Tiki and the Weedeater

I've discovered there is a problem with bombproofing too much. Horses begin to lose their healthy respect for things that can hurt them. There's something to be said for flight instincts and common sense. Tiki, unfortunately, has neither. She is extremely trusting, almost to a fault. This is a wonderful trait when you're trying to get her to do something--"Here, Tiki, you really DO want to walk on this tarp!!" but isn't the greatest of attributes when trying to keep her unhurt and alive.....

Case in point:
Before the Tiki party in September, Joe, Kim, Anne-Marie and I were cleaning up around the farm like crazed landscapers. We weeded gardens, put away clutter in the barn, mowed, cleared off the back porch, the deck, and the addition. We had a trash company come in and haul away some of the leftovers from our deadbeat tenants who had moved out in March of this year and left behind large trash items. Tiki watched with interest as cars and large trucks paraded up and down the driveway. She observed us rushing around the farm with trash bags, tossing doors and trash off the deck, and Joe careening around front lawn mowing at 12 mph :-)

In the interest of neatness, I grabbed the weedwhacker and attacked the barn perimeter. I weedwhacked around the back and side of the barn, the back porch, the deck, and headed for the fenceline. In typical Tiki fashion, she saw me walking up the fenceline with a loud whining weedwhacker in hand and started inching towards me. Hoping to beat her curiosity, I started going faster down the fence. I would mow down a section, she would take a few more brave steps towards me, ears perked up and tail wagging like a dog.

By the time I got to the corner of the field, she was closing in fast, taking more steps across the field faster than I could trim with the string. She was now within 15 feet of me and I was imagining a stone being thrown and uncannily finding her eyeball. All of my mother's sage advice from my childhood about not running with scissors and all the various things that could mysteriously poke my eye out came flooding back to me. I could see it already--Tiki sporting an eye patch and me greeting the guests the next day: "Yes, this is the Tiki Party. You made it to the right place! The thing is, we decided to change it to a Pirate Party! Tiki---can you say 'ARRRRRRRR!?'"

It was obvious Tiki was not going to scram, even with my pitiful attempts to jump up and down with a running wheedwhacker in hand, scream over the din of the engine, and wave my remaining hand in the air like a maniac. She thought my antics were quite amusing and wanted to come up and tell me so! NOOOOOOOOOO Tiki! So, I sighed and walked away, weedwhacker idling, and found another lawn patch to attack instead. I guess I don't need to do any bombproofing training with lawn equipment any time soon.......

Play Ball!

So, one of the goals I have with Tiki to engage her sense of play is to teach her how to play with a ball. I was excited, ordered a small/medium sized ball from PetSmart (COUPON!!! WHOO-WHOO!) and ripped open the box with delight when it came. I envisioned Tiki and I, much like I did with her sire, out in the pasture happily playing ball with each other within days. Sure, it was a trained behavior, but Eddie loved to play and would joyfully run over and stomp on, grab, or carry anything you pointed him at. Hats, zippered jackets, climbing on steps and benches, large and small balls--anything amused him. So, I thought for sure this would be a score for Tiki. Finally, she'd have something and someone to play with.

Boy was I wrong. I go bounding out to the pasture with the ball in hand. I open the gate and as per usual, she comes running up to me expectantly. "LOOK TIKI! A PLAYTOY!" I tell her, proudly holding it out to her nose to sniff. She snorted at me derisively and took off bucking across the field. She was not impressed. I was deflated, but not defeated. I walk off after her, put the ball on the ground and punt it in her and Mona's general direction. It rolls underneath Mona's feet and touches her feathers. Suddenly, it was like Mona was prodded with a hot poker by her legs. She snorts, springs about 2 feet off the ground, lands next to the ball with legs going a million miles a minute and runs at full speed across the field. Tiki, shocked at her mother's sudden and explosive dismay, joins her in her frantic flight from the Ball of Death. NOT a good introduction to the object that is supposed to be hours of entertainment.

