Baaaaaby Cooooolt!

[dancinghorse]

This week has been lost in Baby Brain--getting us all used to the shift in routine, and teaching babymonster (who has a name but I should clear it with the other half of the ownership pool before making public--she's away for the long weekend) all about scrrrrrritchies. I had worried that he would take a long time to civilize, but after arriving on Tuesday, by Wednesday evening he was allowing me to scritch his butt through the fence. By Friday I was allowed to be in the same space while rubbing him all over. Since then he's been coming up to me and being more or less a normal in-your-face DHF babymonster.

His mom came into heat shortly after arrival. Pooka tried to do something about it Friday, mare said NO!, so Saturday they spent a lot of time interacting over the fence. Today I put them out together--watching carefully to be sure the baby would be OK. We have video here and here. Note how mom keeps a weather eye on the proceedings.

For those who haven't seen stallions in a herd situation, this can be fairly boggling. This is what a stallion is supposed to be like. Amazing, isn't it?

I grabbed some stills off the video, too (still haven't figured out how to get the higher-res version).

So much for the Fierce Aggressive Stallion Who Will Go After His Offspring And Eat It:




In case you thought the first one was a fluke:





Boy play while mom makes sure nobody gets fresh:




A very muddy Pooka swaps war stories with the kid after a good hard roll (we'd had a short downpour a few minutes before):



And as a bonus: Post-roll, Pooka throws in a little extravagance. Even covered with mud, the Platonic archetype of the My Little Pony rules.

Comments

[mizkit.livejournal.com]

Babymonster looks *very* *tall*. Is he, or do I just not know anything about baby horse sizes?

*falls right over at that last picture of Pooka*

[casacorona.livejournal.com]

Baby is tall. Lipizzan mass with Arabian leg length. He's going to be a very nice-sized dressage horse for someone.

[rethought.livejournal.com]

Cute is the wrong word, and gorgeous doesn't cover all of it. They're just...just... *gives up*

:)

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

:)

The little guy in person is beyond gorgeous. Perfectly shaped, lots of pizzazz. Coat like black velvet.

[matociquala.livejournal.com]

Lovely boys! I love Pooka running up ahead of the mare and foal to get their attention again after they walk away. ME! no, ME! Look at me!!!!

I knew one stallion whose stall I would happily lie down and sleep in. His half-brother tried to kill me once. (And did succeed in cracking the pelvis of another stable hand.)

It happens in the best of families.

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

I hope the killer stallion was gelded muy pronto.

Pooka gets to keep the optional equipment not just because he's stone gorgeous and an international-caliber mover. The temperament is the deciding factor. AND he passes on the whole package. Our motto: "You See One Pooklet, You've Seen Them All."

[wrathchylde.livejournal.com]

Aw. Just .... aw.

[plutosonium.livejournal.com]

The boggling part is that the mare is *in heat* and Pooka is I'm sure extremely aware of it.. and he's playing gently with a baby.

Aw... I melt. Human males would not be so nice.

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

Pooka is very laid back in a pasture-breeding situation. He's a kamikaze bomber for the AI phantom, and breeding in hand can be exciting, but turn him out with a mare and he's the soul of discretion.

What most fascinated me was seeing how extremely careful he was to treat the baby the way the mare wanted him to. If she angled an ear, he backed off. She was teaching the baby how to play boy games, using Pooka as a study aid--and he wasn't allowed to put a foot out of line.

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

Did Baby bite da Pook on the butt?

I laugh!

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

Yes he did. Several times. And there was a tiny muddy hoofprint on Pooka's back before he rolled--kid was climbing all over him.

[threeringedmoon.livejournal.com]

Great photos. Glad you are getting some rain: we've had two good downpours in the past wekk.

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

It is much needed. We're glad to have it.

[windtear.livejournal.com]

The Pooklet is so sweet... so beautiful. What do The Girlz think of him?

