I am adding on to my July journal post with Buddy! Buddy and I did another photo shoot together so I can keep these memories forever. I would say he is the perfect model horse. If anything his handsomeness should increase his chances of being adopted. Buddy and I have also been working hard on our routine. Nothing I throw his way seems to bother him: flags, pulling, tarps. He is amazing! We have only practiced a few times as I do not want to over do it with him. I am very excited about our music, routine, and theme. It means more to me and my family since it is a patriotic theme and my Uncle is correctly deployed in Poland. I will be using a “tank” which my uncle fuels as his military job. I will cherish this program and memories forever.

The businesses I promoted Homes for Horses to are: Paloma Trails Palina's Ponies Reining Strength Therapeutic Horsemanship Sunny Creek Ranch Horses for Heroes Steinhausers

I lost track of my journal entries with the end of year testing and finals, 4-H state round up and our 4-H district horse show. I will be using July journal entry to also catch up on Buddy and I's adventures in May and June. My undersaddle experience with Buddy has been minimal. It was not what I thought I would have, but it has been what is best for him. When he is ridden he tends to start getting agitated or uncomfortable around the 30 minute time. So throughout my time with Buddy I have focused on using him for informational lessons in our monthly horse club meetings and loving on him. In MAY, our club got a couple new members. Some had never been around horses and some had. Buddy has good manners so we used him to teach a few members horse safety, grooming, and taking up. One member that knows how to ride but did not bring his horse, rode Buddy a little bit. We also decided to start giving Buddy 2 cups of topline feed in addition. We wanted to try and see if it would help him even more. In JUNE, I had a big challenge with him. It was Jaelyn vs. Buddy and the fly mask. Buddy has a white blaze on his face that gets sun burned. He needs to have sunscreen on or wear a full fly mask with nose covering. Since Buddy is out in pasture, does not come in daily, and sunscreen doesnt last all day in the heat, I decided to go with the fly mask. Buddy did not agree. I had a to get a warmblood size in order to fit his large head, the nose piece hung past his nose though and he did not like it. Every day he took it off and I had to go into the pasture and search for it. We also tried slinky fly mask. Somehow he got that off to. At this time Buddy is still winning the fly mask challenge. This month, Buddy and I are going to solely work on our State Horse Show routine and spending time together. My family is really sad to see him go and we are hoping he find his forever home with even more love for him then we have. I will be sharing more pictures of Buddy and I working together in the next couple weeks.

My family and I have continued to back and forth about our decision with this sweet man. We are going to stick to seeing if he can get adopted out. 😥

Why should we vaccinate our horses? -Provide individual protection ms heard immunity. What is herd immunity? -When you vaccinated a group of horses to prevent a spread of diseases through out that group. Describe equine influenza + the symptoms.— equine flu, highly contagious, can respiratory disease spread by coughing, increased fever, appetite loss, swollen neck glands, snotty nose What are the clinical signs of Tetanus? -patruding third eyelid, stiffness of limbs, spasm of Jaw muscles Equine herpes virus is a contagious VIRAL infection that can cause ABORTIOn, respiratory +NEUROLOGICAL disease. (Fill in the Blank) How is Strangles spread? -direct horse to horse contact, infected material such as tack boots clothing

April was a slow month for Buddy and I. My family and I put a lot of though this month into Buddy’s adoption. We sent his medical records to Texas Equine to be looked over and discussed a lot as a family. Unfortunately we have decided to not adopt him as much as we love him. We have to do what is best for him. We hope he can be adopted by something who can financials support his medical needs and love on him as much as us. Because we are not keeping him I wanted to do a photoshoot with him. I took some pictures the other weekend with him so I can share my story and him with other people.

In my pattern I am going to have to take it easy on my big guy. I am going to work with him on different “tricks” to make it more entertaining than focused on skills.

Buddy and I just had fun for March. I rode him a lot in a couple different ported correction bit. He did well in pretty much all of them. I stuck with one certain one to get ready for the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo Youth Show. Buddy and I entered into all grade classes. We did trail, western pleasure, western horsemanship, halter, and showmanship. My baby sister also used him in leadline. He did awesome trailering to and form the show, staying over night at the show, and the whole time we were there. Nothing bothered him. We DQ on the trail pattern as he was just very big. He could not pick up a lope fast enough in maneuvers and barely fit in the chute, box, and so on. In western pleasure he also broke gate during the lopes. I expected this things to happen and was okay with them. I just wanted to have fun and build memories with him. To my surprise we placed 5th in horsemanship, halter, and showmanship. There was not many in the class but we also were not last. I was so proud of him because I know he tries his best and we did whatever we could. We are going to keep practicing (in his limitations) to get ready for the D9 horse show.