I felt like a parent that had been duped by the glitzy kid commercials played ad naseum during Saturday morning cartoons. It rolls! It bounces! Your kids will love it! She likely would have been more amused by the box and bubblewrap, like most toddlers.

I sighed, grabbed the ball, and walked over to the horses. Tiki stared at the monster I was holding, snorting and shaking while Mona grazed. Food, to a friesian, is often higher on the priority list than the lions they must run from in the survival chain. I wondered how many friesians, if in a predator-driven environment, would succumb to their appetites versus stay alive. I imagined a herd of friesians in a particularly tasty part of an African plain, grazing quietly while a lion stalks them. The lion leaps out, roaring, and while most of the friesians immediately take flight, two of them stand there and discuss the options with mouths full of green grass. "You gonna run, Jimbo?" "Nah, I haven't had grass this delicious for at least a day". "Yeah, I'm with you--my stomach's pretty full and these blades ro......." Lion: CHOMP. No wonder friesians were almost extinct, right??

I was determined that Tiki was going to play with the ball. I let her sniff it all over, made it make noise, and bopped it around on the ground in front of her. She walked away and went back to pretending to graze. That's the most insulting part. She's not even grazing. She doesn't really have much in the way of teeth yet, and she's not chewing and swallowing grass. She's just mimicking mom as she sees her grazing in the field. It was akin to a child pretending to sleep to ignore you. I rolled the ball in front of her legs and, curious, she touched it with her nose as it passed by. "GOOD GIRL!" I yell and walk up to scratch her as a reward. She stares at me in confusion. Why did I make such a big deal out of this all of a sudden?? Remembering my trick training and target training days, I roll the ball again, holding my breath and waiting for the moment for her to stretch her neck out as it goes by her nose and touch it again, poised to praise. As expected, she reached for the ball as it rolled by and again I yelled "GOOD GIRL!!" and walked over to scratch her in her favorite places, making a huge deal out of her. I was watching the light bulb in her head slowly begin to turn on.

This went on for about 5 minutes--the average baby horse attention span--with me repeatedly rolling the ball by her, praising the moment she made any move towards it, and scratching her with vigor for every attempt to touch it. After the first few punts, trying to make her take a step towards it, I started kicking it a little further away from her. At this point, her interest completely waned and I began to play a pathetic game of kickball with myself in the middle of the field. People driving by were staring at me as I went from kicking a ball to a ghost opponent in a field peppered with manure piles to pleading eye to eye with a small foal to please touch the ball. At this point I decide to pack the ball up and leave with my dignity only slightly degraded.

The next day, I march doggedly out to the field to try this again. Hoping to pick up where I left off, I walk into the field, set the ball on the ground, and punt it towards Tiki. I wait expectantly as it rolls towards her and gets closer to her legs, hoping for a repeat of yesterday's behavior so that I can praise and scratch her. Much like a slow motion horror film sequence I watch as she turns toward the oncoming Ball Of Death and a look of terror spreads across her face. She leaps into the air to escape the ball and sprints behind Mom to hide. Peeking around Mona's shoulder, she watches as I walk towards her, determined, ball in hand. I again go through re-introducing the ball, letting her sniff it, touch it etc. Again I roll it past her nose and wait with baited breath to praise her for touching it. Gotta start somewhere, right? She reached, I praise, I pet. Finally, I walk a little distance away and roll it in a way she has to take a step towards it to touch it. The ball gets close, goes past her, and stops a short distance from her. She looks at me, cranes her neck toward the ball and takes a tentative step towards it. "GOOOOOOOD GIIIIIIIRL!" I squeal and run up to her to scratch her. She startles, puzzled, and scratches me back as I itch her withers. I make it an extra long scratch for her and make a huge fuss over her. The lightbulb shines bright now. I roll the ball further and further away from her, forcing her to have to take more and more steps to touch the ball with her nose.

