Nell's action photos

I ♥ my new camera...

Financially Stable?

Well, things have been quiet lately. The horses are all going out on part loan to help pay for the supplies we need before winter get here again. Tralee has already got someone to loan him who is a good rider but has lost confidence. She has been riding without fail in all weather so we are hoping she will be an all-year loaner. Considering she was paying nearly £30 for a private lesson and travel costs per week she has saved herself a considerable amount of money as we are only asking £10 per week which should cover his shoes at the end of 6 weeks + a bit of hay money.
There are lots of things to be done and I seem not to find the time to ride much lately so it is just as well that even Nell will be put on part loan so that she is still getting the exercise. I am reluctant to let anyone else ride her but struggling financially is not an option and Mum and I have already decided that we would rather shoot the horses than sell them to someone who may not treat them properly. Grim discussion aside, the weather has been mild albeit dull and overcast and thanks to the school which my mum cleans chucking out an old goal post, I have some new jump poles. Strangely the interlocked poles are the perfect size for jumping and I have enough for the 5 pairs of jump wings that my Uncle is making for me soon, depending of course on how much he's going to charge me.
Nell is still suffering with her skin - her legs are still itchy and she now has sweetitch on her mane where she has been badly bitten. She had little bite absesses all the way up her central parting which we burst, applied sporal-D and TCP and have lagged her mane in aloe vera and aqueous BP to condition the roots and sooth the itching. The injection of ivermectin for feather mites has had no effect on her itchy legs and cost us an arm and a leg but at least they are all completely parasite free!
I'm hoping to update the banner as well a bit so expect some new pictures up there.

Just a little lazy

Yeah, So its summer. I've been lazy about riding and the sticky hot weather does not help. Tonight however I am a free woman, as College is finally finished! I'll be sad to leave many wonderful tutors and fellow students behind but I now have some very firm friends for life who I will certainly make an effort to catch up with regularly. Lisa will come riding with me as well as taking our pet rat passion to the market, Kathryn is interested in trying to ride and lives just up the road and as for Emma, well shes family, so I'm stuck with her.

Tuesday evening was a lovely day for the beach so Lisa and I headed down for a nice ride. The water looked lovely and cool and I got Nell in further than I ever have before. I might even get her to swim with me someday. Mum and I will be speaking to Chris Cook this week about training Nell to pull a trap, which is going to be my big summer project.

This autumn we are also hoping to hitch a ride up to the Joe Moyle's sale with the Tregurtha lot and have a good look around. Who knows - we may bring something home if I can find another job to support an extra beastie. I have been planning for a while to get a quiet youngster as a first breaking project. Something hairy, a bit lazy and about the age of 3 but unbroken. The plan is to break it in then ride it out for 6 months to hopefully make a profit - although the experience is always good even if I never make any money!

Helen's friend has a haflinger stud colt who should be ready for breeding by next spring. providing I can get Nell down to a fair weight I am hoping to breed her at the beggining of summer, ride and drive her for a few months then turn her away for the winter, during which I might fit in a breaking project youngster. It would definately be a keeper, either to replace Tralee, when he gets too sore, if it's a colt or as something with a bit more go for myself if it's a filly. Even Helen said that our old horses won't last forever and that if I am going to have one last foal from Nell it better be soon. after all she will be 19 next year although she could be older. You'd never know it though looking at her! I know the Westfalen Haflinger Association have her on record somewhere because her brand number is unique to her, but as most people will they are trying to weedle more money out of me (250 euro to be precise) for a full DNA test that she should not need! It would be helpful if I could get her information that would allow her foal to be registered, but if I can't then its not going to be sold anyway so it doesn't really matter to me if I know its pure. Anyway though, that's a long time off so I shan't think about it too much or get my hopes up. I'm just going to look to the near future first and work on getting her in a trap and driving.

Jump up

Nell might be a bit fat at the moment but it has hardly hindered her jump. In fact we are jumping roughly 1 1/2 foot with no effort at all. I'm actually holding back more than she is because I haven't had the confidence to jump as big as I used to - but we are both gaining trust in each other and jumping bigger and better.


Got a bit close to me in an attempt to run out - but still jumped the stick we placed there to prevent her running out instead!


