Moving Aspire and New Injuries

I moved Aspire on Saturday to her new home.  She did great loading, even before I asked her to get in she offered to step right up.  I sold my trailer the night before so this was a trailer she'd never seen before, so in addition to her limited loading experiences she had a new variable thrown in there and still did great.  She loaded and unloaded twice really nicely before I shut the center gate and let her haul loose (like I normally do).  After we pulled away is when she began circling and pacing in the trailer.  Could have been either because we were leaving her friends or because the motion/noise was a strong stimulant... or both.  When we arrived at Ginny's (the woman who owns the new place) she wasn't too sure about unloading, but after letting her look around a bit and throwing a handful of beautiful grass down in the drive just outside the trailer she was more than happy to unload.

I put her up in a corral where she'll be for a couple days until she settles in a bit and we make sure the hot wire is running through all the pastures before turning her out.  Today was the first day I got to really play with her since she's been there.  I took her out and hand grazed her for almost two hours before moving to the round pen for some play time.  It was really nice to have a level round pen with good footing to play in.  It desperately needs a weeding as it catches all my ropes and stuff while we're in there but it's a lovely set up. 

I turned her loose to just see what would happen if I sent her on a circle at liberty.  She definitely is an extrovert!! She went right into a trot and had no trouble cranking out a handful of laps before even changing the look on her face a little.  She wasn't panicked but she was moving!  When I looked at her hips she swung right around and faced me and came right in the middle to stand with me!! She was then stuck to me like glue!  I didn't expect it to go that great at our first real liberty session so I tried a few different things.  We got hindquarter and forequarter turns, a yo-yo (with a good bring back!), and sideways.  I was really impressed!  I then flagged her for a bit and introduced the saddle.  I've only played with the saddle twice before I think for a few minutes, letting her sniff it, walk between me and it, around it, etc.  Today I introduced it to her and then offered to throw it over her back and for the first time set it all the way on her! Very exciting.  She really wasn't terribly concerned about it, I even yanked it and let it fall of by her side with no issue at all.  Oh and we did some flagging in motion on the circle which was really difficult for her the last time or two I tried it and she was perfect!

I came back out for a second time today just to see her, the novelty of having her within a bike ride of my house hasn't worn off yet.  :)  She hadn't touched a lick of hay I left from this morning and I realized (as evidenced by the path she'd worn in the dirt) that she'd been pacing the fence all day since her horsey neighbors in the next pen got turned out sometime that afternoon.  I must have startled her or something as I walked over to her corral because she took off at mach-10 down the fence, turned hard left, lost her footing, and slid right into the fence and fell.  All four feet went through the hog wire (square holed panels) that line the very bottom of the corral to keep dogs in/out.  I didn't even know what to think except 'please don't start kicking!!'  I went over as calmly as possible because she couldn't see me from where I had to approach from, talking to her the whole way.  I climbed over the fence and worked her legs back through the square holes and tucked her nose back through as well.  She didn't panic, didn't kick, didn't even get up.  She didn't look like she was in shock like she did when Phoenix ran her through the fence, just maybe unsure of what to do next... I don't know.  But finally did did get up, kicking one hind leg through as she did, and yanking it back out hard enough to earn another cut.  She has a few nicks on her legs, one on her muzzle, and one up high by her udder that wasn't from that fall as it already looked maybe a day old (no idea how she did that!).  What is with this little horse getting hurt?? 

The main issue, besides the fact I don't like her stressed/scared/getting hurt is that at this place there is something called Clostridium in the dirt.  I don't know which strain it is yet, but I hear it is somewhat prevalent in the area meaning it could be at other places too and the property owners just aren't aware.  It's an anaerobic bacteria that lives in the dirt and the horses contract it through wounds and in some cases ingestion.  It's most common in a puncture wound, or perhaps even under a flap of skin, where oxygen isn't present in the body to kill it.  Only one horse has died from it out there in almost 30 years, but I'm still very cautious of it.  I've been washing out her cuts (she got some strange cut Saturday afternoon too) and applying Vetericyn to them for now.  I guess ointments can make it worse by inhibiting oxygen to the wound - which makes sense.  If a horse gets the bacteria in its system it's generally fatal every time... I'm still doing more research on preventative measures, handling open wounds in that environment, and early clinical signs of infection. 

Anyway, here are some photos that I took of her the first day at Ginny's in her new corral, and one from today of her smelling her saddle in the round pen after we were all done playing.  I wish I had someone else taking these shots or some video for me...maybe soon!  If any of you reading this have info on Clostridium I'd love to see it!