|
Post by schwung on Nov 2, 2005 19:02:34 GMT -5
Vanity Fair was the very first horse sponsored by the generous donations of Chronicle of the Horse (COTH) bulletin board members, which later became its own rescue group - SAFE. Vanity Fair is a lovely chestnut Thoroughbred mare, around 15-20 years old, 16.1 hands. She has an unreadable tattoo, so probably raced in her younger years and then became a broodmare. She was discarded at the feedlot when her last breeding failed to produce a pregnancy. Vanna appeared to have been in good health when she arrived at the feedlot, but the sudden access to free-choice alfalfa and stress on her system caused her to founder. When Vanna came to me she had lost a lot of weight, had abcesses in both front feet, and mild rotation. She spent her first several weeks with me in miserable pain, rocking back on her heels, before the abcesses resolved and we were on the road to recovery. Vanna is now 100% sound and starting a third career as a dressage horse. She has beautiful movement and an exceptional temperment. She is a very kind, quiet, thinking mare - the type that will excel in dressage. She has been adopted by her foster mom, Jaime, where she will hopefully become a spokeshorse for rescue animals. More photos of Vanna are here: photobucket.com/albums/b144/schwung/Vanity%20Fair/
|
|
|
Post by schwung on Jan 7, 2006 17:52:40 GMT -5
Inspired by the recent success of bryn in identifying her Kona, I am embarking upon a similar journey myself for Vanna. I have am positive of all but one digit of her tattoo - and she is definately an "S" mare making her born in 1989, turning 17 this year. Wish me luck on getting a match with a chestnut mare with a big wide blaze when I call the Jockey Club!
|
|
|
Post by safehorses on Jan 8, 2006 0:01:24 GMT -5
Good luck Schwung! I hope your search ends as well as Bryn's seems to have. I love these stories...they always choke me up.
|
|
|
Post by falseimpression on Jan 8, 2006 0:15:44 GMT -5
Good luck Schwung and Vanna! She is so beautiful ...
|
|
|
Post by critterseverywhere on Jan 9, 2006 10:26:04 GMT -5
Good luck!
As far as tracing her through her tattoo, I seem to remember a discussion over on the COTH racing forum on how to bring up hard-to-read tats. Black light maybe? I know that several occassions people have posted pictures of tatoos that were totally unreadable in my view & several regulars over there said "oh, that one isn't too bad...it's XYZ and here's her records"
Might be worth a try!
|
|
|
Post by schwung on Oct 2, 2006 1:22:20 GMT -5
|
|
|
Post by schwung on Jan 29, 2007 1:25:35 GMT -5
Vanna went on her first trail ride! It was a beautiful day and a great day to hit the trails. I decided to see how Vanna would do on the trails, so we went to Lords Hill Park. She was SO GOOD! Just her usual mellow self. I went with our wonderful SAFE volunteer Allison who was riding my 19 year old TB gelding Crafty. He's a "seasoned" trail horse....yet 10 feet down the trail he balked over a little tiny ledge he had to walk down, and Vanna bravely walked right over it...ditto on the scary wooden bridges Crafty refused to go over, she just marched on over like it was no big deal at all. The only bad part is she wasn't shod and these particular trails were rather rocky, so she was having a bit of trouble with them. They were also quite hilly and she is very out of shape so we mostly walked and only were out for about an hour. She got very sweaty, but I was so proud of her! Here we are. I look about 10 years old in this picture (darn helmet!): Here's Allison and Crafty: After the ride:
|
|
|
Post by averyacres on Jan 29, 2007 14:31:56 GMT -5
I am SO happy to see you wearing a helmet! You look great! How fun to go play-what a good girl Vanna is.
|
|
|
Post by schwung on Jan 29, 2007 14:40:49 GMT -5
Haha...I wear one when needed...since I had no idea how Vanna would be out on the trail, it was definately a helmet-required day.
|
|
|
Post by diamondindykin on Jan 29, 2007 15:11:11 GMT -5
Wow that looks like so much fun!! Summer is just right around the corner ;D
|
|
|
Post by cardicorgi on Jan 29, 2007 17:55:59 GMT -5
All of you look so bright and happy! (Horses and hu-mons both!) And of course you KNOW I am happy to see the helmet... Is this place near your house? It looks nice!
