The Deep Dark Forest and why Bonnie is so beautiful and What Elk Have To Do With It Anyway.

[Donald Redux]

A couple of weeks ago we had our "5 month old Bonnie," photo shoot with Annaliese Moyer the professional photographer from Portland Oregon. I knew by now (this was the third shoot to chronicle Bonnie's progress as she grew) that Annaliese was very good but she outdid herself and under somewhat difficult circumstances.

Right off it will help if you know that elk and deer figure prominently in Bonnie's life, and her mother's as well. The site for the barn we built for Altea before she foaled is right on a favorite hang-out of a herd of elk that tend to see my back yard as their freeway, and our garden as their lunch wagon.

There they are, thousands of pounds of them. These run up to 1500 lbs in the big bulls. You don't argue with them.

And below, what I replaced them with.

Altea's snug barn where now she lives with her Bonnie (Bonalaria)

The deer wander all about outside the barn endlessly entertaining Bonnie. First thing out of the barn in the morning she runs to the fence and looks for them.

So when we took our jaunt for the photo shoot into even deeper darker woods I was not surprised to hear a bit of noise off in the brush and trees where we could not see but could certainly hear clearly. Could be deer, I hoped.

We all alert to the elk playing nearby in the forest.

But no, the whistling started. Elk when challenging each other or calling cows to join their harem emit this high pitched whistling squeal. And often they will bang their antlers around on the brush and trees to impress everyone, or, should some other bull actually show up, they may have a face off. That is awesome, and scary.

It went on for some time and distracted both Bonnie and Altea, her mom, from much but being on alert. We left after a half hour or so, and as we returned to the open ground next to the public road I wanted to run a bit of the tension off Altea. She was not all the calm, but she certainly showed me, us, why Bonnie is so beautiful. It comes from her mother:

Altea, releasing tension.

Of course Bonnie wasn't the least excited by it all:

Bonnie's opinion of the elk trampling down the forest.

No, not the least excited.

It was though really a special day and we had a great deal of fun.

Bonnie is becoming more and more hand tame, picking up her feet now on cue and letting us pick them out a bit. She's still ear shy and halter shy but with quiet softness and lots of rewards along the way Kate (that's her with Altea in the alert to the elk picture above) has been putting it on and taking it off her quite a bit now.

She comes to a two finger cue to "touch," and she now has her own feed bucket since mom has warned her off mom's ration. And of course she's still nursing and probably will for quite some time. We'll let that end naturally I think.

Altea isn't being trained much at this point. She's still a bit pulled down from supporting Bonnie, and the flies have been terrible and make riding nearly impossible. We have a marshland very close to the barn and not on our land, and the worst of the big horseflies of course lay their eggs along the margins and the larvae develop in the mud and water. I'm building a trap soon.

Mostly I work her on a lunge line with some exercises to help her build up her back and to develop those obliques so she can lift her belly to carry the rider.

I'm bringing in a building for hay storage in the next couple of weeks and that has me quite busy with land clearing, leveling, etc.

The garden is producing heavily and feeding two families. And of course we give away a great deal to neighbors and friends. But it's not the demanding work it was early in the season with cultivation and planting. Kate does most of the harvesting to save my back. (for the barn work, and stall cleaning, of course).

Breath Speak

I am convinced through quite a lot of experimentation that horses talk to each other by smell, as well as using other senses. That the breath gives clues to the content of the mind. You know, I'm sure, the business of horses strange to each other approaching and snorting in each other's nostrils then squealing, possibly even striking out (though rarely actually connecting).

Some weeks ago I tried a little experiment with Bonnie. She had taken to collecting my breath. So one day I prepared my mind to think like my more savage ancestors, and imagined her being butchered and roasted on a spit (shudder...don't scream at me, it's just an experiment).

Bonnie took my breath and you would not believe the expression. First she stepped back, uncharacteristically, and then turned her head away, and the look of disgust on her face was quite clear. She even worked her mouth a bit as though she wanted to expel something unpleasant she'd tried to eat.

She had never done that before during our breath exchanges.

Of course I then switched back to loving thoughts and a sorry apology for my bad evil thoughts, breathed with her again, and she and I were once more on good terms.

But she is now even more careful to check my breath upon each days beginning.

I think if you try to hide your real feelings from a horse they will not trust you. This because you simply cannot do it, only try to do it and they can read that. Not just with the breath and your odor, but with every tiny move, your heartbeat/pulse, I think even your electrical field may be open to them.

Recent experiments in the equine scientific community are supporting these possibilities.

And of course Bonnie and Altea are already telling me it's so.

Just another one of the mysteries of the deep dark beautiful forest.

Donald