Tiki and Friends!

Emilie, Kim and Devinne all pose with Tiki in preparation for her debut in her Tiki Party in September....we spent tons of time in the field and stall with her cuddling and playing. She eats up every minute of it!

Kim getting a hug from Tiki :-)

Emilie hugging Tiki

Devinne and Tiki practicing sitting

Jumping with Tiki

Pics to go with the story ;-)

One Very Extraordinary Filly

So over the past couple weeks as I've gotten to know Tiki I've discovered she's a very extraordinary filly. She is like no other foal I've worked with in intelligence and heart. She is quite literally the sweetest creature I've ever known. She is so bonded to me she whinnies when I walk in the barn, stands at her stall door and puts her nose out for me, and whinnies whenever I leave. She tracks me constantly, looking wherever I am when she's turned out. She doesn't have any playmates, so her focus might very well just be due to loneliness and wanting someone to play with. My friends, when they visit, will go in the field and we all just sit indian style in a circle in the middle of the field. Give it 30 seconds and she's right over in the middle of the group. 9 times out of 10 she's standing over me, playing with my hair, licking my cheek, "hugging" me with her neck and it's been noticed by the group over and over that while they all want to play with her, she clearly chooses me over everyone else to play with. Of course, we're enforcing manners--not letting her bite or paw at us, walk over us, or be aggressive in playing with us. At one week old she already figured out her boundaries with playing. She'll canter right up to you while you sit calmly and skids to a stop at a safe distance from your feet :-) This, short of her constant want to be around humans, is pretty normal stuff.

What I'm starting to really see is her intelligence at problem solving and trust level. If we're out in the pasture together and I'm scratching her or just hanging out in the pasture sitting with her while she grazes nearby, if Mona alarms at a sound next door or nearby, putting her head up, stiffening up and snorting, Tiki looks at me. If I'm not concerned, her demeanor doesn't change at all and she continues what she's doing. If she does get alarmed for some reason, she's equally chosen running to Mona as much as running to hide behind me. Devinne, a vet student who has done TONS of repro work and has handled tons of foals, was stunned at her "circle of trust"--the radius that Tiki feels comfortable moving away from Mona, especially if it's in an area she's not familiar with. A foal of her age will usually stay within 10 feet of mom. Tiki will happily follow me up to 50 feet away from Mona while free in the pasture. In a halter and lead, at two weeks old, not even needing the figure 8 rope around her butt anymore, she'll walk with me pretty much wherever I want outside the pasture already. Devinne was able to lead her into an area she had never been before, with Mona grazing nearby, about 30 feet away.

She's already working very competently in halter. Most foals at this age I'm still figure 8-ing and they're not as confirmed as her in leadwork until at least a month. I took her out back in our grass "ring" and showed her poles and jumps for the first time. After a couple "hell NO I'm not walking over that pole" moments, and me just waiting at the end of the lead rope for her to figure out what I wanted, she walked over them with no problem. I then put the pole about 6 inches high and asked her to jump over them. I've done this with foals, but not normally until they're a couple months old. It was the first time I ever worked with her with a dressage whip and she completely understood what I was asking for. All training is pressure-release-from-pressure, and she's already mastered that concept. She's shown her stubborn streak and the fact she's more willing to lay down and stop listening completely in a temper tantrum than give in, but I've figured out how to work around that already. Things do have to be presented as something for her to figure out or be her idea. I've seen her need to "discover" the answer to the question you're asking and approach her that way now. The great part is while she can be frustratingly stubborn when she doesn't understand, once she does the right thing she LIVES to be praised. Once she figured out that I wanted her to go over the poles, she FLEW over them in a big show and then got to the other side, waited to be hugged and scratched, and then danced at the end of the lead in joy that she "got it right". She was SO obviously proud of herself. Then as we walked past the jump, she pulled to go over it again and couldn't wait to do more. We only did 6 jumps total, but she was incredibly happy and proud of herself, it was so funny to see. Her rapid cognitive ability to figure out what was expected of her and then repeating it was really impressive. I've seen foals learn, but we all clearly witnessed her get it right once and then clearly repeat and want to repeat over and over.

