Tally Ho!

  A great weekend.  Not only the glorious summer-like temps, but two excursions with Irish that worked out exactly as I had hoped.  The plan was to drive to the Cheney's farm in Lyman (Rest and Be Thankful Farm), have a jump lesson with Babette, spend the night and continue to Hamilton Mass on Sunday morning to partake in a ride with the Myopia Hunt hounds.  Well, that's exactly what happened, as planned, no glitches, no delays... and lot of fun to boot!

  The last time Irish & I were at RABT farm was Jan. 25th when he shipped to Aiken (see the January archive). I hardly recognized the place when we pulled in Saturday.... green grass, flowers, no snow or ice. George & Michele are working hard to prepare their beautiful 40 acre farm for 3 clinics with Babette, and other festivities. George started "small" by building a multi-level water complex!  Below are Meghan Smith & Rikita testing the waters during their lesson with Babette. Makes me wonder what George has in mind for the next obstacles he plans to build.

   Our jump lesson with Babette was great, picking up from 2 weeks ago. We finished with a few rounds through the water too!

Up early Sunday morning and off to ride with the hounds!  I am exagerating here of course... more like a walk with the hounds.  But that is exactly the experience I wanted for Irish since he has never A) seen a pack of hounds nor B) ridden with more than 5 or 6 horses in a group. Thank goodness I had introduced him to cows a few years ago, with the wonderful help of Elijah Moore in Belfast, Maine. 

The skills I learned from that experience helped tremendously when Irish first saw the pack of hounds running towards us across the big, lush green Myopia polo field. I could feel his heart pounding under the saddle & knew what was coming... spin, bolt, spin, bolt. I turned him away and moved him to a position where he could watch the hounds from behind.  This is what works with the cows, they are scary when they come at the horse, but when the horse can follow the cow, life is much better.  

 

Irish loved herding the cows! it gave him a sense of power to know he could make them run away. It also gave him greater confidence when dealing with other scary things in the world (except for crickets and horse-eating chipmunks).

   So, this was how we dealt with the hounds. Before I knew it, Irish was right up front and wanting to get as close as possible to the pack. Normally, this is tabu in the hunt field, but Myopia started these Sunday walks to specifically allow new horses & riders a quiet, safe, casual way to get used to everything.  The Huntsman would stop occasionally and encourage everyone to ride up closer to the hounds, who of course had no fears about running behind & under the horses.  The other accomplishment was riding in a large group of horses... 30-40 others showed up, some seasoned hunters, some very cute ponies and very small kids, one green horse who was jumping and jigging and in near panic.  Irish took it all in stride and remained well behaved in the front, middle and back of the field.

Are we ready to take on an actual hunt? not likely anytime soon.  Myopia is a drag hunt which means face paced.  Walking around the countryside as we did yesterday is one thing... galloping behind baying hounds surrounded by other galloping horses, is another.  Maybe we'll try our hand at roping cows first, then think about a hunt!

(cow photos taken by fellow cowgirl, Halla Black)

It's the Little Things...

Sometimes, as with life in general, it's the seemingly trivial moments that give us the most pleasure with our horses. I was reminded of this recently during my trip to get Irish from Babette at Gathering Farm.  There, I re-connected with Ashley Ireland, a delightful young lady (from Maine) who began working for Babette last summer.  Ashley was not able to come to Aiken with us, but joined Babette a few weeks ago to be her barn manager at Gathering Farm. 

 I know Ashley from photographing her for many years and watched her develop into a lovely rider/eventer.  The last photos I took of Ashley and her mare Dream, were from Snowfields H.T. 2007.  Sometime after that, Dream sustained the dreaded suspensory injury and was laid up until a few months ago (sorry Ashley if I'm not totally correct on the timing).  As with so many horse injuries, Dream's recovery must have seemed like a very long road filled with worry/dread that she might not be able to event again.  It's times like these, after an injury, accident or otherwise bad ordeal, that we are most likely to experience and really appreciate the "Little Things" with our horses.

 Ashley got the green light to proceed with Dream's rehab this winter. When I pulled into Gathering, she gave me a big hug and a review of her year. She was bubbling and ecstatic and SO excited with each step of Dream's progress.  A few weeks ago she started Dream back over ground poles and with giggles and laughter related how difficult it was to contain her mare's enthusiasm (wanting to leap over the poles). You would have thought Ashley was talking about her first ride at Rolex.  The next day (of my visit at Gathering), the ground poles became X-bars. When Ashley described the lesson one would think this was her first time jumping and they were flying over 5 foot oxers!  Hopping over the little jumps was just so much fun!!  With her super-positive attitude, I have no doubt Ashley and Dream will be tearing up the XC courses in no time!

  

Waking Up to Spring

  Our lake "opened up" totally yesterday (for you Southerners, that means no more ICE). This is always a sign of Spring despite what the thermometer says. I woke this morning (sunrise ~6:00 *yawn*) to a crystal clear, blue sky, above freezing temps ... and critters galore. Our house sits ~100 ft from the shore of a small, very small lake, Medomak Pond, decorated with a handful of houses and no motorized boats.  The glassy surface was disturbed ever so slightly by the wake of a beaver paddling close to the shore.  Along side the beaver, in V-formation were 8 Harlequin ducks, barely causing a ripple as they glided along.  

Watching intently from above, in one of the oak trees just outside our kitchen window, was one of 'our' bald eagles.

