Ok, here's the horse I bought... This is on her first day at home... She looks quite lethargic compared to today... also, this was in May, she was wooly, she looked awkward and the previous owners had cut her forelocks, mane and tail with scisors... **Yeah, I was pissed...** I freak out when I see this, she has no muscle tone whatsoever, she looks sad and I think she was a bit wormy. She's 2 years and 2 months in this picture. She was in desperate need of minerals and vitamins, after this was taken care of, her coat became true black and shiny. No wonder I was questionning my buy... for 2 weeks, I didn't know what I had done! She looked like this, plus, she was a real brat, probably used to getting away with everything at her old home. Took a good 6 months or more of groundwork to get her to respect people and their space.
We don't see her feet, unfortunately in the picture above, but the were bad... I think I purposely left them out to spare anyone the horror... it's bad enough that she looks like this! Just to compare... here's Dandy this summer. This is taken in May 2009, she still has a bit of winter hair (I'm in Canada, so this takes a while to shed!!) This picture is taken on my boyfriend's farm after a two hour ride to move her there (yeah I rode her there) so spare me the mean looks, we just got there and I didn't have her brushes and stuff there yet.
Now, here are Dandy's feet (pictures are of left fore) AFTER her first ever trim (*ever*)... Her feet were about 6 inches overgrown (maybe more in spots). You can see that her heels are still about 1.5 to 2 inches too long, but I couldn't lower them more than that at first.
To compare her feet... here is a picture of the same foot less than a year later. This is in May after our 2.5 hour ride. There is still a bit of work to do, but this is way better than the first pic! Round happy feet are the best!!!
Let me know what you think in the comments!
Wow what a difference! You've done a great job reconditioning her. She obviously didn't miss out on too much growth, even though her nutrition probably wasn't the best in her early years.
ReplyDeleteYeah... I don't think she was fed very high quality hay... she was in a small paddock right next to the owners cattle and they ate Dandy's hay. At least this is what I saw when I visited. Her hay was thrown on the ground, mostly in mud and she only got a flake here and there. Since I've had her, she's had free choice hay and vitamins and minerals. I've also invested in a drinker so she always has fresh water. This is the link to where I've got it from. No electricity needed to make it work. http://www.horsedrinker.com/ If you live in cold weather like me, we've put hot tape around the pipes to ensure it doesn't freeze in our cold winters. The bowl drains itself after the horse is done drinking so it never gets dirty. So, the water is warmer in winter (with the hot tape) and colder in summer (water comes from underground).
ReplyDeleteThanks, Agapitos, for your kind comments!