Summer!

Merry Christmas! The summer has been a bit all over the place, so far. We've had a couple of very hot days followed by torrential rain and a week of single-digit overnights, which has been disconcerting, to say the least! It has been abscess weather but luckily (or by fantastic good management!) only one of the Pine Hill horses appears to have had an abscess. Phew.

It has been a frustrating couple of months with Annie's feet. About September, Annie started to become sensitive in her hooves - something she only exhibited for the first two weeks after her shoes came off. At first, I assumed it was the spring grass, or a change in feed. I had changed her from KER Low GI Cube to Hygain Balance as she was in with the young horses and they were all being fed Balance. Annie has not been particularly sensitive to feed in the past - certainly not in her hooves.

It got to the point where I simply couldn't ride her on anything but grass. The one comp we managed to go to was our first HRCAV dressage day and, after warming up beautifully on the grass, she could barely manage to get around the first test on the sand and I retired her. So disappointing. And not a great day to exhibit a lovely big barefoot horse. Reckon I was in with a chance to win the damn thing, too!

This went on for two months until I got Di Snow, a local bodyworker and equine nutritionist, out to give Annie a treatment. While chatting during the treatment, and whingeing about Annie's newfound hoof sensitivity, Di asked what I was feeding her. I said, "The usual - Hygain Balance, lucerne chaff...oh, and Rose-Hip Vital for her joints." Di said, "Ah. Rose-Hip Vital is just sugar, basically. It's made from fruit sugar. Could be your problem."

And it was. I took Annie off it and within a few days there was a marked improvement. A month later, Annie is back to walking on gravel and working comfortably on our hard, dry arena. Just goes to show how even a couple of tablespoons of sugar a day can dramatically affect a horse's hooves.

These are Annie's hooves now:

Fronts

Hinds

Front near. Note the big frog but also the wall separation.

Annie's hooves are now about 80%. There was some hoof wall separation and no doubt getting back to true rock-crunching will take a little longer. I'm pretty annoyed at myself! But you live and learn, don't you?

Things are ticking along at Pine Hill. We are now taking a limited number of agistees, and have started our ambitious water project. We will be linking our three dams and pumping stock water up to a header tank at the top of the property. Water will then be gravity-fed to troughs around the property. Once again, an Equicentral design is our template but, since we are also setting up a working stud with resident stallions, there are ergonomic factors that need to come in that aren't really addressed in Jane Myers books.

So, we have a mare and foal paddock right out the front of the house, and another paddock that adjoins it. These two back onto the very large 'Back Country' paddock with its spring-fed creek and rocks and wildlife where the youngstock and broodmares are spending their summer. It's lovely. We also have a more Equicentral 'cell' of three paddocks that use a central 'loafing' area.

The next four months will be spent on the water and fencing more paddocks up the top end of the property. We will create another 'cell' of three or four paddocks around a central 'loafing' area. These areas are like big yards with shelter and the only water source. They are surfaced (we are using plumbers grit) and the idea is that horses are only every in one paddock at a time and use the loafing area for all the standing around they do under trees or around water. This saves the paddocks and minimises those horrible bare dust/mud areas created by this behaviour.

Pinehill Ellen

And here is our little filly, born mid-November to one of our Stock Horse mares. This girl is just a bit gorgeous and loves a scratch!

Merry Christmas and have a safe and happy New Year. Lots more to come at Pine Hill next year, no doubt!

We now have a website so feel free to have a browse - www.pinehillequestrian.com.au

Two weeks in and our first comp in over a year looms

Well, it's been nearly two weeks since hubby and I started the Blood Sugar Diet. It's definitely been a challenge! But, we have both lost a significant amount of weight and, more importantly, centimetres off our waistlines. We are eating a shitload more vegies and zero bread and pasta. We are both very energetic now - it's actually the best part of the whole thing - and I'm riding more, gardening more, just doing lots more. Hubby has fenced a whole paddock!

