Food

For a while now, I`ve been marvelling at just how little I need to feed Ginger to keep her in good condition. She gets about a flake of local hay for breakfast and two for dinner, a tiny bit of grain, and the odd treat. The barn owner doesn`t feed by weight, so the actual amounts are going to vary day by day. I`ve always weighed everything at home so can make an educated guess. I`m guessing a safe bet is she gets 10-15lbs of food in total per day. My feed bill is tiny - even here where hay goes for $15-$20 a bale. Sort of strange considering she`s not a small animal, but hey, I can`t complain.

I`ve also been wondering why her paddock seems much muddier and dug up than everyone elses. I figured it`s because she loves to run around on the soft ground with those big giant feet. Not so. It turns out my slightly-overweight-on-no-food pony and her dug up paddock have everything in common. It seems someone has decided that she`s *starving* and the only course of action is to dig  holes and eat the roots of the trees and shrubs along the fencelines of her paddock. Luckily we`re in the middle of the forest and these aren`t specially planted gardens, so she`s actually doing everyone a bit of a favor clearing the fencelines. So far the barn owner doesn`t mind her not so level paddock. We can bring the tractor in to fix it in the spring provided it doesn`t get too out of control, and she`s put up an electric fence near the barn where Ginger might be able to mess with the drainage if she digs. I might have to look into a slow feeder system so she can stay occupied eating hay rather than excavating the back 40. Or rent her out with some of those land clearing goats ;)

I love to eat trees:

 

What you can't see in that picture is that I was leading her to my stump that serves as a mounting block and all of the sudden she felt HEAVY. I turned around and the fir branch she's eating in this picture was attached to a broken tree limb about 6 feet long and about 5" in diameter at the large end - she was happily eating and dragging the whole thing along with us. So there I am wondering if I tell her to 'drop it' like a dog or try to pull it out of her mouth. Luckily the small piece broke off before I really had to think about it. This is probably a new low for those of us who were told as kids to never ever let your horse eat with her bridle on.

Also a low point- what our drive home looked like at 2:00 this afternoon. I don't mind the rain so much, but that darkness day in and day out? - yuck  :(