She already sits on the beanbag like a pro and anyone can sit her down on it and sit next to her. I got her a small ball and am starting to teach her how to play with it. So far on the first try, I can kick it a few feet and get her to follow it and touch it. She then waits for a scratch as a reward. We've already set a small saddle on her back (she didn't care), saddlepads, jingle bells, towels, lead ropes, hats, whatever you do to her she doesn't care. Complete and total trust. She already flysprays and bathes like a champ, (she turns three weeks old tomorrow), has had her first farrier trim and did great, clips, and stands quiet for the halter to be put on and taken off in the stall and in the field.

She is truly a little ray of sunshine. She loves EVERYONE. She's hard to walk away from. She'll lick you on the cheek and "hug" you with her neck forever. She loves to tickle people with her upper lip and has already learned that nipping people is BAD, so she's very gentle when she comes up and wants to be scratched and groomed and groom you back. I am constantly floored at the outpouring of love from such a little body, and her eyes are a thousand years old. She is so wise beyond her years already, it's somewhat spooky looking at such mature and wise eyes in such a tiny foal. While I am sad that Eddie is gone, I am grateful to have Tiki as his legacy. I'm not sure I've ever been so unconditionally loved by a horse before. It is a strange and wonderful experience. I hope she doesn't grow out of her super-friendly, super-loving self.

The Itch Fixer

I've decided that Tiki's title for me is not Mom #2 or Second Mom, it's The Itch Fixer. I may regret this later in life, but for now, I don't mind the title. It started a few days ago when we were doing our 24/7 vigil on her trying to get her through her impaction. She obviously was having trouble and was biting at her sides, but she also was simply itchy in several places. I was sitting on the beanbag in the stall while she was trying to itch her stifle and told her "come here and I'll fix it for you". She promptly marched right over and presented her side to me and I scratched it for her. She then began to point to a bunch of different places with her nose and her hind hoof and I scratched them all. Mona thought this was an awesome new service I was providing and walked over, used her nose to point to her front leg, chewed it a little and then presented it to me to scratch. I sighed, and started scratching the leg. She then pointed to her hip etc. So I ended up standing between the two of them in the middle of the stall, scratching Mona's hip while she was scratching Tiki's butt and Tiki was scratching (best as she can with no teeth) my leg for me. I was just laughing so hard while the itch "circle" was going on. Now, when Tiki has an itch, she just comes up and points to it and waits. Now, I know this isn't all that unusual, but I still find it really funny to experience it.

So this morning as I'm cleaning their stall Tiki comes up to me and points to the dock of her tail and waits. I dutifully scratch her, since I am The Itch Fixer now, and go back to cleaning the stall. I lean behind the other side of Mom to clean up a pile and feel this presence next to me. Tiki has walked up behind me. She taps me gently on my back with her nose to get my attention, I turn to her, eye to eye, and she reaches out and briefly licks my cheek, like a little kiss. It just seemed so much like "Thanks Mom!" Now, the logical side of me knows she's just a foal being a foal, but my heartstrings tugged, I giggled, and just looked her straight in the eye and said "you're welcome".

The All Night Mineral Oil Vigil Worked!!

Tiki was finally able to go on her own at 2am and 6am. It's so soft it's actually a little runny now. Guess she doesn't need any more mineral oil :). But she's no longer acting colicky. No more straining to go, no more stamping her back legs and constant up-down trying to get comfortable. She's happily snoring and whinnying away in my lap as I type this on my phone. I swear I've never seen a foal dream so much or be so noisy in them. Give her 1 minute of a nap and she's twitching, mouthing, snorting, grunting, and whinnying in her sleep. Right now her head is in my left hand on my lap and she's snoring. I've raised a lot of foals, but nothing like her. She whinnies for you when you walk away and waits at the door hoping you return soon. She beams when I walk in the door and waits for me to scratch her and cradle her head in my hands and play with her ears. She lives to cuddle and loves when you sit next to her when she's laying down. She thinks human pillows ROCK lol! She LOVES water. LOVES it. She's facinated with it and was already drinking little slurps out of the water trough her first day of turnout. When I fill the water buckets in her stall she plays in the water and watches it swirl with undivided attention. She stamps her front feet in excitement and I have a feeling she'll be trying to get them IN the water buckets soon. And she LOVED the hose when we gave her a bath on day 2. It was 105 degree heat index that day and we needed to get the milk, afterbirth etc off moms legs so we took them in the wash rack. She was so fascinated by moms bath we gave her an impromptu one too. She loved every minute. She is an odd little duck but in a great way-she seems to find incredible joy in every new discovery. It's funny to watch her.

