The Animals of Harmel's
I was talking to Mom on the phone the other day, telling her yet another funny story about the horses and she told me, "You should do a blog post about all of these funny stories." I thought it was a good idea and it would be a funny post, one needed after the sad story of Cimmaron's passing. So here we are...
I'll let you know right now, I will save the best one for last because it is pretty damn funny. The first one I will start out with is a character trait I finally put together today about one of our horses, Spartacus (we call him Sparty). I was on a ride the other week, leading three of our Junior Wranglers that we had that morning, when I saw my co-wrangler, Nick, heading back from leading his ride. I had to quickly find a spot off trail to turn us around so we can start heading back. There was just no way we could pass them on the trail, it is impossible. On the way back, I had us pull over in an area where the trail split off then rejoined 10 yards later. I didn't realize that our other wrangler, Lauren, was in front of Nick leading a private ride. We let Lauren pass, then Nick. The reason we let them pass, was 1. we were going slower than they were, and 2. Sparty gets pissy when he is not leading. He has to be the leader of the ride or he is in a sour mood the whole ride. I know this first hand because, once I was on a ride with him, he was not the leader, we were stuck in the middle of the line, and he was not happy the whole two hours. He was really pissed. I didn't really, 100% realized that was the reason he was mad during that ride until today.
So before moving on from my stories about Sparty, I have one more. This is going to transition into me falling off of thing (namely horses). This was the day that I was riding Sparty in the middle of the pack when he was not happy. I was getting on Sparty after helping guests get on their horses, and put my weight too far forward and fall off on the other side of him. Luckily, none of the guests saw my epic failure, but my boss did, and he just laughed and told me what I did wrong so I wouldn't do it again. But it was still shocking. I got up from falling and I just could not believe I fell off a horse, in front of guests! (And I almost fell in Sparty's poop pile!)
So sticking to the theme of falling off things, I fell off of a horse while on a guest ride at our turn around point on the trail. The horse's name is PoCampo, and he is a puffer. What I mean by that is, when we are tightening the cinch on a horse's saddle, some of them like to puff out the mid section so that when we do their cinch when we are getting ready to ride them so we think it is as tight as can be. But then they start letting out the air they were holding in, so that means the saddle starts becoming looser. This is why we check their cinch at least three times before sending them out on a ride. So, when I rode PoCampo, I found out the hard way that he is a big puffer. At the turn around point of the ride, after I had taken pictures for the guests and gotten back in line, I felt my saddle slipping to the right side. Before I could do anything about it, I was on the ground, and the saddle was upside down on the horse. I could not believe what happened. I quickly recompose myself and fix his saddle and get back on to finish the ride. When we got back to the corral, my co worker, Lauren, told Bode, "So, Po Campo is a puffer, and Ellie had to find out the hard way." Again, Bode just starts laughing. "No one has a perfect record of staying on their horse," Bode said. "I'm just happy that it was me and not a guest, and I guest my perfect record of staying on a horse would have to end the more I start riding," I replied. "That is true. And I'm very happy about that too," said Bode. Those are the stories of me falling off horses.
This one is funny and cute. This happened before the ranch was even open for the season. I was riding this horse by the name of Pita. She is super sweet and is usually a kids horse. So we were doing trail maintenance of our most heavily used trail. I was in the back of the pack with Pita carrying giant plant cutters that can easily cut through willows. At one point on the trail I had to get off Pita with my loppers, we call them, and start cutting back some of the willow trees that are too in the way of the trail to make the ride enjoyable. So I am going through the trail cutting back trees, Pita is still in the back of the pack waiting for me to be done, or so I thought. As I am on my last tree, I hear Lauren. "Hey Ellie, Pita is on her way over to you." I look behind me and there is Pita poking her head out from around the corner, looking for me. As soon as she sees me, she walks up to me, as I am still trimming back this tree, and stands right behind me, still waiting for me to finish. I finish quickly, and get back on Pita. She is still on of my favorite horses, even though I have not ridden her since then.
So the last story (for now) is about one of our horses, Irie. She is a bit of a trouble maker. She may not look it when she is tied up in her spot, but if you do not tie her up correctly, she is a huge trouble maker. When we put our horses in their spot after putting on their halter in the morning, we have a special knot that we use so that they cannot untie themselves and we can quickly untie them when we are getting them ready for a ride. Now, some cannot untie themselves, but some can. If they can we put a daisy chain on their lead rope after the knot. If we do not put this daisy chain on some of the horses lead rope, they can easily untie themselves. Irie, if we do not put a daisy chain on her lead rope, she will untie herself (sometimes if the daisy chain is not done correctly, she will still untie herself). After she unties herself, she will go and untie her friends and they will all cause trouble.
That's all for now! This post has actually sitting in my drafts just waiting to be finished. I woke up this morning feeling the need to write. So, I wanted to finish this post! I want to be writing more here soon and I think that I definitely can because the party phase has died down here and we have started going to bed early almost every night. With that being said, stay tuned for more posts!
