And today it's snowing

Yesterday I became concerned that Keo was acting a bit sluggish. I finally, after watching her while doing outside spring yard work, went out to the field and brought her in to our corral. I took her temperature and she seemed fine. In fact she actually perked up because the other three horses disappeared over the hill. So, I let her back across the road.

After talking with Jack we decided to move the horses off of the huge pasture and put them into a dry lot. The spring grass is coming in strong and I'm concerned about foundering.

In order to do this we needed to move 2 young cows, a bred heifer and two old cows out of the dry lot. Dry lot = no pasture or live grass. The youngest girl, S. helped us load up the young cows, heifer and calf. Then she and I caught the old cows with halters and walked them to a different field. I wish I had pictures. I'm sure if we had traffic at that time, they would have stopped for the entertainment value. I so love the cows that the girls have taken to shows. They are usually easy to catch and you can lead them anywhere.

After moving the cows S. and I worked hard at removing the round bale ring from the round bale. Okay, more explanation? A round bale is a giant hay bale that we feed the cows. In this case it is more than half gone so we are giving it to the horses. The round bale ring is placed around the hay to keep the cows from laying in their hay. Because they will. Then they defecate on it and won't eat it. No one said they were smart like that. The ring in question was for cows and not horses. Hmmm, you say? Cow bale rings have a top piece that if the horse put their heads through it enough, they will rub their manes off, and it won't grow back. In fact, last winter Gunner rubbed his hair off in a 6" area. Luckily it grew back, but that section of the main is now about 4" shorter than the rest. It drives my husband nutty, but hey, a woman has to care for her horses manes! Back to the story at hand. S. and I worked and worked at getting the bale ring off, but with no luck. The man then returned from delivering the young cows, heifer and calf and being THE MAN, walked over, lifted it up and rolled it away.

Next in the plan was to move the horses. S. had already caught Kelzon and was waiting for a lead rope. N. my oldest daughter saunted out of the house as only a 13 year old can do and asked what are you doing? Everyone left the house. I was practicing the flute and piano and no one was around! So the three of us went to catch the four horses. The man came and offered to help. This made all of us stop and stare at him. Have I mentioned he hates horses? So, off we go, horses in hand, except me, the horse whisper, who couldn't catch her horse. Darn if it hadn't started to rain at this point, and I GAVE up. Something I rarely do. Everyone who has horses knows you NEVER give up on catching a horse, or you will never catch them again. Gunner instead just followed the rest, again I wish I had pictures. It was a sight to see, The Man and his girls walking the horses.

To thank him I let him watch hockey last night despite the fact that Earl was on. By the way Wisconsin made it to the NCAA Hockey final four and after last night advanced to the championship game. Saturday night in Milwaukee, amoungst a mere 15,000 of their closest fans. Sadly we won't make it, but I will be calling the goalie a Sieve from my Uncle's bar...

So, now it's been raining non-stop, the horses are standing in 4" of muck and mud, and it just switched to snow. Sigh. Classy will likely get thrush before the weekend is out. Worry, worry, worry...