New Year Same Horse

I'm still here, just. Clinging on at times and wondering how life got so complicated. The horses are so grounding at moments like these, the routine of the day being dictated by feed times and mucking out. No lying in bed for me, or feeling sorry for myself, when so many animals rely on me for their survival. The UBF is careering towards being five years old. There is still that tiny voice in my head who nags me, telling me that the UBF is not far along enough in his education, telling me that he should be competing in dressage competitions, hacking out and hopping cross-poles with ease. The truth is that he is nowhere near doing any of these things and my true self is more than happy about this. 99% of me has stopped comparing my horse with others, I'm working on that other 1%!

The (NOT so ) Ugly Brown Foal's days are mostly spent in his huge field, taking regular naps on the deep pile of straw he has in his shed. He saunters slowly to the gate for his breakfast, never in a hurry to do anything with speed. He pulled his Christmas carrots out of his feed bucket, not liking the look of these foreign, orange objects. He has grown a spectacularly fluffy coat, his mane is tufty and spiky after being rubbed out over the summer and his hooves are cracked from such dry weather. He looks like a delinquent. He looks like an over-grown pony who has wintered out on the hills of Exmoor.

Just got out of bed in time for breakfast

To his credit, his lunging is developing brilliantly and he has carried a rider around the arena a few times. He was the gentlest horse on the farm with a friends child, nuzzling him sweetly and exploring this little person with such care - despite his enormous size. He shares his dinner nicely with the dog. He wore his Christmas fancy dress without fuss. And he stood on a pallet. Small wins, happy pony.

Happy New Year All.

A few circuits of the arena with a rider

Christmas dress-up

Dinner with the dog

He stood on a pallet!

Walkies

The UBF lives on a spectacular finca. It really is beautiful, nestled in the village of Calvia and overlooked by the domineering church. The oleanders and jacarandas bloom for many months of the year, littering the ground with purples and pinks and off-white flowers, like confetti. The farm is full of chickens, geese and aggressive turkeys which chase you when you are not looking, including the UBF. The resident dogs yap and bark and race past the horses at breakneck speed busily chasing sticks or intruding pigeons. The tractor rumbles away occasionally and the hay is delivered on a rattling trailer through the UBF's field. So he has seen a few things, the Ugly Brown Foal, and he has not really reacted to any of it. It was time to take him off the farm for the first time in two and a half years!

The problem with the paradisaical finca is that it is on a main road. To be able to access the gorgeous little lanes and tracks we first have to walk a few hundred metres up a very busy road into the village - we have to walk past the bus stop and pray that the number 107 doesn't turn up at the same time we do. Lorries hurtle, cyclists whizz by in their pelotons, people drive too fast and take no care with horses - so we decided to take Ed on the road on a Sunday afternoon, the quietest day of the week.

Kira, my 12 year old mare who is wonderful in traffic, nanny-ed him up the pavements and past the post office, town hall and bus stop. He did so well, sweating anxiously but holding it all together. As we wandered from the main road and onto the village lanes, Ed encountered barking dogs, traffic from behind and in front of him. He saw sheep and goats and chickens and rabbits. He nosed at a dog agility course and peered into fields with horses, just like him. He was very good, it was a big outing and a real milestone in his education - that there is life outside the finca where he lives.

We're on!

Life has taken me through some pretty horrible twists and tumultuous turns recently, it certainly wasn't the summer we had been expecting. In times like these, the horses take a back seat and are simply looked after. Of course their every need is met, but I had no expectations from them. My mare got fat and snoozed in the excruciating heat while Ed rubbed out his glorious mane on an almond tree. The horses ate, scratched and sweated in the Mallorquin summer, needing nightly baths and a dose of electrolytes in their feed. 

We all struggle through the summer, I write about it every year and moan about the humidity and heat from May to October, it really is unbearable. The sweat pours down our faces as we heave wheelbarrows of garba to the fields, our energy is sapped walking up and down the hills, filling water buckets, picking out feet, applying the fly spray and picking up the never-ending poo. I feel exhausted most of the time, and so do the horses - which is why the summer was the perfect time to get on The (not so) Ugly Brown Foal.

One searing evening, after Ed had been lunged and worked, his trainer thought him calm enough to get on. He had had weeks of training up to this point, he had learnt how to stand calmly next to the mounting block, he was happy with a saddle and girth on his back, his trainer had jumped up and down beside him and had lent over him, so he took her full weight. The next step was simply to put her leg over him and gallop off into the distance. Of course, the next step was simply to put her leg over him, scratch him and praise him....and gently slide off. The galloping will have to wait.

And just like that the trainer was on. Except it wasn't just like that, was it? It has taken months and months of patient and gentle training so that Ed has fully understood every step of the journey - so that flipping the leg over and sitting on his back really was no big deal at all.

Good boy UBF. And thank you to his gorgeous trainer too ❤

Saddle day

It is time to find a saddle for the UBF, which means it's nearly time to ride him. After a year of groundwork and consistency, the UBF has shown that he is mature enough to accept a rider. I don't plan to do much with him over the next few months, maybe a little walk and trot in a circle, but for that to happen, we need a saddle. There are many things I don't know about horses, despite having been around them all my life, fitting a saddle is one. So I called a professional saddle fitter to help, knowing that I could be 100% sure that the saddle didn't pinch or hurt his back. It is imperative that his first rides are a great experience, like everything else in his life so far.

Ed was incredibly well behaved on saddle fitting day. He ties without fuss, he was measured and prodded, saddles were put on his back and taken off. He even had a girth fitted and was lunged in a circle with the saddle flapping about - something he had never done before.

