horses | Abernathy's Rabbitry

I know I posted a few weeks ago about Kermodie, the white horse I was going to lease. Well, that fell through and instead I am leasing a different horse at a different stable. His name is Forest and he’s a ten year old Andalusian/Appaloosa cross gelding. That Spanish blood seems to equal a lot of personality!

He’s a very fun horse to ride, and we went on our first big three-hour group ride today. I almost got my eye poked out by a wayward branch, but luckily dodged it just in time and only have a bloody gouge underneath it now. I’ll have to be more careful next time, as I use my eyes a lot and would like to hold on to them.

Forest was trained in reining and has been very responsive with me so far. He has a few quirks, he likes to lick your hand like a dog and he likes to try to nip my arms. We’ll have to work on that!

I have a horse! Technically this is not my horse, but I am now in the process of leasing him. He’s an American Quarter Horse, and used to be a working cow horse. His name is Kermodie. Isn’t he cute?

Today I learned how to ground work him on the lunge line, which was very interesting and empowering, since I’ve never lunged a horse before. He tested me a bit, but I soon had him transitioning from walk, to trot, to canter and back again very easily. He can be cold-backed, which means I’ll probably be lunging him before every ride. I don’t mind a bit.

I’m taking a few lessons first even though I’m an intermediate rider, just to brush up and demonstrate to the owner that I know what I’m doing out there. Then hopefully the goal is to get out on the trails. Modie doesn’t much care for only trotting around in circles and neither do I!

I’ll also be doing chores to help out with the lease, so I’ll be adding stall cleaning and paddock picking to my own farm chores at home. I can’t say I mind, I’ve always enjoyed horsey chores!