Wednesday Walks: The Neighborhood Conspires

Butterball and I headed out for a nice relaxed hack last Friday. He'd worked hard Monday through Thursday, so the plan was to walk our normal loop, mayyyyybee add on the extra 3/4 mile to the front of the neighborhood and then call it a day. However, all the critters of the neighborhood had met and planned to cause the absolute most chaos possible. 

It started off innocently enough. Foggy morning with a light breeze. 

First was the neighbor who always has loose dogs. There's an aussie and a mastiff and while neither seem horse aggressive they always leave their yard to bark at us. This time though there were also loose chickens rustling in the woods, which were kinda suspect but not bad. 

Then we got to the field where there are sometimes cows. There were cows but they were apparently totally freaked by the horse, so they went on somewhat erratic running spurts midway up the field. I think if they were closer they would've been more identifiable and less scary. But we persisted. 

We turned the corner and found a tuxedo cat, apparently far from home

It rustled through the woods and shrubs staying about thirty yards away for quite a while

Eventually we parted ways with the cat without Butterball ever actually getting a close look at it to sort out what it was and that he didn't need to be worried about it. He felt like trotting, so we picked up a trot and were swinging along nice and stretchy until we spooked the flock of turkeys in the field by us. This prompted him to go sideways, fortunately missing the half-assed fence made of metal rebar and a single band of thin rope. 

Then we got to the sheep

These are new sheep, never been in this pasture before. And they had lambs. And we first saw them through the woods. Then they ran away from us. Butterball definitely knew it wasn't a scent he was familiar with. I could feel his little heart pounding and was shoving cookies into the side of his mouth that he was absent mindedly chewing while still staring straight at the sheep. To his credit he only once considered noping the heck out of there. 

Hard stare at the sheep, at least not through the woods now

Then we proceeded. The next property always has cattle and they're sometimes in the woods. At this point not typically a problem for pony pants, but we were on about our fiftieth rabbit by this point, so they were a little freaky. 

But lookit how cute the calves are 

Then we walked past the bull of that herd. I never stop to chat with him because every time I see him I'm reminded how insufficient that fence appears. Then we turned the corner to our friendly cows (the ones that tried to murder me once, but now we know them and are fond of them). 

Wants to lick his face, Butters isn't sure he's into that 

But wait! There's something in the distance. The other cows are coming, fine. But there is a dog that is harassing a cow so the dog and cow are doing a spinning dance and the dog is barking as they approach. Perfect. 

Dog and cow visible in the distance. Friendly cow has also turned to see WTF is happening. 

Cows arrived. Dog opted to remain 3/4 of the way down the pasture and bark a bit before getting called home. 

The second set of cows came over to see what the fuss was about. And were through the woods, again. 

What's going on here? Party time?? 

Thank goodness this pony is a saint. He ate some clover in front of the cows and didn't attempt murder/suicide at any point on this journey. 

An actual cow gauntlet 

We carried on and did the 3/4 mile add on. I let him canter the dirt road in the woods because he felt like he really needed to. He woahed off my voice at both ends of it though, such a good pony. I started our relaxing hack with an entire jacket pocket full of treats and finished with none. Lots of click and cookie for flat footed walk after each scary event. And lots and lots of clicking and lots of deep sighs on my part to attempt him to take a breath while staring down the sheep. He finished with a relaxed swinging walk though, success.