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Listening to Vetch
July 20, 2004
Some days are just odd, no doubt about it. It seems pretty normal when you wake up, brush your teeth, tie your hair back in a pony tail and head out to the barn for chores, but things just don’t seem to quite go as planned.
For me today it started as I drove the ten miles of country roads to get to work in town, running a bit late to a meeting with University administrator types. I was listening to the news on the car radio when I puzzled over why the radio station would be playing cat meows over the news. I turned off the radio, and realized the meows didn’t go away.
As soon as I was able, I pulled into a parking lot and surveyed my van from back to front, looking under seats, opened the back, scratched my head. Then the meowing started again—under the hood. I struggled with the latch, lifted up the hood and a distressed bundle of kitten fur hurtled out at me, clinging all four little greasy paws to my shirt. Unscathed except for greasy feet, this little two month old kitten had survived a 50 mile per hour ride for 20 minutes, including several turns and stops. He immediately crawled up to my shoulder, settled in by my ear, and began to purr. I contemplated showing up at a meeting with a kitten and grease marks all over me, vs. heading back home with my newly portable neck warmer. I opted to call in with the excuse “my cat hitchhiked to work with me this morning and is thumbing for a ride back home” and headed back down the road to take him back to the barn where he belongs, now with the new name “Harley” because he clearly desires the open road.
After getting back from a short day at work, I returned in time for our two year old mare Nuance to be picked up to go out for a month of intensive ground work with our trainer. She has never left the farm, so had never been trailered before. The trainer arrived with a warmblood in the slant load, a fairly fussy and impatient gelding who did a fair amount of shifting and stomping. Nuance approached the trailer warily, wondering about the racket, and with a bit of encouragement in front and behind, loaded within ten minutes, not a bad first time loading given that she was not at all sure about her traveling partner. By the time the trailer was pulling out to the road, I could hear major commotion in the trailer, waved the truck to stop, and dropped the window to find I was staring at a Haflinger butt, not a face. Nuance had done a complete 180 stretching the trailer tie bungee rope to its full length, leaving her head up in the air because of how taut it was. We opened the back, released the quick release buckle on the tie at the halter and decided to let her ride backwards untied, if that was her preference. She rode fine the remainder of the 45 minute freeway trip, but now she’s going to think that is always how a horse rides in a trailer.
After breathing a sigh of relief to hear that my second traveling farm critter was safe and sound, I went out to check fence line as the hot wire seemed to be shorting out somewhere in the pasture as the mares had decided that the wire interfered with their hearts’ desire and had broken through, so it clearly was not hot enough to discourage them. It was a warm day today with only a brief shower this morning and persistant drying breezes this afternoon so as I approached the fenceline, I heard numerous snaps and pops that I interpreted as hot wire shorting out in the dry grass and weeds, creating a fire hazard and certainly potentially dangerous with the winds whipping up. I walked closer and was really puzzled to hear snaps all up and down the fence, but could not see sparks. I approached more closely and heard a little "snap" and a tiny seed pod burst open in front of my eyes, dropping its contents very effectively. It was the dried common vetch seed pods that were snapping and popping, not hot wire shorting out. They were literally exploding all up and down the fenceline in a reproductive symphony of seed release. I put the broken wire back to together, plugged it in and all was well, at least until the next Haflinger decides the adjacent pasture looks better.
After turning our stallion out for his turn at pasture for the evening, I saw him pawing furiously at his round black rubber water tub, splashing water everywhere and creating quite a spectacle. I went up to him to refill the tub with the hose and he continued to paw and splash in the tub and actually went down on his knees in the tub and then tried to lower one shoulder into it and his neck and face. By this time he had created quite a mud puddle of the thick dust around the tub and his splashing and thrashing was causing mud to fly everywhere, including all over me, my hair, covering his mane and tail and belly and legs. I took the hose and sprayed the cold water over him and he leaned closer to me, begging me to spray him everywhere, turning around so I could do his other side, facing me so I could spray his face. I drenched him completely, and he was one happy horsie and I was laughing my head off at what he had done to me. Both drenched, muddy, dirty, but happy and much much cooler. What a sight we were. And this is the Haflinger that hesitates sometimes at water hazards on the cross country courses because he wants to splash and play in it.
This was an odd day on the farm indeed. It is never dull here. Remember to bang on your car hood before you get in, let your horses ride backwards if they wish, keep the hotwire hot, and share a mud bath with your Haflinger. But especially, listen to the vetch and don't let it fool you that catastrophe is about to happen. The vetch is simply exploding in noisy reproductive ecstasy. It doesn’t get much better than that.