Downsides are not to be sneezed at. This is a huge change and it's been a massive challenge to avoid foods I would normally just shovel in without thinking about it. Bread and toast are things I miss a lot on some days but not at all on others. Buying lunch is an absolute nightmare - we can't have bread or rolls, or rice or whatever. So, no sandwiches, wraps, rolls or sushi. What's left, I hear you ask? Sashimi. Soup. Green salad with tuna or chicken. Eggs. That kind of caper.

Last night, we had a blowout and had takeaway with the kids. Burgers, chips and beers. It was pleasant, but not really fantastic. Both of us were so full afterwards, and the glow had worn off by this morning. But, neither of us feel at all bad about it, which is also a big change. We needed to let the leash loosen for a night and now we're back on track. It's quite a lovely, forgiving way of going.

Mindfulness and exercise are a big part of the diet. I have started brief mindfulness sessions using an app I downloaded and I think it's helping quite a lot with anxiety, hunger, generally getting through the day. It's an interesting journey.

Horse-wise, things are getting busy. I've been out judging all last weekend and now have my two sit-ins ticked off for upgrading. So close now. I have to admit, I have not developed a love for dressage judges through my time judging. I find them, on the whole, pretty condescending, unforgiving old women with very inflated senses of their own importance. No wonder riders dislike them. I am determined not to be like that, especially when I get more senior.

Annie and I will be off to our first dressage comp in Wagga next weekend. I had entered a Novice and Elementary test (eek!) but then the opportunity to do my last shadow judging arose and now we're just doing a Novice test at the end of the day. Luckily, we have a clinic with Manu Mclean next Mon/Tue so that should set us up nicely.

The grass is absolutely amazing at our property now. We put down lime and dolomite in Autumn and wow is it paying off. The mares are out in the driveway every day eating down the long grass and everyone is looking fat and shiny. I am a little concerned about the sugar content, though, and Annie showed a little tenderness walking on the gravel this morning, after only one day eating the lush grass. It's amazing how quickly they can react to a change in diet!

Cleo's baby is due in the next three weeks or so. She's looking so fat and shiny, still very athletic, despite starting to waddle. She's like that woman at work who runs marathons then gets pregnant and just keeps running every day until she pops the baby out. I wasn't one of those women. ;P

Day 2 of the Crash Diet

Well, the good news is, I've lost nearly 2 kilos already. Yey! And I'm feeling pretty feisty. And not hungry quite all the time. In fact, not even hungry much of the time, though I'm keeping as busy as I can and drinking lots of water. I am, however, starting to feel wistful for chips, and cakes and ice cream....But that's what got me here in the first place so I know sugar is the devil!

Spring is a crazy time on a horse farm - any farm, I'm guessing. The grass is growing which is awesome, but so are those hooves! I've been trying to trim a horse per day and it's hard work. I'm especially trying to get them all up to date before the weather dries up and their hooves turn to solid rock. I struggle with hard hooves as I just don't have the strength or endurance to rasp them forever. I don't own any nippers (though I'm seriously considering buying some!) and I try hard not to let their feet get long enough for nippers to be useful. But there are a couple of the paddock ornaments that are probably a bit far gone now....need to get on top of them!

Our first event that it looks like we'll actually make it to is the Irish Draught and Sport Horse Show in just under two weeks. Annie the big legend will finally be getting to go out and show those prissy show horses what a real Irish eventer can do (which will probably include winning exactly zero prissy show horse events, but potentially taking out the 'Working Hunter 100cm' class because we are the only ones in it). I need to dust off the fancy pants gear and I'm hoping I actually squeeze into it all by then given the current starvation regime!

Wagga Dressage the weekend after that we're I'm judging and riding the big girl. I really like the Wagga vibe. Probably since I went to uni there for a couple of years and had the time of my life!

