Forum Replies Created
- AuthorPosts
Joshua Kingsley
ParticipantWe got a little heavy white and grey slime/slush it was hailing a bit yesterday and now the sun is out and a litght breeze and some warmer rain…. back to mud for a few days. This weather is a shock for those fruit trees that we planted last week. oh well welcome to new england.
Joshua
ParticipantThis sounds like a really great way to have the community support agriculture and conservation. Neat Idea
Joshua
ParticipantI have been told by several older guys to use chewing Tabacco..
JoshuaApril 10, 2010 at 5:51 pm in reply to: A question for all you horsemen & horsewomen of the world #59316ParticipantMy mentors were family that had drafts as I was growing up. My mothers uncle lived down the hill from the farm and had drafts. He would drive by and ask if I wanted to go for a ride. I still remember riding on that wagon with the slow breeze and him handing the lines to his big team to me. That was a start of driving. Then I got a donkey and had to figure out how to get him to pull a cart on my own as Uncle Russel had passed on. I was about 10 or so at the time.
My grandfather on my mom’s side lived across the street and would shake his head as we were trying to get that donkey to move with bribery. My sister in front with a carrot and me on the cart with the reins.
At 14 a wonderful thing happened, I started going to my dad’s Uncles house in the summer for a couple of weeks at a time. He didn’t own a tractor so everything was done with his horses. That first summer I picked up hay with a team, and did all sorts of things from working on a stone boat to learning how to hook them up all alone.
Over the years the tasks went from just raking and tedding hay to mowing and baling. Then we started logging with the old team and I remember being there for two weeks and loosing a bunch of weight, as I would only ground skid. He would cut and I had to pull out every hitch.
When I moved here to the current farm I wanted drafts so I tried to remember every thing I had learned and I have made plenty of mistakes along the way. With phone calls to my uncle and books I have always muddled through though I am sure that I still have a lot to learn before I would be comfortable teaching others.Sorry for the long post,
JoshuaParticipantIt is always funny how and when things happen.
I have thought about what you said about the different areas of “enlightenment” and determined that I am in no way qualified in my mind to guess what level would be right, as every time I do somthing or look back on a situation I am thinking that I am doing this or that all wrong. There is always things to learn and I swear that if I were to live for the next 100 years I would never know all that one of the neighbors has forgotten over the years.Tom is in his ninetys and still putting up hay. He still remembers how to do most anything with horses and has most of the origional equipment that he used over the years. Including some really nice Woods mowing machines and other stuff that still looks and runs like new.
Joshua
ParticipantThat is one nice looking stallion. I would love to have a pair of those, but right now I am happy with some really nice Suffolks.
JoshuaParticipantI live on sandy loam with a marble quarry in the same town as me.
I am on the Otter Creek though and they say that the water here is full of minerals.Joshua
ParticipantWe’ll see where she finally ends up some day;) I have never had this much growth on a “mature” horse before. Though I bought a pair of haflingers this spring with the intention of selling them after I worked them for a while and they seem to have gotten a little taller and they are about 10-12 years old. So I am at a loss as to what is going on, maby it is somthing in the water or the dirt here.
JoshuaParticipantPlowboy,
last fall she was about 16.2 when she was for sale. She foaled and I started graining her so that she would have plenty of milk and then she started growing… I have heard that the english horses tend to grow a bit in the 5 to 7 year range. She has shot up a bunch and her filly is going to be BIG… she is pushing 13.2 to 14 hands at 5 and 1/2 months. This is the first foal that I have raised so I don’t know what to expect in the growth pattern.
JoshuaParticipantThe mare is about 16-1700 pounds right now, she is still nursing a filly from last fall and growing so I would like to see her a little heavier.
She is registered her name is Merck forest betsy # is 3696-M foaled June 12, 2004I will try to get her harnessed and get some pictures in the next few days if anyone is interested.
JoshuaParticipantThe mare is a comming 6 year old. I have not worked her myself though I know that the previous owner worked her last summer haying and around the farm. She does go single, and in a team from what I have been told. She stands perfect for trimming, I have not set shoes on her. She is in good health, she was floated this spring and the vet was really impressed with her and haow quiet she stood for everything. I will have to get a tape weight on her. She wouldn’t be forsale if she were shorter as I have yet to own animals of this caliber. I really like the mare alot.
JoshuaParticipantIt sounds like you have a good thing going. Not only do you have a good neighbor and mentor but you have a routine and a good thing going with a really good sounding team.
I wish you the best, Hopefully you will find what ever equipment that you may need to expand your scope of work.Have fun and have a great weekend.
JoshuaParticipantI am in all sandy loam here. So trying the plow with a tractor or 4-wheeler is an option. The beam and all look straight to me which is why I bought it. Now I haveto put the new landslide and share I just got via UPS yesterday on and see what else I have to do. My haflingers are pretty hard from all the woods work and other stuff I have been working them on, though now that I look at the bottom I wonder if I should hook my suffolk up as well so that I can work 3 abrest.. That should be fun as they have never worked together and the suffolk has been off for the winter. The other issue with that is the haflingers are just over 13 hands and the suffolk is over 16. So angle of draft may be an issue.
I hope to try the plow behind somthing other than the horses this weekend and then possibly try the horses if everything is figured out.
JoshuaParticipantSOLD, thanks
JoshuaParticipant@dominiquer60 17105 wrote:
Example, the owner of the elite Equestrian Restaurant/Bar was driving home early one morning, supposedly sober, and failed to stop at a stop sign, unfortunately there was a 23 year old man crossing the road and the bar owner struck him and sent him flying into a canal to his death. There was not a handcuff or night in jail involved because he probably called his lawyer before he called 911.
What a sad commentary on our times and the state of this country.
Joshua- AuthorPosts