Hey, Diane -
Nymbus is turning into quite the stunner. Still moves a little like a gaited horse, which truly surprises me because I've never seen it so prevalent in a Shetland or heard of it in the Minis. Maybe if he was in a larger pen or in the pasture, he'd outgrow that quicker OR maybe he will remain gaited. If he stays gaiting as he matures, he'll be a fun, comfortable pony for someone to ride. By the time he's old enough, our granddaughters will be too big, but we've just had two sets of new neighbors move in - each with younger children, so we shall see.
Taff - well if I'd gotten her before I got soooo sick in 2012, maybe I could have done more with her? I truly don't know. I do not have the physical strength to hold her when she explodes anymore and trying to avoid flying hooves, well.... hmm.... and she truly doesn't care if she runs over the top of you when she means to vacate the area. She has literally jumped into large men blocking her way - knocking them down or to the side - to get away from us. She has gone thru several different kinds of fencing once she's been running (I really think her mind just goes totally blank) - including hot wire (broke both the light wire & the stranded rope), cattle panel (destroyed 2 panels and bent an 8' heavy steel post almost in half - was thankful she didn't impale herself), hi-tensile wire (6 strands - hit it running hard, got her head/chest thru a pair of wires and leaped and kicked until her whole body was thru the opening - very much like a deer)and field fence (when her legs went thru several sections, she again leaped and kicked until the fence section totally mangled and destroyed). Since we caught her the one time after she tore thru 3 fences in a row, she went into the pen(s) made from the blue panels and has NEVER been fully turned out on larger pasture again since July of 2012. She can and does move those panels around if they are not attached to posts, too. And we've found where she's gotten them unpinned on occasion, too. I've learned to check them, let me tell you!
She can and has drug full size cowboys who know how to throw and dally proper ropes around posts set in the ground, she can pull a 250# + man like any wild mustang (& worse than any I remember seeing or dealing with as a youth and young adult) and has run under a trainers' assistant horse when being worked with "naturally". Several people have actually asked why I've kept her...
If she would turn that cunning and crafty mind to working with people instead of being so dead set against them - she'd be an AWESOME pony! She may never reach the potential I feel that she has and it makes me sad. Her grand dam is getting older and is such a lovely, grand driving pony as well as a riding pony and a truly WONDERFUL mom that I really wanted this mare to turn out better.
It may be crazy and/or stupid, but I do plan on breeding her to Echo next month. I DO want to see what the pair of them will produce. Should be a truly NICE pony, a little larger, hopefully with Echo's great mind to offset her "crazy"... and then we'll see. Of course, I DO also need to reduce some of our numbers as well - we need to get down from the 30 we are back up to to about 15...