A real long shot here but such fabulous form! She did one of these jumps with me on top the other day and almost threw me out the seat. Thankfully a substantial neck with plenty of mane helped me stay aboard that one. With her jumping like this you I feel confident we can do a few small shows this year.

Due to a tendon strain last summer I'm wary about how high I jump her but she seems to be clearing them with plenty of room to spare and no signs of it playing up.

You can see here that she really is enjoying herself! Last years action photos had a lot of ear pinning and threats to kick - this year is so much different! I really think she has bonded better with me now and feels happier to work for me. There wasn't a single pinned ear in any photo. On the downside I think the camera on my phone is getting worse. Ah well, you can't win them all.

Spring fever!

the long dark of winter is over and I have spring fever! I can't wait to be out riding all easter and don't worry - there will be lots of photos this time!

I'm finally getting somewhere with regards to finding out Nell's real identity: I got an e-mail from the westphalian horse registry. They may have found her. The downside is it will cost me 250.00 euro - roughly £116 uk pounds at the moment. I am considering it as it will include a full investigation, dna testing and whatever else they can give me. I may wait for a while though - I have livery bills to pay over summer and I'm not in a hurry for it.

With the days warmer and drier, I will be doing some competing. There's a fun showjumping show locally coming up that I might attend and an agricultural show where I want to enter some art, photography and the dog into.

Here's a piece of my artwork that will definitely be going:

Lisa and Jade are going to be riding again this easter. I WILL HAVE PICS THIS TIME! so keep watching this space. ;)

Beaches and Banners

Spring really is here now. The daffodils are blooming, the sun is bright and the horses are losing their winter coats. Oh and up there ^ is our new banner. Lovely is it not?

So today was another beautiful day that makes living in Cornwall absolutely magical. Every colour was rich and vibrant, each green leaf sunkissed and beautiful to behold. Today I noticed everything in all it's beauty for finally the long, barren, colourless winter is over. Look through the eyes of an artist, a poet, a writer; and you will know exactly what I talk about.

A ride to the beach was in order. I normally go down once a week to school anyway but I haven't really had the energy to ride all the way down there for a while so it felt good to be down by the sea again. We had very little beach left by the time we got their but we made the most of what we had. I now have my dad's old camera which is by no means old. As you can see it takes stunning photos. Rocky quite liked the water and must have enjoyed the taste as he found a salty rock and started licking it. Nell got her feet wet but backed up the beach very quickly when the waves "chased" her. She didn't spin but it was an odd sensation having her run backwards.

We finished with a couple of nice canters although it was difficult to do with so many people on such a small amount of beach.

Keen to get home as ever, Nell charged up the slipway nearly breaking a canter to get up the steep slope. At the top of the coast and beyond the Skewers's farmTwo large fields with an opening in the hedge between them offered a fantastic spot to canter. At first Nell did her long extended trot, refusing to move up a gear but when Rocky was put in front to canter she didn't want him leading. The result was an explosive haflinger. She went from a standstill to an extended canter, surging past Rocky. They were next to one another as we passed through the narrow hedge opening - a little too close for comfort, then Nell carried on past Rocky; obviously making sure she was still boss.

I just can't get enough sunshine at the moment! We're going Rocky Road tomorrow as long as something doesn't go wrong again. Last time Nell threw up lame so I really am looking forward to going there.

Groundwork

Nell is an especially bargy mare. She is incredibly hard to turn away from you as she walks ahead of you. If you speed up to put her inside the circle she gets quicker as well. I don't know if it is a dominance issue or whether thats just what her past owners let her get away with but I need to get it under control at some point. I did a few basics like walking a straight line (very difficult when Nell is trying to pull you back to the gate), turning my back to her and changing direction when she walked ahead of me and trotting poles in hand which she was not very keen on at all. It's going to take alot of work this year and their are lots of bad habits that need breaking. We did manage a few jumps in hand though. I did have to turn the leadrope into an extra noseband to stop her shoving me around but once she did a couple of jumps she seemed to start enjoying herself and I didn't need to encourage her much after that. At the end of the seesion when Lucy came back from her ride I attempted a free jump. We have a gate that opens to the top field that consists of two wood planks that slot into metal resters(?) which can be simply slid out of the resters to open the gate or a piece of metal attached to the resters can be pushed down into grooves in the planks to lock it. I simply placed the lowest plank so it was sitting half on the rester and half on the ground. I then tempted Nell to follow me with an apple.
I ran towards the gate and she followed. I jumped over but at the last minute Nell ran out and decided it was safer in the top field than to jump that scary 1.5ft plank of wood! Not worth an apple! The second time she realised that she would have to jump it or stay up their so we tried again. I ran. she followed. I jumped and lo and behold! She followed! She ignored me and cantered straight down to Lucy, looking rather pleased with herself. I did give her the apple though. ;)