Then we're heading to our first HRCAV (grown up pony club) event just up the rode. The ARCs run these great 'jackpot' weekends where you ride a couple of dressage tests on the Saturday, then a couple of SJ rounds on the Sunday. Points are awarded and you win a rug. A RUG. Woo! So, Annie and I are going in our first one and I'm quite looking forward to it. No plaiting allowed (not ALLOWED, I tell you!) and I get to wear a groovy club t-shirt rather than stock and jacket. Loving it already.

Lots of dressage judging in the next few weeks too. I'm really hopeful I finally get to complete all the shadow judging and sit-ins required to upgrade to the next level of judge. Fingers crossed - it's been a loooong time coming. Lots of support from the Jindera and Wagga Dressage clubs has been an absolutely fundamental factor. It makes a huge difference!

Then it's getting my country on in November for the Stock Horse boys' shows. There's a couple of them on before the end of the year so I thought I'd take the two colts and just do the led classes. It's interesting, the ASH community seem very keen on starting 2yo horses and riding them a lot. The ridden classes all start at 2yo and there's even campdrafts and other events for horses under 3yo. I really don't understand this mentality - the horses are not even close to being mature enough for that level of riding and work at 2yo. I'm sure there are lots of injuries in the 5yo and up ASHs. Come to think of it, you don't see many ASHs over 5yo for sale. Not real quality horses that would have been out doing shows and drafts as babies.

Maybe I should do a research paper for the ASHS....in my spare time!

Speaking of spare time, we are now very close to announcing the new business venture. I hope to get that all nailed down by the end of October. Exciting!

And another reboot ;)

So, it's been almost exactly a year since my last post. And it's been one hell of a crappy year! This will be a far more regular blog, I promise, though it may be taking in more non-horsey topics, which I will get to in a minute.

Moving to a whole new state where you know no-one, have no riding facilities and no money is pretty must the hardest thing you can do when all you want to do is what you were doing before! I fell at Lynton Horse Trials a year ago, tore the ligaments in my ankle (very painful and slow to heal) and then found that my confidence was really messed up. I basically struggled to get on and ride the whole year, and haven't jumped a jump since. I even sat out of the Lucinda Green clinic. Not good, right?

I am slowly getting into a better place. I have done a couple of Manu Mclean clinics which always help my self-esteem. I am definitely aiming to do the Lucinda clinic next February, and I'm now a member of an Adult Riding club down here (my god, ARCs in Victoria are huge - like Pony Club for grown ups!).

I am now a proud Australian Stock Horse breeder (Pine Hill Stud, baby) with my very own young colts standing next year. Though, I fell off one of the breakers and hurt my bloody back a couple of weeks ago, sheesh....

In the last year, amidst all the turmoil and, to be fair, loneliness, of leaving my friends and equestrian community behind in Canberra, I stacked on the weight. It's terrible! So, today I'm starting the crash diet developed (I mean to say, 'marketed') by Dr Michael Mosley, the Blood Sugar Diet. It is an 8 week torture fest during which I will live on 800 calories per day. But, I should lose about 15kg, re-set my blood sugar to normal levels, kick-start my metabolism again, and, most importantly, not look like a fatty on poor Annie. White breeches are unforgiving, people.

I plan to blog about it and share the torture. :)

I also have a busy few months ahead as I start a new business (details to come when they're finalised), take the ASH boys to my very first Stock Horse shows, take Annie to our first comps in over a year, and generally ramp up to Christmas. We have a little ASH foal due in 6 weeks, too. So, I promise this will not turn into an awful, over-sharing weight-loss blog. It will only be a tiny bit of that.

I want to blog about this because the equestrian community is all about appearances. We all want to be improving and doing fine all the time. We don't want to show we're scared, we feel fat or uncomfortable, or how intimidated we are by the pros and their bloody gorgeous horses. But we do feel those things - lots! And I want to share my experiences and do a bit more embracing of the amateurishness of those experiences.  I want to do a bit more showing how it really is, including the mis-steps, the bitching and the judging. Oh yes, I'm doing lots of dressage judging too - heh heh heh.

