salee's waffle er... i mean blog?

You've been quite quiet then    

Phew, sale.... I'm exhausted just reading about what you've been up to.   Glad cilla is on the mend.

pen

yes it was an exhausting read! I had to keep having to rethink who was who  .Such a long time since I've been on here

CILLA :- 4 vet visits, 2 different vets, tests & drugs = 3 different diagnosis + 1 megga bill.

she is now looking a lot better, glands down, weight up, attitude back to the Cilla of before, she even did a tiny bit of work earlier in the week.

so what was it????????????????

well......the worm count came back as clear, so the general opinion is Cilla already had some gut damage due to her past but not bad enough to cause a problem & which is now clearing up albeit slowly,  but the stress of being bullied by Spirit started affecting her imune system, the long nasty winter pulled her down a bit more & upset of a sudden move with strangers & so on just put the last nail in for a highly stressed pony who was under a health strain already.

oh & they think she had an allergic reaction to the wormers + meds or something else too as well as feeling the heat a bit much for her, the illness sent her heart temporarily off top  beat so the heat really got to her & she was heaving a lot.

but now the underlying problem has been sorted she can cope with heat,work the whole lot again, i just have to bring her into light work slowly to get her fitter & improve her cardio-vascular health, then if she continues to be ok i will offer her as a lead rein pony to an approved home if anyone is looking point 'em my way.

on a good note, WILLIAM the donk has begun work in harness on my fields  with a home made harrow so he is a working donk now! i need to get the shafts altered to be longer for him or replaced on the pony cart to fit him then we can go trundling off up the road too - anyone know a bod who does fabrication work?

i have been offered the possible use of a few small fields so i am after buying a trailer if anyone has /knows one to sell, bye

  Poor cilla,.....and you of course salee, such a worrying time, especially when you can't get a diagnosis. Fingers crossed that cilla has now turned a corner.  
...and good luck with William.

pen

Hi all, Cilla continues to be ok, so far so good, william is still doing some harness work, spirit is being ridden out, Mia rides out too as well as continueing her paddock work to improve transitions, do pole work & general de-spook training, 

Mia is now quite sure we are nuts as we want her to stand still while big pieces of plastic flow over her body& under her belly, & we ask her to walk over taupaulines, over poles, past things that flap & rattle etc, but since she is sure we are not going to hurt her she accepts all this as just some crazy human game,
spirit is equally resistant to being spooked, william is more or less the same but in his case he is too lazy to be bothered spooking,

BUT Gwen is still convinced there is imminent death associated with it all & won't play  

still 4 out of 5 is not bad & Gwen is improving....some of the time.
as i said on another post i will make up some of those rythym beads to see if they help Gwen distract from monster hunting behind evey bush in all shadows etc. when i have had them on her a few times i will report on if they helped at all. bye 

hi all i just got to tell you  this story....

my minibus broke down & was in the local village garage for repairs, their phone was not answering  & since it is too far for me to walk i rode Spirit over to see how it goes?  

well we arrived at the garage and we rode right up to the door Spirit was really interested in all the goings on & was ready to walk straight in!
anyway 1 guy was facing us & signaled us to wait while the other guy who had his back to us was on the phone..... 

spirit decided to stick her head in the door & gave a full blast megga whinny which echoed all round the garage causing the guy on the phone to jump a mile & almost drop his phone  at which point the other mechanic cracked up laughing.  

he was still giggling when he handed me my keys back, Spirit & i rode home & my guy collected the bus later.

wonder what the person on the other end of the phone call thought the noise was?  

bye 

  Typical woman, always got something to say for herself.

Pen

where has summer gone?
last week we did lots of riding, this week.........nah!  

last wed we did a 4 hour hack to find where we can get onto the rail line track between mortain & mont st michele, great!

only found 2 things so far that always  spook spirit....

joggers & kids on push bikes  

Mia was in front both times & did not bother, but spirit tried to hide behind Mia or climb into the hedge, once we get a break in the rain my sons are being press ganged into running & cycling round her in the training paddock! - -- - - even if they feel a twit    .

Spirit has really turned the corner in her training, she stands so firm while i crawl aboard, & because i can't get off in the normal way it is super important she stands while i get off too,  hard to believe she used to lunge forward & start bucking when anyone tried to mount.

we have stayed using the monty robberts headcollars to ride in with no added bit for both Mia & Spirit, had a few canters & a bit of wild woods riding & they went just fine, 

still can't get Mia to click up to canter, my workaway  on last ride out sent her on & got turbo trot instead, mia overtook me cantering on Spirit like mia was the starship enterprize & i thought oh heck hope she can bring her back from that, but when asked to slow down Mia was no problem, in the M rob headcollar she does not lean on 'the bit' as she would have when raced so she accepts the signal well.


while i am on....has anyone tried a memory foam seat saver? the 4 hour hack was a bit ooooooch for me & i was thinking of trying something. ow ow ow!!!

bye

The Heather Moffett type seat savers are brill - I think I have a second hand one left, if you are interested PM me

jeenie f
i did pm you, didn't you  get it? seems i have a tendancy to lose stuff in cyber space...oh well if you  read this consider it an 'open PM'

the news this week, i may be putting some of the mob out to grass on my other rented field for a month or maybe 2, i can still ride out in the fosse artour if i can catch 'em, so i shouldn't miss out on that but i am not going to send william the donk  or gwen.....why?????

'cos gwen still looks like a sofa so 3+ hect of grass & she will be a dead cert for lami, & donks 'aint waterproof & the only shelter is getting under a small wood of trees

so gwen & william will stay home & if i fancy a short plod out i can take gwen.


the opinion of the old farmers is in general this winter will be 'a bad un' so consider yourselves warned ok?

i want to bring them all back in before xmas/jan because as we all know thats when the snow fairy & jack frost come out to play.   .

little cilla has stabilised now, she has been ok for a while, so if anyone wants to consider her as a companion or light hack she is available, cilla is excellent on the road, to box, farrier etc & since she was my herds queen  before spirit came she is a good granny for any youngsters too.

bye