Our first scare with Tiki

She's been having a little bit of trouble passing manure on her own. She's 5 days old today. She had hard stools a couple days ago but then seemed better. Tonight when I brought her in from her first full hour of turnout she was constipated and can't pass any manure on her own now. I gently used my finger to pull out what I could, and it was very soft, odd consistancy and color, tinged with a little blood. Tried enemas but unlike her merconium enema that went in fine, this was like it hit a wall and came right back out. Seems she's impacted right near the rectum and can't push it out. Vet will be here in the am, until then i'm pulling an all nighter in her stall and giving her 20ccs of mineral oil orally every 2 hours on vets orders to try to soften it up. Tiki is uncomfortable, but sleeping and nursing fairly normally. She's actually dreaming as I type this on my phone and whinnying in her sleep. She dreams alot and whinnies all the time :) It will be an all-nighter. Kim and Anne-Marie are on their way to help keep vigil overnight and help give her her mineral oil oral dose treatments.

Tiki's first real day out!!!

So, even though little Tiki is a bit down on her pasterns, especially the right hind, the vet said it was ok to go ahead and give her a little bit of turnout. We had let her go out yesterday for a few minutes to try to straighten her legs out on her own. Gosh knows she's been folded up inside Mona so long!! We're supposed to get a boot in the morning to put on her RH foot to help prop it up and strengthen it. She has to spend two days in the boot with it taped on, and then she's good to go! Joe took pics while Kim and I encouraged a little movement.

The fun of imprinting!!

I do a ton of imprinting, so by day two she has already had a bath, had a saddlepad with jingle bells on her, halter, leadropes all around her, sits on a beanbag, lays down with you, picks up all hooves etc. Her mother, a maiden, is completely ok with everything--just enough concern to be a wonderful mother without being too possessive. Even when Tiki was walking around the stall with a towel, jingle bell necklace, saddlepad, and more jingle bells draped over her back, Mona just looked on. As for Tiki, so far she puts up with everything we do to her!


Mona's legs were incredibly dirty and crusted from the foaling. We took her and Tiki into the wash stall to hose Mona's legs off. The temperature was in the mid 90's, and when Tiki was born it was 105 heat index two days prior. While washing Mona, we decided to spray Tiki off a little, and it grew from there. Well, we got her wet, why don't we try some soap and see if she'll stand well for that?? Well, she's handling that, let's see if we can spray her off? Short of not liking the water spraying on her back legs and kicking out at the wall a little, she handled the experience like a champ. Anne-Marie was taking the pic of Tiki and I started laughing and said "Wait a minute!" I took a big glob of suds and stuck them right on Tiki's nose. Had to laugh, she didn't care one bit, but it made for a hilarious picture and we were laughing hard at how chagrined she looked standing there with soap on her face!


On Day 1, I was showing her how to "sit" on the beanbag and she's been living with it in her stall ever since. The photo below was her first attempt. The photo above is one of my favorites! One of the points of teaching the "sit down" to a foal is to have the ability to quietly lie them down for the vet or farrier if you need to for any reason. The bonus is having a little foal that will sleep on you and curl up and nap with you whenever you want!

Our fun with Tiki--we put a rainbow colored jingle necklace on her, tied a towel around her neck, threw a saddlepad on her, put little rainbow-colored bands in her mane, and draped large jingle bells over her back. We tried all this on Mona first while she watched with interest, and then put one thing on her at a time. Anne-Marie and I then played "pass the football" with her to turn her around and have her walk towards the next person to "catch" her so she could experience movement with all these things draped around her and making noise. She took it all in in her typical "college try" way. Almost like she shrugs her shoulders and says "well, this is weird, but okaaaayyyyyy...." She thinks we're great fun to play with, and I guess by these pictures you can see the feeling is mutual!