At this point, I'm thrilled. Is Tiki going to take over Pele's position with the Cosmos? No. But, I have her consistently walking over and touching the ball. She was loving all the scratching and attention, so I felt this was going well. As with most training and small attention spans, her attention span burnt out quickly and I had to wait until the following day to continue trying to teach her about the ball. The next day we were able to start right where we left off. Tiki is very motivated by any attention, so it was great to have something she felt it was worth it to work for.

What I didn't expect, though, was what happened next. The parent and child relationship reversed. Here I was, like a kid, gleefully kicking the ball in the field for Tiki to walk up to and touch. Whenever she touched it, I jumped up and down, squealed with happiness and ran over to pet her. Tiki, channeling a patient mother playing with her toddler, began to watch the ball roll by, look at me, sigh, put her head down and walk over to the ball. She would touch the ball and stand expectantly for her scratches. I've never felt more condescended by a foal in my life. She was humoring me.

After this episode, I've decided that Tiki can take the damned ball and stuff it. I'm sure she thinks the same of me as well, so we've agreed to table the attempt to play ball for now. Maybe we'll approach it again at a later date, but for now she'll just need to amuse herself by pretending to graze......

One month old....growing up!

She's looking very mature now! More like a red friesian now than an andalusian......

It's amazing to see her filling out, getting bigger, and getting more bone on her. She really is starting to have big knees and starting to grow into those legs of hers! I don't have to bend over quite as much to give her a hug, and when she puts her little head up at me to stare into my eyes lays it on my chest/shoulder so I can pet her head, her chin now rests on my shoulder.

If I get down on one knee now, she towers over me like a giant. I call it "Attack of the Giant Baby!!" Thankfully, she's gentle (most days, unless she's got a ton of pent up energy and wants to play) and I've been reinforcing boundaries to her. She needs to know humans CAN be her playmates, but THEY ARE SOFT AND SQUISHY, GET HURT EASY and ALWAYS must be allowed to win. (big grin) She also is learning that she must be INVITED to play (more on that in the next post). She can ask, but she may be told NO by a human. And she has to ask NICELY!!!

Her legs are finally starting to straighten out a bit, and while she's still on restricted turnout, she's less over-at-the-knees than she had been after turnout. Her chest is getting wide, and she's got a great foreleg-to-chest connection. While she's a bit close behind, which I do not like, I'm hoping that straightens out as well as she grows in these next couple months.

No matter what, I am still amazed at the deep wisdom in her eyes. She is truly an old soul.

Early shedding is looking like she may shed out to be a liver chestnut (sigh) or even a black chestnut. Her "adult coat" that seems to be growing in underneath a few scratches is VERY VERY dark. I've gotten used to her red-ness (which happily was starting to get as deep red as her sire's coat!), and she gets deeper and deeper red daily. So, knowing she may end up being a strange dark-red-brown color makes me sad, but I've learned to look past her odd coloring. It would be a neat color genetics conversation starter if she shed to black chestnut--very black-looking with dark red points-- like this morgan stallion:


Eh, who knows? What will be will be.....

Swimming with the sharks

So, it's Tiki's first day out with an adult horse. I have to admit, Doc isn't much of a shark. Normally, "baby's first day with adults" is a swimming with the sharks moment, where the babies stick close to mom, and the adult horses swirl around them like curious sharks. Or, with a bold baby, you have the role reversal moment where the baby stalks the adults, who are running away from the protective mothers. DON'T YOU TOUCH MY BABY!!

So.........you take a wild guess as to which situation this is......

"Hey look!! A new horse in the field!!"

"My name's Tiki! What's yours??"

Mona: "GET AWAY FROM MY BABY!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Now, as babies are wont to do....SOMETIMES the bold and smart ones figure out that they can get their new pasturemate in trouble by "baiting" them to incite Mom into thundering over to beat the crap out of them. We had a colt named Gossamer who was famous for this--truly his favorite trick. He would stalk the unsuspecting adult grazing nearby, walk slowly but very deliberately up to the adult horse, one eye on Mom, one eye on the target. Once within a few feet of the horse, Mom gallops over, teeth bared, ears pinned, wheels around and begins firing with her back legs.