|
|
|
Post by schwung on Jan 29, 2007 18:49:58 GMT -5
Its not too far, maybe a 20 minute drive. Really nice trails, just not for an unshod horse or an out of shape horse, as they were pretty hard/rocky and rather hilly as well!
|
|
|
Post by pdevlieg on Jan 30, 2007 23:25:37 GMT -5
She looks great. What fun and what a fabulous girl.
|
|
|
Post by schwung on Feb 1, 2007 17:28:45 GMT -5
I'm actually getting somewhat motivated to get her going (at her ripe old age of 18 this year!) with the hopes of making her into a horse that my boyfriend can ride as well as getting her ready for the SAFE benefit show! I rode her again last night. I can't say enough about how level-headed and willing she is. She does not spook and is surprisingly lazy for a TB (I had to wear spurs!). Right now we are working on a few things:
1) Not walking off while mounting (I realize she can't help this, given the racing industries method of "toss the jockey up and off they go" method of mounting).
2) Stopping using my seat, not my hand - she has that typical OTTB habit of leaning and pulling on the reins, especially when stopping where you have to get into a pulling contest with her - I hate that! So we are doing a lot of walk-halt transitions to get her listening to my seat aids and not my reins aids when halting.
3) Steering - she is not too bad, but understands steering more from reins than from legs. Therefore as you try to turn her, her neck will turn but her body will keep going straight - gotta get her listening and understanding those outside leg aids!
4) Leg yielding - this will help with #3 as well. We are doing basic leg yielding at the walk which she is actually catching on to very quickly. Leg yielding at the trot will be next.
5) Bending - she is actually not too bad with the bending concept, surprisingly. She bends very nicely to the left, a little stiffer to the right but not too bad. Lots of circle work is in her future.
6) Contact - she tends to want to put her head very low and lean on the reins, or throw it up. Right now I am not asking for her to be on the bit in any way, I am just keeping a steady, light contact as I drive her forward to try and keep her off her forehand, or do lots of transitions when she starts to lean on me. She's getting it, she is just not sure what to do with her head right now.
7) Forward! She's got a beautiful trot when she gets going, but forward is not her thing. Need to get her moving quicker off the leg so I am not constantly nagging her to go forward.
8) Lots of work on the lunge - she has no back muscle, so we are doing some work in side reins to help increase the muscling over her back and top line. She is also very very unbalanced at the canter and has a hard time even getting the correct lead. I have not cantered her under saddle yet and she needs to get a lot more balanced on the lunge before I will attempt it in the arena.
|
|
|
Post by schwung on Feb 12, 2007 3:13:57 GMT -5
Vanna has proven herself to be truly worth her weight in gold this past weekend. Juliane loaned me an old western saddle of hers so I could try her out in it for putting beginners like my boyfriend, my son, etc. on her. The perfect opportunity arose this weekend when my volunteer, Allison, brought out her nephew to see the horses. Vanna was unphased about the western tack and was her usual, willing, calm, ever-trustworthy self. I am so glad I kept this mare, she is so amazingly special! Here she is being a lesson pony to a 10 year old: Watch this video to see how fabulous she is packing this little boy around on the lunge line! She's a little ouchy on her front feet from our trail ride, which you can see, so I have decided to go ahead and put shoes on her the next time the farrier comes, since it looks like she is now officially become a riding horse! s18.photobucket.com/albums/b144/schwung/Vanity%20Fair/?action=view¤t=100_1249.flvAnd we even got my 11 year old son up there (he doesn't care much for horses) and he trotted for the first time! And Mike got a ride also, and got to trot a bit on the lunge, and I introduced him to the concept of posting: Today Mike rode her again. She must have liked the attention yesterday, because today when I called her she left the others and came running up to the gate from the back pasture at a gallop. He worked at a walk on his own on just basic steering, going forward, stopping. Then I put him on the lunge and he worked on trotting and actually got pretty good at the posting concept! I figured I had better teach him how to post right off the bat, both to save Vanna's back and Mike's butt, as she has a pretty big trot. Oh, and I rode her a few times and even pushed her into a canter, which although unbalanced was very smooth! I LOVE THIS HORSE!!
|
|