I did not have pictures from this month. I haven’t been able to ride with my injury. Here are pictures from before when we were working.

Under saddle 1. Why is collection important? -allows horse to move freely and easily -its less wear down on horse -helps perform with advanced riding and movements -collection is a difficult task in my opinion 2. Why is stopping important? - safety when mounting, dismounting, or if needed when riding -important for many disciplines as well, I need to stop when running out of the ally after barrels and poles for safety, also need to stop when doing stock horse classes and reigning for queen competitions as well as drill team. b. Please list out the 4 steps to a good stop -sit deep, push legs forward or take off pressure -say woah or word taught to horse for stop -pull reins back, not up -take 2-4 steps back and release reins back 3. Describe to me what two-tracking looks like in your own words, and why would be useful? - it is when the horse is looking and going forward but is moving sideways at the same time and is important for responding to commands, lead changes, and overall horsemanship

This month buddy and I did not ride together as much as I wanted to because of weather and being busy. I was able to try a couple different bits with him to find the one we work best with. I found a port bit he likes. I also decided to sign up for classes at the Houston Rodeo Youth Horse Show with him. I felt he needed to get into a couple other arenas before the state show. We are signed up for halter geldings, showmanship, western pleasure, western horsemanship, and trail. Buddy is not able to turn tight, takes a while to gather a lope, can only lope for a small period of time, and can not stop on a dime (have to come to a gradual stop). I know this will hurt our scores but that is okay. I am excited for the memories and adventures. I had planned to practice a lot with him the next couple weeks. Unfortunately I broke my collar bone last week and am restricted from riding until my follow up Xray the day before show. My sister is going to try and help me get him more ready for Houston by riding him for me. I can not wait to write my March update after the show.

Buddy and I are still working on more new things. At our January 4H club meeting we talked about confirmation and Buddy was used as star. Even though his confirmation isnt perfect he still was good to use. Buddy and I practice Showmanship and Horsemanship patterns. I also took him on a trail ride this past weekend. I did not go far but it seems that he is doing well. He has a lot of fun running in the pasture with my other horses.My goal for February is to practice more horsemanship classes and try to enter in something. I will probably use him at my next 4H club meeting to teach TPR. Oh and I did not have a blanket to fit him so his rear sticks out of his blanket. As seen in picture. 😆

It is important to correctly take your horses TPR so that you know how healthy your horse is or if they are not good TPR reading you might be able to know what is wrong or tell a vet where help is needed. You should NOT take your horses vitals right after a work because your horse is not calm. It will also not be correct. Temperature should be between 99.5- 101 Buddy's temperature was 100.2 Pulse (heart rate) should be between 28 to 42bpm. I do not have a stethoscope so I choose to do it by the lingual artery. This was the hardest. Respiration rate should be 8-14 breaths per minute? I tried to do his respiratory rate by watching his flank move in and out. I counted his to be 12 breath per minute. I will be demonstrating this at my next 4h horse club meeting.

1 we want to choose forage with lots of leaf and crude protein. You want to stay away from forage that is high in starch and sugar. When choosing hay you want to make sure your going hay from a good supplier. Feed store hay is more but is most likely tested for quality. If not you can test your hay to make sure the quality so good. You can also exam on yourself for trash, forage that should nor be in the bale, and amount of leaves and stems. 2 to weigh your horse with out a scale you use, heart girth x heart girth x body length / 330. What we learned at the training day. My family has had covid this break and I have not gotten help to use the tape to measure Buddys weight. He is to big for me to do alone so I will update this. I am going to say he needs at least 15lbs a day. We do leave buddy out to pasture 24/7 to help him eat the full amount he needs. 3 body condition scores are a 1-9. After feeling along the next, withers, rib, behind the shoulders, flank, crease down back, tail head, and inner buttock, I would say Buddy is a 7. This is something I would like more practice with to be confident in my scoring.

Buddy is doing really good. We found a headstall that fits and have tried our first bit on him. It is a correction bit. I have walked, trot, and loped on him. I have just been testing him out to see what he knows. He responds okay to neck reigning. Sometimes I have to use my legs. He had some struggles with backing up and other tasks but I feel he is just trying to get used to a bit and remember cues again since we do not know the last time he was ridden. I have not lopes him for more than ten minutes and rode him for more than 30-45 minutes a day. I feel slow small steps have been beat for him. We have continued our groundwork. Buddy has been moved to the large pasture to graze with all the other horses (geldings and mares). They are all getting alone even though they told me he would need to stay separate. He was also part of our last Equine 4-H Club meeting when it came time to open ride. He is doing great with everything. My goal for January is to introduce him to flags and obstacles.

