Megasus and the Moonlight Trail Ride

A few days before the hunter pace, my Megasus Horserunners FINALLY arrived. This was, of course, after I caved and put shoes on Gwyn.  I grumbled to Eric about the irony and the hit to our checkbook when I had to have the shoes replaced days after they were initially put on. They had been holding.

Had been.

A couple days after the hunt pace I went out to feed and Gwyn was once again missing a shoe. I wailed about a bit and gnashed my teeth and finally opened up the horserunners box because dammit I wasn't about to pay YET AGAIN to have the farrier put shoes on when these should do for such a situation. Nor did I want to miss out on a moonlight trail ride in two days and I also did not want Gwyn to be on that ride missing a shoe.

So... the unveiling:

I kickstartered for 2 sets. Apparently I also got the winter version? I don't remember that being an option and I'm a little miffed about it as I would have gotten the summer ones, TBQH

Fancy packaging. Was this the delay?? Who knows.

Like I said, we got the winter edition? They'll have to deal with being used in the summer because I'm not paying again for these fuckers.

They are pretty solid and a garish orange and blue that makes me flash back to grad school at the University of Florida. 

The thickness. Those slots are where the clips that attach to the hoof slide into

All of the additional gear needed to attached these suckers to the hoof

The tiniest nail polish size bottle (with nail polish brush) of solvent I've ever seen. Smells like paint thinner

The covers, more on this in a moment

Nice bright blue

The tapes attach to the hoof and provide one side of the 'velcro' that the clips lock onto

The side clips

So I got to prepping Gwyn's foot for Megasus attachment. First up was cleaning her hoof. They wanted me to bloody buff the hoof but I settled for wire brushing it. I might go find a buffer to sand down her hoof to get better adhesive attachment for future tapes but I'm not displeased.

You start by putting in the front two clips. You mark on the hoof where the center is and line that up, then also mark where the clips are. This is your guide for putting on the tapes.

You can see the nasty crack I've been fighting. Also, there's still nails in her hoof from the shoe. WTF is up with that? I rasped and wire brushed her hoof and then avoided touching it since the instructions say to not have grease of any kind on the foot or it'll ruin the adhesive. You mark around the hoof on the shoe itself.

It looks long in the back, but that's okay, because it pretty much is guaranteed to get removed.

With those markings all set and ready to go, you use the solvent on the hoof and let it dry, which will happen quickly because it's a solvent and pretty much trying to evaporate as soon as it hits air. Then you carefully remove the backing on the tapes and apply them to the hoof, starting at the markings you made from where the front clips land.

Now, I misplaced these on the hoof. They should curl up more and be further from the ground. But again, I'm not too put out by the error and it's working okay for now.

Then I set up the covers, which go on over the tapes.

I put the covers on at night and went back the next day to prep her for my night trail ride. The covers were gone. So much for what I said about them in the video. As of this writing, I have only recovered one cover from my pasture. So that leaves 3 horse shoes and 1 megasus cover unaccounted for.

Friday I also used the jigsaw to cut away the extra shoe. The whole thing is a pretty thick plastic. Gwyn is pretty solidly a perfect fit to this size so I really didn't need to do much adjusting. It also meant that I didn't have to worry about sharp edges. I did use a rasp to take it down a little bit. I did not do the recommended 45 deg angle under the heel as I just didn't have the time. 

Upon retrieving her and inspecting the tapes, the back bit of tapes pulled away from the hoof, but that's also where I wasn't able to really rasp down the hoof and prep it for adhesive. I clipped away what was no longer sticking. Everything else was solidly attached so I went ahead with doing the final clips and adjustments. Then we loaded up for our trail ride!

The previous owners of our house are starting a non-profit designed to help veterans with PTSD and they were hosting a Full Moon Trail ride on the Polly Ann Trail! She needed to get a special permit for the ride as after dark usage is not permitted.

I met Alicia there and it was great. My tail lights were out of battery, which made me sad because that would have helped at some points on the ride as it turned out. Instead I had reflective gear, which was at least beneficial for the road crossings. Alicia forgot her cinch, and ended up riding bareback. Oops...

The following pictures are screen grabs from the go pro.

Just after mounting up, 9pm at the Leonard trail head. Moon has not risen.

Gwyn immediately thought we were going to go fast again. Oops

Crossing Rochester Rd. If you turned right and went a few miles you'd get to my house!

Bareback Alicia

Two happy horses in the lead. 

Gwyn pretty much took off at a swinging walk. She wasn't impeded at all by the Megasus shoe and in fact was moving very confidently. We were leaving the quarter horses in the dust and they had to trot to keep up with us.

This the field where later a fucking truck was off roading at nearly 11pm at night and scared the FUCK out of Gwyn and she went spooking toward this opening only there's a bloody chain across it and thankfully I stopped her in time.

The full moon, also a blood moon, as seen on the go pro, lol

The ride was very eventful. I think Gwyn likely has at least some bit of moonblindness as she got incredibly spooky once it got dark. While she is very much a 'must be leader on the trails' kind of mare, she was much happier after dark following other horses. The final nail in that coffin was when a fucking bicyclist was coming at us. Us humans couldn't see him, he wasn't lit up at all and Gwyn lost her  mind.  Remember, we had a special permit for night use. He should not have been there.

