Girls

19 07 2011

Now for some girls. 🙂 From the same evening with Comanche’s and Hollywood’s band.

Briosa and Eliana with Eli’s mom and Bri’s (likely) grandma – Mahogany.

A little girl (Juniper) in a great big country. The hill in the middle distance is Flat Top.

Juni walking up to big sister Winona.

Later … I’m not entirely sure whether she was whinnying at Hollywood or Bri and Eli.

Briosa with mama Piedra

Eliana with mama Mahogany

Mama/grandma Mahogany with her girls …

… She seems to have a little more patience for both of them together. Piedra has less patience with Eliana … but watching Eliana and Briosa, it’s easier to tell which of the mares outrank which – Eliana, the little princess, is clearly the leader between her and Briosa – even though Bri is older and bigger.

But Bri is a bit more curious!

They do hang out quite a bit together now. 🙂

Besotted? Who, me?! 🙂


Comments : 1 Comment »

Categories : Briosa, Eliana, Juniper, Mahogany, Piedra

Some to love

27 06 2011

It occurred to me that I wouldn’t get any of these posted if I tried to do them in some kind of order – the always way of it these days – so here are some pix of some horses … Beautiful, all.

Houdini and Deniz.

I’ve been expecting the usual migration westward as the forage and water grows scarce back in the east. One of the two ponds back there is holding pretty steady, though, so several bands are (still) taking advantage of it. Grey/Traveler’s band, however, had made the trip, and I found them at afternoon water in the Wildcat Spring area. There’s enough water there this year – interestingly – that there are some stagnant pockets of it along the wash. I heard the girls (Terra, Gemma and Corona) playing in one such puddle, though I couldn’t get a clear look at them because of the obscuring greasewood on the banks. Mama and baby and Grey were above the arroyo. Deniz is going grey fast, like sister Gemma. She’s a big tall girl, eh?

Baby girls Briosa, left, and Eliana, with Bri’s mama Piedra in the background. Eli’s mama Mahogany was grazing down to the right (a pic is with the “Oppose sterilization” post of a few days ago). I wanted my wide-angle lens for, well, not the first time, I guess, to try to capture some of the beautiful background of the basin “behind” the fillies as they napped.

There’s some of it behind Hollywood, who was, I think, watching Aspen and Sundance, close-ish again. In the near background is part of the north side of the east-west hill, and in the far-ish background (not all the way back) is part of what I call Lizard Mesa.

Eli gives Bri a little post-nap nuzzle. They’re now at the age to be interested in each other. Bri, not quite a month older than Eli, is considerably bigger and stouter.

Sunny little Eliana is just a beautiful little princess of a filly.

Piedra was closest, and after she got up, Bri walked right over for a snack. Eli lingered, though, taking her sweet time walking down the slope, stopping, looking at mama, at stepdaddy (Sundance is Eliana’s sire), at me, back at Bri … before finally going on down for her own lunch. Bri’s a stout little girl, eh? Takes after daddy.

Speaking of daddies, here’s Varoujan with his daddy – Butch.

And with mama.

Kreacher’s band weren’t too far, and I waited for them, too, to mosey their way up to, across and off the road (it was like rush hour out there! 😉 ). This was a horizontally shot image I took through the passenger-side window and cropped into a vertical. I also took the image a post or so back of Apollo looking through his legs horizontally and cropped it vertically. I crop almost all my photos – some more than others.

Heading out of the basin for the evening: Hook’s band. I couldn’t decide between this one and …

… this one. Ponies gilded with light, those hills in the back! The near-ish hills are part of Spring Creek Basin, our northwest hills; the far-ish hills to the sky are outside the basin but still part of Disappointment Valley, basically, the far northeastern edge (the basin is tucked a little lower into the valley’s east-northeastern side). From left: black Sable and grey Twister, hanging with the band; almost yearling Fierro looking toward the camera and dark bay Pinon behind him; grey Ember, bay Hannah and Hook. Ember is due close to any time now.


Comments : 2 Comments »

Categories : Briosa, Butch, Deniz, Eliana, Ember, Fierro, Hannah, Hollywood, Hook, Houdini, Kreacher, Luna, Piedra, Pinon, Sable, Twister, Varoujan

Little red misses

27 05 2011

I’m liking this change:

Briosa

Eliana

What do they have in common?

! 🙂

What else might they have in common?

