4 Trips to Middle Grove

 When I stepped out of the house this was what laying on the driveway.  My dad would say, "what a dumb place to take a nap".

The poor frog wasn't smashed so not sure how he died. Not that I know the gender. Mom was wearing her new socks this morning.

Sarah Reinhard bought them for her. Can anyone guess why? I left right after the walk, in fact we quit a little early so I was on the road by 8:00 am for the first trip to Middle Grove. Not knowing where the herd was I hiked straight up the hill in hopes they would be hanging around there but they weren't. I had to walk the ridge for quite a ways. They were all drowsing under the trees.

Rosalie was haltered and I started the long hike back dragging her. She didn't want to leave the herd and her filly wasn't following well until Irish and her colt came following. We made it almost to the trailer when Irish stopped. That made both foals stop. I thought it best to tie Rosalie to a tree, walk up and halter Irish and start leading her down and that was going well until Rosalie pulled back and broke her halter, then took off running back up the herd taking both foals with her. I decided to keep Irish and just put her in the trailer then hike back up for Rosalie.  I grabbed another halter out of the truck but when I got all the way back to the herd Soul was there waiting so she was haltered and we started down the hill again. Her filly followed well until we got close then took off up the hill for the herd so Soul was also put in the trailer with Irish and back up the hill I went for the 3rd time. This time Jury was waiting so Jury was chosen. This worked well as Jury's foal, Irish's foal and Soul's foal followed all the way down to the trailer. The trailer door was opened and Soul's filly jumped right in. Irish's colt took a while to get in, probably more than a half an hour but I wasn't in a hurry so just stood back with Jury and waited. Once those foals were loaded Jury was loaded and for the next THREE HOURS I waited for her colt to get in. Instead he found the salt block. Jury was a basket case calling for her colt who was ignoring her..

It was just too hot to leave the mares in the trailer much longer so I closed it up and drove out onto the road but before I could shut the gate the colt came running out of the field onto the road calling for his mom. Again I opened up the trailer door and again he refused to go in and ran back into the field. The gate was shut I took this load home, unloaded the horses, put Soul and Irish and their foals in the far paddock then put Jury in the 2 horse trailer and headed back to Middle Grove to pick up her colt. The round trip takes and hour and I was pleased he was still hanging around the gate when we arrived. This time when I opened the trailer door he jumped in and I was on the way home. Thank goodness for air conditioning. It was 91 degrees and humid.  They were put in with Indy and her filly.  At 2:00 pm my guests arrived and by 4:15 pm we were on our way back to Middle Grove. Mike met us there with the 4 wheeler found the herd so we drove back and got reasonably close before needing to hike.

The horses were all glad to see us.

I put a new halter on Rosalie and Mike led Lola to the trailer. Both mares loaded up well but their foals would not. We tried for about a half hour then decided to just take the mares. When we got back to Hanna City those two mares were hosed down, Rosalie put in the middle paddock and Lola loaded back for for the last trip out to Middle Grove. I arrived there by 6:50 pm, her colt jumped right in the trailer and I was on the way home by 7:00 pm. I snapped the picture below just as I was leaving Middle Grove for the last time today. 

I'll leave early in the morning with Rosalie and hopefully her filly will be so glad to see her mom she also jumps right in. Once home they were put in with Soul and her filly. Whiskey still needed to be teased and I got her successfully covered by Evan just before dark.  It is still probably a little early as she didn't stand well.