Guess who is home?

Yup, little Storm…..

…… And his friend……

….. Tiddles (or Tids, as he is known).

Storm has a hacking cough, which I was hoping was a viral infection that would go away on its own.  But, sadly, no.  The cough seems to be bacterial and is not going anywhere unless I treat it with antibiotics.  So Storm, who is showing the worst symptoms, and Tiddles , who is Storm’s best friend, have come home to Thordale o be jabbed with a stingy antibiotc.  I would love to say that both are very good about this but I would be lying.

Tiddles, darling boy, of course, is fine.  He lets me bung the injection in, no fuss, and no performance (I love this little man).

Sadly,  Storm is a big girl’s blouse.  I favour the bottom to give an intramuscular injections, but with Storm, his bottom bounces, with a threatening kick,  We had words and I won my argument. I don’t know how long this will last as the antibiotic treatment is for five days.

So, today, Storm began his treatment.  He had his first injection (as did Tids) and some cough linctus (which Storm said would do no good, but actually hs helped hugely) – bloody boys.

Storm seems to be professionally ill with few symptoms.  Apart from attacking his fieldmates, hence why I took him into quarantine at Thordale,  I have never seen this behaviour from him so something is very wrong.

Please, healing vibes  for this little argumentative boy who tried to kick me when I gave him an intra-muscular antibiotic injection (and his friend who I am treating in case he starts to cough).

Of course, therapy for the injection involves a huge amount of hugging and telling a small piebald Shetland pony that his mother loves him and his behaviour is difficult.  In five day’s later, I will probably be a shell of my normal self.

Ok, so where are we with all this fur stuff?  I have been having a bit of a clear out.

Up for grabs……

A small packet (0.75 oz) of Tiddles’ foal fur (from last year).

Remember, Tiddles is a skewbald (not, spotted, they don’t do spotted in the Shetland Pony Stud Book) miniature Shetland pony.

It is a little bag of brown and white foal fur.

Then, there is 4.5 oz of black Shetland pony foal fur that was given to me last year by a friend, who knew I was collecting.

And, lastly, there is 6oz of Hjalti’s Icelandic horse foal fur that I brushed out of him this spring/summer.

Hjalti is chestnut, like his mother and apparently, though I might be wrong, the Icelanders used to spin Icelandic foal fur.

Let me know if you are interested in any of this wool/fur/stuff.  I am happy to send it all over the world for the price of an extremely generous donation to The Minion Winter Fund (believe me, they eat).  Failing that, it is all going on Fleabay!

Lambie and ‘Ster’s wool has already found a home, so please don’t ask for their wool.

However, if you want a Shetland sheep fleece, I can certainly get hold of Lambie’s sisters’ fleeces.  They are moorit (brown) or flekkit (brown and white) and of good quality. Let me know.  frances@fstaylor.co.uk

UPDATE:  Tidles ‘ fur now gone plus a bit of Hjalti.

I have been feeling bad about leaving Waffle and Silver out in the Fat Fighters Field.  Silver is a lovely shape now, if a tad bum-high, and Waffle has certainly lost some weight (yes, I have changed my mind since yesterday).

So I caught just the little boys and took them up to the field where I had moved the others to.

My theory is that they will all play together and muscle will replace any flab.

There was instant pile of ponies.

Everyone was very pleased to see each other.

The Minions are seldom split up and it is not something I like to do so it is nice to see them back together.

Even Delia came over to say hello (or something like “get out of my way, stop eating all my grass and never bother me”.)

She almost liked the Minions last winter so no one is new.

Lyra was intrigued by the new arrivals.  I don’t think she has ever met Silver and Waffle.

She was quite hopeful that young Waffle might be a potential Handsome Prince.

I fear she will be sadly disappointed but she is at that age when she fancies “anything in trousers!”

At the end of the day, even if Lyra hasn’t bagged herself a bloke, she still has a nice little herd to boss around and all the little boys think she is beautiful.

Silver and Waffle quickly realised their lives had changed for the better again and started stuffing their faces.

Hjalti was thrilled to see his best playmates back.

There will be lots of games and hopefully some calories burned.

Today, there were two more additions to the Fat Fighters Field.

Haakon and Kappi.

Yes, I know, but they had to go as they are fatty, fat, fat.

Having said that, seeing Iacs with Kappi and Haakon, I feel that actually these two boys weren’t looking too bad!  Iacs is still fatter than his cousin, Haakon! (just sayin’, Daisy)

Of course, Klængur looks fabulous.  This is thin for him!

Meanwhile, the two Minions are doing very well in The Fat Fighters Field.

Silver, especially, has a waistline that many should be envious of (Iacs *** cough ***)

But Waffle is still a square little table that could sit 4 round for dinner, including the family silver!

I don’t know what I can do to slim Waffle down, short of putting him on concrete and feeding him nothing, which I would never do unless he had laminitis.

Maybe he is like me – he only has to look at an éclair and he puts on weight!

Most odd.

This morning I was pottering about outside when I saw Hetja leave Brá and Efstur, canter under the fence (rather than go through an open gate), and start shouting at Taktur.  He was in a field across the hill with Haakon and Kappi.

Recently, I had been thinking of putting Taktur out with his mares soon but had seen/smelled no evidence.

Armed with a lunge line, headcollar and dressage whip (insurance in case of bad behaviour, which of course I didn’t need), I went over to Taktur’s field to catch him.

Taktur put his headcollar on (well, he would’ve if he could’ve) and I led him over to the mares’ field. He, of course, behaved perfectly while I lectured him on the way over that “no” means “NO!”

Hetja was surprisingly very happy to see her Handsome Prince.  Two years ago she barely tolerated his existence.

Handsome Prince was very happy to see Hetja.

Brá and Efstur came up to see who the newbie was and Brá quickly made her feelings very clear to Taktur’s suggestions.

And so they quickly cantered off again.

There was one mis-fire (those poor sheep in the background are now busy bleaching their eyeballs from what they have witnessed today).

Then Taktur quickly remembered which bit went where.  He was far better behaved (ie less annoying) than last time.

It has been a day of pornographic squealing.  Hetja is clever. She always puts herself between Brá, Efstur and Taktur and both mares protect Efstur no matter what.

Again, this is nature at its’ purest.  The mares have it all under control.

Good call, Hetja.