Mahogany might be Piedra’s mother, which might make Eliana Piedra’s sister … Briosa’s aunt.

Mahogany and Eliana

Piedra and Briosa. The funniest thing about this photo is the backstory. Briosa had been nursing and must have slurped a bit too hard because mama delivered a swift reprimand in the form of a snap to her little heiney – which provoked a little kicking fit from both of them! “Don’t bite the udder that feeds you”?! Learned early! 🙂

Hollywood was working to keep his girls close … because Aspen showed up on a hill a short distance away.

To recap, Sundance had Mahogany for a bit more than a year, then two weeks ago, he finally lost Mahogany and Eliana to Aspen the day after I first met Eli. Sometime in the last two weeks, Hollywood managed to steal them from Aspen. To go a little farther back, the winter before this last, Hook briefly stole Piedra and Sage from Hollywood. He had them a shorter than the winter before, when Aspen stole them!

Shall we go even further back in time?

Mahogany and Piedra were originally part of Steeldust’s band. When I first started documenting the horses, Hollywood had Jif … and then they started hanging out with Steeldust’s … that was in the days when the Bachelor 7 were running around with them, too. Then Grey/Traveler stole Jif to add to Houdini and Two Boots and Twister, and Holls turned his attention to lovely Piedra. Bri is their third baby!

Bri is a month old, and Eli is about 2 weeks old – enough age difference that Bri is more independent than her aunt Eli (!), who still sticks pretty close to mama.

So here’s a question: Who is alpha? Piedra, who has been with Hollywood for a few years now, or Mahogany, who is older – and possibly Piedra’s dam – but newly come to the family?

Oh, the wild ways of the wild ones!

Can you stand the cuteness?

How amazing it will be to watch these red babies grow together!

Little beauties. How amazing they are! And together!? Look out! 🙂


Comments : 5 Comments »

Categories : Briosa, Eliana, Hollywood, Mahogany, Piedra

Contact

24 05 2011

A couple of “miscellaneous” and several from an evening.

Piedra and Briosa looking south … I think that vibrant green cottonwood makes the whole scene. 🙂

Ties of family are strong, blood or no. Liberty and her mother, Molly, spent time with Bounce’s band shortly before Molly died in the fall of 2009. Afterward, Liberty went back to the band … then ended up with Cinch in the fall of 2010. Gaia ended up with them over the winter (January 2011?). Gaia is 3 (Alegre’s daughter, Bounce’s stepdaughter), Liberty is 2 (Seven x Molly). It’s not a huge surprise these girls ended up back together. 🙂

Sundance and Hollywood in sync.

I ended up right on the road in a great position to watch some awesome dynamics playing out. From a distance, I had seen Sundance (recently separated from Mahogany, Eliana and Aspen) with Sage and Ze, two young (2 years old) bachelors. Hollywood’s were close – as were Hook’s band.

Hook

Hollywood

Double trouble on the bubble – Sage and Ze wisely kept their distance, but all the boys – and girls – were well aware of them.

Sisters Hannah (bay) and Ember

Part of the magnificent background of Spring Creek Basin – Knife Edge, McKenna Peak and the unnamed promontory …

Hook’s band – Brumley Point in the background …

Fierro, Hannah and Sable. Hollywood actually stole Hannah briefly when she was a yearling (by briefly, I mean around an hour or so). That was shortly before she followed sister Ember and half-brother Pinon to Hook’s band … followed shortly thereafter by Sable.

Hollywood about to greet Pinon …

Hollywood left Piedra and Briosa for quite a long while during this melee … He later chased Sundance far to the east, and Hook’s and Sage and Ze eventually followed, and Holls eventually went back to his girls.

What a day!


Comments : Leave a Comment »

Categories : Briosa, Cinch, Ember, Fierro, Gaia, Hannah, Hollywood, Hook, Liberty, Piedra, Pinon, Sable, Sage, Sundance, Ze

Briosa and family

11 05 2011

Had *wonderful* visits with Hollywood, Piedra and baby Bri last week. Am delayed getting out to the basin by much-needed rain and snow (!) – moisture – so I was able to get to some more pix today that might have been pushed off even further!

Here are some pix from the first visit:

She’s a bit of an independent girl.

Daddy Hollywood

She made a few overtures to daddy …

He wasn’t overtly interested in her, but he just seemed to “quiet” … I don’t know how to explain it, but I’ve seen it in all the stallions when the babies are near. Careful. Gentle.