Until literally a month ago, I had this weird mindset of thinking I was a professional, that I had to be riding at a certain level, had to be going up the grades all the time. I had never questioned this - never even really acknowledged it. But, my unconscious seemed to have me pegged as a future Olympian (I'm not actually exaggerating here), and every time I didn't do well, I beat myself up for it. Which was obviously all the time, since I ain't winning no trophy rugs!

I stopped wanting to ride at all when I fell at Lynton. What's the point, I thought? And I was scared of falling. Really scared. I stuffed up the approach to a difficult jump and Annie just couldn't get high enough to get us out of it. There were a couple of things I might have done to avoid the same fall, but really it was just a mistake and they happen all the time. The prospect of making a mistake and getting seriously hurt still makes my stomach churn.

So, this blog will be my way of documenting my ordinariness. My life as an amateur, a grassroots competitor and an average punter. Don't get me wrong, I'm still competitive as fuck, but now I'm not focusing on 3*! And this blog will not be full of how awesome I am (well, not all of it, anyway :D), but will be full of honesty, self-reflection and journey. 

Barefoot Eventer is back!

Hellloooo out there!

After the longest hiatus, I thought it was high time to kick off this little blog again. Barefoot adventures await documentation, and there's a whole lot happening horse-wise now.

So, Annie the superstar continues to go from strength to strength. Lucinda Green came again in February and taught us a few things! She's such a gifted coach, very encouraging and non-judgmental. I enjoy her lessons immensely!

Lucinda demonstrating something - could've been the 'tube.' Riding your horse between your legs and hands like they're in a tube.

Tackling the skinny oxer

And the normal oxer!

 We stepped up to PreNovice (EvA105) at the start of this year - probably one of the most terrifying experiences of my life to date! Of course, Annie was a pro (a green pro, but still a pro) and looked after her frightened little middle-aged rider. It was pretty awesome, and that heady mix of relief and elation after completing our first 'big kids' event is hard to describe.

Us on our first EvA105 run

But, then we moved. After thinking and researching for a year or so, we decided to move the family to Beechworth, Victoria, about 30 minutes south of the NSW/Victorian border. This upset the applecart in a big way, and led to a period of about 6 months without riding. A dark time, indeed!

On the bright side, I finally got to the bottom of Uno's issues (see previous blog posts if you're wondering who the hell Uno is!). Rose had a gorgeous little colt called Onyx around Christmas last year.

Onyx about a week old

But Onyx started to suffer some problems very quickly. He had a muscle hernia to his offside flank (not uncommon according to wonder-vet Ian Neilsen), but experienced a slight fever and inflammation around his umbilical stump. Within three weeks he was dead lame on a hind leg. His joints became enlarged and he was very sad.

Onyx about a month old, having been shaved, x-rayed and osteo'd within an inch of his life!

The vets agreed he was suffering from physitis (inflammation of the growth plates caused by an imbalance of calcium to phosphorous in Rose's milk), but even after changing Rose's diet, he continued to show marked lameness. It would be another 6 or 8 weeks of expensive 'treatments' before wonder-vet Ian came out and said, almost nonchalantly, "It's still physitis - you need to wean him."

So, the poor little bloke got weaned at just on 4 months' old. Two things happened - the first was we moved to Beechworth and I took him with Annie to keep him company. The second was that Annie adopted him like her own, making it impossible to ride for months! It really helped his mental health, though, as he had a foster mum to make him feel safe.

The physitis disappeared within 3 weeks. Amazing!

Onyx at about 7 months old. Completely recovered!

This means we need to think carefully about breeding from Rose again as she seems to have this milk imbalance. Ian surmised that it was Rose's milk that caused Uno's difficulties, as physitis greatly increases the chances of fracture and injury to joints. At least we know now, but such a shame.

Since we've moved the herd as increased quite a bit. More on our new fur family in the next post, or this will be a whopper! The new farm is over 90 acres, with lots of rocks and undulating country. Perfect for barefoot!

