Cold, windy and icy still.

This morning I had a reminder of exactly why I did not do much with the horses during the winter, it was freezing cold, windy and miserable. Even at noon there was ice on top of the horses water.

Saturday night Wildairo was locked up in the small pen and was a very humble boy Sunday morning. He pressed his nose up against his prison bars wanting kisses. We were taking William back to Ellensburg so I couldn't spend anytime with him. I just let him out into the big corral.

This morning Wildairo was keen to interact and Echo is enjoying his last days playing the wild horse card. I am going to attempt to finally get my hands on him in the small pen. Funny thing is even though he won't let me touch him he enjoys me kissing his nose. I will also work with Wildairo in the small pen because I need to have his full attention like I did before. Right now he has the attitude of 'quit messing about with me and just do your job and feed me'.

I was rough-housing with Bobby in Echo's corral and Echo wanted to be right in the middle of the action despite the fact Bobby was 'play' growling and going pretty much crazy like she does when she plays. I could feel Echo's nose pressed against my back as I wrestled about with Bobby then he gave a tug on my sleeve. He knows he is not supposed to do that so when I turned around he jumped back and his front feet came off the ground a little bit. He came right back to me when I held my hand up. I'm not sure if he wanted me to stop hurting Bobby or he got carried away in the ruckus and wanted to rough house too. Then he started chasing Bobby, but didn't try to hurt her even though he could have.

I have been feeding Echo in the alley and he has finally ventured out of his corral. This evening when Brad came home we went over to the corrals. The wind had died down and it was much nicer. Echo was in the small pen so when we walked down the alley we had him cornered. He was big eyed looking at Brad and was actually shaking! We were talking nice to him and he even took a carrot from Brad, then the cattle came in and were pushing and shoving around the water trough right near the pen. Then Dandylyons started a fight with another cow and that's when Echo lost it. He tried to bolt. What I really like about mustangs is they are pretty sensible and don't seem to do anything too foolish and hurt themselves even when they are petrified like poor little Echo was.

Tomorrow I'll get him in the small pen and just have a calm little one on one session with him. While we were looking at Echo, Wildairo kept stomping his foot on his gate wanting attention. Yep, he's doing that again. I made a big fuss over him before we went in for the night. For a big lad he responds very well to baby talk. I made a point of touching the top of his head and also holding his head so I had control of it. I always marvel at how horses let you do thing's like that. They are so much bigger and stronger than us yet they will give us control. That's one of the many reasons I love them so much.