Adult Camp 2019 Day One

This year Mom and I each attended camp. This made the situation a little tougher since they scheduled us back to back. My ulcerative colitis have been super bad, so I was worried about having to run to the bathroom mid tacking. Luckily Peggy was able to attend and help me. The horses stay overnight and we leave the truck and trailer at Sprieser. I drove my car loaded with all our stuff and was able to find their stalls before the horses arrived. Good thing too since I only found Rosemary's. I walked the aisle twice, but there was no sign with his name. A staff member was just as puzzled as I was. She remembered his name. Eventually she found his name paper behind another horse's. She found a stall down the aisle from Rosemary and right next to the bathroom. Perfect for me.

Someday his name will be spelled correctly

The horses settled in just fine, chowing down on the hay provided. Mom and I had to work on chipping them out of the mud they gathered from the rain the night before. I could tell Roscoe had to pee, but he is not a fan of pelleted sawdust. God forbid he get splashed. When I got him tacked up, I asked Peggy to walk him in the grass. He had to pee before going into the indoor. NO PEE allowed! He cooperated after scoping out the area.
My mom rode right before me and Rosemary seemed to handle the work okay. We worried a bit about her heaves. I made sure to trace clip her so she would not get too hot.

Roscoe and I headed in for our lesson with Skye Finn, a new trainer to Sprieser.  "This must be the Roscoe I have heard so much about," was the first thing she said. Uh boy, wonder what she has heard. Fair warning, the loud voice is Lauren teaching the other lesson.

Roscoe was full of it and distracted. He spooked at mom walking in, shadows and some mystery stuff. So Skye had us doing baby leg yields and shoulder fore.

 Roscoe started to settle as we worked. He was still a bit tight in his poll. She had us do a  clock exercises of moving his head to points on the clock to loosen him up. I was really wishing I had remembered my spurs. From there we moved to adjusting his trot open and close. Roscoe was deciding all this was a lot of work.

But there was no rest. Onto canter or maybe try to canter. He seemed to forget how his feet work. The tail monster was working overtime. When we finally got a canter, Skye said "he actually has a good canter." I guess he can still surprise people. She wanted to work his transitions. We tried to do a canter figure eight one direction, but my riding could not coordinate, so we changed it around and it worked better. He was still a little dramatic on his left transition. We ended with some nice trot work. Overall though he was distracted, he still did some nice work. I really have to lock down my outside rein so I can support him more.

We had a couple of hours before our cavaletti lesson. Mom and I were in it together. It started with going over poles on a circle and adjusting the number of strides between poles.

 From there we serpentined over poles down the center of the ring. The cobs handled the turns well.

The next part is where it got dicey. Our cobs are pony sized, but they are not pony strided. Both have done cavaletti with horses and not had any issues. Skye ended up closing the distance on the three pole and the two pole to an insanely small stride. We always thought two poles, especially close together, were a no-no. Roscoe decided to just ignore the suggestion and go over both poles in one stride.

We were told to close up our stride. Considering the bad weather this winter, the horses are out of shape. So something happened to Rosemary going over the three poles. We could not see any injury, but she hurt for a little while. Mom eventually was able to get her going again, but the focus changed to Roscoe.
We moved onto some canter work. I can honestly say I let him down. A side effect of the colitis is malnutrition and it drains me. My pony takes care of me and does not hold it against me.

Day one was complete and we survived despite all of us being out of shape. We left the ponies eating their dinner and figuring out that they were staying. Tomorrow we had one more lesson. I was already feeling today. No pain, no gain.

Foal Pool 2019

This year we are expecting Roscoe's first partbred foal. It will be interesting to see how this foal will look.
So let's introduce the dam, Jewel. Sorry I only have screen shots from a video.

She is a black paint who actually has less white than Roscoe. I know she has had at least one foal.

Remember everyone, Roscoe could actually be registered pinto. I am wondering if the baby will have more chrome than both parents.

She was bred 5/22/18.

My guess is:
Colt
4/18
Blaze, 4 stockings, belly spot, Some body white too
Chestnut


Put your guess in the comments until April 10th.

Basic Guess
Gender
Date

Bonus points for
Chrome (legs, face, belly, etc)
Color

Prize:
$25 RW Gift Card
And
A framed cross stitch

Oh and if anyone is interested, Roscoe will become a grandfather this year too. So expect lots of foal pictures. The first two will be a combination of two super breeding programs, while the third continues Castleberrys known quality.

Castleberrys Ffrewyn x Quillane Audacious 

Castleberrys Debonair x Quillane Atarah

And Castleberrys Reno x Hawkshill Castleberrys Rosina

Retention, A Blessing

Once my parents came home, the relief of having support again awakened the need to ride. I needed pony therapy and Roscoe definitely needed the work. I have two dead blankets thanks to the Cob boys deciding play time during blanket change was a good idea.
So I convinced Mom to ride with me over the weekend. I worried about what we lost during the two month break. I did feel somewhat better when an article mentioned that over in Europe horses tend to get long breaks.
Energy was not a problem. We seemed to have hit on the right feeding routine for him finally. He has maintained his weight so well this winter.

With the energy I was surprised that he also brought the right moves. It turns out our "10" canter from last year was not a fluke. I still felt solid when we canter to the right. Retention is such a blessing. And the fact that Roscoe is at the point of retention is an achievement. To me that says his training is on the right track. Now I just need to get his left lead up to the right's standard.

I used the feeling of the right lead to help work the left. Of course I think the biggest problem is me and my inconsistent outside rein. So I steadied the rein and focused on getting the same feeling of being around him evenly. It was hard for both of us, but I felt a difference. The next ride was not as successful since he was probably sore decided to fight the change. He still felt good though.

Sadly the weather has been so wet that I have not managed another ride recently. At least when the next ride does happen I will not feel like we have lost so much time and have to make up ground. This year I plan to do very little showing and try to focus on moving up to 1st level with more lessons. That plan starts in a couple weeks with Adult Camp. This move up will be hard because it will be a move up for both of us. I only have one 1st level test under my belt and that was on a made horse, so I can't help Roscoe. I think he is going to help me.

In other news, breeding season is coming up next month. Roscoe will attempt to breed one of the mares from last year who has a new owner. I let the breeding transfer. He possibly has another breeding as a result of the Westfalen Stallion auction. I will know more later this month. During one of the auctions, my ethics lost him a bid. Roscoe's contract is good for 3 breeding seasons, live foal guarantee. If a rebreed is needed, the mare owner only pays $200. One mare owner bid on a discounted breeding when she already has two contracts with two years remaining. I could not let her pay more than she needed. So I lost out on some stud fee, but hopefully kept a mare owner happy.

And of course I will be setting up the Foal Pool soon. This will be a short time one, the due date is soon.