This Month Buddy and I have made some BIG forward movements. I was told Buddy was ridden at some point in time but no one know how long ago he was ridden. I knew it at least had been since June when he went to the rescue. I had planned to not ride him until December, so I decided to just see how he took to a saddle to prepare myself. Buddy did not seemed phased by the saddle at all. I treated the saddling like if it was the first time . . . with extreme caution . . . to make sure. I was so happy with the results. Since he did so well the next day I decided to see how he would do with my getting in the saddle. Again I treated it as if it would be the first time . . . with extreme caution . . . just hanging from it first and so on watching his responses. He did not care at all, therefore I found it safe to swing a leg over. He did GREAT!! Now I was lead around on lead rope for caution purposes. The next day we tried to introduce him to a headstall and bits . . . unfortunately, none of the headstalls we had fit his big head. My local stores did not carry a headstall big enough for him either. I had to wait until I had time to go to a larger tack store to find one for a draft size head. We were testing his ability to take bits without a headstall while we waited and he was taking to the bits nicely. I can not wait to find out which bit he works best with and get the riding going. I was also informed Buddy has troubles being a pasture mate. It was said that he tends to play rough and can not be put with mares because he becomes over protective and moody. At my house most the horses are turned out together. We decided to see if we can acclimate Buddy with the heard. At first we introduced our older Thoroughbred gelding. . . that did not go well as Buddy pinned the ears back, bit at him, and turned to kick him. We pulled him out and waited a day. We introduced him to a mid aged quarter horse gelding. Buddy did fine! We waited a couple days and added in the two ponies we have (one a gelding and one a stallion) . . . Buddy was more scared of them then anything. With 3 male equine now working out, we decided to try the Thoroughbred again. This time Buddy did not bother him. Buddy has seemed to become very attached to the mid aged quarter gelding. He following him around most the day. After about a week of all the boys together and going smoothly, we decided to add in our two mares. Our mares and gelding have always been together, so we prayed when adding another strong gelding to the mix. When we first put in the mares Buddy left them along, but the mares did their mare thing front kicking at him and giving a fierce neigh when he came near. That behavior only lasted a little. All the horses have been out to pasture now for a little over a week enjoying grazing together and leaving each other alone. I feel it is safe to say we may have successfully turned him into a pasture heard horse. In December I am looking forward to figuring out which bit work best for Buddy and getting in some time under the saddle, along with many other things.

Lunging is important for many reasons: -building the horse & rider relationship -establishing ground manners before going under saddle -developing basic ground skills -making sure horse is listening -making sure extra bundled up energy is released before riding -making sure horse is sounds before riding -can work on many skills while lunging like word commands, collecting the head, and more -break bad habits or getting used to scary situations safely The horse is ready to join up when he is listening (look at you, war pointed toward you), licking his lips or has a relaxed jar, ears are forward, commands are being met immediately on first gesture, and lowering head. I know when I stop Lunging and they come to me relaxed looking for praise they are ready.

Buddy- I was so excited to be chosen for this program and even more excited to get another horse to take care of. I mean who doesn’t want more horses?! When I saw him for the first time I could not stop smiling. He was so handsome. Unfortunately his legs were all cut up from getting caught in his pasture fence most likely and I had to leave without him. Fast forward to two weeks later and he finally arrived at my house, thanks to ASPCA transportation. I even got to stay home from school to greet this handsome guy. We kept him in a stall with a run for the rest of that week and weekend to make sure we can get him used to the barn noise and activity usually going on. The next couple days we let him out to graze in a long slim paddock near our arena. It was attached to this big pasture where the other horses are but they told us to be cautious of putting him with others. That is why we are taking the it slow. the other horses and him seemed to not find each other. After a couple days we opened up that paddock into the arena and he has had free rein of both. He loves it! I can not wait to give him an even bigger paddock and try and give him a pasture mate. Buddy came to us with coffin bone issues as well as arthritis. It was stated he gets lame easily. it was recommended he have shoes with pads at all times. upon Buddy’s arrival he was missing a shoe. we schedule pir farrier to come our as soon as possible. He came out a week after buddy’s arrival and thankfully was able to put anglers pads on his with shoes. Buddy unfortunately was already starting to get lame again but now is doing better. Due to his lameness issues he has not been ridden since May or before. He is also known to be pushy! Because of that we stated With ground manners. We are working on walking together with appropriate space and respect. We are working on the lunge line to again work on listening and respect. Buddy seems to have knowledge of all the things I am asking, just needs a reminder and to understand who is in charge. I think we are moving along well. I do not think I will put a saddle on him in November, but I do hope to put one on him in December. Stay tuned!