Follow Me, Baby

Oct 8, 2014 | Horses

This is what happens when you try to photograph foals in the pasture. They’d rather visit you than pose. Sans assistant, you get pictures of noses, ears, foreheads; the haunches of a shy one as it scoots behind the mare; a selfie with one of the snugglers if you’re lucky. (We call in the professionals for advertisement-grade baby photos.)

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Even the shy ones are curious. It feels like an accomplishment when they let you get close, or they reach out and nuzzle your hand. (You have to crouch down to their level and let them come to you.) The bold ones barge over and lean on you, asking for a shoulder-scratch. Or try to climb onto your lap, like sweet baby Maddie, who got up from her nap to play with me:

Selfies with baby Maddie

Selfies with baby Maddie

If Tom and Mandy can’t find me at lunchtime, they know where to look.

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The bay on the right is One Story Nite.

This is One Stormy Nite, the by colt born the day after Hurricane died.

This is One Stormy Nite, the by colt born the day after Hurricane died.

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Blue eyes run in our stallion's family.

Blue eyes run in our stallion’s family.

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With a daughter of our World Reining Finals Champion mare, Darlins Not Painted

With a daughter of our World Reining Finals Champion mare, Darlins Not Painted

 

This one’s nickname is Donna (registered name: Spend The Nite). Even in her pre-grooming pasture life, she had the silkiest-ever coat:

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Once the foals are weaned, they get into herd behavior even more. The yearling fillies bunch around you and push each other. They chew your clothes, breathe on your ears, slobber your hair. Fabulous!

My Stanford poetry teacher, Gaby Calvocoressi, visited the ranch when she was living nearby, at the university in Denton. We spent an hour with the yearling fillies. Gaby’s like me: she didn’t want to leave. She said it was one of the most extraordinary experiences of her life. (Check out Gaby’s brilliant books, Apocalyptic Swing and The Last Time I Saw Amelia Earhartforceful and compassionate poems about longing and tragedy; jazz, boxing, small-town America, and that famous lost heroine.)

sarah gang

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Our beautiful Belle Starr Dun It, as a yearling

Our beautiful Belle Starr Dun It, as a yearling

Belle and friends

Belle and friends

Reining horses start their training at age two. Warmbloods develop more slowly. In Hamburg, where my young jumpers live, the horses stay in the field until they’re three. We I visited during the World Equestrian Games. These herds include yearlings, two-year-olds, and three-year-olds out of my speed-demon jumper mare, Labelle:

Our For Pleasure filly is in the middle

Our For Pleasure 2-year-old filly is in the middle (bay); our 3-year-old Epsom Gesmeray is on the right.

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Same two fillies together

Same two fillies together

Yearling colts

Yearling colts

With the yearlings (ours is the dark bay at right, by Nonstop)

With the yearlings (ours is the dark bay at right, by Nonstop)

Our Nonstop yearling

Our Nonstop yearling colt, Nabokov

He’s shy enough not to push you around, but he wanted to visit—and stuck around even when the others took off:

Two-year-old colts

Two-year-old colts (by Cornet Obolensky, For Pleasure, and Sandro Boy)

Sandro Boy colt

Sandro Boy colt, Sammy Boy

Love the Cornet colt. Camera inside jacket to protect from chomping.

Cornet Obolensky colt, Corner Pocket (Camera inside jacket to protect from drizzle and, more importantly, chomping!)

The grey at left isn't ours; the other three are (by For Pleasure, Cornet Obolensky, and Sandro Boy)

My three boys together (For Pleasure, Cornet Obolensky, Sandro Boy), plus one of their friends on the left.

 

 

 

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