Tiki is beginning to master this art......

Tiki: "MOOOOMMMMM! Doc's touching me!!!"
Doc: *SIGH* "Kids......."

Appreciating Mist

It's a small thing, really, but when I was cleaning Tiki's stall this morning, there was a gentle mist rolling in from the field. She stood with her head hanging out over the wheelbarrow, observing the world around her while I picked her and Mona's stall out as Mona munched on her breakfast. Being only a month old, Tiki still has very little interest in the vittles that Mom will just about tear a stall apart for every morning. She and I have a solemn pact worked out when it comes to stall pickout time in the morning--she is allowed to casually look around the barn with her head out of the stall (a rare treat) as long as she stands quietly at the wheelbarrow. No escape attempts are tolerated. If I see her body tense or her little back legs start to come under her like she's thinking about a flying leap (something she tried only ONCE) I come flying at her with the pitchfork tines pointed at her chest, screaming like a banshee, so fast it makes her head spin. So, as long as she's quiet and relaxed, we enjoy some relaxed bonding time together in the morning. Me, picking her stall out and listening to the birds, and her, poking her head over the wheelbarrow, watching the cats and looking outside. Occasionally the siren song of the outside world is drowned out by her desire to follow me around the stall like a dog and play with me while I clean :-) This morning, though, she was looking particularly pensive as she stared into the field. I realized as I was removing the wheelbarrow from the front of the stall and stood next to her that she was staring at the mist rolling in from the field. She had never seen anything like that before and was just fascinated by the movement in the fog as it swirled. I stood quietly next to her for a few minutes, taking in the sight, and listening to Pepper lapping up water from her water bowl in the otherwise eerily silent barn and realized that my friend was right. A big part of my journey with Tiki is to see things through her eyes for the first time, slow down, and appreciate the wonder of her world around me.

Tiki Party!!!!

I LOVE MY TIKI :-)

So, it was our Warlander filly Tiki's 1 month birthday on Sept 10, and SO many of our friends wanted to come meet her after she was born, that we held a Tiki Party in her honor. We had about 40+ people, decorated our deck, our bar, and the barn in Tiki/tropical decor and had a great time :-) Tiki lights were everywhere! Mona and Tiki have been WONDERFUL about having a lot of people milling about in their stall, meeting and greeting them. They're awesome ambassadors for the breeds. In true friesian fashion, they took the festivities completely in stride. We decided for fun we'd give everyone a Hawaiian lei as they arrived and have them sit with Tiki on the beanbag in her stall and pose for a photo. Well, after I started telling friends about our plan, it really took off from there. Can she wear a lei? How about a grass skirt? What about a backdrop? Even when our wonderful friend Lisa (I bred and sold her her Otte filly) came over to make a backdrop for photos in their stall, the horses didn't blink an eye as we assembled it in their stall. Lisa used large rolls of colored paper to create a beach scene with palm trees, coconuts, and a boat in the background called "Leaky Tiki" (remember Adventures in Paradise with the schooner??). Little Tiki pees so much that her nickname has become Leaky Tiki :-). I got a little grass skirt from the party store and put it around her neck for the photos, and put the lei around her ears as a cute headdress. She loved every minute of it! She's such a diva, she loved playing dress-up and posing with the guests. She was so patient, quiet, and well-behaved with all the non-horsie people from work who came up to our house for the first time to see what all the excitement was about. We even had a few family photos taken with Tiki. I was so proud of how still, gentle and good she was with the little kids who came up to pet her and sit with her. I told her there was a special place in heaven for her for being so good! And gosh knows, she'll put up with nearly anything. It was less like having a horse with you than having a large stuffed animal or a really big dog hanging out with friends. We know she'll only be this little once, so we're taking full advantage of her cute-ness LOL!

We had a ton of fun, people LOVED meeting our little angel filly, and it was a great experience we'll never forget.

Tiki N Emilie

Tiki, Angie, Brenna and her new baby brother Paul

Tiki and Ray Luellen pose with his girls