I'll let you know right now, I will save the best one for last because it is pretty damn funny. The first one I will start out with is a character trait I finally put together today about one of our horses, Spartacus (we call him Sparty). I was on a ride the other week, leading three of our Junior Wranglers that we had that morning, when I saw my co-wrangler, Nick, heading back from leading his ride. I had to quickly find a spot off trail to turn us around so we can start heading back. There was just no way we could pass them on the trail, it is impossible. On the way back, I had us pull over in an area where the trail split off then rejoined 10 yards later. I didn't realize that our other wrangler, Lauren, was in front of Nick leading a private ride. We let Lauren pass, then Nick. The reason we let them pass, was 1. we were going slower than they were, and 2. Sparty gets pissy when he is not leading. He has to be the leader of the ride or he is in a sour mood the whole ride. I know this first hand because, once I was on a ride with him, he was not the leader, we were stuck in the middle of the line, and he was not happy the whole two hours. He was really pissed. I didn't really, 100% realized that was the reason he was mad during that ride until today.
So before moving on from my stories about Sparty, I have one more. This is going to transition into me falling off of thing (namely horses). This was the day that I was riding Sparty in the middle of the pack when he was not happy. I was getting on Sparty after helping guests get on their horses, and put my weight too far forward and fall off on the other side of him. Luckily, none of the guests saw my epic failure, but my boss did, and he just laughed and told me what I did wrong so I wouldn't do it again. But it was still shocking. I got up from falling and I just could not believe I fell off a horse, in front of guests! (And I almost fell in Sparty's poop pile!)
So sticking to the theme of falling off things, I fell off of a horse while on a guest ride at our turn around point on the trail. The horse's name is PoCampo, and he is a puffer. What I mean by that is, when we are tightening the cinch on a horse's saddle, some of them like to puff out the mid section so that when we do their cinch when we are getting ready to ride them so we think it is as tight as can be. But then they start letting out the air they were holding in, so that means the saddle starts becoming looser. This is why we check their cinch at least three times before sending them out on a ride. So, when I rode PoCampo, I found out the hard way that he is a big puffer. At the turn around point of the ride, after I had taken pictures for the guests and gotten back in line, I felt my saddle slipping to the right side. Before I could do anything about it, I was on the ground, and the saddle was upside down on the horse. I could not believe what happened. I quickly recompose myself and fix his saddle and get back on to finish the ride. When we got back to the corral, my co worker, Lauren, told Bode, "So, Po Campo is a puffer, and Ellie had to find out the hard way." Again, Bode just starts laughing. "No one has a perfect record of staying on their horse," Bode said. "I'm just happy that it was me and not a guest, and I guest my perfect record of staying on a horse would have to end the more I start riding," I replied. "That is true. And I'm very happy about that too," said Bode. Those are the stories of me falling off horses.
This one is funny and cute. This happened before the ranch was even open for the season. I was riding this horse by the name of Pita. She is super sweet and is usually a kids horse. So we were doing trail maintenance of our most heavily used trail. I was in the back of the pack with Pita carrying giant plant cutters that can easily cut through willows. At one point on the trail I had to get off Pita with my loppers, we call them, and start cutting back some of the willow trees that are too in the way of the trail to make the ride enjoyable. So I am going through the trail cutting back trees, Pita is still in the back of the pack waiting for me to be done, or so I thought. As I am on my last tree, I hear Lauren. "Hey Ellie, Pita is on her way over to you." I look behind me and there is Pita poking her head out from around the corner, looking for me. As soon as she sees me, she walks up to me, as I am still trimming back this tree, and stands right behind me, still waiting for me to finish. I finish quickly, and get back on Pita. She is still on of my favorite horses, even though I have not ridden her since then.
 |
| Everyone watching me cut back willows from their horses. This was seconds before Pita came to look for me. |
So the last story (for now) is about one of our horses, Irie. She is a bit of a trouble maker. She may not look it when she is tied up in her spot, but if you do not tie her up correctly, she is a huge trouble maker. When we put our horses in their spot after putting on their halter in the morning, we have a special knot that we use so that they cannot untie themselves and we can quickly untie them when we are getting them ready for a ride. Now, some cannot untie themselves, but some can. If they can we put a daisy chain on their lead rope after the knot. If we do not put this daisy chain on some of the horses lead rope, they can easily untie themselves. Irie, if we do not put a daisy chain on her lead rope, she will untie herself (sometimes if the daisy chain is not done correctly, she will still untie herself). After she unties herself, she will go and untie her friends and they will all cause trouble.
That's all for now! This post has actually sitting in my drafts just waiting to be finished. I woke up this morning feeling the need to write. So, I wanted to finish this post! I want to be writing more here soon and I think that I definitely can because the party phase has died down here and we have started going to bed early almost every night. With that being said, stay tuned for more posts!
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