Family 🙂

Many with mama Piedra, of course …

Little darling girl!


Comments : 5 Comments »

Categories : Briosa, Hollywood, Piedra

Promised

6 05 2011

Oh, to live like the ponies … in the moment, the future now. Roll with the flow. That’s how it goes when I’m in the basin … the only planning moving forward, one step ahead of the last.

Piedra and Briosa – last week. At the tail end of the wonderful long hike that introduced me to Coal for the first time, I caught up to a visit with Hollywood and his girls – with Bruiser and Milagro tagging along. She’s taking a sweet break here, but this little doll lives up to her name – “spirited”! I got to spend more time with them this weekend – what an absolute treat!

No new babies this week … but several are due within the next couple of weeks … some closer than others! The weather was spectacular. 4CBCH folks – cross your fingers, hold your prayers aloft – bring buckets of sunscreen and vats of water – and bug spray, the gnats are back! But if we have weather next week/end like this, what a glorious time we’ll have!

More changes to report ahead … promise.


Comments : 2 Comments »

Categories : Briosa, Piedra

Two new

21 04 2011

Still haven’t seen Miss Shadow (saw everybody but them and Poco!), but we have two additions to the world!

My Cortez talk is tonight, so these are just teasers until I can get to more!

Gemma, baby sister and mama Houdini.

This is at least the fifth straight daughter for Houdini – and the third daughter for Grey/Traveler and Houdini.

And …

Piedra and her baby girl – her first daughter!

From a couple of previous suggestions from friends, I’ve already named this little one Briosa – Bri (“bree”) to friends – which means “spirited” – for THIS exuberance:

How spectacular is SHE! 🙂

Welcome to your basin, little girls! We’re delighted you’re here!

Some changes coming (they’ve already happened – the reportage is coming) … It’s springtime again in the basin!


Comments : 6 Comments »

Categories : Briosa, Houdini, Piedra

Hollywood’s

18 04 2011

Some of Hollywood’s other family members …

The sun had lit the west, but we were still in shade when Hollywood and his firstborn, Sage, appeared in relief on a ridge against the sky. Between seeing them and training my lens on them, Sage’s expression drooped, and in the next half-second, off he went. They do appear very different, don’t they?

Curious George of colts …

… and George II – brother Tenaz, too! This little guy more closely resembles their daddy.

Watching Comanche’s crew … Tenaz and Hollywood were just to the left … baby and mama Iya at right.

It’s no wonder he was (at least) once mistaken from a distance for a sorrel – how red he glows in the early light!

Mama Piedra stood thus entranced for quite a long while (notice her shedding along her topline), and I couldn’t quite figure out what she was so intent about …

… until I looked up the hill and saw this little – still her youngest – moseying about, sun behind him from mama’s view. What was she thinking? What was he? … I could be completely wrong, but he demonstrates this lagging behavior every time ‘Nona is in the vicinity … 🙂


Comments : Leave a Comment »

Categories : Hollywood, Iya, Piedra, Sage, Tenaz

Hollywood’s

27 03 2011

Monday, March 28, is the deadline to call the Dolores Public Lands Office at (970) 882-6800 *to request placement on the mailing list* to be sent the scoping letter for the Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area roundup this fall. The scoping letter then should be coming out very soon. The scoping letter also will be online, and I’ll post that link when it’s ready. The deadline for comments will be in that letter.

********************************************************************************

Hollywood’s band was *right* off the road when I was making my way out of the basin, all hope of sunset light disappearing behind clouds. He made quite a striking figure standing sentry with some low hills, still spotted with snow, behind him (beyond the basin).

Though the golden end-o-day light didn’t break through as I had hoped, there’s something really lovely and soft about the last diffused light we did get – especially on Holls’ gorgeous dun coat.

Hollywood

Hollywood’s girls – and one of his boys: Baylee (left) will be 4; Iya will be 3 in late April; Sage, his son, will be 2 in late April; and mama Piedra is likely at least 5 this year.

BFFs Baylee and Iya. Has anyone else seen the news that the Oxford English Dictionary added that “word” recently? Like, OMG, I LOL at the ridiculousness – IMHO, of course. 🙂 I (heart) Spring Creek Basin mustangs! I’d try to get *meep* in the discussion – you know, like the roadrunner “says” in the Wile E. Coyote cartoons? – but I just can’t come up with a basin meep. I’ve heard marmots meep but no mustang meeping. Heh. (Wait, is that a word?)