I love the images of Pooka playing with the baby. That's paternal if ever I've seen it. I have no idea of what stallions are normally like around their foals, but I'm glad Pooka is this gentle. I only hope that next time he gets ridden he doesn't decide that he must now show off for Baby - or, if he must, that 'showing off' consists of being perfect.

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

The Girlz are fascinated. They love babies.

Stallions are supposed to be like this with foals. This is how they are in the wild. As for riding him, I longed him yesterday morning before I let mom and baby out, and he was perfectly behaved. Breeding makes his back tight so I didn't ride him today; I'll see how he is tomorrow.

Supposedly the best thing you can do for a stallion after you breed him is ride him--and I mean immediately afterwards. He's all relaxed and his back is pumped and he's lovely, they say. I haven't tried it yet.

[dancingwriter.livejournal.com]

Oh, wonderful!

There is a family up the road from us who have Percherons, and one of the mares had a baby this spring. I love driving by and seeing how it's growing.

(Excuse my icon's irrelevance; it's the only thing horsey I've got!)

[plutosonium.livejournal.com]

Friends of mine live next door to a farm with minis. They have mama, daddy, and a teeny little baby in a field next to the road. I die of the cuteness every time I drive over there.

[simplystars.livejournal.com]

Hee. I love Pook's yawn at the end. And the Pooklet is a little firecracker, isn't he? Nibbling and quick to scoot his foreleg out of reach... smart mama, too. :)

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

Baby is Exactly like his dad. In about 5 years, he'll be Pook all over again--a hand or so taller. He has a lot of charisma. He's All Boy.

[christymarx.livejournal.com]

I love the video. Pooka is such a Prince, and the baby is gorgeous. Love those long legs!

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

:) We like those legs. Lipps do have that fireplug thing going on. The ArabX, when it works, gives you more daylight underneath and a more modern profile.

[monder.livejournal.com]

Oh, the cuteness! I could sit and watch them all day. But, guests are gone. Must get back to work.

[miintikwa.livejournal.com]

I die of cute.

The baby is going to be absolutely amazing if he's as smart as Pooka with those long Arab legs! Oh, *whimper*

I need horse therapy.

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

Hippotherapy. Best kind.

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

These are wonderful!

and all that muzzle-nuzzling is affection and play?

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

Communication--touching noses is a major conversational gambit in Horse. Social interaction. Baby stallion games--figuring out who's top horse. Dad's letting kid win. Mom's making sure dad doesn't get too strong with kid. The leg stuff is classic stallion posturing: they bite at one another's forearms to signify dominance. Kid chasing dad's butt is a dominance game, which mares also play.

Kid is learning how to be a herd citizen. One thing he's trying to do is get dad to do mutual neck grooming, but dad isn't cooperating--so kid has to go to mom for that.

There's a lot of complexity and nuance in what's going on. And the one in control is the mare. She's modulating what both of them do, to a quite sophisticated degree.

In the one where Pooka yawns and walks off, what he then does is come up to me and start licking my hand. He's had enough of the kid, so he goes off to take a rest with his human.

loverly family pics

[wynnsfolly.livejournal.com]

I've greatly enjoyed them.
It's really neat to see them live in a natural group setting, too.
One of my favorite boys, the sire of my icon above, was such a sweet boy as a stallion, that when we sold the filly's mom when it was time to wean her, we kept her with her daddy until she was nearly a year old. she turned out to be one of the sweetest, best tempered of all our babies.

Re: loverly family pics

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

A good stallion is pretty amazing, isn't he?

Pooka has no sexual interest in his immediate family members btw. Sister, mother, daughter--they don't exist for him in that way. Apparently that's how it is in the wild.

ZOMG!! MORE PLEASE!!

[meri-psychcmedm.livejournal.com]

That baby has his daddy wrapped RIGHT around those little hoofies!!

SOOOOOOO *CUTE* I finally gave in and added you (all Plutosonium's fault! :D ).

*Best wishes,*

--Meri

Re: ZOMG!! MORE PLEASE!!

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

Hey, welcome!

We'll work on getting more soon. :)

[sfmarty.livejournal.com]

Glyph of happy for you.