My mum has agreed to bring a fellow boarder at Kestel's horse in for her on days she can't. In return we asked if she could teach me to lunge. Its strange that in all the time I've seen people lunging down their I've never thought to ask about it. Its one of those skills that you should know but have never needed. If I can get Nell to follow me over jumps then I will but if not the lunging would be helpful. Especially as I don't think I can even get over 3 ft jumps anymore, I'm so unfit! As that is my goal for this year (ride Nell over 3ft jumps) I might just need to know how to lunge. I don't even know if Nell knows how to so that should be fun!

Cough! Cough! Cough!

Last week Nell broke into the mouldy haylage on the dung pile. Now the bloody mare has a cough. Its her own fault- we taped it off, electrified the fence, fed her in the evening and she still thought it neccesary to break in.

So now we've called the vet and he should be out to take a look tomorrow if all goes well. Lovely, another big bill to pay no doubt. Worst case scenario is mold spores in the lungs and possible irreparable damage. Best case scenario is that whatever it is can be cleared up with no further problems.

I'll let you all know tomorrow as soon as I hear.

Oh, and mum took Tralee hunting this year again. ;) He was good as gold and mum had a great time.

Numbers...

Useful things, numbers. We now know most of Nell's german registration number in fact. I haven't got a reply from the english letter I sent the westphalian registry so I'll have a go in german. This should be good; I haven't done german since yr 9 secondary school - thats 5 years ago!

I know enough to get the message across though and a german neighbour of mine can proof read. So far her registration number would be as follows.

either 41???9992 or 42???9992

The first two numbers represent the westphalian area. The next three numbers are her german registration number(currently unknown), the two numbers after that are her brand number and the last two is her (suspected) birth year.

Thanks to Kerstin Dreborg for the info! We are getting closer!

What did you get for christmas?

Well I got everything I wanted minus the breyer. ;) a bridle that is absolutely gorgeous on Nell, a middleweight turnout rug, tote bag for all my brushes, tack box cover and saddlepad. All in purple of course! I'm most pleased with the rug and bridle. The rug seems slightly lighter weight than her turqouise one but she looked comfy under it.

The most amazing thing happened today... The sun came out! The wind was chilling but it was actually dry for a change so I took Nell out in all her purple gear. Saddlepad, bridle, reins, my jumper, chaps and boots; all purple. It took me about an hour though just to sort the bridle due to Nell's strange head shape. Lengthening the noseband made the bit drop in her mouth, then the throat strap was too small so I took the halter conversion strap off and finally by the time it was sorted she barged me out the door and I had to do a flying mount off the block as she trotted off!

Other than that it was a good ride. It was rather on the quick side but enjoyable nonetheless. I will get some piccies of her all tacked up in her purple stuff for my next entry.

A draft of the letter to Westphalian Registry

To whom it may concern,

We are looking for some information on a Haflinger mare we purchased last January. We noticed in the spring that she had a Westfahlen brand on her quarters and wondered whether you can help us identify her. We are not completely sure of her age because of her lack of history but she is roughly 16 which would make her birth year 1992. The number under her brand is 99. Could you please check for mares with this brand number and similar markings. You may have to search for mares of a different year due to the uncertainty of her age. We have enclosed a copy of her passport and a photo of her brand. We look forward to hearing from you.

Yours faithfully

Gaenor Jehu




So what do you think? Anything to add? Anything to take out?
Any pointers on letter layout and writing would be much appreciated.