How My Horses Found Me

How My Horses Found Me

From time to time, folks have asked me how I went about buying my horses and what they should do in order to find their "right" horse. I have no method. All of my horses have picked me out of the crowd, instead of the other way around…

Dennis
Before I bought my "Old Man", Dennis, I was a weekend rental rider when I wasn't working at guest ranches, taking out trail rides. I had used other people's horses in gymkhanas and other events. I always vowed that SOMEDAY I would have a horse and live on my own "ranch". I had Dennis for about 10 years, but had known him off and on since he was about 4 or 5. Our paths kept crossing at various shows. I never liked palominos, but he was handsome and just had this...personality. I always made it a point to circle around to the horse trailers so I could pet him. As I talked to his owner one afternoon, I found out his name was "Dennis".

At a time—and several years later—when he was completely out of my mind, I was with a friend who was visiting her friend at a boarding stable. As we walked down a row of stalls, I noticed a handsome palomino sticking his head over his gate and nickering. I did a double-take and walked over to the stall. I turned around to my friend and said, "Remember that palomino we used to see at the shows?"

As I stood there talking to her with my back to the horse, he stuck his nose under my arm so that it landed around his neck. There was a "For Sale" sign on his stall with the name "Dennis" and a phone number. The next day, I called the number and asked for "Dennis". After a little confusion, the person answering the phone determined that I was calling about the horse they had for sale. My jaw dropped. It really WAS the same horse! The rest, as they say, is history. Although his "real" name was Rooster's Gold Nugget, somewhere along the line, he got named Dennis after Dennis The Menace. The name fit him perfectly!

He was a very narrow horse, in addition to always being thin. He could stand with his front knees and ankles touching and if he did not want me to pick up his front feet, would cross his legs!

He also burped. I think he was sucking air, but sometimes those noises came up all the way from his toes! He never cribbed, just stood around and burped—especially after getting a yummy treat. He would never let me feel sorry for myself, either. I was leaning on his hindquarters one night boo-hooing and he reached around and bit me (hard!) on the butt, snorted and walked off. Another time, he bit my toes.

Dennis was also notorious for playing practical jokes, especially with one of the ranch cats that he constantly picked on (strangely, the cat kept coming back for more!). Dennis would stand patiently by the water though and wait for the cat to come get a drink. When the cat would balance itself on the edge of the trough, Dennis would quietly step over and nudge the cat so it would fall into the water, then quickly take a big step away, giving the cat a surprised look as if to say, "Wow—YOU fell in!"

I might add that this same cat would also "ride" Dennis bareback around the playpen and Dennis never minded. When the cat got tired, she would jump off.

Dennis passed away on September 22, 2007 at the age of 25. I'm not sure what his cause of death was. One of my neighbors saw him grazing in his pasture that afternoon and he appeared to be okay. Whatever the cause of his death, he waited for me to come home from work that night—and I was an hour late. He was already distressed and getting a vet to come out to my area, especially late at night, is next to impossible. We had about three hours of talking and nose nudges before he slipped away.

Baldy
Baldy is a Thoroughbred and is the one David (the former room mate/business partner) took back to the track when he moved to Safford in May 2007. His real name is Gonnabeatchabald. He was four years old when I bought him in October 2004.

At that time, we owned another race horse—Big Guy—who was up at the track in Phoenix. In order to keep your horse at the track, you have to have an owner's license. To get an owner's license, the horse's papers have to be on file in the Steward's office. Big Guy's papers were back in Tucson. I had been looking around for another race horse and David and I were in Phoenix to check on Big Guy. We were standing in a breezeway talking to one of the trainers David used to work for and heard a commotion outside. As we walked down the breezeway, this big red horse trotted in with three frantic grooms running after him. The big red horse stopped in front of us (he had gotten loose from the hot walker). I reached up and took hold of his halter and Baldy put his head on my shoulder. I looked at David and said, "I think we just found our horse." So I bought Baldy.

