What's Up Wednesday: Mid Summer bumps in the road

 

Oof! Things have been going so wonderfully smoothly of late, that I knew at some point, things might get a little bumpy. (In Eros' case, literally... Lol!) Fortunately, I'm used to the roller coaster that is life with horses, and none of it earth shattering (so far anyway.) 

The horses had a fairly easy two weeks due to my braiding schedule. As I get older, the all nighters are harder to recover from. I just can't power through like I used to. But I accept that, and I just try to adjust things as best I can. That means some shorter easier rides for the horses. It happens. Plus, I think it's not a bad thing for the horses to have some easy days now and then. They've all been working pretty hard for awhile. The heat that has been oppressing much of the country (world?) has finally arrived here in New England this week, so we're back for another week of easy rides. I'm disappointed about how things have played out though because I was hoping to make our horse show debut this coming Saturday. Due to the forecast mostly (and other things that I'll talk about shortly) that will not be happening. Soon though! That's the great thing about horse shows. There's always another one. Anyway, buckle up, let's revisit the past week!

I think I mentioned last week that Al's quarter crack decided to be stupid and bother him last week. He was sound on it even when it started bleeding. But then my farrier sent his assistant (he himself was out of state shoeing) to put a patch on it and for some reason once that was put on, he was very lame. Which makes no sense as it really shouldn't have bothered him any. But it did, I guess. So we tack walked most of the week. I did some trot each day to evaluate, and by Sunday he was feeling quite a bit better, but not perfect. Fortunately, my farrier was back in town Tuesday and was able to come out. He floated the heel and put him in bar shoes. He felt decent the first day in them, but today (day 2) he felt pretty much back to his old self. THANK GOODNESS! So he hasn't jumped in a bit and obviously is also why we're not showing this weekend. We're going to do an easy lesson this weekend and see how that goes before diving back in to bigger fences and prepping for a horse show. I'm optimistic he'll be just fine. No one seems too concerned so that helps my attitude too. 

With Al on the DL I was half considering taking Eros to the horse show instead. He's been going pretty well, and the local shows around here have schooling divisions with small fences that are open to everyone. Lots of pros ride their green horses or school clients horses in these divisions so I don't feel like it's unfair of me to ride in them. But alas, he too wound up with some extra days off this past week. his hives came back with a vengeance. He's currently on 16 Benadryl twice a day and while he's looking better (and thankfully is hive free where the saddle goes) he's still pretty bumpy. Plus I'm not sure you can show on Benadryl... I still haven't figured out what could be causing this. Nothing at all has changed! Must be some bug that's biting him. Only thing I can think!

He did get to have one jump school last week before the hives got bad. He was pretty great and got some cute screen shots even:

I just love him! I hope we can get him bump free soon and maybe actually take him somewhere to do something fun. 

Pammon is mostly doing well. Riding is going great and he feels pretty good. But (there's always a but right?) he's being REAL weird about drinking water all of the sudden. Like really weird. He goes to take a sip, and then yanks his head away like it hurts him. He is getting water (the bucket levels are dropping as normal) and he likes to soak his own hay, so I feel comfortable that he's getting enough water, but still, it's making me anxious. I have a call in to the vet, but he's scheduled on the other side of the river all week. If he wasn't drinking, doc would come out right away, but I think we can wait until his schedule allows for us, at least for now. This is what he's doing, maybe one of you have seen something like this? It's so odd, and of everyone I've shown it to, none have ever seen it. (I was thinking maybe a broken tooth, but there's no obvious swelling anywhere, his breath isn't stinky, and his nose isn't gunky.)

Prior to this drama though, we did jump our first crossrails last week! BIG DAY!

He was sound after which is even better. Not that I was convinced he wouldn't be or anything... (I totally was. I was sure I broke him with those two crossrails.) Since the start of the bucket nonsense I've shortened our rides. It's been in the 90's with feels like over 100. Just in case he's not actually getting enough water, I don't want to push too hard. He still has to work correctly for our shortened rides though. That part is key to keeping his back happy. Such a balancing act with this horse. 

And then there's Shiny... She's the clutch hitter around here for sure. While she took an unplanned break this winter, she tends to step up to the plate when I need her to. For that reason, I did actually consider taking her to the horse show this weekend, until the hot weather arrived. If it was going to be nice, she'd be going! 

She's feeling quite good after her injections. I'm only jumping her once a week for right now as she eases back into it, but she's jumping small courses very happily. I'm excited to get her a little more fit and move the fences back up to 2' ish. The little wall I have is around that height and I let her pop over that this past week, but otherwise I've been keeping things around 18" for now. She seems pretty excited to be doing the thing again!

So that's where we are at the moment. Dealing with some bumps in the road, but I think things will smooth over soon. I'll get to looking for another show to get to. My trainer is only home this coming weekend and the next before heading back to VT for a couple weeks. I'm not sure there's anything too close by the second weekend, so our debut may have to wait a bit longer. But it will happen! Eventually... Lol! 

In other news, I braided 10 manes and 5 tails last week which was exhausting. But also nice to make some extra cash. 

The toilet in my barn is broken. It's one of those up flushing ones like people have in a basement, so it's stupid expensive to repair. My two weeks of braiding will pay for that, so it's nice to at least break even there. Bummer I can't buy anything fun with my hard earned money, but hey, that's adulting amiright?! 

And that's where we are! Bumps, cracks, weirdness, and a broken toilet. Lol! But this shall all pass and then we can get back on track!