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Until a year ago we were quite happy with our two lovely
rescue dogs, Scruffy and Suzie, with the daily visits of
Chici, our Spanish neighbours dog, who thought she lived
with us too. However, last year, our neighbours moved
into the town, and Chici became unofficially ours, as we
couldn’t bear for her to be left on her own next door.
It didn’t make much difference to us really, as the dogs
all got along very well. The only problem we had was
that she hadn’t been spayed as our neighbours didn’t
agree with it. Typically, Chici became pregnant, and on
Monday gave birth to eleven puppies!
 She is a wonderful
mum, and is managing to keep them all fed, forever
shifting them around to give them all a turn. Thank
goodness our neighbours have now agreed to have her
fixed, but we are left with eleven puppies to find homes
for. If any of you out there would like a puppy towards
the end of October, please get in touch. They are all
black and if they turn out like their mum, will be of
medium size with lovely kind natures. Though I would
love to keep one myself, I doubt very much if Clive will
let me, especially as we have recently given a home to a
Spanish water dog called Chocco. Our guests might not
appreciate so many dogs around, though I have to say
that so far we have always had dog lovers staying with
us, I dread the day when we don’t!
As well as the dogs, the horse population continued to
grow, all be it unintentionally.
A friend of Elizabeth’s decided that she would like to
buy a horse and keep it on livery at our yard. Along
came Lola, a young horse, purchased locally.
She got on well with our existing horses from the start
and it wasn’t many months before she was officially part
of our family, as for various reasons we ended up buying
her.
We thought that we had now completed our horse family
and certainly didn’t intend to have anymore, but once
more fate intervened.
One day I saw an advert for a mare and foal for sale to
a good home due to their elderly owner becoming ill and
unable to care for them. Once more I couldn’t resist and
along came Capri and Bonny. Capri is short for
Caprichosa, which means willful, and she soon lived up
to her name!
Her previous owner had never ridden her and didn’t know
anything about her past. She seemed very placid and nice
natured though, so we didn’t expect any real problems.
When she arrived she only had one shoe, so we rode her
briefly to see how she was (and she was fine),then
waited for the farrier. She proved to be incredibly
scared of farriers, and had to be sedated. Following the
farriers visit we tried to ride her again, but instead
of the well behaved horse she had been before, she had
turned into a rearing monster! We couldn’t understand it,
but it seemed that she had pain in her head. We called a
vet, assuming she had a problem with her teeth. To our
horror, the vet discovered that when the farrier had
injected her, he had blown the vein in her neck, causing
incredible pain in her head, it could have caused her to
go blind! We changed her bridle to a bitless one to make
her head more comfortable and she was soon fine. She is
now a lovely horse to ride. Needless to say we never
used that farrier again.
Bonny, Capri’s filly is a stocky, bargy little character.
Last spring when Bonny turned three, Elizabeth started
to ride her. Using Monty Roberts methods she was able to
put a saddle on her back and ride her all in one session.
Within a couple of days she was hacking her out – it was
incredible. Unfortunately, the riding had to stop for a
while, when we realised that she was pregnant.
Poor Bonny, her pregnancy didn’t go smoothly. We didn’t
know when she was due, so when she started to show signs
of labour we assumed that was that. Unfortunately it
turned out to be a pregnancy related colic. She was so
ill that I spent two nights in the stable with her. The
vet started talking about caesareans and told me that
the foal was in the wrong position. He showed me what I
would need to do if the foal started to be born the
wrong way, explaining that I would have to try to push
the head back in and pull the feet out! She was in such
pain that she was self harming, throwing herself against
the walls over and over again. Thankfully after a couple
of days it was like it had never happened and she
finally had her foal a couple of weeks later, on her own,
in the early hours of the morning with no problems
whatsoever. The foal was so thin that we called her
Twiggy – a strange name now that she has turned into a
big fat thing! She is stocky and bargy just like her mum
and completely adorable.
Capri was pregnant too, and gave birth to her foal
Picasso a couple of weeks later. The family relationship
is complicated – they all have the same dad but Capri’s
son is Bonnys half brother but also Twiggys , or is he
Twiggys uncle, with Capri being Bonnys mum and Twiggys
grandmother? all very confusing.
Three foals in six weeks – how lucky! Foals thrive on
having other foals to play with so it was perfect timing.
Now the three of them and Spirit all have fun together
and are very independent of their mums. On top of this,
they also have their dad, Leo to play with.
Our latest addition to the adult horse population is
Hercules, a wonderful English cob and a great weight
carrier for heavier riders. He put Leo’s nose out of
joint when he arrived. Poor Leo was used to being the
top man, and suddenly there was this big macho horse
taking his girlfriends away from him! Luckily they soon
got used to each other and Leo has accepted that
Hercules is boss. They are now good friends and can
often be seen grooming each other.
Having the horses is not all fun – there is constant
work involved, not always pleasant.
In the winter the paddocks can become so water logged
and muddy that pushing a wheelbarrow is virtually
impossible. The horses love it though – you would think
they were hippos the way they roll in the mud. Having
clay soil, the mud then dries on their coats like cement
and is virtually impossible to get off. They are happy
though, which is all that matters.
Our most hated job is getting the straw in every summer.
We are lucky that our neighbour Pedro grows several
fields of crops and we can buy the straw. This involves
collecting the bales off the fields in our trailer in
the July heat. You have to cover up completely, as
otherwise the straw cuts you to pieces. Its horrendous-
2000 bales, with the trailer only taking 20 at a time.
It’s completely exhausting . One of these days I expect
Clive to say ‘it’s me or the horses!’- after a full days
work, the last thing he needs is to then go out
collecting straw!
Of course, with the recent water shortages the straw
yield last year was much lower than usual and since
early spring this year, until the summer harvest we have
had to buy in vacuum packed golden grass for the horses.
Though expensive, it actually worked out more economical
than the horrendous prices being charged for what little
hay or straw was available at the time. Though very
nourishing for the horses there have been unexpected
side effects. Because the grass has less bulk than straw,
the horses eat it very quickly and are left for much of
the day with nothing to eat. I have tried my best to
ease their boredom by cutting grass from verges and
giving them tree cuttings and logs to chew as well as
giving them their grass in small amounts at more
frequent intervals but to our dismay they started
chewing their post and rail fencing. Creosote helps to
stop them chewing but unfortunately you can no longer
buy it as it has been withdrawn from sale. We have
electric tape around the field but they still manage to
chew where they can reach without getting zapped. They
chewed through both gate posts and we had to replace
them with metal bar, which doesn’t exactly look as good
but at least is secure. This led to me having a really
stupid accident earlier in the summer. As I was getting
a horse out of the gate, the metal bar touched the
electric fence tape and the current went through me and
then the horse, causing her to jump and stamp her foot
down on the top of my foot. By that night it was very
swollen, but I ignored it as I could not be bothered to
go to hospital. The next day Clive and I had planned a
picnic on the horses with some friends and this went
ahead, with me just squeezing my foot into an old boot.
As the week went on the pain increased and I had to give
in and go for an x-ray. It turned out that the tendons
and nerves on the top of my foot were damaged and I had
to have a bandage on for 10 days and rest with my foot
up as much as possible – not easy with the horses to
look after.
To be continued……………
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