If you read the last post I made about Tom and Dixie leaving for Colorado, you may be wondering about Dakota.
We met Dakota about a year ago just a few hours after she was born.
This is Dakota and Mom, Betty. Dixie is in the background. Dakota is a filly in every sense of the word. She is little and dainty and really looks like a little girl.
When Dixie first dropped the bombshell about moving (YOU”RE GOING WHERE?) to Colorado, we asked if Dakota was going along. YES! She is going along. Sigh! OK. We had told Dixie that if she ever wanted to get rid of the little girl, let us know first.
Since it seemed to be a sure bet that Dakota was going to Colorado, we sorta put her out of mind (but not too far out) as an option of getting her.
Since we really wanted another horse to keep Dusty company, we kept our ears open. That is how we came to be the new owners of Neche. When we started planning the addition to Dusty’s stable, we added an extra stall. (just in case) It was one of those “you never know” reasons for adding that third stall.
Monday night, the 20th, Dixie came over and asked if we wanted Dakota. Bev, Shari and I all said “Hell Yes” at the same time. Dixie explained it was a hard decision, but she was taking 3 adult mares, and 2 were going to have foals in the spring. They were going to be in a round pen for awhile till they could get something else set up for them. Besides, she couldn’t ride 5 horses.
Tom and Dixie were leaving on Friday and we had nowhere to put another horse at the moment. “Ok girls, panic time. 3 days to get something put together for Dakota.” No problem. We would improvise temporarily.
We figured we would think about it after I got home from work Tuesday night.
Tuesday night when I got home, Bev said we had to get her picked up TONIGHT.
OH NO! Ok how about…..Bev said “We got it all figured out.” We had reduced the size of the original round pen by 2-16′ and 1-12′ panel. We could set up those 3 panels, using one panel of the existing round pen for the 4th side and put her in there, then work on the additional stalls this weekend. That was the same plan I had thought up at work. Sometimes it’s scary when we come up with the same plan.
So, we are very pleased to welcome another “horse of a different color” to our farm family.
Meet Dakota, a yearling paint filly. She is 3/4 quarter horse and 1/4 standard bred. Dixie has done a nice job of starting her. Most of the hard stuff has been learned already, leading, picking up feet, not biting, no kicking, and not a problem to catch. She has had a saddle blanket on her and just a little head tossing when haltering, but not bad.
This is a picture of her sire, Sailor.
We want to thank Dixie for trusting her little girl to us to raise and train.
Just so you don’t get confused with all the paints in the pictures, here are the two new girls getting acquainted over the common panel.
Dakota had never been off Dixie’s property and had always been in sight of her mom. To say she wasn’t real happy as we led her to her new home is an understatement. As soon as we came in sight of Neche, her focus changed from where she had come from, to where it looked like she was headed. Her and Neche started “talking” to each other 1/4 mile from home. Now she was in a hurry to get there and not so worried about where she had been raised her whole life.
As soon as we put her in her new temporary pen, she started getting acquainted with Neche. Phew, they are getting along very nicely.
So,,,,,we have our work on tap for this weekend, and lumber is setting by the stable just waiting for Saturday morning. Luckily this is a long weekend and we have 3 days to get the girls into their permanent home.
This should be a real hoot getting this built, stop back first part of next week for pictures of this project.
Cindy
August 30th, 2007
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In one’s lifetime, people come and go. A lot are acquaintances, but a few become real friends.
Our mentors in homesteading headed for Colorado today to start a New Chapter in their Book of Life. Dixie and Tom Eves.
Dixie and Tom pictured above with Mom and Bev, stopped by to get some goodies to munch on during the 10-13 hour trip.
Dixie helped us with the sheep and horses. She was always there for even the stupidest questions, or injuries to an animal no matter how minor. If Dixie needed our help, we were right there in a flash, to lend a hand, no matter how inexperienced that hand may have been.
Mom will miss the answers to questions about flowers, garden plants, and other “outdoorsy” type questions. She will also miss Tom enjoying her potato salad during the cookouts.
I have mentioned Dixie in more than one post. She was so much fun to be around and talk to. Her and Tom were a necessary addition to our cookouts.
They are going to be sorely missed and will be in our thoughts and memories as true friends. In our New Chapter of our own Book of Life, they will have a chapter dedicated to them.
Tom, Dixie, enjoy your new adventure, and don’t worry about Dakota, we will take good care of her and make you proud.
Cindy
August 30th, 2007
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Well, this is the first meeting, nose to nose for Dusty and Neche. They have been talking over a distance of about 30 feet since we got Neche.
Since today was a first ride for Neche, Bev and I, we decided to take a swing by Dusty’s area and let them meet close up.
They did fine till Dusty sorta forgot about the electric wire and got a bit too close. He spooked, but came right back and all was good again. It will be easier to put them in the same turn out area and have stalls right next to each other after meeting like this.
I rode Neche around the Round Pen for about 15 minutes and then took her outside the pen and rode down the road. She did fine.
Cindy
August 26th, 2007
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The dreaded day has arrived and I am going to get my first lesson of living on a farm. Remember I am a city gal and never experienced slaughtering a chicken before. My education continues. Last night after our 35 young chickens went in to the hen house, we raided the “Roos”. We gathered 11 and put them in a Doberman sized cage. Didn’t feed them but gave them water. (no bread either)
This morning we spent getting the cleaning station all set up with needed equipment. Shari and I will take care of the outside work, and mom will take care of the inside part. Bev is going to be hiding, otherwise she said she wouldn’t be able to eat them.
Needless to say, there will be no pictures of this adventure. Those of you who have experienced this sometime in your life will know what is involved.
Just another part of farm life I guess. An education and new experience to say the least.
