The Hobbit Hole III - Journey to the Cross-roads!

[HairOfTheDog]

Welcome to The Hobbit Hole!

Journey to the Cross-roads
The Two Towers Edition

Come on! Come in! -if you would like to have some seedcakes and a pint and relax a while. (If it is a special occasion, we still have a few bottles of the old wineyards left!)

Our first thread ( New Zealander builds Hobbit hole ) reached 4,100 posts, and we thought that was big. Our second thread (The New Hobbit Hole ) held us for over 48,000 posts, and we loved it dearly. We talked about moving to a new thread for the last 38,000 posts, but we are really slow to muster! Finally, the time has come. Tomorrow (at 12:01 am, to be precise!) The Two Towers comes out, and we start a new chapter.

[Overtaxed]

Morning!

How is JarJar?

[Lil'freeper]

I'd have to move the whole garden to AZ.

It's not worth it to move a whole garden for the weekend? ;P

[2Jedismom]

The bigger chicks spent the night in their coop last night for the first time. I saw them eating and drinking this morning, so I guess they did ok. I moved their box and everything out there and let them sleep in the box they've been in since I got them. Still, they cried like I was torturing them.

I had Roy on my shoulder, trying to get a good pic of her (I didn't) and she reached over and PECKED me right in the eye!! YOWZER!

[2Jedismom]

Still sneezing as of yesterday, but maybe better?

We'll see...I have a week of medicine still to give.

[RosieCotton]

Just checked out your profile page - wow! I really enjoyed it! Great pictures of some of my favorite actors, for one! And LOTR stuff, of course.

As for Sam...feel free to admire him, but remember he's mine. ;-)

[PayNoAttentionManBehindCurtain]

Where do you pick blueberries? We came across a big patch of blackberries yesterday.

Becky

[RosieCotton]

Good morning! Looks like it's fixing to rain out there. So much for my usual landscape! Can't even see the hills.

[2Jedismom]

A place in BA. I don't know very much...I am meeting someone and following them out. I'll let you know what I find out this afternoon.

[PayNoAttentionManBehindCurtain]

Ouch!

I think I am going to turn the water trough on it's side today so the chicks can stat getting out in the coop. Have to get it emptied for the new batch.

I have forgotten are we 10 days or less from hatch day? Do you still want to hatch a batch? If so I need to start saving eggs.

Becky

[2Jedismom]

Yes, this time next week we should have some chicks. Yes, I would still like to do a batch!

Are they wild blackberries? I would love to make a pie!

[2Jedismom]

See you later!

[HairOfTheDog]

Sunny here again...

Good Morning!

[RosieCotton]

Heh...hobbit bed head again!

I like that picture.

[PayNoAttentionManBehindCurtain]

We have learned something new this week.

I use too compete on a mare, Belle, before Rusty. She is a big bay mare, we have been using her for the last few years as a brood mare.

The reason I stopped using her for competition was she had a problem. I got her when she was 3. She is 11 now. I tried for 6 yrs to get her over this but it finally defeated me. Is what she would do is when you first saddled her, or when you first sat down on the saddle she would throw a fit by slinging herself back and forth. I had several people say she looked like a cutting horse. But she only did it once in a while. If she didn't throw a fit at the very start of a ride she was good to go, and when she was good she was very very good. She place everytime. She even won 3rd in the region one year, and we only went to 4 rides that year.

But the last few times she had her fits I got hurt. Once she slammed me into a truck, dented it with my foot. My foot turned black from bruising. Then one time at a competiton I mounted her that morning and she did it, but that time she slammed herself down on the ground on her side with me underneath. That was finally the day I started getting susipicous as to what the problem really was.

She jumped up immediatley, (took me a minute), ran out into a road, (I was hoping she would get hit by a car:), some one caught her, when I got her I put her on a lunge line and started lunging her. She was running around like an idiot. But all of a sudden she stopped. I had a lunge whip, but even with that she would not go. She kind of looked around then came over and stood by me with a confused expression in her eyes. So I patted her, got on her, and she did 40 miles without another bauble. She placed 3rd. My leg swelled up till my jean leg was tight on it, and it turned black again from the knee down.

