Disappearing Wire

For those who have horses, you know how deadly a stray piece of electric fence wire can be. We have had our worst horse injuries come from a piece of wire getting loose in our pastures. Electric fence wire can escape the fence posts in a number of ways but usually it is the horses themselves that break these devils loose with their own foolishness.

On one occasion we found empty t-posts right before dark where one strand of wire was missing. While searching the field for the wire my DH discovered a very horrible leg injury on my gelding, the injury was so bad that he couldn't walk and we had to take the trailer to bring him to the house for first aid. Darkness fell before the wire could be found and the search was to be resumed the next morning by me.

As soon as dawn broke, I was walking the grid in the upper pasture until I came to a group of horses with a young filly's leg shooting blood out two feet with every heart beat. I summoned help, got a disposable diaper (a must for all horse owners) and some vet wrap and returned to the scene. Once the bleeding had stopped and I knew help was on the way, I left the filly standing where she was and started the search again. My top priority was finding that stupid piece of wire.

It took a long time to find it but I finally did and we doctored the two injured horses several times per day for three months. Both fully recovered with only slight scarring. Time and space does not permit me to tell you the endless heartbreaking stories of horses that I know of who have been injured and even put down because of electric fence wire and high tinsel wire.

Alright, now that you understand the dangers of wire around horses, this is what happened on Saturday morning. When I awoke, I heard banging around in the barn. I looked out to find Cooter in the barn wrecking havoc. I snatched him up and drug him back to the goat lot only to find that the whole bottom strand of electric fence wire was missing between his lot and the lower horse pasture. Gadzooks! I said, and turned him loose in the lot anyway.

I started searching for the missing wire immediately and could not find it, it was not in any of the usually hiding places. Now bear in mind that the lower horse pasture is where the big round bales of hay are fed and we have had a lot of rain. There was no way that I could walk out in that deep mud soup to look for a piece of wire.

I went to the house and got my binoculars, I stood out there on firm ground for about an hour combing the pasture. First I searched every horse's legs with my super vision because that is always a good place to find wire. No luck, I couldn't see it anywhere.

When my DH got home he started walking through the mud looking for the wire, he walked back and forth many, many times without finding the 100 feet of wire. I suggested that perhaps it was buried in the thick mud but he doesn't think that there is any way 100 feet of wire could be totally covered with mud.

So now we have a mystery, what happened to the wire? Neither of us will rest easy until we figure this one out.

Blossom

Blossom has arrived and I got to drive her today, she is soooo sweet. We plan to keep her for the rest of our lives. She is brand new and her full name is Orange Blossom Special but we are just going to call her Blossom.

She is a Kubota MX5000, hence the Orange inspired name. We have been without a tractor for a good long time, our last one was hauled away for junk. But it was junk when we first got it and it caused us much grief. With Summer quickly approaching and pastures to be mowed, we had to make a long thought out and hard decision. So, instead of buying a new truck, which we need, or building a house, we bought a tractor.

Horse Treat Recipe

We have a dear friend who owns several acres that she keeps mowed like a golf course. She only has three horses and each Spring they tend to founder on the plentiful, weedless, rich grass. We help her out each year by taking our broodmares with the new foals to her place to help eat down the grass.

This is a great solution for all of us, her horses don't get as much grass and don't have to be locked up in her corral as much. Our mares get good grass, the babies get their first experience of being loaded and hauled in a horse trailer. They also get hand fed treats and get lots of handling and attention (she loves the babies). The extra bonus is that we just pick the mares up in the fall and bring them home to wean the foals. Usually we bring the weanlings home before bad weather sets in but this year we only had two babies left that didn't sell and Diana kept them all winter. So, both Biscuit and Diva got some extra spoiling.

We put Diana's hay up for her each year and try to help with other problems that crop up at her place from time to time, like downed fences, trees or injured horses. We have one lame mare that she always winters for us also.

Diana buys carrots in bulk from Sam's Club as treats and also has a nice apple tree in her yard that supplies treats in the fall but she was buying expensive horse treats as well. So to help out, I found a recipe online that looked good to me and started making treats for her to feed during the winter months. I don't like baking during warm weather, so I only make them when it is cold outside. All of her horses and our horses love them, my goats do double back flips for them too, my dogs even like them.

Diana's Favorite Horse Treats and My Favorite Goat and Dog Treats.

Recipe:
1 cup of quick oats
1 cup flour
1 cup shredded carrots
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon sugar
2 tablespoons corn or vegetable oil
1/4 cup water
1/4 cup real molasses (real molasses is a good source of iron) or you can substitute pancake syrup or corn syrup

Mix all ingredients into a large bowl. Make small balls and place on a greased cookie sheet. Bake at 350º for 15 minutes. Shut off the oven and leave them in the oven for several days to harden. I always double or triple the batch, I cool them on a cooling rack while the others are still baking, then pile them all back on the cookie sheet for the hardening stage in the oven. Letting them set out in the open for a few weeks takes any softness out of them, making them crunchy and more desirable for the horses and goats. They also store better if they have no moisture in them.

2007 Slipping Away

2007 wasn't that bad mind you, but I think that I am ready to see it go on down the road. We had a terrible drought this past summer, the worst that I have ever seen in my 50 years. Our pastures turned to dust and no one had any hay to sell, they all put it in their own barns in order to charge outrageous prices to desperate animal owners this winter.

We did end up trading horses for hay, so we are going to make it through. Others weren't so lucky and will be in real trouble before spring. We are feeding a lot of grain this winter, which is something that we usually don't do. The idea is to feed grain, so they won't eat as much hay but it isn't working very well, they are all just getting fat. We are going to have to find a way to limit their time with the hay bales.

After experiencing this dry summer, I did say that I would never complain about rain again, so far I am doing quite well. It has been a very wet late fall and early winter. I have just about had to quit feeding all together because of the mud. My husband is doing all of my chores to prevent me from further injuring my already injured back. I hate not being able to get out but I am not complaining about the rain or the mud, I will just say that I really like cold weather and frozen ground.