Vale Uno

Uno, as many of you who read my little blog will know, is the son of the massive but gorgeous Rose, by a lovely Irish Sport Horse stallion, Highland McGuire. Uno managed to fracture his knee through the growth plate on the outside of the joint around two weeks of age and was not well managed for the first two weeks following the injury. There's more on that in the posts I wrote at the time in 2013.
After a year of intensive treatment and therapies, including body work, chiropractic work, monthly and sometimes weekly trimming and lots of love, it became clear that Uno's knee had not healed well and he was in apparently chronic pain.

Uno getting a massage from our wonderful friend Tatjana.

He was taken to Canberra Vet Hospital and the amazing Rebecca Walshe gave him a thorough examination, noting initially that his knee joint mobility was extremely limited. He could not bend the knee beyond about a 100 degree angle - no pain shown, it just wasn't happening. X-rays showed the fracture had essentially 'blown out' and a large piece of bone was now sticking out from the side of the knee. He had other changed to the joint that were not particularly obvious on the x-ray but Bec just kept shaking her head and saying, "That's not how the knee is supposed to look!"

I asked Bec what she thought his pain level was like. She and I have made some hard decisions before and I trust her implicitly. She also knows I'm a realist and I don't keep horses alive when their quality of life will be poor. She said his pain is probably quite chronic and as the arthritis in the joint progresses it will become more acute. We talked about managing it, but give his overall sensitivity to drugs (he scoured and became ill at the drop of a hat!), the fact we would just be delaying the inevitable, and the expense involved, it seemed a pretty pointless exercise.

I was taking him home to bury him. I can't describe the sadness I felt at this information. He was really the loveliest person and carried lots of hope and dreams for the future on his bony shoulders!

Uno on his last morning

The photo below shows the knee. The midline is obviously not straight and the 'knob' on the lower left part of the knee is where the bone fragment had come away and was essentially floating out on the edge of the knee.

 

 

This hock on the same side as the injured knee was continuously puffy with no heat or lameness shown.

I called the wonderful Robyn Larson-Shelton from Equine Miracles who has been my horses' bodyworker for over six years now. She had helped me treat Uno's initial injury and had worked on him his whole life. It was Robyn that triggered the decision to take him to CEH for a review and x-ray. When I told her the news she was upset but we made the decision to see if the vet who came to euthanise Uno would amputate his off fore and off hind for Robyn to dissect to see what the joints actually looked like. Then Uno could be contributing to learning into the future and his life wouldn't be wasted quite as much as it felt like it already was.

Suzanne from CEH came out with a truly awesome Vet Nurse (who's name I never remember but I love her!). It was a horrible grey cold day to fit our moods. Once Uno said goodbye to my son Ben, and he was put to sleep, the grizzly but unbelievably interesting work of removing the two legs began. Suzanne gave me some fantastic insights into where the foreleg muscles attach into the shoulder, what muscles and tendons move which bones and was really interesting. Thank you, Suzanne, you made a horrible day into a valuable learning opportunity.

As an aside, Suzanne told me donations of horses for learning opportunities is rare and I was somewhat disappointed to know I could have actually donated Uno's whole body to vet science. Something to bear in mind if you need to euthanise a horse....

The dissection of Uno's joints was a revelation and a real confirmation I had made the right choice. His elbow and knee joints showed advanced arthritis - he had the knees of a 20 year-old, not a yearling, and it was clear he would have been in significant, chronic pain. Interestingly, his hock joint also showed evidence of an OCD - osteochondritis dissecans - which is essentially a piece of cartilage that had come away from the joint and was floating around. It can occur through injury.

I have included pics below of the dissected joints for those of you that are interested. They are graphic, however, so don't view them if you don't want to see that kind of thing.

Uno's muscular development was fairly poor and he was always very tense through his neck and withers.

Saying goodbye to his buddy Ben, my 4 year-old son with Down syndrome

Graphic pics

The off elbow joint. You can see the advanced wear of the cartilage and right into the bone. This would have been very painful

The elbow. The pink groove in the joint is simply not supposed to be there.

