Getting back on.

Uhhh, why am I tacked up right now?

Riley's had a charmed life for the last few weeks. He had his shoes pulled 3 weeks ago and they've been making decent progress. Not spectacular, but at least there's healthy growth. I took a Rider's Rasp to the toes (don't panic, it was a tiny, tiny adjustment) on Saturday because they were starting to chip pretty bad and he's not due for another trim until next Wednesday. That will be 4 full weeks and I am eager to see what P has to say. Looking back on my calendar, I can't even remember the last time I rode him, maybe to test ride the new saddle... yikes. Whatever the timeline was, it meant enough time for my newish saddle to get MOLDY. Nothing like being all set to hop on and have to clean your tack first! The weather up here this summer has been not unlike Florida with temps in the mid-90s and 100%, so it's to be expected.

I finally bit the bullet and hopped on him Sunday. He's been very sound on grass and in the arena so I figured it's time to get him back to work of some sort. We just walked, but we worked on lots of transitions and connection. I think the walk is a brilliant place to start teaching him about contact and we're trying out a new bit to see if he'll soften a little easier.
For reference, I had been riding him in a full cheek, beefy snaffle and now he's going in a Nathe. At first he was a little confused by the bit, but I have to say I got some of the best work out of him in that bit so far! We kept our ride to sweeping turns around the arena (he's still not super sound on small circles) and I added in some steps of baby lateral work to get him moving off my leg. *Did I mention he can be lazy?

Somebody save me from her!

I'm sure the other riders at the barn might think I'm a bit of a weirdo not riding my horse for weeks  and then only riding him at the walk, but the farrier said take things s-l-o-w. So we are!  We only worked for about a half hour as it was quite hot, and well he's out of shape. You would have thought we just ran XC by the way he was acting. Poor guy, vacation is over! He got a really nice bath afterwards where I worked desperately on his hideous RAIN ROT. UGH. This time I went with a combination of Head & Shoulders followed immediately with bedatine, scrubbed it in and washed him off. For those reading, I know you're not supposed to scrub at rain rot, but this is after all the scabs came off (I thought it would be best not to chronicle his rain rot journey!). It's looking a lot better already!

Oh, and I finally got to try some of the Absorbine stain remover for white markings, etc! I was a bit skeptical because Riley has permanent manure stains on his back sock a brown mark on his face from his halter, but it's awesome! After he was washed, I sprayed it on his sock and a little on his blaze, a few minutes later I scrubbed it a little and then rinsed it off and voila! WHITE again! I'll do a full review later with some before and after shots (plus a giveaway -- yea, the one I promised months ago)

The brightest his blaze has ever been! His sock is very clean here too, but this is moments before he pooped AND peed in the aisle. Grrrr.

Snoozy Riley. Hard to believe he's only 4.

I'm hoping to take him on a little field trip this weekend if the timing works out. My friend Emily wants to get her project horse for the Retired Racehorse Training Project over to xc school at Carousel Horse Park and she thought we'd be good company for her young mare. We most likely won't jump anything, but the terrain is nice undulating hills with many water crossings, and good footing so it would be nice for Riley! Plus, I just want to get him out of the ring while he's still a bit foot sore on pavement.

That's all for now. Things have been a little crazy at the barn this week with a freak storm two nights ago that sent two mares barreling through the electric fence line into Riley's field. Luckily only one horse was injured (she apparently tried to jump a 5 foot gate) and she should make a full recovery from her flesh wound. I checked on Riley today (obviously I got a report of who was injured, etc) and he had only a small cut on his shoulder, phew. No more excitement please, horses!

Bonus picture:

+5 points for anyone that can guess who's farm this is? It's just down the road from our barn. Swoon.

Summer Sale on Paper Cuts!

Hi everyone-

Time to start chipping away at Riley's expenses! I'm running a new sale over at my Etsy shop!

Enter code SUMMEROFLOVE to receive a 25% discount on your total order! Don't delay, this sale ends August 31st!

Here's my latest piece for inspiration!

**I need to lay off the exclamation points.

You've made a believer out of me.

Nature that is.

While my gut told me to pull Riley's shoes I don't have any credibility to back up that feeling, and without the thumbs up from the farrier and the vet I don't think it would have been an easy choice for me. It's only a been a week, but I am so pleased with the improvements so far. The new turnout schedule seems to be helping too. I know he prefers to be outside 24/7, but apparently he's become quite fond of his fan, living the life! But in all seriousness, I think just having a bit of a break from wet grass constantly is helping to firm up his hooves.

His Farrier's Formula arrived today (along with the Venice Turpentine) so that starts a new part of his treatment, another factor in this hoof equation. While he was still a bit gimpy on Tuesday morning, he was like a different horse this morning when I went to see him!

