The big bank holiday blog + lots of pics!

It's been a busy three days in horse land....

On Friday, osteopath Emily Bewsey came out and did a fantastic session with Cady, who was very well behaved - particularly on the lunge showing Emily her paces.

This really deserves a post of its own but I'm so happy to have excellent professionals like Emily to help. For a while now I've been very pleased with the team who help us - farrier, instructor, osteopath, dentist, livery yard, vet etc... They offer excellent, reliable services that actually make a real difference to the horses.



Gorgeous Cady having a drink in the Saturday sunshine - how lucky are we to have a horsey life?



Emily's assessment was that Cady is doing well, but needs to use her tummy muscles. She also re-jigged her balance pad so the saddle sat a bit better. Cady changes shape a lot so this was important. Cady uses her left shoulder a lot (we think possibly connected to a giant splint she picked up as a four-year-old) so some schooling should help her re-balance.

Then on Saturday it was time to try and bring Rodney in. He'd been AWOL for a week and showed no signs of warming up to the idea of being caught. My plan was to put all his friends in the next field, leave a nice big feed in the pen and gently walk him in.

He did go into the pen but then shot out like a champagne cork when we tried to shut the gate. After a few near misses we decided it wasn't working as he was just galloping about getting sweaty.

In the afternoon a gang of the yard girls came up and kindly offered their services. We tried to usher him gently into the pen but he was having none of it and was so animated by this point we just let him run and get it all out of his system.

Eventually he drifted over to the pen but when one of the girls tried to shut the gate he jumped out over the fence, snapped the top wire and went for a trot around the farm.

Fortunately the farm has lots of gates so we were able to enclose him again by which point he'd had enoough - he'd given us a gallant and dramatic last stand and was ready to concede defeat and be caught.

I walked him off in the arena and then was finally able to give him a good scrub down on his face where he's losing his hair. It still needs to grow in but it looks an awful lot better now and he must be more comfortable.

He's now in a little starvation paddock and gets hay morning and evening. He has friends in the next field and it's the best we can do for now. The summer grazing is just too much temptation and I think he would have ended up with laminitis had he stayed there much longer.

Rodney's new home: still on high alert after his dramatic Rambo-esque attempts to avoid capture

Yesterday the calm returned. I took Rodney for a short walk just to stretch off his legs and give him a change of scenery. He seemed a bit disorientated and emotional and was shouting for his friends but I hope he'll settle soon.

Remembering that he also has a job to do! It felt great to be back on him

Then it was time for Cady to come out and play. We wanted to take her for a hack but it was blowing a gale and I didn't feel it would give us the best chance of building confidence! Instead we set up a little obstacle course of cones in the arena and played around them.

You can see from her tail how strong the wind was - we look like an Arctic expedition leaning into it.

It was really good fun and she was excellent, despite some seriously spooky moments - one when my coat leapt off the fence and landed at her feet. She shivered from top to toe but quickly got her mojo back. What a clever pickle!

We often warm up with a few minutes lungeing so Cady can let off any 'steam' ha ha!

I hope you all had a great bank holiday - happy horsing! x