RIP Pony Toes

It isn't fair that bad genetics made me let you go far too early.

I wrote this when I had to put down my beloved Fudge:

Nothing quite equals the love of a pony
From when they are young till they get old and bony.
they take up a big huge chunk of your heart
Then at their death it gets torn painfully apart
I will miss you my best equine friend
But I will do my best for you up till the end.
I hope that you're happier on the next plane
But right now all I can think of is pain
I hate that this is causing me such horrible grief
But I know that the end will be your relief.

The friends

I will never get tired of my view

Oh Pony

Last week was shots and teeth day for Penny. In the past J the vet has had no problem with Her Royal Poniness. Now, that can't be said for another area vet; Penny used to kick and bite him. So, we were quite shocked that she would not allow J to sedate her. She bucked, reared, kicked... so very unlike my pony. While there could be other possible reasons for her behavior our consensus is that it's another sign of her downhill decline.

She's gained quite a bit of weight this winter. In theory I should stick her in a corral and put her on a diet. But, she's just not going to be happy if I do that, so I'm not going to worry about it.

The state of the underside of her tail wasn't as depressing as it would have been a year ago. It is worse, but since I've decided to let nature take its course with her it was more of a sad sigh instead of tears over what opportunites I would miss with her due to her health. Those things are being missed regardless of the progression of her melanomas now.

Her tail has always been the worst part, but now the lower areas, which I accidentally didn't take a pic of, is so, so much worse than it's ever been. Nothing there is healthy now. You can feel the melanoma bumps in ever pinch of skin.

It does seem sort of wrong to me, who is so crazy anal-retentive over my equine's health, to just say, "Let it be." But, it's also very freeing. I can throw all the money I want into her and it's not going to change things. So, better to give her a good life while she can have one and when it's time it's time.

How Penny feels about winter

I want the grass back.

Mud

The downside of the cold to warm to cold to warm to cold to warm winter... muddy ponies.

Cuteness

Land of Snow and Cold

Snowy and cold here in the Land of Snow and Cold. At least it's sunny? Not much of a comfort when you're climbing through snow drifts to get to the barn.

It's even been snowy and cold at the Taskmaster's and we've officially now lost more days of riding this winter so far than we did the entirety of last winter. That's okay, forces us to take a break for a bit and that's not a bad thing.

I do have four new jackets to keep me warm though. It was the Christmas of Outerwear for me.

White stuff

Bye bye grass, we'll see you in the spring.

The bulge

Found a better shot. The bulge at the intersection of browband and cheek is the melanoma. It's on the eye side of the intersection. There is a natural bulge there, which is why I didn't notice it for so long, but this is really quite giant.

Some pictures from Santa Fe

Crappity Crap Crap

The vet was over tonight to give Penny her Legend shot, our latest attempt at tracking down her owwieness. She looked at her head and said, "Have you noticed this big bulge between her eye and ear?" Sure enough, there it was. And she's 99% sure it's a melanoma.

Crap.

Crap. Crap. Crap.

This is not a good thing. (Duh.) It means her melanomas are no longer centralized in the under tail area. This one is more internal (it's all fuzzy coat on top) so it indicates there's probably other internal melanomas going on now. As for the ones under her tail, the hole in the one that ulcerated is getting bigger, indicating its not going in a good direction either.

I love this pony so damn much, but I suspect we're quickly approaching the "let nature take its course" point.

Ponies can fly!

 

From the Event at Santa Fe

Free!

For the first time ever in the time I've owned Penny she's loose in the pasture.

I'm free! Freeeeeeee!

I was too worried about her gaining weight and not being able to catch her to turn her out before this. But, she's been pretty slim this summer and if she gains a couple extra pounds the world won't end. I've been working her up to this, hand grazing her for progressively longer time periods. It took her a good hour this morning to remember how the grazing muzzle works, so I've been able to leave her out longer than I thought I would.

She and the Old Men are getting on very well. I know there will be lots of squealing when she goes off Regumate next week though.

I love having horses in my mountain view.

But! I had dreams!

It's hard when you think your friend might be done. Or, at least not up to what you'd like to do with them.

It's looking more and more like Penny was in some pain at Santa Fe. Needing her hocks done is sort of a no-brainer. Its almost been six months. The farrier was out yesterday and he said she's wearing her hind feet weird and he thinks there's something up with her back.