The post foaling excitement

We had an eventful morning finding Tiki in the field resting next to Mona, who was standing guard over her. She looked like a small brown log next to Mona's feet. My morning consisted of the dreaded "Mona had her baby last night..." call--even though we ALL looked her over extensively the night before and she didn't show a single sign of impending foaling. Her milk hadn't let down, couldn't express a drop, tailhead was tight, etc etc, so she was turned out in the field for the night. I ran out to the field repeating over and over to myself "Please let the foal be alive and Mona ok". I felt like I was running through water to get out to them and inspect them both. Mona had miraculously (for a friesian) fully passed her placenta. Tiki walked right up to us, fearless, and we quickly shuffled them into the barn. Tiki had extremely lax pasterns, so I had to really support her and help her walk as we navigated the field. She showed no signs of having nursed and seemed slow, so after calling the vet, close watch was kept on her and Mona. Her IGG levels were good, but she had a weak suckle reflex and no concept of nursing from mom.

After all of us taking turns for hours milking Mona out and trying to teach Tiki how to nurse from a bottle, we finally had success around 12+ hours after she likely had foaled. We had several friends helping (see Scott nursing Tiki at right and Kim trying to teach her to nurse from Mona above). While the first priority was getting Tiki to nurse her colostrum, the priority quickly shifted to Mona, who was showing the beginning signs of a post-foaling colic or possible uterine bleed. Her heart rate was elevated, she was in clear pain, and was biting at her sides, pawing the ground, and up and down. Her eyes were glazed over, and the vet was called out again to look her over and palpate her. She had a slight impaction right at the end of her intestinal track which the vet cleared. Hoping the problem was caused by Tiki's lack of nursing, we hand milked Mona out more, put warm compresses on her udders, gave her a couple doses of Banamine, and just kept vigil on her.

At around 5pm, one milestone was finally passed--Tiki NURSED ON HER OWN. We thought for sure we were going to have to bottle feed our "slow" filly for the first 48 hours until she caught on. We were already divvying up shifts for the night, since she was going to have to be fed hourly overnight. So, we relaxed, watched a movie, watched the horses on the the webcam from the living room at the same time, and let Mona and Tiki bond.

Mona was still not passing any manure, though she seemed a little less painful as the night went on. Kim, Anne-Marie and I went back into the stall to play with Tiki more and check on Mona. We all hung out for a long time, sitting on the beanbag, petting the horses, watching for further colic signs, checking vitals etc. Finally, around 10pm, we notice Mona seems restless and hanging by the corner of her stall where she tends to go. Anne-Marie and I pick up on it and feel like maybe Mona needs us to leave, so we packed up all the stuff around the stall, walked up to the house and stared at the camera. Less than 5 minutes goes by and her tail lifts :-) WE HAVE POO!

That was the last thing we were all worried about. We celebrate--glasses of wine, etc and all give a collective sigh of relief.

A Chestnut Warlander Enters the World!

Well, it's been a long year and I've been waiting to post this---our Warlander filly, by my Andalusian stallion, out of my friesian mare was born on Tues morning. Her sire's name was Masetto, so we named her Mas Tequila, and call her Tiki for short. She's a chestnut with her sire's exact markings--1 white sock, some white hairs in a crescent on her forehead, a dorsal stripe and looks like she'll probably have his wither and leg barring. We're very excited--she's the sweetest filly, loves people, and is a joy to be around (for now.....she IS a redhead so this may change LOL)


This is her sire, Masetto. He was bred by Sarah Hollis of Tintagel Andalusians. He sadly passed away in December of 2009, shortly after he was bred to Mona Lisa, our friesian mare, and Ariana RL, our andalusian mare. Ariana lost the foal in March 2010, so the result of the breeding from Mona and Masetto (nicknamed "Eddie") will be the only progeny ever produced from this special stallion. We have since sold Mona to our friend Anne-Marie, who is very much her soulmate. Mona and Tiki are boarded with us until it's time to wean in December. The fun of a late bred mare!