The hock. Robyn is pointing at a fingernail-sized piece of cartilage missing from the joint.

The knee. The piece of bone on the extreme left that isn't attached to anything is the fractured fragment.

The lower leg through the knee joint. The hole at the top is where the tendon passes.

So, Uno has gone and is no longer in pain. We planted an orchard of fruit trees (lots of apples which he would have loved), and he was joined by his mate Phoebe, our wonderful dog, who we lost to aggressive cancer only a couple of months later.




If you have any questions about the pics you see, please ask away. I will pass them on to Robyn if they're beyond my expertise. Or you can attend one of Sharon May-Davis' workshops on anatomy and ask her!

Hello again!

I can't believe how long its been since I posted an entry on my blog. It's been a long winter and I think I started to run out of things to say! Then, of course, lots has happened, meaning I got all procrastinatey about writing because I imagined it would be a behemoth of a post! So, strap yourselves in....

The last post I started writing was about Uno. I made the decision to put him to sleep a few months ago. He was in chronic pain and would never get better. I will finish the post devoted entirely to him and post it soon - the photos of the joints we dissected are unbelievable. I knew when I saw those photos that I had made the right decision.

On to happier things. Annie and I finally broke through our depressing bout of coming dead last in every event by coming a rather amazing 4th in one of the EvA95 classes at Canberra Horse Trials last weekend. After a great clinic (perfectly timed, I must say!) with Manuela Mclean a couple of weeks before, we finally scored a top ten dressage test. Annie was great and it was one of those weekends where everything just came together.

Showjumping was a little hairy but I think the main problem is I let her get too long and flat as the round goes on - that, and I need to ride her in the Peewee bit! She gets so heavy and dead to the hand when she's jumping. I think she genuinely enjoys the jumping and cantering - she certainly feels happy about it!

One of these days I'll drop some money on a decent photo of us at a comp and post it. :)

We've had some interesting hoof issues lately, though. Annie had to go almost 8 weeks without a trim as our current Wonder Trimmer Shelly went overseas on a much-deserved holiday. While Shelly was away, Annie's feet got a little long, but not too bad, and even more interestingly, she developed two small splints on the inside cannon bones just below the knees. They are gradually shrinking now she's getting her monthly trims, so I am confident the splints developed as a direct result of unbalanced hooves and long toes. Just goes to show how important it is to keep the trimming very regular in our performance horses.

I've got a lovely little Quarter Horse type staying with me at the moment while I ride him and sell him for our local Riding for the Disabled. He's been barefoot probably his whole life (he's 14 and from the Kimberley in Northern Australia where he was a station horse, we're told), but is the most sensitive of all the horses at my place with his feet. He is very short and mincey over gravelly or hard earth while Annie and Andy the dressage pony are quite happy cantering around on gravel. Particularly Annie who now has true 'rock-crushing' hooves after a year without shoes.

I will be very interested to see what Shelly thinks of his feet and what we might be able to do to improve his comfort-level.

Some pics from the last couple of weeks:

Hay-high was a feature of our winter and you'll note both horses standing square and engaging their backs as they eat their hay. This contributed to both horses' strength under saddle.

Annie about a month ago looking fit and shiny as we headed into an unseasonably warm spring.

Annie's dainty hooves post-trim. The near fore appears to be a little later than the off fore and we're keen to see if this will balance up over the next couple of trims. Might be a consequence of the long lapse between trims over winter.

It could just be the way she's standing, but the near looks very different to the off. Might be a bit of both!

So, next comp is Goulburn next weekend - hopefully our last EvA95. We're looking to make the step up to EvA105 at Silver Hills in three weeks. Our super showjumping coach Ben Netterfield managed to slam himself into the ground at speed while paragliding a month ago and will be out of action for the forseeable future (love ya Ben!), so we've been taking a bit of an ad hoc approach to jumping training for the last month. Will see how that pays off!