Blue

Blue, or Bee B's Blue's Man. Is a 14-year old Rocky Mountain Horse gelding. He was owned by the same woman from 3-13 years of age. Due to financial reasons, she rehomed him to PALS (People and Animal Learning Services, Inc.). PALS is the therapeutic riding center that we leased my old guy, Fred, to while I was in college for his semi-retirement. So I knew they were good people and his old owner was still very involved in his life as well. They were retiring him from being a therapeutic horse after a year for a few reasons. He wasn't a fan of being with so many different people and would occasionally try testing them. Nor was he great with the less able-bodied folks. But, he was still safe and sane which were my goals with my second horse. When I tried him out in late September, I had a blast riding him and never had a moment of feeling unsafe or not being able to trust him. That's big for me, as I almost never trust a horse the first time I ride it. Blue has been trail ridden in several states and been to some big show facilities (including the Kentucky Horse Park. He travels well and settles in quickly. (He travelled like a champ on the six hour drive home.) He's an extremely easy keeper (aka pretty fat right now) and does all of the things that a horse should. I worked did some ground work with him Sunday and lightly lunged him Monday. He was well behaved and definitely does better with a lunge whip. He's very treat motivated and is looking for one at all times. I rode him for the first time at home Wednesday evening and he was a pretty good boy. He definitely wanted to "test" me with being lazy and leaning that shoulder toward the gate, but he was easy to correct and was never actually naughty. I felt good on him and was getting bored riding in the pasture, so I took him to the big field on the hill and he was a good boy out there as well. I see a lot of long walks in his future to try to get him into better shape. We did gait some but I don't feel good doing that for too long of intervals for a while. Short intervals of gaiting and endless walking. If the weather holds, I'm hoping to take him along the county road this weekend sometime. We'll see. So far, I'm happy with my choice and I'm sure he'll only get better as he settles in and gets to know me.