Big boy day

Out of all the saddles I have accumulated over the years it turns out that with a bit of flocking, Spot's saddle fits the best of all. Spot is my dear pony that I lost through a tragic accident a couple of years ago, his saddle has been growing mould and feeling neglected ever since. Tears pricked my eyes to see Ed wearing it so proudly, and as it was adjusted to his back I gasped at the little white hairs still caught in the buckles and flaps. I don't want to clean them away, I want Spot to be with us through this process, a little white angel guiding us.

We miss his cheeky face so much

Hoping his cheeky side doesn't transfer to Ed!

Three stories

The UBF's birthday came and went. He had a carrot or two and we sang to him, which he obviously appreciated. His lunging is coming on a treat but we noticed that he is most definitely stiffer on one side of his body and it was decided an osteopathy session was needed. Ed was a very good boy for this. He was pulled, manipulated, pushed and stretched - looking on with curiosity at the woman who was treating him. He has this very chilled nature about him, trusting and good. The osteopath manipulated his poll and jaw, seemingly doing nothing to the uneducated observer, and he licked and yawned at the release. All seemed fine until dinner time and he couldn't chew at all! His cute wonky nostril had been un-wonked and he had to learn to eat all over again - poor UBF. The osteopath had to make a number of visits so that he was able to eat and now that his jaw is completely aligned it's funny to think we didn't see how crooked it had been.

Ed and his wonky jaw

I learnt from a friend of a friend of a friend, that Ed's dad is such a cool character. Apparently he is so laid back that small children can ride him bare back - and that is something very rare for a pure bred Spanish stallion. It turns out that the UBF has inherited all of those genes and then some - he is so chilled he is horizontal. This week he was introduced to umbrellas which didn't faze him at all, in fact he wanted to play with it with his teeth. And lunging over tarpaulin is easy for him too, even in trot and canter. It turns out that with his calm character and trust in myself and his trainer, the UBF can do things that would have most horses running for their lives.

Umbrellas and tarpaulins

Every morning, after I have fed, hayed and mucked out the fields, I check over the horses for cuts, scrapes and apply their fly spray for the day. The UBF has sensitive heels which go all scabby in the summer, so I lather the area in sudocreme - lovingly shipped from the UK as we can't buy it here in Mallorca. I noticed this morning that under his belly, near his penis, there were fly bites and crusty scabs (it's a grotty job being a horse owner!) He hates me touching that area, so with caution I put a little cream on at which point he flung his head round to warn me he didn't like it. I applied a little more and he promptly bit me on the bum. My fault. My fault entirely. He had warned me, and I should have listened. I should have worked much more slowly to convince him that the cream was OK but instead I was in a hurry, wanting to get the job done without considering the horses feelings on the matter. Lesson learnt, number 562. 

Horses are always teaching us if only we are prepared to listen.

Musings on the future

It's the UBF's birthday next week. He will be four years old which means I have owned him for half of his life. He has healed and grown into such a stunning animal that I gasp regularly when I see him. His neck is strong and muscled, his legs are full of bone and his face is graceful, kind and cheeky. His tail is thick with gorgeous black hair and his coat is a striking chestnut - almost orange when it glints in the morning sun. He gallops to see me whenever I call his name, he will leave his food for a scratch on his withers or a nose in my pockets and he has the cutest wonky nostril, which he wiggles when dinner is coming. He is so balanced as he canters around his field, he is chilled, laid-back and happy. He is mine, all mine. But what on earth am I going to do with him?

I didn't mean to buy such an impressive beast. My aim was to save a trotter, a horse which had been raced here on the island who could no longer compete - and give the animal a nice retirement, some love and plenty of food. The universe gave me Ed, the scrawny two year old who fell off the lorry 2 years ago. Over the last two years I have grown to love this incredibly beautiful animal, his character has given me so much joy and I love that he learns quickly although we are in no rush with his education. I already have another horse to ride every day, my lovely mare Kira who I plod around the lanes of the village with. I didn't mean to buy another horse who would need riding!

As I look forward to our future together, the UBF will be coming into his prime as Kira starts slowing down for her retirement. So perhaps I will let the future unfold as naturally as it always does, one moment at a time. He has given me so much pleasure just by being him, he owes me nothing.

I owe him everything.

Being a very good boy with the farrier this week

Days like these

It's not all connection, learning and gentle teaching. Training a baby horse is also not linear, sometimes it's very much 'one step forward and two steps back'. Sometimes you feel stuck on a plateau for a very long time, not wanting to push him before he is ready.  Some days it all goes wrong, a number of things stack up against you and your horse - with the final straw causing the horse to explode. Today was like this.

Ed, aka the UBF, was eating his hay happily in his field and didn't want to learn today. He took a while to connect and bit his trainer's finger. He flashed his ears back a number of times, warning us he didn't want to do anything. We slowly persisted and he agreed to come out of his field calmly and begin his session. Then the wind picked up. And there was a new tiny rescue pony to meet. The dogs were chasing the chickens manically and careered through the tarpaulin causing an almighty crashing of plastic and BOOM! The UBF spooked, reared and looked enormous on the end of his lead rope. We now needed to get him to come down to a relaxed state. He was full of adrenaline and flight, the horses survival system when in times of danger, and he was completely unaware of us. He ran into his trainer, he wanted to see the new rescue pony, all the horses on the yard started neighing, the wind was howling and it had started to rain.

All we could ever expect to achieve from this type of training session is for the UBF to calm his nervous system, licking and chewing and be aware of our presence. It was incredibly important that we were aware of our own states and took a moment to calm our breathing, encouraging the UBF to follow. Danger had passed and he was safe with us. It took a while, but eventually he calmed and slowly walked back to his field, to continue his day.

Some days are just like this - and we will try again tomorrow.

Relaxation and connection in the rain