HORSE TALES

Monday, August 13

Casey, above, is currently #1 on the I-hate-that-horse list. On our last visit she bucked off both Mitchell and Catherine, and on this visit she kicked and resisted all attempts to be guided.

Below left: Sox, Goldie, Casey and Pebbles in the corral.

Below right: Casey attempting to kick open the corral gate and gallop towards freedom.

What a day!! Steve and the kids went out this morning to clean the barn and corral. Surprisingly, it didn’t take long, and with that done, everybody wanted to ride the horses. One problem: no one had seen any of the horses since we arrived on Saturday. So the boys set out to find them. There are over 320 acres to the ranch and after a thorough search, no horses were found….just a downed fence! The horses were eventually found on someone else’s land and the long task of getting them back to Cedarosa began. I don’t know all the details but there was something about getting a truck stuck in the mud and it slipping down the side of an embankment with my 15 year-old behind the wheel. I’ll have to get details from the boys.

This is Mitchell's story...
Okay, this is what happened. Because of the recent flash flood that hit Cedarosa ranch, some of the fence around the property had been knocked down. So our brilliant horses decided to roam free and go wherever. So it was our task to locate them and guide them back to their home. Our search began on the back end of the property where we thought the hole in the fence was. We were in two “groups” which turned out to be me on the ATV and everyone else in the Chevy ranch truck. So I searched and searched over hills, going over all kinds of terrain and I finally reach the peak of a hill to look over the property and I see the truck stopped in the dirt with my dad and Brice standing outside and flagging me down. So I descend down from the hill to find out that the truck was stuck in about a foot and a half of mud. Because of the flood, the mud was ridiculously soft and squishy. So with all our might we try to shove the truck out of the mud with Catherine driving. Our first attempt failed, so after digging out some mud and using bags as traction, we finally emerge the truck from the mud. Unfortunately where Catherine was backing the truck there was a little bush, which made the truck tilt when she hit it, causing panic and mayhem. So, finally we got the truck out, but still no horses. So, everyone in the truck decide to go the freeway to find the horses and I look everywhere else. After about another 45 minutes they call saying they’ve found them, about a mile and half down the freeway, on someone else’s property. So a plan emerges, we pack up two saddles, the four wheeler, a bail of hay and two trucks. After driving over to the property, finding the horses, saddling up one of them to lead the others, we start our adventure. My father and I embark on a grand mission. We have to guide these horses over rough terrain, ditches, soft dirt, rocks and everything in between, on foot and on a 4 wheeler. All this with my uncle yelling at us from the freeway telling us what to do! So, through another good hour we manage to get up to the fence line, but there’s no gate, so we had to make shift one by shoving down one of the poles. But we’re still stuck on someone else’s property and we still can’t get these stupid horses on to ours. So to make this ridiculously long story shorter, we cut some fences, yell at horses, drive more trucks, tip the ATV yell at each other, mend the fences lead the horses back and finally collapse at home after a long, but eventually successful mission. It was the longest “chore” I have ever done at Cedarosa and I am not ready to do it again anytime soon. On the bright side, my farmer’s tan got much worse turning it into a “rancher’s tan”!

Goldie, the eldest of the six horses.
This is Sophie.

To the right are Sophie and Joshua.