We all may have yelled at him, made him get off the damn bike and talk constantly as we passed him. Gwyn thought she was going to get eaten.

Did I mention that two of the horses were studs? They were decently well behaved until one spooked a little and his bit got caught in his breast collar. He went up and over backwards with his rider - who was not wearing a helmet - and we all freaked out. Old house owner S hopped off immediately to help, her daughter who is like 12, was freaking the fuck out and Alicia just calmly started running through a concussion screen like it's her job because it basically is (she's a vet tech).

The rider was shaken but thankfully okay, and so she and S walked a bit of the trail on foot for a while to calm down.  We were still 2 miles from the trail head. We had done an hour out but two of those miles in the hour out were at a decent clip and it was not going to be the same time going back as we were much slower.

On top of it all, S's horse (one of the studs) was in the pen they have and ran into a nest of yellowjackets and they both came running out in a panic because he got stung and S is allergic. 

So it was eventful. But it was also beautiful. The fireflies are still going so the darker forested parts of the trail just sparkled and glittered with their blinking light. We were dive bombed by bats feasting on the bugs. I didn't get one mosquito bite. It was almost chilly, in the upper 60sF and while there were some clouds, they cleared as the moon rose, beautiful and red, with Mars trailing to the side bright as could be. Alicia and I laughed and laughed, even through some of the scarier parts because I'm a nervous laugher. But we had an amazing time. The shoe held up quite well and was a pain to get off, which I'm calling a positive because if I have to freaking pry the thing, it's not going to just come loose on the trail. I have an amazing mare who trusts me and is game for pretty much anything, which is my dream horse. Instead of being frustrated at our slow return pace, I worked on using my seat to rate her back and she was mindful and listened. I hold no blame for her spooks. I knew this is an eventuality with her eye injury and because she's part Appy. I blame the idiots who were joy riding. I blame the moron riding his bicycle where he was not allowed.

She's my best mare and my buddy and it was really nice to have 'just' a ride with friends that night. It was the perfect end to a really long work day.

Night Ride

Not much media because it was night time, but I took advantage of Hazel falling asleep early (she didn't nap while I was gone yesterday) and escaped to the barn for solo chores.

From the morning. She heard me on the deck and is always VERY attentive to what I'm doing outside :)  It's my favorite part of having her in my backyard.

"Hi Mom! I see you! Do you have treats? Oh, you're going back inside? That's a shame..."

Now, Hazel didn't stay asleep but that wasn't my problem, have fun hubby! (They watched Blue Planet II)

Lit by the arena lights

I lunged her first and she was up but not out of control so again I kept it short and hopped on. I worked mostly on myself and being balanced.

I tried to ask for canter and she started snaking back and biting at her girth, both directions. This is infrequent but I did wonder if something was bothering her (for future reference, I used an old purple dover pad and maybe how the girth was laying on it was not comfortable? If it happens again I'll see if that's a common element) she's normally pretty unflappable.

So I pulled the saddle off and hopped back on bareback :D Aside from the shedding horse hair poking through my pants, it was a nice ride. We did about a mile in the arena, working out to 30 minutes of mostly walking but LOTS of transitions and geometry. I wanted myself to be really responsive with contact.

I had treats in my pocket, along with a clicker. Peppermints and ginger snaps. Gwyn now expects a treat every time I say good girl. I've probably said it often enough she associates it more with a treat than the click. On a more positive note, now that I'm carrying pocket treats, she's not walking off with me after I mount up on her.

I want to start clicker training Saffron and the ginger snaps and peppermint candies seem to be the trick. The storebought horse treats weren't interesting to her but she willingly left her alfalfa to get more ginger snaps from me last night. I do need to desensitize her to the click as she flinches a lot if I use it. Poor thing :( What did humans do to you?

Silly donkey did try and eat my saddle while it was hanging out on the gate. She is a curious and nosy thing! I never expected to love her as much as I do.

First Ride of 2018! New Stirrups! A question about manes!

Due to the deep freeze and snow storms across the east coast, me actually getting home (a separate post in itself for my non-horse blog) took ALL YEAR.  😂😂😂😂😂

No but seriously, today was the first full day I was at home in 2018. AND it was getting progressively warmer throughout the day and night, which meant that my designated riding time (after 8pm) would be actually warmer than the daytime!  SCORE.

So what's a horse girl to do when she can ride in a rain jacket and no gloves and not freeze her cheeks off? Ride of course!

Fat!Pony is not impressed with the the fact that her stall is closed and her halter is on. (Please ignore the dirty stall, I cleaned it after)

Use the arena floodlights for the best lit selfies

Unless your Fat!Pony wants to rub her face on you and becomes a blur monster

But then she gives you kisses because it was 8 fucking days apart and that's practically torture and don't you know she was SO hungry and cold even though the nice neighbor lady came and fed her every day.

