Tal

The spring birds are arriving from the south in huge numbers. We get thousands of geese flying over going from the fields to the swamps at night and back again in the morning. I never grow tired of watching masses of them go honking overhead! We also have seen two big flocks of swan with their funny sounding whistles. Beautiful! Sunday morning, we woke up and were surprised to see...

a small flock of pink flamingoes that landed at the end of our driveway!! It must have gotten too terribly hot in FL for them so they hired a couple butterflies as tour guides and headed north. We were so honored that they chose to rest for a bit on our farm!


They hadn't reckoned on it being so cold up north and soon pulled out their Hawiian scarfs and hats.

One of the poor little guys got stuck in a snowbank!

; )
Ok, now on to another new animal that resides on our farm, but first, let me show you a picture...

This is of me on a Shetland pony named, Rosie that we used to board for a friend. Rosie was such a stubborn little pony that kept defying all the rules in the vet's manual and lived to be 36, I think. She was my responsibility while my brother, Peter took care of our two draft horses and his horse, Princess. It was so fun having horses and hooking the drafts up to our sleigh in the winter and going out for a ride with our sleds tied on behind the sleigh, then having hay rides in the summer. I rode Rosie for a little while, but soon grew right past her! It's been several years now since we've had horses and I really missed them.

Well, a couple weeks ago, a neighbor said that one of their horses was looking for a good home and wanted to stay with us, so our new animal on the farm is Tal's Character, a 5 year old, black Standardbred gelding!

Tal is very affectionate and loves to be petted! He wasn't used to electric fences so last Saturday, after we led him around the perimeter of the pasture, we and some friends lined up by the fence and let him go. Unfortunately, I didn't have my camera so I couldn't catch all of his antics then. He bucked and kicked and charged down to the corner of the fence closest to his old home and would smell for his old pals down there. He finally touched the fence, but didn't get shocked! We knew something was wrong so we brought him in to try again later. The fence out back had been knocked off the insulator by a deer and was shorting out through the wooden fence post.

(Notice the Brocketts curious horse, Cinnamon peeking around the corner.)

Yesterday, we got it fixed and I let him loose in the pasture again. This time I had my camera...

He soon stopped playing around and stood by the fence near me. I tried to get him to go around some more, but he just walked back and forth right there. He leaned over the fence to touch Mike and...the fence worked!! Now he respects it nicely, so far. =) He still didn't run away very far so I turned around and walked along the fence a ways. Tal came trotting after. When he almost passed me, I spun around and walked the other direction and Tal spun around and followed me. I got in the pasture and walked to the other end where the Brocketts horses were watching. The puppy-dog followed me across the pasture and wouldn't look at the other horses until they looked away! Then he layed down for a good roll...

So, when we become good friends, I will teach him how to be saddled and I can't wait till we can go thundering across the fields together!

By the way, Tal's Character is a funny name, but I would rather that than his sire's name, Shady Character! =)