A Different Kind of Pond

Sadly this drought has drastically limited our fitness opportunities. While we can ride out for miles from home, which Leah pointed out is a privilege in itself for sure, the ground is too hard for me to feel safe doing a lot of trotting or cantering. I'm still protective of pony's feet and am trying not to find the line where he gets bruised (and this was true before I pulled his shoes as well). Meanwhile, diesel prices mean that a weekly haul to Sweet Dixie isn't ideal either. I started to look at water options, but nearby poor Dinner pond is completely dry. There is another lake quite close to there, but there's a lot of vegetation. When DH ad I checked it out the other night there was a gator gliding quietly around. I am pretty positive a gator wouldn't attack a pony, but that's pretty positive, not 100% positive. After some mulling, I figured that while I'm happy to swim in lakes and ponds in Florida, I could never forgive myself if Butterball got mauled. 

But I poked around and found another door! I contacted the veterinary/rehab clinic that is right around the corner from my house and the farm, and they do in fact offer aquatredding. Butterball has been to aquatred a few times, part of a package deal I had leftover from rehabbing Ben. But that clinic is even further away than Sweet Dixie, so it was great to find this location less than ten minutes away. 

Butterball had his first session (of 16, but no one tell him that) on Friday. The staff greeted us and let him poke around in the area where the treadmill was. Like before, I asked if we could try him without sedation since he's a pretty chill dude with pretty low motivation levels. They were totally game to see if we could get him used to the whole thing without drugs, but their vet was there just in case he did need something. 

I immediately liked the tech who led his session, she had that calm demeanor that animals are just drawn to and Butterball was no exception. She walked him through the treadmill a few times before okaying closing him in. Once he was closed in, they started the belt. He just took a second to get used to that. I very much appreciated the veterinarian supervising the whole session. She watched him from the front and side, making sure his walk was staying 4 beat and that he was straight on the belt. She recommended turning up the speed at one point because he would get close to the front then pause and slide back, going a bit faster prevented that. As she said, he should march, that's his job. 

He was pleased to have FOUR people fawning over him and paying attention to him and didn't mind the treadmill moving. Then they added water. He immediately stuck his face down into it, but was most DISPLEASED to find that it was salt water. Sorry buddy. 

But after that little disappointment with accompanying faces, he was just a star. We're going again on Wednesday and they'll add a bit more water, eventually working up to it being about at his elbows. I'm excited to have this as our latest fitness tool!