Cole's New Mission: Self Destruction

The last time I posted, I just heard back about Riley and his EPM. Since then, Riley has been doing pretty well. He still slips a bit, but I feel like it's getting better. His slips have been mild and mostly on the part of the arena where the sand has spread out to the edge and there's no base. (Note to self during my ride last night: for a quick fix, just don't ride in that spot.) Riley even jumped last Tuesday! He was AWESOME, and felt like my old horse, only better. Unlike before, where he generally had one speed of powerful canter (fast) and our riding was a little laissez faire, I was able to collect him while maintaining the power, resulting in a more calculated and enjoyable ride. On Sunday he was very stable on the lunge line, no slipping, and was happy to help John improve his riding at the canter (I'm so proud of them both for how good they looked!). He finishes up his Oraquin paste this week and switches over to a feed-through powder.

In the meantime, the two boys started going out together last week and were best friends for a few days in the front field. They then got put in the big back field, where I think they're mostly just ok with each other, although not best friends (which I'd imagine has something to do with Cole kicking Riley, and then now Riley always pinning his ears at Cole).

At first the boys were practically sharing the same blade of grass, but of course by the time I took a photo, they stopped looking quite so adorable.

I am slightly convinced that Riley is playing Bad Big Brother. I think he's convinced Cole that it's not that hard to get a day or two off if you just try to kill yourself. Of course the next best thing to Riley getting the retirement he's always wanted (since those plans aren't working out as well as he dreamed) is to make his little brother look bad and get all the glory. Maybe they shouldn't be turned out together after all...

The reason Riley ended up jumping on Tuesday in my lesson, instead of Cole doing dressage, was because Cole was off from a nice slice on the inside of his leg, right above the hock. (How he managed to do that is both impressive and a mystery to me.) The vet said it was just barely not deep enough for stitches, but to keep an eye on it and put him on an antibiotic to prevent infection. So Cole won on Tuesday and Wednesday and got those days off. On Thursday, he was sound and the swelling had come down a bit, but he was very disappointed about working. I guess he figured he had to pull out the big guns when I rode him, by which I mean the big bucks and baby leaps. Then on Friday through Sunday, Cole was tucked up and kept having an elevated respiration rate, making me paranoid about him having heat stress or colic. He won again, with Friday off and easier works on Saturday and Sunday. He was very grumpy during his Saturday trot set and once again let loose the big bucks when I lunged him on Sunday. Because his efforts still weren't working, on Sunday he cut his cannon and his stifle, hoping that would at least be worth two more days off. Thankfully he was sound Sunday and Monday, so I'm hoping that if I just keep making him work, he'll finally figure out that it's not worthwhile to kill yourself just to not have to work.

I'm also hoping that having lame pony torture time will discourage the self destruction.

Cole not only got the swelling above his hock iced, but got a massage from Riley's awesome new back massager. 

Still having to do a 15 minute trot Saturday, only at 6:30 AM to avoid the heat. 

In other horsey news, I just finished up taking care of Sarah's horses for a little over a week. Bailey, Tristan, and Doodle Bug were all very well-behaved and made it very easy to take care of them. I wish I had a picture of Doodle to flaunt on here because he's this absolutely adorable spotted pony. Sarah's farm is usually pretty quiet, but I've never seen as much wildlife there as I did this past week. I spotted a gorgeous fox, there's a bunny that lives by her horse trailer, and then one day I spotted a doe with two fawns. Two days later, I spotted another female and a male with a small rack.

I was amazed by the doe and her two fawns- the photo doesn't do it justice, but the babies still had spots!

Tonight I have a lesson with Cole, which will hopefully go well, assuming that he hasn't injured himself further. I told everyone what a jerk he was being (refer to the huge buck comments above) and had a bit of a crisis over buying him, so of course he was perfect last night. I do still think I'll be consulting Dr. Martha, because his personality doesn't seem in line with being as big of a grumpy jerk as he was Thursday-Sunday. All the same, my fingers are crossed for another perfect ride tonight.