My name is Andrew Siemer and this is yet another blog that I am going to maintain. I am a father of 6, ex Army Ranger, software engineer, father, and over all nerd. I am adding to this the fact that I have always loved horses and have recently been able to extend my life into the world of horses. I now have 4 horses. Rowdy, Daisy, Nemo, and Chester. I almost had a 5th horse “Cookie Monster” but he has turned out to be more monster and less cookie…so his feed lease with us is up!
Rowdy
We first got into horses when we were out looking for houses (bad market for some…great market for others!) and we came across the Pet Kiss Ranch. We decided to stop in and see what they had (for sale). This was in November of 2008. We were allowed to go for a ride on some of their horses to see if we liked it as much as we thought we would. We did and started to take some lessons there (each of us going for a small ride in their large arena). We did this for a while and got to the point that we decided to start looking for a horse that would be a good starter horse for the whole family.
My father-in-law, Bill Thompson, knew a lady that bred dogs (whom he purchased his Labrador Retriever from). She just so happened to also have a bunch of horses on her property. She was in a position that she needed to get rid of one (/some) of them. Bill thought that one horse in particular would be a really good horse for us. He was a really big pony in fact.
The whole idea of having a pony at the time didn’t really appeal to me all that much. I am a pretty big guy and my riding a pony didn’t conjure up anything but a silly smile! I was in doubt.
We went out to this lady’s place one day (in early December) to take a look at this “pony”. As it turned out it didn’t look like one of those normal bloated funny looking ponies. This guy looked like a normal size horse in thickness but that had been squished into a shorter not so long body. We were told that he was a quarter horse / welsh pony cross and he was painted white and an orange-ish brown color. He was a cute little guy.
We walked up to meet this 11 year old pony named Rowdy. He seemed really nice – not “rowdy” at all. He came up to meet each of us. Then the kids each took a turn riding this little guy around his 40’ x 40’ stall. The Bill ponied the pony around with one of my kids on his back. He seemed mellow enough. Then my wife took a turn. All was well.
One thing for sure though, this pony didn’t like big men! He got a little snorty when I came close. Oh well…this little guy was not slated to be my primary horse. We came back a week later with a trailer and picked him up.
Once we got back to our home town we met up with Bill Pursley from the Pursley Ranch. Bill helped us get Rowdy out of the trailer and into his new home (mid December). All was well!
We spent some time with Rowdy to get him cleaned up and ready to be a part of our family. Each day we would spend time with him, groom him, muck his stalls, etc. We got his feet taken care of. Rowdy was turning out to be quite a happy little pony. We then got some tack from Grandpa Bill Thompson for Christmas. Of course we couldn’t wait to get home and ride our pony. We got so carried away that christmas that we got all (6) of our kids everything they needed to dress up like a cow boy/girl. From boots to hats…they were ready to ride.
Once we got back from our Christmas vacation we were quite excited to get a saddle on our new little pony and go for a ride. We got Rowdy out, cleaned him up, tacked him up, and walked him to the round pin.
Now we know why he was named Rowdy!
Rowdy took off and ran about that round pen. Keep in mind that we are still very new to horses. Learning with Rowdy may not have been the best idea. Long story short we enrolled Rowdy into a training session at the Pursley Ranch with a man named Josh Avilla. This was our first experience with a horse trainer. As it turned out the guy was a “cowboy” style horse trainer (more on this topic later). We let Josh play with Rowdy for the enrolled 30 days.
We were so very happy to now be horse owners. The kids were happy too. We went to the ranch every day to take care of our little pony.
Daisy
As I said earlier, I never had any plan to ride our new little pony. Going out to the ranch to take care of Rowdy was very enjoyable but didn’t ever satisfy the urge to get out there and ride a horse. So in the back of my mind I was always looking for a horse that was better suited for me.
While out house hunting we came across the local Gymkhana. We had passed this seemingly empty lot several times. That day it was alive with action as many competitors were there for the fun. We stopped by to see what was going on (as we had never seen a Gymkhana before). As we walked up the main road we encountered the biggest horse I have ever seen in person. Daisy.
