Had an eventful day yesterday. I was scheduled to go pick up Jubilee, the big Irish Sport Horse mare, for a 'spring tune-up'. Earlier in the morning I received a phone call from a gentleman in Dallas PA. He had spoken with me previously abut getting a 3 year old Arabian colt of his to start, and he wondered if I could fit that in. Also, my neighbor Zack had a 2 year old TB filly he needed to pick up, so we worked together for the day to go get all of these critters.
Started with the colt. I wasn't sure what to expect, as I knew this fellow had not had much work. He ended up being s sweetie and we had very little trouble loading him. ( Zack actually put a shoulder to the colts rump and onto the trailer he went.) He traveled well and we soon had him safely tucked into a stall.
Then we went for Jubilee. She's been here before, and has loaded well, and has had times that she didn't load well. This was one of those times. I think she knew her vacation was over and it was time to go back to work! But with a little persuasion she was soon loaded up and headed to the Ranch.
Now for the third one. This mare wasn't too far away, it took less time to travel to her farm and home than it took to catch her! She's destined for the racetrack, but as of yet has not had a lot of handling. Zack had worked with her some for her owner awhile back ( thank goodness!) but she had not had much handling recently and she did not want to be caught. We arrived and went to her stall. Zack went in and tried for a bit to catch her up and get a halter on her, but the big filly was having none of that! We tried this and that for a bit to get a rope around her neck, but to no avail. Finally I used a long rope to make a loop and roped her. When the loop fell onto her head she was really not pleased!! I quickly got the rope dallied around a post and slowly inched her toward a corner. Then with Zack manning the rope I managed to get a loop of a lead line around her nose and around her neck, then got a halter on her. Whew... But that was just the first step! We still had to get her onto the trailer. We managed that without too much more trouble, and headed back to Zacks with her. She did sweat up a good bit, but she was a pretty willing filly, didn't want to hurt us, just didn't really know what was going on. Shouldn't be long and Zack will be riding her.

Today I head north into New York to work on a bunch of draft horse teeth, then back here to work a few horses. Lots to be done before Saturdays clinic!


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