Who WAS That Masked Horse?!?!?

It's the Lone Ranger!


He was pretty good last night, but his favorite red-head, Paris, was in and it's like he was showing off for her. I had a hard time keeping his head forward on the rail. He kept turning in to watch her. She left and he got better. Lope was slower but I had a hard time making him drop his head.

After lots of interweb research and asking several horsey people, I decided to go with Thrush Buster. I gave a call to my vet friend but she's the busiest human being I know so she hasn't gotten back to me yet. I saw/heard conflicting advice about using bleach. Some people said it's fine, some people said it's bad for the rest of the live tissue, not just the bacteria. After reading lots of bottles I finally settled on the Thrush Buster. The only complaint I heard/read is the staining so I will try to be careful. The Thrush Buster had the longest application staying power at 8 days.

I ran to EquusNow this morning and picked up the Thrust Buster. It pays to shop around AND check the interwebs. Equus's website had it at 10.95, Rods at 15.95, we don't have a discount type farm store around and the little feed store in Uptown didn't have anything. The price AT Equus was the same as Rods but they gave me the web price anyway. I also picked up a Hood, a mane comb and a pulling comb. I have asked one of my students to help me pull his mane in April.

I was able to get to the barn with daylight to spare so I cleaned his feet out and led him out into the yard. Since the Thrush Buster is staining I thought the grass would be the safest place to do it. His hooves looked a TON better today and much dryer. I was able to pretty clearly see where the Thrush was so that's hopefully going to make sure I got it all covered.

He was content to eat grass while I worked but it wasn't comfortable for him to hold a front hoof up and eat so he just stood. I got a few littLe spots on my hand but I managed to avoid his socks! (The spots are almost gone after a good shower.) I waited a while and then made him step on a towel to make sure we wouldn't make purple tracks in the barn aisle.

He rode okay. He kept wanting to speed up to an extended trot when I asked him to move out to the rail. We did extended trot during the lesson on Wednesday and since then he's been really willing to move out, which is good for English, but it's a little annoying when I'm asking him to drift over NOT speed up. Hopefully KAT's work with him next week will help with that.

I spent a good while putting his mane in training brands. He stood fairly well. I wished I'd had a hay bag to put his hay into so I moved his Stall Ball/Treat thingy to where he was tied. He nibbled it a little. When I got close to the end he was clearly ready to be done with that game. I put his new hood on. Remember I was going to make one? Well, the cost of materials was higher than the cost of buying one new. Of course. I just got a plain black one with a metal zipper. I've heard that the plastic ones tend to break and the one I borrowed from KAT was broken. I'm worried about the metal zipper rubbing, but if it does I will stitch a wide panel of fleece into the inside and it should be fine.

He didn't seem to mind it being on and went back to munching his hay. He's awfully cute. The GINORMOUS eye holes on this particular hood look really funny with his wide blaze.

Here you can see how straight-up his man has gotten again and how the braids help smooth it down.


And here's that masked horse again!!!!! I don't know if you can tell but he's lost some of that chubby that he had in early winter. I CANNOT WAIT FOR IT TO BE WARM ENOUGH TO GIVE HIM A BATH!!!!!