Beauty and a Beast

Johnny is such a sweet boy... most of the time. I love his eyes and the way he comes to get apples and carrots. His nose is so soft as he snuffles around my hand to get every bit of treat. When I come out the back door he nickers softly to say hello. When I open the barn door to let him out onto the pasture he always goes and does his business before he leaves. I hardly ever have to clean up the pasture...he goes back to the barn when he needs to do his thing. I don't know if this is normal for horses but it sure surprised me. It makes my barn chores so easy to have all the mess in one place. This is all good news. THEN he turns into the wild child.

He has this mischievous side. He will work and work and work to open the barn door and eventually it will come open. So now I have to put a second snap on. I will groom him for about an hour and then he goes and rolls in the dirt! I clean his hooves and trim them all nice and smooth and he goes and walks in the mud.   And what do I do with this hair? After a good run it looks scary. Last week I got out the vacuum and blew all the sand and dust out of his long hair. It worked quite well once I convinced him he liked sunflower seeds more then he was afraid of the vacuum!

Oh, Johnny, we love you...we do...we really do.