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Living the book that they will publish
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SWEDISH JOURNALISTS GO WILD
Part Seven
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More time with Rusty (Monday, Sept. 21)
After spending some more time out in the obstacle course, Willy brought Rusty into the round pen. We wanted to get Rusty used to seeing people up close on horseback and to learn to follow lightly on the pony lead. This was a new experience for both Willy and Rusty, however before too long Rusty was leading nicely.
Willy Ponying Rusty from Kahlua, a BLM mare.
After Rusty had become soft and comfortable being ponied off another horse, we decided to see how he would handle carrying the weight of people on his back. We were not yet mounting Rusty but we started out by laying all over his back and having him hold all of our weight.
Willis laying over Rusty's back.
As the day started to heat up, Willy and Torsten went back to the Lucky Horse Corrals to shoot some additional photos of Shirley and the orphan foals.
Shirley and Bruce with the foals.
"Ozzie" happened to be coming by on his morning walk. Ozzie was found as a young foal, severely injured and with a broken neck. Clearly he survived and has done well.
Ozzie and Shirley
Back with Rusty
On Tuesday Willy and Torsten planned to go back to Palomino Valley Center and view horses that were arriving from the Beatty Butte range in Oregon. However before they left, Willy worked a bit with Rusty. Afterwards Willy practiced some bareback colt starting maneuvers that were new to him on Kahlua.
Rusty watching Willy practice some Clinton Anderson style balancing on Kahlua.
Then they were off to Palomino Valley Center.
The Beatty Butte Horses (Tuesday, Sept. 27)
The Beatty Butte Herd Management Area is known for its color and the horses that came in were no exception. Willy and Torsten went back to Palomino Valley Center to photograph the horses and they got to spend some time observing how the horses were aged, vaccinated, freezemarked and blood drawn for their Coggins tests. The crew at Palomino Valley are all old pros at this process and the horses moved through the chutes and the vetting squeeze in an orderly fashion.
While the vetting squeeze may look scary, nearly all the horses remain calm. The crew maintains a quiet demeanor and when the squeeze opens up, most of the horses just lick their lips as if to say, "Wow, that wasn't really so bad," then they just amble off to find their herdmates.
On the deck of the preparation chutes.
The well and chutes have smooth metal sides so that the horses can't get snagged on anything.
The vetting squeeze.
Applying a freezemark.
Lots of vaccinations.
A liesurely walk back to rejoin the other horses.
Lots of color.
Pintos!
On their return to Stagecoach, Willy and Torsten took a side road and came across a magnificent band of pintos.
On Wednesday Willy and Torsten went to Sacramento to do a story on Standardbred trotters. Rusty and the rest of the Nevada gang got the day off. However on Thursday some interesting things went on.
Note: These photos may make gentling a wild horse look easy. Each success followed careful
work in which the horse was continuously evaluated and his willingness to comply was developed.
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