I got my new weapon in my war against the goatsheads.

I decided I needed a pump-up sprayer.   A little on-line shopping last week showed that the 1-2 gallon ones were barely cheaper than the back-pack models so I got a 4 gallon back-pack model.   I don't intend to put 4 gallons in it very often if ever but I tried it out today with 1 gallon and its a great tool.  I love that side handle pumper and it came with a nice long wand.  I can stand still and hit a good radius of weeds.  I felt like I had spent enough time spraying weeds about the time it was nearly empty but I had a bit of herbicide left to hit the strays I saw walking back to the gate.

Then I had a glass of cold sun-tea and took a quick 4 mile ride on Sadie.   She felt pretty good to me today.  Probably because I had my monthly chiropractor visit yesterday so I didn't have any stuck spots. 

Life is short, so carpe diem

Sis called yesterday morning.   They had a horse tragedy,  mountain lion or something came through  and scared their horses so badly they broke out of their pen  and their pretty tri-color 4 year old paint mare and a 5 year old gelding that B had bought as a weanling 'for company' for their 5 year paint mare ran on the highway and were hit and killed by a semi-truck.   The neighbor's horse and ponies where spooked too and broke through a fence into the big pasture area at sis's place. 

Here is Squirt at an endurance ride in Sturgis SD in 2009 before she was weaned.  Sis had come up to visit and we did some trail riding the next day after I was done with the official ride.   Its hard to believe the filly is gone.  I hope they can find someone to track down and shoot the mountain lion.   It is not too full of moon bats where they live so there is a possibility that folks will be allowed to deal with the problem wildlife that does not belong --they are not on the edge of any national parks or wilderness areas. 

Black Hills trip was pretty good for fandamily

Three days of great riding.  I had a little trouble with hoof boots popping off.  Maybe Sadie will need to use the epics on her front feet and non-wide gloves on her hinds -- I had epics on hinds and wide gloves on her fronts and things were a bit too loose.  

Sadie was much calmer with group of horses by day three and she got lots of practice crossing water.   I got off and led her a few spots where she was anxious and I was concerned she'd tangle in a fence or land on sharp rock etc if she took a wild leap but she walked nicely through most of the creek crossings.   On the 2nd riding day we split it into morning and afternoon rides and I tried my re-fitted saddle on the afternoon ride. 

 Dad was just sure Ole needed to go along and get some exercise --so we tried it and only about a mile into the ride I notice Ole is not hanging with the ranch owners dogs anymore.   I had been tired and not even sure I wanted to go so we turned around to make sure Ole had gone back to camp or if he hadn't have a good chance of him hearing us call.   But the saddle stayed in place real well so I used it again on day 3 which included hills and it stayed in place very well.   A very good thing as the treeless was causing a swelling on her back on the left side.

I did get a little testy with  dad and sis.  On Saturday dad announced we should clean the pens and not leave it all till Sunday morning when we were leaving.  I said "OF course, we have been cleaning the pens every day"   "I didn't know you cleaned Friday, -well no I hadn't felt like making myself hoarse just to announce to him that I was doing it,  it was not a big enough job that I needed help or anything and sis jumps in with "*I* only cleaned my horses pen, not yours" at which point I got pissed at them -- I'm not lazy and I've never felt the need to announce every little thing I do, and it was high annoyance for them to be acting like a thing hadn't happened just because I just did it.   and Sunday sis was griping at me for 'rushing' to give leftovers to the dog after everyone was done and I told her to quit bitching at me.   She had got to quit thinking she needs to improve my language or manners,  I am not bad enough to be an embarrassment to her, and she should trust her riding club to not judge her by me anyways. 

But overall it was a good trip.  Dad drove the whole way up and back, we took his pick-up because he feels like he doesn't have enough miles on it and I also had in my mind that my pickup seems to have some issue every hunting trip so maybe using it for family travel is just not a good idea.   Food was great, that riding club always buys great food for their trips and I contributed a bit to  cooking a couple of breakfasts and didn't feel like too much of a slug but didn't have to do any major cooking.  We rode out with the owner every day since no one in the group was comfortable to just use a GPS and the owner's waypoints.   He loves to ride and was not just taking out our group, we just joined rides that other folks were taking anyway for the most part.   

Got back home early on Sunday and found that my processing at work had stopped that morning.  The RAID the sys admins had been warning me about kicked the bucket.  So I was in emergency mode Monday getting processing re-started using a different data area and I'll be in fairly urgent mode to get processing moved to the new computer.   I had hoped to be able to have things going with the new software version so I didn't have to do things twice but no such luck.  

quick 5 mile rides Saturday and tonight

Spent most of the weekend pulling and spraying the durn goatsheads but I did ride Sadie both evenings and we swapped pickups on my trailer.  Now have to remember to swap out the health certs and brand inspection paperwork for the horses and load a couple bales of certified hay. 

Finally rode Sadie this morning

I decided to spray the goatsheads, trying out my new ag dye so I would not get so caught up and run out of time.   Well with starting out having slept late and what all I still didn't get on the horse till the morning was mostly shot but I needed my vitamin H,  thank god for flexible work hours.