Anyway, after that I always thought that she did not do this from being a brat, but that she was having some kind of seizue when the saddle pressed on something just right.

When I finally retired her because I just got to afraid of her, my son tried her for a while. He ropes, and she had been trained for roping before I got her. She did the same too him. When she was good she was real good. but occansionly, and it was getting more and more frequent, she had these spells. Everyone else thought she was just being a brat. But my son finally stopped useing her because he was afraid of getting hurt. She was also getting to where when she went down, she was staying down for a while flopping around.

Well my husband this past week decided that we need to get some steers and let my son practice, and our SIL wants to learn also. So Mack decided we needed to look into if Belle's problem IS seizures. He is big on getting info off the internet, and low and behold, seizurs are sort of common, and are triggered by putting the saddle on. Everything he read seems to fit. It takes alot to determine it by a vet, and sometimes can't be diagnosed for sure.But there are things to try, and see if the fits stop.

Anyway, have you ever heard of that?, seizures in horses? That would be great if we could get this horse fixed, she was so good, and she is a beautiful horse. And she is so sweet and likes people. That's why I kept trying for so long.

Becky

[HairOfTheDog]

Another kindred spirit! My goodness I'm sitting here listening to The Unforgettable Fire and decided to poke around your FRhomepage.

No kidding! - She's got a whole flat fellowship!

mtngrl, you should check out our Flat Frodo adventure!

click the graphic!

[PayNoAttentionManBehindCurtain]

Yeah they are wild blackberries. They are pretty far from the house. We were on the horses when we found them. I'm not sure yet what is going on around here Sat. morning, but if nothing is, do you want to ride then? If so, do you think you could ride for several hours the first time without getting too tired or sore? Too get to where they are takes about an hour, then we would have the ride back. That is alot for your first time out:) How long to berries last on the bushes? There was quite alot of them, do you think they will still be there in a few weeks? Give you a chance to ride a couple of times before we go that far. Would Steve keep the boys in the evenings sometime? It doesn't get dark till late. We could do a few rides in the evenings before dark if so. That would build you up:), If you think the blackberries won't get too ripe, or the birds won't eat them all. I'm not much on berries, so I haven't paid attention to how long they last, but I do know the birds eat them.

BTW, do you like persimmons? There are a bunch of wild persimmons that are closer then the blackberries. They aren't ripe yet though.

Becky

[HairOfTheDog]

Interesting story Becky, and it does sound like some freak thing if she otherwise has a really great temperament...

The closest thing I know to that was a friend's horse who would sometimes faint, or collapse, when the saddle was tightened, and she has started riding with a quite loose cinch and breast collar and crupper to compensate for the looser cinch...

Would be interesting to find out if it is something like a seizure that is treatable, and I suppose, also good to find out if it is genetic before you breed her again.

Let us know how this goes, if your vet can find it!

[PayNoAttentionManBehindCurtain]

Yeah the breeding thing does worry me. We only have one baby from her. The baby is 3 now and my daughter is breaking her. So far she has been great. No signs of a problem. Belle was showing these signs before I bought her, but then I thought it was just because the boy that had her didn't know alot of what he was doing. Once I got her she was great, didn't have her first spell for over a yr. Then didn't have another for another yr. And she did not go down those times. Just slung herself back and forth. So she was doing it before age 3. Dot (the baby) hasn't done anything to resemble this yet.

Becky

[Corin Stormhands]

Is the flood over yet?

Mornin'. Managed to snap a picture of the dog when I took him to the back yard this morning...

I am adjusting to the fact that our whole summer will be like this. Remember 10 years ago when the Mississippi Valley flooded? Maybe it's our turn. I'm almost inclined to think that's a better way of looking at it than hoping against hope that the sun will come out again...

[HairOfTheDog]

Good sign then, and maybe close enough to an answer, unless it is some kind of a recessive issue where both parents have to have it for it to show up. Have any way to get in touch with her breeders to see if there is anything going on with other offspring from the stallion/mare? Have any idea where they are?