Baldy quickly took to Dennis—and everyone else. He was inquisitive and always trying to "help" me when it came time to clean his stall by trying to stand on my shoulders to see what I was doing. He loved the Velcro on my sneakers, and would try to pick my pockets, working my cell phone, two-way radio or truck keys out and holding them in his mouth for me to retrieve. He grabbed the Velcro tab on my sneaker one night and pulled on it so hard he pulled my shoe off and then ran to the other side of the arena with my shoe in his mouth!

Striker Bask
Striker Bask came to Havano Ranch in August 2006. He was then 15 years old and an Arabian stallion. He was standing in a backyard in "downtown" Elfrida and his owners—Tom and Marion—were running into health problems and could no longer take care of him. When we first moved down here, the local animal control gal (Julie) stopped by one day to introduce herself and I told her that I wanted to start a horse rescue. When Tom and Marion told Julie they wanted to find a good home for Striker and that they were going to give him away, she high-tailed it over here to see if I would take him. I was a little dubious about taking in an Arabian—let alone a stallion. Without promising Julie anything, I went with her to look at him and fell in love. He moved in the next day!

Striker was an absolute joy to have around. He resided in the front pasture and greeted everyone he knew with a toss of his head and a deep whinny that came straight from his heart. He fell "in love" with the mare across the road (I called her "Girlfriend"), who was a flea-bitten gray just as he was. They never got together, but they would spend hours each day at their respective fence lines making goo-goo eyes at each other. When it was time to eat, they would part company long enough to chow down their flake of hay, and then return to the fence.

Striker died suddenly one evening in March 2008 at the age of 17. I had him buried the next day. Girlfriend stood at her fence line and watched as neighbor Paul operated the backhoe and put Striker in the ground. As he put the last of the dirt over Striker, she turned and walked back to her barn with her head down. The next day she was back at the fence, looking for Striker. I walked down the driveway and over to where she was standing, stroked her forehead and told her that Striker was gone. She let out a deep sigh, rubbed her head once against my shoulder and walked away. Who says horses don't have emotions?

Shiloh
Shiloh came to me October 6, 2007, about two weeks after Dennis died. I was working at an equine-based ranch for troubled youths and had been looking at one of the mules they had for sale. At this point in my life, I only need something with "forward", "reverse" and "whoa damnit". I figured the mule would be safe enough. After all, if the kids could ride Lulu, I should be able to! They only wanted $300.00 for her. Not much, but the same day, I also received my property tax bill—which was $325.00. Huh. Well, had to pay the taxes, so that took care of buying the mule!

A few days later, I was on my way to work and drove by neighbor Paul's place. I saw this scrawny paint horse in Paul's front pasture that hadn't been there before and didn't quite fit in with Paul and Lynn's bubble-butt horses. He stood by the gate with his head down and his tail tucked in.

Two days after I noticed the paint in Paul's pasture, Paul flagged me down on my way to work and asked me if I wanted a free horse. He explained that he had rescued the paint from a place up in Tucson where the owners were keeping him in a 10 x 10 pen for who knew how long. Paul told me that the manure in his pen was walled up over a foot high and when he turned the paint loose in his 80 acre pasture, figured he wouldn't see the horse for months. The paint never left the gate!

On October 6, 2007, Shiloh came to the ranch. He's somewhere around 25 years old, but thinks he's about three years-old. No arthritis, no stiffness. Amazing. He actually MOVES like a much younger horse. Even now, he still has trust issues. Some days I can walk right up to him and put his halter on. Other days, I get a 20 minute workout before I can catch him. Once he's caught, he's well behaved. It took over a year for him to realize that he can move away from the fence. We still cannot walk toward him with a rake or shovel in our hand—or anything that resembles a stick—or he will move off and maintain a "safe" distance. It took almost six months for him to take a carrot from Rick's hand and unless he has his halter and lead rope on, we cannot stroke his face or neck without him moving away.

We're still working on getting away from the fence, but it all takes baby steps. He had apparently been abused and does not seek the companionship and interaction of humans that I've experienced with my other horses. On the other hand, any step that he takes to come to me or Rick is highly celebrated and he's given lots of praise. It just takes a lot of patience. And time.

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