Generally, he's a bit on the lazy side. He's got it in him to be naughty and I've seen glimpses of his athleticism out in the field, but that never usually translates to how he is on the ground/under saddle. Today, rather than walk quietly across the field while his pasture mate canters over, he raced him to the gate! Oh boy. I took his buddy inside and grabbed him halter and lead to take him down to the arena for a soundness check. As I walked down I could sense that he was feeling quite full of himself, and without warning he squealed and bolted away from me. I literally had no idea this was coming until the lead rope slipped through my left hand and I was holding the end of it! Cheeky! I don't know if he was mad about not getting breakfast first or what, but he snorted the rest of the way. We got inside the arena, I unclipped his lead rope and grabbed the lunge whip assuming I'd have to chase him a bit...um, no. He took off at the most beautiful (sound) trot I've ever seen out of him. He proceeded to trot around making circles at either end of the ring changing his direction... it made for some good video:

What can I say? He looks great. I let him prance around for a bit, called him and he walked over very proud of himself. He was all too eager to get back to the barn and I had reinforce some ground manners en route. Seriously? Who is this horse? After breakfast I cleaned his feet and after a 15 minute battle with the lid, I put some turpentine on his soles. I don't want to jinx him, but I hope he keeps improving this steadily. I still might hold off on riding him for another week or so, but this weekend starts lunging boot camp 101. Time to get him in shape!

Also, I can't say thank you enough to all my readers (and friends, internet and otherwise) who have been so supportive throughout this. I know it's just a small thing in the realm of horses, but it's been nice to have my questions answered, hear stories about your horses, and get great recommendations on our situation. I feel very supported by all of you!

Good news, bad news.

With all the craziness that's been going on in my life (good crazy, not bad) it's about time that I throw myself 100% into horse ownership. Because of the timing of his purchase it still hasn't completely settled in that he's MINE and I will admit to leaning on my training wheels more than a few times out of fear of screwing up my horse. Case in point, I wanted to take a MUCH more proactive role in his care, starting now. He's been on and off sound since I bought him. I wanted to figure out why and although I had come up with my own conclusions of what I thought the best course of actions was to take, my sophomoric prognosis needed some backing. More so, we needed to make sure that any of the really scary boxes couldn't be checked while we evaluated the possibilities (talk about a rabbit hole).

Down an internet rabbit hole of lameness.

Sunrise over beautiful Chester County.

Ugh. Of course, I find a saddle that fits him, start going to the barn at 5am for sunrise rides and then...

Riley is lame, again. I have owned him for 2.5 months and he's had two abscesses in the same hoof (and he blew one in that hoof a month or two before I bought him) -- he's hardly been sound for more than a week at a time. Remember his PPE was near perfect, not even the slightest reaction to the hoof tester or flexions/jogging... so yea, I'm a little frustrated at his chronic lameness. I'm trying to dutifully record the patterns of lameness to see if I can find any common threads. This latest case of lameness was likely caused by him ripping off his bell boot AND shoe (shoe was not loose) on Friday. However when the farrier came out to look at him she wouldn't put the shoe back on.

Here's what I've come up with so far:
*He is quite flat-footed up front
*He probably has thin soles (he's quite tender on gravel without shoes)
*He's had 3 abscesses in his left front (all that have ruptured near the toe)
*The last time he went lame was right after the farrier came out to trim and re-shoe him
*He seems to respond well to magic cushion/wrapping for a few days
*He's definitely more comfortable being outside. We kept him in for a few days and he got VERY stocked up behind. But keep in mind it's about a million degrees here and the humidity is off the charts.
*In the past he's traveled well over varying terrain and types of surfaces
*Usually after a day or two of tenderness he's sound again (ex: he trotted across the field sound this morning)

My game plan for this week is to have the hoof x-rayed and see what the vet says and if everything looks okay, I'm going to have a second farrier take a look and see what their recommendations are. I think my farrier is fine, but she's not much of a problem solver as much as she's good at doing simple trims and shoes. I will admit, I was a little frustrated on Friday when he was jogged for the farrier and she decided that he was too sore to put the shoe back on. Of course he was sore, he just ripped his shoe off and you can see he's standing on his soles. Sigh.

Because of all of this I've found myself digging deeper into internet rabbit holes into the causes for multiple abscesses in the same hoof and of course all I have done is thoroughly freak myself out. What if it's laminitis? What if it's pedal osteitis? AHHHHHH. I'm so new to horse ownership and I am positively freaking myself out because I'm sure I'm going to ruin him.

Step away from the internet. Slowwwwwwly.

For now, I think I am making the right decision to get a picture taken and have a second and third opinion. He's only 4 and if the worst case means I pull his shoes at the end of the summer and let him recover and grow hoof, then that's okay with me. There are lots of horses there for me to ride. I gave him a nice microtek bath on Saturday, scrubbed his legs with betadine (he had some little cuts on his back legs) and stuffed him full of treats before re-wrapping his foot.

Speaking of riding, I had a lesson on Saturday and I discovered two things: one... my horse is really easy/comfortable to ride, two... I forgot how to ride any other horse but him. I rode my friend's new mare who is a 5 year old OTTB mare. She's gorgeous and dainty. She last raced at the end of May and she's pretty quiet in nearly every way. Of course, when I rode her, I nearly got taken off with at one point, so we spent a majority of my lesson working on helping her understand contact at the trot and we got some really nice work out of her in the end. I just love watching the greenies figure things out.

She's going to be really special and better yet, she's a sort of celebrity. If any of you follow along the Retired Racehorse Training Project, you can read about her here. I took some glamor shots of her for the blog too:

Victory Money, aka. Prima

Two cheeky ladies (ps. Emily is the person that sold me Riley!)

I feel quite fortunate at least that I can keep my horse under the guidance of Emily & Co. I describe myself as a horse owner that has training wheels... at least for now. And while Riley gets sorted out she's graciously offered to let me ride her horses so I don't miss out!

I'd love to hear any feedback you guys have about abscesses and lameness and everything else!