  

I never know which of the eagle family is in the tree until I tip-toe out with my camera and huge lens. The adults have eyes in the backs of their heads and sense my approach early on. The juveniles are less skittish and often let me get to the base of the tree before flying off. This is a game I never get tired of, and am still trying to get that one great shot.

And then we have our fox families with whom I have a love/hate relationship. I love them because, well, they are foxes... beautiful, fluffy, healthy red coats with white-tipped tails. They run effortlessly, almost on air. And the cubs!  cuter than any puppy. A few years ago, the den was in a thicket between my barn and riding arena. Seven cubs were always out and about, playing in the bushes, basking in the sun on the warm sand of the arena. Mom & Dad were never very happy when I got close with my camera and eventually moved the pups to a safer location. Each year the den was somewhere else, but we always saw the fox families in the early morning or evening, frolicking like kittens.  

I hate the foxes because they LOVE my cats.  We have been lucky so far, but Yang in particular has had too many close calls. She is always the one who manages to get chased and treed by a fox several times each spring. I soon learned whenever she was AWOL for 24 hours to look UP during my searches and listen for her YOWL. Twice last year I saw a fox sitting at the base of a tree in which Yang was perched high above. In one summer, Yang was treed at least 5 times (that I know of). She failed the "Climbing Down from the Tree" class in kitten-school so many of those times we would lug a ladder to the tree and help her. The one time she tried to come down by herself didn't go so well...

 

Two days ago, Kevin looked out the back and saw the first fox of the season.  We were delighted until we noticed he was hunched down, ready to pounce.  I stepped outside, clapped my hands and yelled until he ran off. 30 seconds later, FuzzButt and Yin came roaring out of the bushes as fast as all 8 legs could carry them to the house... tails in full fuzz!   This is why part of me dreads seeing the beautiful foxes on the farm.

I end this post with a sad note from Polly in Aiken. Our community Bunnie (remember Sophie?) has passed to the Great Carrot Patch in the sky. Polly saw her limp body just across the street from her house. Soon after, a woman appeared, put Sophie in the trunk of her car and drove off.  We hope it was her original owner who will give her a nice memorial service. Now I face the difficult task of breaking the news to FuzzButt whose last meeting with Sophie was a Pax de Deux of sorts in our back yard one evening.  The tides turned when Sophie began to follow FB everywhere she went.  If I called to her and she'd come up for a pet, Sophie would charge up too!  FB was NOT going to let this mammoth thing get close to her, so she'd run off only to be hopped after.  Kev & I got quite a chuckle watching the interaction.

Here's to you Sophie... it was lovely knowing ya'. 

  

What Goes Around Comes Around

  It's hard to believe, but my time in Aiken is over. Two months... wow, seems like just a couple of weeks. But here we are, in bumper to bumper traffic somewhere in NC crawling along due to construction up ahead. This is actually a good thing... Kevin is driving the trailer for the first time, so moving at 15 mph is giving him time to get use to it!

Recapping the past week post-polo... on Monday Pol, Em, Susan and I took one last glorious ride together at Hitchcock Woods,.  a 2000 acre forest on the edge of Aiken with miles and miles of sandy trails and no motorized traffic. The Woods is home to one of Aiken's fox hunts, so jumps are everywhere.

  The next day was pack-up at the farm & prepare for TJ's arrival Wed. Polly & Em moved Tahd, Doug & Matty to a wonderful stable in town, sitting on the edge of the track. Irish, Rakita and Spider loaded into TJ's van noon on Wed. and arrived at Gathering Farm (new home of B-Eventing!) about 30 hours later, tired but in good shape.

   Then the rains came on Thursday which made it easier to finish up loose ends related to work and start the packing process. We enjoyed a last supper with Pol & Em at a brand new cajun restaurant Thurs. night, finished packing Friday and hit the road early this AM.

Pol & Em are the lucky ones... remaining with their horses in Aiken for another month.  Miss you already!! see you at King Oak?!

 

Keeping One Eye on the Ball

   The polo leg of the Aiken Triple Crown did happen on Sunday. The rain left and skies cleared but the wind was fierce!  Sadly our plan for a big sideline party was whittled down to Polly, Em, Susan Cipolla and me.  The rest of our group had departed for home very early Sunday morning. 

   Polly purchased the sideline parking pass which we shared, and we set up our goodies alongside the "pros" who come every year, much like tailgating at a football game. When I discovered that Emily is a budding 

photographer, I loaned her my "smaller" telephoto lens so she could shoot the festivities and get closer to the action.

Polo is fun to photograph because it is so challenging. Its one thing to aim & focus on the galloping horses, but quite another to include a fast-moving, small white ball and flailing mallets in the frame too. I learned to keep my eye on the path of the ball, trusting that horses would immediately fill the frame.  Unlike eventing or dressage where I take pride in capturing the "moment" with one or two exposures (one of my pet peeves is when someone stands next to me and holds their finger on the shutter button), I lowered myself to rapid fire while shooting the polo action. As long as the histogram was telling me the exposures were on ... I figured I'd get a few cool shots, and I did.  

                            

Of course, I also had to shoot my favorite motion blurs.....

   

Upon reviewing the images, I noticed that ponies galloping side-by-side would often have the same stride, all 4 or 8 legs in sync...

   A "pax de deux" of sorts.  Care to dance?