Becky
| This thread has been locked, it will not receive new replies. |
|
Locked on 02/24/2006 9:22:08 AM PST by Admin Moderator, reason:
Thread Nine: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1584833/posts |
Posted on 10/04/2005 9:56:41 AM PDT by HairOfTheDog
By the way, good morning everyone :)
Becky
Walmart in Fallon (farm country there) carries feed, horses, rabbits, chickens, etc. However, a lot of it is their store brand which I don't trust. And it's not consistant - sometimes they have it, sometimes they are out.
Just thought I'd ask all of you, what are you using for wormer in January. I've gone from Daily Wormer with 2 x a year ivermectrin to a regular rotation. I'm in the south if that's any help. What do you all use in mid-January and why?
Thank you. :) Worming is the bane of my existance!
It probably costs me less because I feed hay. Some of the horses spend a good part of the year on hay only, and we buy hay by the truck load so it's a little cheaper per ton.
Mack was just asking me (he's been lurking:) if you've ever looked in to haveing it shipped in straight to you from somewhere? Have you ever put a pencil to if you could get it cheaper that way. I mentioned that the problem with that would be keeping it fresh. I don't know how long it will stay good. But you're paying like $5 a bag more then I am, that would surely be more then enough to cover freight, if you could buy enough within the time frame of it staying fresh for you??
Becky
That's gonna make it hard to find the pot of gold...
It must be close to raining... Hope so.
My problem with the hay became it was never consistent. I realize I pay more per horse, but what I feed is always the same, I like that.
Becky
My ex and I had a VW Bug as our first car - I hated it :). I wasn't very good with stick shift then, and it was sooooo little.
LOL, Good for you.
I worm my horses once a month, because they are dry lotted. In Dec. after we had the freeze I wormed with ivermectrin. In Jan. I'll probably use Strongid Paste. in Feb. Anthelicde, March, imvermectrin again. So on and so forth:)
Becky
There is a 20% chance of rain today.
Becky
We use Ivermectin and Panacur on a rotation - every two months. The broodmares get wormed 30days before foaling, but everything else is just the regular every two months. The only thing that's on a set date (first of April) is the 5in1 shots and West Nile (except for broodmares). That's 30 days before foal date also.
I'll check today to see if there are any plants close by. Or what it takes to become an outlet for Purina, that might work.
Worming is always a mystery to me, because I've never seen signs my horses actually ~had~ worms, I just kindof do it blind.
We worry less about worming now than when there's flies present, but some schedules recommend a double dose of pyrantel pamoate two days in a row in the winter rotation to kill tapeworms.
I can see where it would be a problem if your hay varied a lot. We buy most of our alfalfa from second cutting from local area ranchers and it's pretty consistant. If we run low and have to buy first cutting or third cutting then we have to make allowances for that.
Our feed store is down to third cutting orchard grass and the horses are wasting most of it. It's too coarse and brown and they'd rather sleep on it than eat it.
:) When you finally get your own place, plan on a building to store hay. Then it's cheaper and more consistant. One of the reasons I like alfalfa so much I guess. Occassionally we will get some with weeds or real stemmy but on the whole, it's good.
Oh yeah - I plan on being able to store more. Actually, we used to buy local, and 200 bales at a time, we've got room, but the quality of the local stuff is a lot less. This stuff is not as good as 2nd cutting, but it's better than local.
We ended up doing a lot of mental arithmetic about hay, we can get local hay, little 30 pound bales for $3-5 per bale, but it's crap. Or we can buy Eastern WA hay from the feed store, $10 per bale but it's 100 pound bales and it's better quality. We decided the $10 bales were a better value. When it's nice out and we can use the big truck, we buy 10 bales at a time. When it's rainy out like this, we've been buying it 3 bales at a time in the little truck that has the canopy to keep it dry.
I checked into that with Purina one time. I had a heck of a time getting a dealer to understand that he could NOT run out of my feed because it was all my horses got:). Horse Chow was not a regular feed that any of them kept in stock around here. It took awhile to get one in the habit:).
Purina would not ship it to me direct, I had to go thru a dealer and I can understand why, even tho it pissed me off:)
Anyway, I think is what the best thing for you to do is find an independent trucker who could be trusted to bring in loads for you from a dealer where the prices are cheaper. It might take some research but I bet you could find one. I have a friend who is a trucker, and I could see where he could add some feed to any of his loads and drop it off.
Becky
Well, not in the same way that humans do, but I do think horses have emotions and feelings. And they are known to have exceptionally good memories about experiences, so I think she could be "missing her man". It may not occur to her until the memory is triggered, say by the sight of another human, but she probably remembers. One of my mares, who is now a brood mare, has an exceptionally strong bond with my old gelding, who she spent quite a few years with, just the two of them, and she never fails to perk up and put on "airs" with every time they get back together. She's the nastiest mare in the pasture to any other horse, but with the Old Man, you'd think she was a young filly again. One of these days I'm going to retire them back to the same pasture and they can enjoy their old age together.
That being said, I think the advice the others gave you is spot on. Young horses will try you at every turn, ESPECIALLY colts. I've raised several and it always amazes me the games they'll try to play with you. Every minute you're with them, SOMEBODY is getting trained, whether you know it or not and you've just got to make sure that you don't come out on the short end. Having a trainer, whether at your place or theirs, to teach him basic ground manners and show you when and how to discipline him so that he knows what he's being corrected for will help you a lot. I think I'd definitely send him to the trainer's facility when it's time for him to be ridden. He'll probably get more saddle time if the trainer isn't having to come and go. It's good that you're getting to ride the older mare. Ride her as much as you can. It'll improve your confidence and balance and it'll be good for her too, but if they've bred her back you might be limited in the amount of time you have with her before she has her next colt.
You asked about training methods. I personally prefer Parelli. I've been to quite a few of his seminars and have some of his home study material but I must admit that I'm not the best student. I never seem to have enough time to go very far with it. I do however practice his ground school methods and find that they work. Most of the other TV trainers methods are similar. They all show you just enough on TV to pique your interest, but you can't really expect any results by using just that little bit. You need to buy their material and put in the hours to get the kind of results that they get. You're in for an interesting experience raising this colt. Some of it will be great and some of it won't. You'll definitely make mistakes but horses are forgiving for the most part. As long as you are careful, don't get discouraged and don't give up you'll eventually end up with a nice horse. It may take a lot longer to get there since you'll both be learning at the same time, but I think it can be done. It'll just take lots of love and hard work on your part. Hang in there! (sorry for the long post)
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.