Daisy was a Percheron baby from a PMU rescue. She had a fairly big fella on her back and they were walking to the warm up arena to get ready to compete. I asked the guy what sort of horse he was riding, how she rode, etc. The guy said that he was feed leasing her to compete in Gymkhana and that he loved her. He said that she was very very sweet 3 year old mare!
We hung out to see how Daisy competed and how she went. She was pretty amazing. She was an absolutely HUGE horse…but very light on her feet. Apparently they were currently in first place for there area. Now that I knew the type of horse I was interested in having…I was happy. I was one step closer to find a horse for me!
We left to continue our house hunting. We had a whole list of houses to check out that day. On our way back home after looking at a few houses found ourselves back at the Gymkhana. We stopped by again (though my wife wasn’t too happy about that!). We walked up to the main arena to watch the fun. They were doing some jumping!
As we got there, we were in time to see Daisy do a run. After her run was complete they called out her pretty fast time. Then came an odd message. As of that moment, Daisy was for sale. For sale? You have to be kidding me.
I started to ask around about Daisy. I heard various things about Daisy…some good some bad. (the bad later turned out to be more human politics related than anything Daisy had ever done). We located the owner of Daisy..followed her home…and went for a test drive on Daisy.
I WAS IN LOVE! I found my horse. I had the owner of Daisy hold on to her for me so that I could talk to my wife about possibly purchasing Daisy.
We started payments on her the following week (middle of January).
Finding Daisy was probably the best thing we could of done. Just because we found her. But also because we found another boarding facility that seemed to be more family friendly. And…they were just down the street from where we were currently located. We immediately relocated to the Ramsey Family Boarding facility.
At the Ramsey’s we met many new friends that were very much into sharing all of their knowledge. This got me into horse training. We were invited over to watch horse training movies (with cookies and coffee). Good friends, more group rides, all was good.
We also met up with Syd Thurman once we moved over to the Ramsey’s. She was the local horse trainer. With her guidance I have learned so much about riding horses, caring for horses, and training horses. She immediately fixed all of our previous issues with Rowdy. She also fixed the issues that our cowboy trainer Josh Avilla introduced (Rowdy was no so scared of men that he would cower at the back of his stall when Josh would approach him). And she helped me to show Daisy some simple ground manners.
WE LOVE SYD THURMAN!
Nemo
After having spent so much time with Syd Thurman I felt ready to start training my own green horse. I really thought that I wanted to get a horse that knew nothing. Our friend Josh told me about a lady that always picked really great horses and that she might have a quarter horse for sale. We met with this lady and this new horse Nemo one night. While he was not quite as untrained as I was hoping for, he was going to be the perfect horse for my kids one day. You could see that he was an absolutely stable minded horse. He smiled, hugged, and loved to be rubbed. Apparently he had spent his past 6 years as someone's backyard pet receiving nothing but love and attention of all the right sorts.
We immediately purchased him on the spot.
Our most loved trainer Syd Thurman immediately started to work with me and Nemo. Eventually she took over his training to put him on the fast track to being a horse that all could ride. He is now a very ride able horse. More importantly he always loves to greet you, and give you a hug!
Chester
Now that I have spent several months learning all that I could about horses I finally ran across a Paso Fino horse. For those that have never heard of or seen a Paso Fino take a look at this video or search YouTube for Paso Fino.
All of my new friends at the Ramsey ranch really wanted me to buy Chester. He is a very large (which is rare) Paso Fino that would be perfect for a big rider like me. We went to look at him at Lori Ebert’s place in Acton Ca. My wife and I rode a few laps on Chester to see what we thought of him. Initially we were not going to buy him (as we now had 3 horses that we were boarding) since we were still looking for a house to buy. But as things progressed Chester became the Paso Fino for me. My friends pushed and pushed and pushed for us to get Chester…so we did.
I have to say that Chester is the most fun horse I have ever ridden and is indeed my preferred trail horse. Their gate insures that there is one foot on the ground at all times. This makes them the mountain goat of horses. Also, many refer to them as the “border collie” or the horses as they are very smart and pick things up quickly. He rocks.
Now that we have Chester my wife is finally taking lessons and getting very much involved with the horse world.
Andrew Siemer
Teacher, Author, Engineer, Architect, Build Master, Scrum Master, Father of 6, Husband, ex Army Ranger
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