April 6, 2008 – Burnt Timber

On April 6, we headed back up Burnt Timber. We first found Jackson’s family spread out on a hill slope. It’s great to see Jackson come into his own and put together such a nice young family. I came across a picture of Jackson as a foal this week, I will likely post it in an upcoming post.

Just up from them was Teton and his family. Teton is moving out of his black winter coat into his summer blue roan coat. The blue roan bachelor Fools Crow is also, but I’ve only seen pictures of him from visitors lucky enough to see him lately.

Phoenix was near Teton and the dun mare.

The upcoming three year old colt is also losing his winter coat and going into his summer roan coat. He doesn’t quite have the elegance of Teton’s coat change, though.

I am still very interested to see the final color of the 2007 colt. We’re still leaning into some variant of buckskin, such as sooty or roan.

We came out onto Cheyenne Flats and saw some horses there. Like seeing Two Boots’s family, this was a nice surprise as it was Tecumseh’s family.

Tecumseh was on a small rise above his family. He has a dark bay mare with her 2007 filly foal and a bay roan filly.

I was surprised to see the color the 2007 filly foal had turned out to be, but it does make sense. She is a really pretty dun with nice stripes. This is the probable coat color she would have given that her father was a dun and her mother a bay, but I just didn’t think she would look quite like this.

We went a little further up to see if we could spot any other horses. We saw a dun in the distance, and so we moved closer to identify it. I was hoping it would be Looking Glass, but it was the young dun filly that had been with White Cloud.

We did a thorough inspection of the area, and White Cloud was nowhere to be seen. Tecumseh was the nearest stallion to her, and he was a good half mile away. She seemed to be smelling Duke’s family, who was upwind but a few miles away to the west.

Right now, she is considered to be “in transit,” which means that she is just a female horse by herself. She will of course get taken in by another family soon, but it is an interesting thing to see female horses in the “bachelor” lifestyle. It will be interesting to see who she ends up with next.

April 5, 2008 – Lower Sykes Ridge

We headed up Lower Sykes Ridge on April 5. As we went up, we saw Corona’s family in a grassy area.

You probably notice here that today Corona’s family had an extra member – A new foal!

We believe this to be the first foal of 2008 born. It is a little filly that is dark bay in color and has a large star, a back right pastern, and a faint dorsal stripe.

The mare Waif was the first to foal last year, and so it wasn’t total chance for us to find this new foal. Corona and Waif’s 2007 foal is a foal no longer – She is now a yearling, and she is pretty big.

Halo has changed a bit since she was first seen as a long legged red bay with a large star. I am planning a post showing the 2007 foals as young horses along with photos of them now.

We went and looked in another area to see about any other horses. I was happy to see Admiral in there as it’d been a while since I’d seen his family. That is indeed a fence Admiral is behind, but he isn’t separated from his family. That is a boundary fence between the Park Service and BLM portions of the range, and there is a big open gate just about fifty feet down from where Admiral was.

The filly is looking great as she reaches her second year. She is looking like a little clone of her mother, with the large star and the great leg stripes.

The mare Seneca is looking like she could be close to having a new foal, so I am keeping an eye out for any new ones with them.

Foal season is definitely upon us, and there are a few other very pregnant mares out there that I am watching. So be expecting lots of new faces on the blog as we progress into the Spring.

April 3, 2008 – Burnt Timber

I was able to get my first trip back up to see the horses on April 3, and we went up Burnt Timber. Lakota and Teton’s families were near the road while we could see Duke and Jackson’s families only with the spotting scope. We also saw Santa Fe’s family near the catchment, and so we walked out there to see how they were.

Santa Fe and Broken Bow were grazing and keeping watch while the grulla mare and the two fillies grazed nearby.

We left them and saw some other horses on the way back. Upon closer inspection, I was excited to see it was Two Boots with Looking Glass’ former duns.

Two Boots is looking pretty good as are the duns.

As we watched them, Santa Fe started moving his family out toward where Two Boots had his.

As Santa Fe got closer, he ran out to meet Two Boots.

Two Boots was awaiting him, and the two did a lot of posturing and noisemaking.

Santa Fe ran back from Two Boots to check on his family.

Two Boots’ family was content still, and Two Boots followed Santa Fe.

The two started up with the posturing again.

Things settled, the stallions returned to their families.

Two Boots snaked his family a little further down while Santa Fe watched.

It was great seeing Two Boots, and it was a lot of fun watching him interact with Santa Fe. These aren’t two of the strongest stallions, but they both have great families and their intelligence likely helps them with their family gathering skill.

Also, as an interesting note, Santa Fe has Two Boots’ former family; and Two Boots is Santa Fe’s father. Broken Bow was Two Boots’ former mare, and Demure is his daughter. The two fillies are Two Boots’ granddaughters. However, Santa Fe is not part of the “Broken Bow lineage.”