as far as the eye can see..

it seems as though everywhere you look, there's a mare popping out another baby! since april 26, we've had 4 babies!!! so, the official count as of 9:00 monday night is 23 down, 17 to go. we have a mare in the stalls right now who is pretty close to foaling, so perhaps by morning that count will change to 24 and 16!

we've had a palomino filly, a sorrel filly, and 2 sorrel colts in those last couple days. we've been lucky that they've all been fairly healthy, and our only health concerns are a few bouts of diarrhea here and there (which is to be expected during the mare's foal heat).

i'm still partial to a few of the older babies, but these new little guys are growing on me too!

also, i've been getting some more experience with the breeding, and rita has been letting me do a bunch of the AI work! i'm pleased with my experiences so far, and i'm glad i ended up here in the middle-of-nowhere wyoming...for now, at least!

stranger things have happened...

2 weeks after abbie's visit, my seth came to visit me! i had worked all weekend the weekend prior to his visit so i could have a day off to show him around my neck of wyoming. unfortunately, at 5:00 on friday, chatty cathy decided to roll the gator on her foot, which is where my story begins.

at 5:00 friday, chatty cathy came rolling back into the barn, "hopped" out of the gator and limped into the lab. i asked what happened, and that's when we got the 25 minute story about how the gator rolled on her foot causing her to fall over, twisting her knee in the process.

i suppose "twisting" is a bit of an understatement.

poor rita had to cancel her friday evening plans to transport chatty cathy to the ER in douglas. several doctor appointments later, we've come to find out that she actually dislocated the patella when she fell, and that injury caused one of the ligaments in her knee to tear. long story short, chatty cathy is in a hunk of metal brace, and i am the only healthy intern now. she's still waiting to find out if surgery is necessary.

needless to say, i did not get a day off that weekend and poor seth got to be the other intern for the duration of his trip. rita and i were grateful to have the extra hand. and seth, luckily, enjoyed his weekend here anyway.

first visitor!

my first visitor's trip is coming to an end. we'll be heading for Casper tomorrow morning. but I'm thankful for the time I've had with abbie.

i think ab is more than ready to get home and not have to do ranch work, but she DID get to do SOME fun things in wyoming. saturday, we went riding in the windy wilderness. though it was quite cold, hopefully ab enjoyed the view on the mountain. after that, wee saw the lovely wagonhound lodge, where Abbie tried her hand at ping pong and pool! then we spent the rest of the day shopping in Casper!

we went to the Easter service yesterday and enjoyed an afternoon of relaxation.

overall I think it was a pretty successful sister weekend.

and I'm looking forward to my next visitor!

lost luggage

poor abbie still hasn't gotten her luggage. but i got the day off yesterday, so we got to spend some quality time in casper.

Happy Easter! luckily, this weekend has been pretty "slow" as far as stuff going on at the barn, so i got done this morning with plenty of time to go to church. the church was having the service at the local high school, so we went for the hymn sing and service they were having.

we had a mare we needed to breed this afternoon, so abbie and i had a sort of late lunch. now, we're heading back to the barn to do the afternoon chores. we get to be back at the barn at 8:00 tonight to ultrasound another mare.

apology

i used to think, "why would anyone start a blog if he/she's not going to actually keep writing?" i suppose i'm an example of hypocrisy at its finest. it's been since february that i've updated this blog. it's no excuse, but we've gotten so busy with breeding that i have just let this slide. so, i'm sorry to everyone who has been looking forward to these posts! i will try harder to update a little more often. 

here's a quick rundown of things that have been happening for me in wyoming:

-most importantly, my lovely little sister is sleeping on my couch as i type!! my first visitor to wyoming is here, and i am so very happy about that (even if she did lose her luggage and we're having to deal with that)!!

- we now have 13 foals on the ground. 4 new ones in the last week or 2. all of these birthdays are running together for me! i stopped remembering birthdays after the two colts born on march 8 (George and Jones!)

-we've been breeding mares nonstop (or so it feels). this past weekend, i was at the barn WAY longer than normal weekends because we had so many mares to breed and ultrasound.

-yesterday we started the first of our heartbeat checks. if i remember correctly, we have 12 confirmed pregnancies now, with 11 additional mares bred (haven't been bred long enough to confirm pregnancy yet). SO, the heartbeat checks were pretty cool. i wish i had taken a picture yesterday when we did that.

-we kicked out some of the older kids yesterday (kicked out to a pasture instead of pens closer to the barn)

- there's a mare in the barn right now who will probably foal tonight, so i'll probably lose some sleep tonight. 

i'll try to update a little more regularly now, and perhaps in subsequent posts, i'll share some better details!