Happy New Year from Flicka

remember to click on the pix to enlarge them.
I guess all the horses want their feature blog. here's one for Flicka. Flicka is not a rescue horse. I have had her since she was a yearling. She is about 15 now. Today while we (me & the horses) were waiting (patiently) for Greg to plow out the horse yard (I couldn't put them out for supper until he was done), Flicka and I went for a little ride in the snow. we went out and checked the pasture fence. It's all up, but boy are there some big drifts. I think I can let them go out there and run tomorrow though. Flicka was a perfect ride today. all by herself. out in the scary tundra. She is as close to a perfect horse as you can get. I have vowed that I am going to do less stuff with other people's horses and more stuff with the horses who live here at DoubleHP Horse Shelter. So the ride in the snow today is part of that. I smiled the whole time. I used to ride in the snow a lot. It was really beautiful. These photos don't have anything to do with my ride today. These photos are from last weekend. But they are of Flicka. My friend Flicka.

questions or comments,

email Shelter Manager Darci at doublehphorses@alliancecom.net

Prince & Butterscotch back with herd

This is Prince & Butterscotch, with Spirit in the background.

Prince & Butterscotch are very happy to be back out with the herd, after their recent Vet trips and stall rest.

The evening we got back from our Minnesota / Wisconsin vacation, August 23, we had visitors. Deb & Randy Antonsen and their children Christina, Amanda, Paul & Gabe came to visit. Paul is a 5-year-old boy who has had 4 open heart surgeries and now has a mechanical valve (as of June 2009) and I believe his status is still "congestive heart failure." Their whole family spent over a month in Ann Arbor Michigan in June-July for Paul's most recent 2 surgeries. And then of course he was not allowed to ride for a while. So, finally, he can ride again! But the kids didn't ride on this day. "Their" horse, Prince, was very sore. He suffers from severe arthritis in his right hock. I took him and Butterscotch to the Vet the following Tuesday. Prince had a total of nine needle pokes, and he was not sedated at all. The theory was to block out certain nerve areas with an injection of some numbing product (sorry can't remember the name). and, if Prince were to trot off with less lameness or no lameness, we would have found the sore area. We had him injected a couple of weeks before we left for vacation, but it did not help. So I knew something else was going on. Xrays show more of the same, severe arthritis in all 4 joints. with some more changes going on. Prince is only 7 or 8 years old. But lived the first year and a half of his little life in a state of starvation. His bones and joints did not have a chance to develop as they should have. other than this hock thing he really does pretty well. Anyway, by the time the Vet was done with the "blocking," he was numb from the top of the hock all the way down into the foot. And he was still as lame as he was when we started. Along with the "blocking" the Vet had injected some other stuff into the joints, hoping to help him feel better somehow. Sadly, however, I took him home just as sore as he was at the start. The Vet gave me some kind of "experimental" pills to try. For dogs. Which I am more than willing to try. But I thought I would give all those injections a couple of days to kick in before I started the pills. And sure enough! In a couple of days, Prince was doing much better. And he still is. He is lame, but at least he is back to where he was a few months ago. He runs so fast I can't believe his leg just doesn't fall off. I have not tried the pills yet. But I will, if he gets more sore again.

The following 2 Wednesday evenings, the Antonsens came to visit Prince again. The first Wednesday Princie was still really sore, it was the day after the trip to the Vet. But the next Wednesday, just last Wednesday, Prince was ready to ride again. Deb and Paul came just the 2 of them that evening. And Paul rode for a long time, out in the front yard. Prince was such a Prince! What a fine pair they are. We have more info. about our Paul's Prince Project on our website http://www.doublehphorses.org/

During one of these visits we also picked apples. Christina and Paul are quite impressed with the holes that Scarlet has been digging.

And while Prince was sore, the kids got to ride Flicka. Deb rode too! Christina told me she felt like she was going to cry because she was so happy to get to be riding again. I told her that was perfectly okay, that's the way the horses make me feel too!

I love this picture. Amanda & Christina with Flicka.

Holiday Visitors

We had a nice, pleasant variety of Holiday guests this year. Including Caitlyn in the light pink coat with her Dad Chad, and her friend Alyssa in the dark pink coat. They are all friends of Jamie Flinn, Photographer of JF Photos in Sioux Falls South Dakota (605) 254-3062. Jamie helped us with our Unbridled Beauties of DoubleHP 2009 Calendar, which you can see and purchase in our website http://www.doublehphorses.org/.
The palomino, Moonshine, is about 26 years young now. He has given rides to more people than we could possibly ever try to keep track of.
The chestnut mare is Flicka, just a teenager.

These are not rescued horses. I owned them before we started to do the rescue thing.