It's so hard with her, to figure out if she's being disobedient just because she wants to be disobedient or if she hurts. Even on the best of days she's still highly opinionated and you simply will not be making her do something she does not want to.  We've been chasing down possible pain in her for two years. She's had her poll x-rayed and ultrasounded, same with her hind legs. Nothing ever shows. We injected her hocks for the first time just to see if anything would happen: she got better, so now we're doing hocks. We had her on an NSAID for a month earlier in the summer and she was super. I could even ride her down the gravel road without shoes on. Alas, no NSAIDs for competing ponies.

I'm seriously considering retiring her from eventing. She loves the jumping parts, but she just hates dressage so much. Yes, I could compete her "for fun" but it's not much fun when she bucks during her dressage test. Also, it's a pretty expensive weekend with at least a 6 hour drive. We're always last unless other competitors get massive sj and xc faults. If there were more competitors in Area X we wouldn't have any ribbons at all.

For now, I'm taking Bean to Coconino at Pre-Comp and see what she thinks about XC. She's not a long term solution for a mount: she is 22. But, we'll do just fine and there's a good possibility we won't be last.

Goose Downs

I have to start this story with the drive. Out here we have a phenomenon known as "monsoon rains." Starting in mid-summer almost daily thunderstorms show up in the afternoon. If it's been a particularly dry year they start wildfires. They also cause flash flooding as they tend to drop a lot of water in a little time. Between Albuquerque and Santa Fe we drove through a huge storm. The arroyos (dry creek beds) were full of rushing water. We saw snow. And there was a flash flood across the freeway, fortunately not deep, but there was a car backwards in the water in a ditch on the side of the road.

Okay, it could be hail, but we're calling it snow

There should not be brown water going across the road

We schooled Stadium on Friday, thank goodness we did. We have never seen anything like those jumps. Everything had flowers. There was even a brick wall, which she refused the first time. I don't think she knew what to think about that thing. She also pulled a rail, which is completely unlike her. Stadium was held on a polo field and I had been quite concerned about the grass, but she didn't trip at all.

As for dressage... well, on the plus side we did get a 7 on our free walk and the comment "Good energy some stretch." We also got a 1 on our working canter left lead. She did pick up the correct lead for the first time ever, but she bucked her way through the half circle before the canter depart. Comment: "Repeatedly disobedient."

Someone had the bright idea to put the tents for the Trade Fair next to the dressage arena. And, as it was a roping arena it had high walls so only the flappy tops were visible. Before we even started our test I had some brilliant spooks and it sorta went downhill from there.

Ahhh! Pony Eating Tents!

Which is a damn shame, because she actually warmed up really nicely. Then we went in that damn arena and lost it all. 51.4, which isn't our worst score, but gosh darn it, we have worked so hard to fix our dressage.

Stadium went just fine, though she bucked her way to the first fence. The brick wall wasn't on our course, though we did have to go past it. She spooked at it.

After stadium we went to visit the Trade Fair, as several people I had talked to that morning wanted to meet Miss Pony Toes. She was fabulous. She let all sorts of strangers pet and love on her, including petting her head. She wouldn't have allowed that a year ago.

Of course people love me. I'm adorable.

We had to trailer to Goose Downs for XC. She was quite wiggly to all the jumps, but we got over them. She wasn't as fast and focused as usual. She was not herself this weekend. I'll be talking to the vet.

Penny

But the weeds are so pretty!

Condi (and evidence I really need to kill the weeds in my arena)

First I have to convince him it's okay if I get on. Today he had Sonny to give him moral support.

Then the first few minutes he's pretty darn tense, but he calms down.

Today we had a shadow

And after I was done with him he stood in the arena and scratched his belly on the weeds

Orange pony

The fun of having red clay as your local dirt:

Penny progressively gets more and more orange the more time she's home. She was closing in on "Cheeto color" when I took this. She was due for a tail scrub two days ago so I rinsed her and she's back to "slightly yellow/almost white."

Haven't been doing much with her. It's hot or my arena is slippery muck and she still doesn't have shoes so we can't head down the newly graded road.

Super Pony Vision

This is what I see every morning through the front door when I put on my shoes:

I'm pretty darn sure she can see me. Sure, the distance between house and barn is not huge (though it sure seems that way when there's snow out there) but it also isn't right next door (see previous post for a better idea.) I'm not shocked at the distance, but at the seeing me through the glass of the door part. She doesn't start "the stare" until I'm visible, I know because I peek through the blinds from the bedroom sometimes to see if she knows I'm awake yet. If she isn't watching I hear her "Walk faster! I'm hungry!" neigh as soon as I shut the door behind me on my way out. That said, she's perfectly patient with my "whenever I wake up" feeding schedule, which is anywhere from 7-8:30.

I love seeing that face in the mornings. Or evenings. Or any time really.