The ride was OK.  I thought she felt a bit off --trot seemed kind of rough or uneven at times but nothing consistent from her --then when I got off I was very stiff on my right leg so its quite likely that my body was causing what I felt.   We went 4 miles total,  trotted or cantered 2.5 miles,  she had lots of energy.  

I bought some blue dye to add to herbicide when I picked up feed on wednesday and used it in my little hand sprayer the first time today.   This is going to be very useful for getting a much higher percentage of the young weeds that haven't set burrs yet sprayed.   I was shocked at how many skips I had when I could quickly see whether I had sprayed or not. 

I invited the folks that have Lady to trail ride on Sunday and have not heard back.   I should have worked on trying to set up a conditioning ride date to go to with Sadie instead but I don't think she'll mind just doing flat rides at home. 

Must keep perspective with the goatshead burrs

I'm feeling like I'll never get them under control.  I need to remember that they used to be thick even in the yard and now in the extensive yard and driveway area there are  just a few stray sprouts that I need to watch for to try to keep them from making a comeback and they used to be thick in the horse pens nearly right up to the fence where I have my feeders and I do now have a pretty wide strip where they are gone.    I CAN claim a bit more ground and have a smaller battle field next year.

Time to feed the grain, and get headed to work I want to pick up some feed on my way. 

Had a good but slow first loop at Happy Jack Ride

I was debating leading out or trying to ride at the start and decided to try riding. Sadie had happy feet and some boing boing deer hopping and I was able to ride through that at the very beginning going down the the road. Then we turned off right behind the horse camp and with the siren call of camp and big meadow vs a defined road Sadie was ending up doing circles and I wasn't able to get her lined out going straight so I just got off and led her. She calmed down when everyone had passed us and she had gone a few hundred yards but a Saturday rider had told me there was a boggy water crossing 1/2 mile from the start. Ah no, it was over a mile so I walked a bunch more than I would have needed to. I found a way around the first deep crossing and my alternate route was shallow water and not too muddy, but the trail looped and we had to cross again in a 100 yards. Sadie was not going to cross that even with me leading and I felt like that mud might suck my lace-ups off; so I detoured from the muddy area with little dropoffs into the muddy water and took her through some soggy wet grass area instead --that area still had a few spots of deepish mud. So I got my feet soaked and muddy but my shoes and her hoof boots stayed on and we were back on marked trail so it was okay.

I walked her a bit after that for her to calm down from the skeery mud experience and then mounted up. I had to lead her past a few campsites, as apparently tents look just like horse eating monsters and I opted to lead her through some technical rocky areas. She did quite good, going through lots of brush, picking up a trot on the good footing open spots without me even asking and so on and as I got tired I just stayed on for some shorter technical sections and she just walked through them nicely.

However with the walking a long ways out and my trudging walk pace through the technical spots and so on it took us 4 hours to complete the loop which is billed as 15 miles and may only be that far but is technical enough that it feels like 16 or so miles. I had already given myself permission to quit after one loop and the ride is billed as a 25 miler with a 6 hour time limit and a 1 hour hold before we could start the second loop so I knew there was no way we would complete that 12 mile last loop. (it used to be a short 10 but its longer now although I don't know that they have acknowledged the extra distance.) So I vetted through and Sadie passed but she did have some B's vs A's on gait and hydration and then I pulled and the manager will have to decide if it should be considered Rider Option or RO/OT RO/lameness RO/metabolic since it was not just that I was tired, we would not have completed in the allotted time and Sadie was not 100%.

I felt a bit weird about entering when I knew going in that there was a good chance I wouldn't finish since Sadie is still so green and I figured I might have to do a lot of getting off and leading. But since the ride didn't offer a 'fun ride' distance and I didn't have a sound horse to ride one day officially and then just take Sadie out on the last loop before riders would be on it the second day, I felt like it was better to enter the distance and even though I had given myself permission to quit it was a good thing to be entered as it gave me the mindset to go on through the creek crossings rather than thinking "I don't want to get my feet wet and muddy and then have to ride 14 miles" plus it was good exposure for Sadie to go through the start with several other horses and cross the creek and so on and I got to have her vetted before and after the ride so I know she doesn't have any lameness issues other than she was a bit tired.

I was taking Sadie to the saddle maker this morning to get the saddle fitted to her since Shade will not be doing any serious mileage anymore; so I stayed overnight and hung out with the RM and volunteers and a few riders who also stayed overnight for quite a while on Sunday night. They were friendly to me so I have the impression they figured it was fine to enter and give the ride the financial support versus feeling annoyed with me for entering on a horse that wasn't ready yet.

Sadie bounced back with a few hours of rest and was trotting circles on the lead rope when I was walking her around to graze and stretch her legs on Sunday late afternoon and again this morning.

Got home and the mini's were so excited they pushed the gate open. Frosty went out the driveway gate that I had not shut right away before unloading Sadie but he did come back in the yard on his own and I got the driveway gate shut behind him. I was able to lure Mojo into the pen with some feed .Then I guess Frosty figured he had gotten enough running around done, so he came up to me and ate some feed I put in a pan and let me halter him. Haltering and getting his fly sheet on daily has been good to tame him down quite a bit.