  We buried her in her favourite resting spot with that area being fenced off forever now.  We are going to plant some maples so every autumn I will see their chestnut leaves and remember her.  Its been nearly 3 months and I still get emotional when I think about her.

The boys are becoming partners!  People who told me to get rid of them, send them to the Pal Factory are now wanting to know what I have done to change them.  My neighbours are stopping to quietly watch me as I play at liberty with Star, who offers to show me how much he values me by playing off-line like he was on-line.  There is no bigger compliment than this as far as I am concerned!

Scout and I attended a camp in Victoria with Chris Corbidge, a Parelli Natural Horsemanship instructor, and we made the biggest in-roads into building our relationship to date.  We now have an understanding and he's letting me be the leader and having faith that I am a worthy one!

We have had a new arrival in between all this.  Querida, a 2 yo Pura Raza Espanola.  She is my project, my blank canvas and my little special girl!  Well not so little as she's 15hh at 2 and won't really mature till 4 or 5 so i think she's going to get to 15.3hh possibly?  Who knows.

I am avidly learning as much as I can, reading, watching and surfing and I am collecting more savvy arrows as I go.

I hope to come back more often to fill in what's going on.  Things are changing so rapidly it would be a shame not to have something to look back on and relish our achievements!

So 2009 holds for us.  More of the same, a wonderful journey with three very special horses and carrying the memory of Jazz always very close.

Feb 08

Quiet night tonight...am too pooped to play! One interesting thing though of note. I take the feed out...mixing up the times so they don't rely on being fed at the same time every day. To start with once upon a time Star would charge me and be aggressive, almost saying "Hand over the food human and you won't get hurt". I started making changes and asking him to wait. This was met with disgust from him. Now I feed with savvy as I have been shown, I use my savvy string and create a "force field" around me and my feed, I use it like a helicopter over my head. This isn't scary for him but more makes him uncomfortable....I then get to mix feeds in the paddock, with him watching some way away. If he moves in for the big lunge like he used to I use the savvy string over my head to drive him away and when I am done I walk away without looking at him. I am told I am recreating the natural pecking order in the herd. I am showing ALPHA behaviour and therefore re-asserting my level in the herd as numero uno. Jazz is quite happy and got the gist of this straight away and waits happily for me to leave before she goes to her bowl. You know what though! I have two happier horses for it! I think I have only progressed like this as I have an insatiable appetite for learning, have immersed myself in this program as I am getting results and am driven by the passion of being the best human for my horses. I like distance learning and seeing the results and I am really looking forward to starting studying Level 2 Ground skills as I know with them will come Level 1 riding at some stage when he is ready. Finally...just remembered this. Played for some time last night, was putting his rug on afterwards, was a bit windy and a freak gust blew up and blew the rug over my head and his...now I didn't react, he just stood there and waited for me to get it off us. Now would a normal TB do this? I was amazed and so proud of him and at that point in time I knew that this is the best thing I could have found.