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Well, I just got home from looking at that horse. It wouldn't have taken this long, except we got lost on the way home.

So yes, this is going to be a looong post, so sit back, get your cup of coffee, and read away. I don't even know where to start, but maybe I should say right off that we didn't get the horse for a variety of reasons. You also must also know that this is a barn full of rich teenagers. Virtually no adults were present, and the kids? They had no idea why they were doing the things they were doing.. they just did them because every other person in the barn did the same thing. For instance, EVERY horse in that barn wore bellboots, whether they needed to or not, EVERY horse was body clipped in some fashion, and quite a few horses wore dressage tack, even though believe me... those kids wouldn't know how to ride balanced if their life depended on it. And oh! The board there is $1000.00 a month, for virtually nothing. No bathroom, no washstalls, and the stalls themselves were crappy. They did have an indoor, but the property was full of mud and muck, and we almost got stuck trying to go down a very long dirt driveway that was more of a swamp than a driveway.

So! Getting to the horse!

The boy who owns him was very sweet and a nice kid, but had no idea what he was doing, and was clearly terrified of the horse. He had him in a mylar kimberwicke with a double set of reins. We asked him why the horse was in that bit, and the kid had no idea why. (Mylar bits were clearly a fashion at that barn too) He also told us that the horse was nutty, and hadn't been ridden since tuesday. They did a terrible job of selling him to us, because right away they told us that the horse had chronic diarrhea, (They didn't know why) and that he had a club foot, and several conformation issues. (They horse didn't have a club foot that we could see, but he did wing and forge.) Mostly we saw that the horse was acting "nutty" because he wasn't being ridden in a balanced way, so he was rushing about with his head in the air because the kid had no idea how to handle a double set of reins, didn't ride him in a balanced manner, and had virtually no contact the entire time that he rode him. But, the horse never did anything really stupid, he was just quick.

So finally my trainer got on the horse, and made him balance himself, and rode him correctly. The horse was really tense and nervous at first but settled right down as soon as he knew what was expected of him, and he was clearly listening to my trainer, but was definitely very confused about things, and gave her a hard time about bending and riding in frame. He wanted to rush off of her leg a bit but with a half halt didn't try to do it again.

Either me or the person that I'd be splitting the lease with could ride him no problem, but it would take lessons and training to do it right and not ruin him further. The kid had had him for three years, and he's 8 now, so he ended up with him when the horse was pretty young. He's good and sensible with a sweet personality, and once he's ridden consistently and correctly, he's going to make someone a great horse. I wish that I had more time for him. I'll be posting pictures in a minute, I just got them in an e-mail.