Tenaz seems to be floating above Spring Creek canyon, which is really quite a distance away. That tiny glow of pink in the sky is all the color we got at the close of another wonderful day.


Comments : 3 Comments »

Categories : Baylee, Hollywood, Iya, Piedra, Sage, Tenaz

Subtlety

23 03 2011

This will be at the top of posts until the deadline – Monday, March 28 – to call the Dolores Public Lands Office at (970) 882-6800 to request placement on the mailing list to be sent the scoping letter for the Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area roundup this fall. That should be coming out very soon.

*******************************************************************************

The following are photos from my visit with Hollywood’s, Comanche’s and Mahogany’s bands last week. They were once all part of Steeldust’s large band (except the youngsters and Iya) – though not for a couple of years now. 🙂 Mahogany leaving with Sundance and bachelor Aspen is the most recent development.

Full brothers Tenaz, almost a yearling, left, and Sage, almost 2, right.

Here’s the rest of that story:

“Reading” stud pile messages. Iya in the background.

Mahogany (bay) and Sudance. SunD stays close to her to ward off Aspen. Mahogany is in much better shape this year after a year’s rest from raising a foal.

Mahogany is the dam of Baylee (almost 4), Pinon (almost 3) and Sable (almost 2). Bayles is with Hollywood; Pinon and Sable are with Hook. She should be due in May.

Aspen with Round Top in the background. See the road? It ends just above the curve you can see. That’s where I parked the day before and walked around the west side (to the right) and came back to the Jeep from the east side (left). Seven’s and Bruiser were “behind” it on the leftish side – basically southeastish.

I’m positive Iya is pregnant.

Baylee sure doesn’t look pregnant …

Watching me carefully while she rubs an itch using that greasewood! (Check out her lip!)

What do YOU think?

Straight-on of Baylee …

Straight-on of Iya.

Hang in there, mama Piedra. Only about another month for you.

If she’s as consistent as she was with Sage and Tenaz, she’s due around the end of April.

Sundance – check out that groovy, wavy mane.

Camouflage, naturally. (Did anyone see him in one of the pix above of Baylee?)

As he grows up, he reminds me more of Chrome in his carriage.

Comanche

I had been photographing Sage and Tenaz playing over the stud pile when I noticed ‘Nona moseying in our direction. Hollywood’s had spread out grazing, but Tenaz was lingering even after Sage had wandered off. Oh, sly boy, I wonder why? 🙂

Winona walking down into the shallow arroyo. Sure-footed and beautiful.

Earlier, Tenaz sticking to big brother.

Big trot …

Do you see the future? Mr. Tenaz guarding his family? Brother Sage and auntie Iya in the background.

Watching daddy Hollywood, who hadn’t yet crossed the arroyo. Don’t you see Hollywood in this boy?

Curious George, err, I mean Tenaz. 🙂

I went on up the hill to watch them, and Mahogany and SunD came up and past me again … Lack of golden sunshine didn’t diminish the beauty of the basin.

Someone in Telluride asked me (basically): Of all the wonderful places in the West that are loved and cherished and protected and should be protected, what’s so special about Spring Creek Basin?

An innocent question (I think … I hope) … one whose answers completely undid me.

“It’s magic,” I finally managed. I can’t remember what else I said through my tear-choked throat.

Is magic enough? To protect this place that most would see as empty, desolate, scrubby and lonesome and well off anyone’s definition of a beaten track?

I think I tried to say that I write a blog to try to tell people just what’s so special about it … Mostly, my attempts fall short.

The wind, howling the day before, howling overnight, was still at dawn and for a couple of hours … until it returned seemingly out of nowhere about midmorning. I got up to head back down the hill, and saw that Winona had laid down for a nap not far below me.

Ordinary? She’s watching a pair of noisy (mating?) ravens flying across the hill that had been with us all morning. Maybe, to her, alert to the goings-on of her world. Extraordinary.

Loved the soft light illuminating her mane, the dark eastern ridges rising above her, complementing her buckskin gold.

Head. So. Heavy.

What’s so special?

Really?

Do words even exist??


Comments : 4 Comments »

Categories : Aspen, Baylee, Iya, Mahogany, Piedra, Sage, Sundance, Tenaz, Winona

« Previous Entries Next Entries »