I love this view

The snow is turning to slush it's so warm

We practiced stepping under and using her back and also our geometry. 10 m circles are easy to evaluate in the snow

More circles!

Ugh that poor mane. Super thick and long near her head, wispy and thin toward the withers. HOW FIX, BLOG WORLD? HOW?!

 You may note that my stirrups are super reflective!  Woefully, I have been searching for a good winter boot to wear whilst riding.  Everyone suggests Mountain Horses, but the tall boots that would fit my ginormous calf are not being sold any more in my foot size. Joy.  Since I need a wide footbed in addition to a wide calf, I tried ordering a pair of mens Ariat paddock boots, Extreme H20. It was too tight across the top of my foot and I immediately started to lose feeling in my foot while wearing them. Definitely not gonna be good for riding.

I also ordered a pair of ovation winter paddock boots. These things are a two layer system that just sucked. Nope. Getting returned. If the ridiculous thinsulate booty was not a separate thing from the boot itself it might have worked, but I couldn't get my foot in the boot when the pieces were already together, and if I took the booty out and slid my foot in already in the booty, my toes got jammed up and cramped by the booty in the boot and it never loosened up.

I'm picky. And both of those are getting returned.

What I currently wear in the barn in the winter is my muck boots, super thick rubber and plastic, but my feet have never been cold in them. But they're super duper unsafe for traditional stirrup irons because of the lack of heel.

So, I figured since I do endurance, and they make stirrup irons for non-traditional riding shoes, why not embrace the muck boots and just get a safe stirrup iron? It would do double duty as a wide bed stirrup for endurance rides and a safety thing for winter if I wear my muck boots.

So merry christmas to me! I ordered from Distance Depot with my swell discount for being a new AERC member and they arrived while we were gone!

They are, obviously, in purple beta with reflective overlay.

My muck boot fits well in them, I'm not fighting to fit the ginormous boot into them, so it gives me confidence that they'll work well in the summer too. I'll have a bigger shoe option to wear for endurance.


But really, the big question I have for you all, what do you do with a mane that's super uneven in thickness? Gwyn is half friesian, so I tend to err on the 'let it grow' mentality and just braid it in the summer when it's hot. I would like the mane to be more uniform, so I might as well work on that now. How do I do that? I'm already supplementing with Biotin for her hooves (which has worked out wonderfully, btw)  What else should I be doing for care? I minimize brushing it, but will finger pick the worst. She doesn't rub it (to my knowledge), doesn't wear a blanket regularly, and really never gets it super tangled.

3.1 miles and 1.03 miles, YTD 39.65

The weather has returned to its mild mannered self and I am taking FULL advantage. Plus I need to practice for my lesson this Saturday (WHEEEEE!!!!)

On Saturday the 25th, I decided to ride up in the farm fields. I do have permission to ride on the properties that I was on and I pointedly stay off the ones I haven't gotten permission for yet. Some frustratingly put up no trespassing signs AFTER I rode out there once so I do suspect there are trail cams. Anyway. Have some screen grabs from my helmet cam. Once I get the video uploaded to youtube, I'll share it.

 I got 3.1 miles of riding in that day and covered a decent amount of ground. I also worked on getting Gwyn on the bit. It was really productive for a trail ride.

Tonight I did 1.03 miles in the arena and then a jaunt around the pasture before calling it a night. Since during the week I basically get home after dark I've resolved to just ride after the kids are in bed. It's really pleasant and I'm enjoying it a lot more than I expected.

A confused pony who would like her hay now thankyouverymuch.

How I ride at night when there's minimal to no moon.

We can see pretty well!

UGH. Okay. Naughty donkey. So I decided to pick the first exercise from the ground poles and jumping exercises book by Cherry Hill. I figured it would be something to practice and give us a purpose (other than practicing the principles from my lesson) for the ride so I wouldn't just feel like we were toodling.

I set the book and my new measuring tape (JUST for measuring jump distances!) to the side of my 'mounting block'.  Saffron came over and PICKED UP THE BOOK AND STARTED FLINGING IT.

So I chased her around the arena. I got a REALLY nice canter out of Gwyn while doing so and was pleasantly surprised! Like, a canter that I would need WAY more leg to maintain and felt very nice underneath me.  Gwyn has a long way to go to really have the stamina for a good canter but this is a HUGE step up from where we were! She's definitely gaining muscle, we just need to keep working more frequently than before!


After I was done doing arena work we practiced Standing By The Gate So Your Rider Can Unlatch It Without Dismounting.  This took some time and required going back to basics (Yes, you can walk straight on the side without swinging your butt in and away from the fence) (Yes, you can stand quietly by the gate without swinging 90 degrees to face the gate)  Eventually I was able to unhook the gate and open it. From there we ventured out into the pasture, leaving our lights behind.

Up on the Hill, looking down at the arena. Right side is my solar powered flood lights, left side is the barn lights.

 We toodled around the pasture and I wished for less clouds and more moon. Then it was back to the arena to turn off my lights, take a selfie in the dark and go untack.

A good Goober Pony repping that sweet purple Two Horse Tack!