Cindy
August 26th, 2007
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Neche is Bev’s horse. She is going to be the one working with her and teaching a few things that Neche has either never been taught or has forgotten. Neche is a little shy, not exactly skittish though. She is well broke as far as manners and behavior. It’s going to take a few days to get used to her new owners and surroundings. She is still a little stand offish with us.
Now Dusty is another matter. He is in your back pocket all the time. He follows us around like a BIG puppy. The only problem is that his manners are not quite as good as Neche’s. To give you an idea of the difference, if Dusty was out in a very large pasture he would come right over and meet you. Neche would probably go to the other side of pasture and make you come and get her.
Eventually Neche will do the same we hope, it’s only been 1 day. The series of pictures below is the getting acquainted ceremony.
And that folks, is how it is supposed to be done. Almost anyway. In the ideal situation the horse will come up to you. Neche didn’t, but she also didn’t run like she did before we got her home.
We want to do a little ground work with her before we attempt to ride her. The previous owner rode her Friday and Saturday prior to delivering her and she did fine. We just want her to be comfortable and have some ground work basics before we ride.
Cindy
August 12th, 2007
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Dusty was all ears and alert as the trailer containing Neche pulled in at the end of his turn out area. Since we weren’t really expecting Neche till later on, the camera was in the house. Naturally!
But we did get it after supper and went out to get acquainted with Neche. The picture below is Dusty looking at Neche probably wanting to get acquainted with her. He now has a pasture-mate to play all the horsey games with. Maybe he will calm down a little more and not try to play his games with us.
The second picture is of Neche looking at Dusty. Doesn’t look very interested in making friends does she.
August 11th, 2007
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Since we are due to have a few new additions, hopefully about 4, to our small herd of sheep, we decided we better enlarge the pen before it was too late.
Last weekend, Bev built a “drive thru feeder”. Basically it allows Shari to feed without having to go into the pen and risk a small flock “walk-about”. She also built a “lambing jug”. The lambing jug is used to put momma and newborn into so they can bond. After a couple days to a week, it is safe to put them back into the herd without another momma stealing another momma’s lamb.
Below is a picture of the lambing jug. 4′x4′
The next picture is of the drive by feeder already put in place. It actually takes the place of a fence panel. It will also show the enlarged pen after it was finished.
The picture below is of the sheep pen before we enlarged it. The sheep are gathered in the corner of the fence.
We almost finished it just in time. Neche was delivered about 4PM. We took about a 45 minute break to get her settled in, watered and fed. Then we went back and finished up the pen. It was mostly clean up and turn out the sheep to their new area.
Cindy
August 11th, 2007
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For 50 some odd years, I always thought days off from a J O B were to relax and recuperate so you were ready for the next week. I guess I was wrong, again. I am going to have to go back to the farm work to rest up from the work around home.
We had 2 fairly big projects on the list for this weekend. One of them got cut down due to lack of equipment, but not eliminated. We got both projects done and managed to do it without killing each other.
Enlarge the lamb pen was the biggest. Last time we enlarged it, it took us 2 days. We must be getting better at this stuff cause we did 2x as much in only 3/4 of the day.
First thing this morning we had to reset the round pen. That’s not real tough but there is always minor adjustments to do on the last panel. Today was no exception. Everything went pretty easy till we got the last panel in and tried to put the “man gate” in.
I want it so it opens to the outside to facilitate a rapid exit in case I need it. Like I am about to get run over, kicked, bit, or some other event that may prove injurious to my aging body. It took more time to get that stupid man gate, or in this case a woman gate, to open out without getting caught on a pin from the adjoining panel than it did to put the other 9, 6′ panels in to resemble a round pen.
We had to get that done because our new mare was getting delivered this afternoon and we had to have somewhere to put her. Below is a picture of Neche in her temporary home.
Since this post is getting a little long, I will cover the lamb pen in the next post.
Cindy
August 11th, 2007
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We got tired of hauling hay by the 7 bales at a time, every week. So we decided to get a few more bales this time. 50 to be exact. We loaded the truck with the help of Michael and James, both of which I work with. Without their help we would have still been trying to get it loaded on the truck.
The bales weigh around 100-110 lbs. each and don’t move around real easily. As we were backing the truck down the side of Dusty’s turn out area, he had to sample a couple bales as they went by.
I only have room for about 20 bales of hay in the “barn”. This is the area they will be stacked in.
Here is the truck prior to unloading
Michael on the left and James on the right.
This is the moving crew with Shari taking the picture. The rest of the hay was unloaded near the sheep pen so Shari, or me, didn’t have to move bales up to feed sheep.
For helping us move the hay, we had a cook out of burgers, potato salad, pop, baked beans and ice cream.
August 4th, 2007
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That was mom’s reaction when we told her about Neche. The picture is really unfair because I took it as she turned around and she didn’t know it.
No, she didn’t have her fist doubled up to clobber us. She was starting to say something just as I clicked the pic. She had just come out of the house.
Cindy
August 3rd, 2007
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We are pleased to welcome “Neche” to our Farm Family.
Neche means Friend in Ojibway. She is a 4 yr. old Paint and not sure what her heritage is. Looks like there may be some 1/4 horse, and maybe some Tenn. Walker. She isn’t a real tall horse, but pretty stocky. The nice thing about her is she is ridable as she stands.
At the moment she is at the previous owners as we need to do some construction to accommodate her and provide her shelter. The construction project will start this weekend with the manual labor part.
We are hoping Dusty enjoys some equine companionship. Horses are herd animals and it’s hard for him to be part of a herd when he is a herd of one.
Stay tuned for further developments with this pretty lady.
Cindy
August 3rd, 2007
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