visitor

Meet Rusty.  He is an Appaloosa gelding belonging to my husband's sister's family.  He's visiting us for a few days because they wanted to ride out to look at a farm they are considering purchasing, which is just a few fields over from us.

He's a very pretty, dainty, quiet horse.  His mane is just so lovely and straight.  Poor guy, though.  He's being ostracized by our crew of horses.  They take turns either intimidating him, or standing around in a pack and giving him the evil eye.  If looks could kill....

Eat up, Rusty, soon you'll be bossed away from that hay pile.  I think he'll be glad to get home to his own barn.   Herd dynamics are so complicated, and involve hierarchies and associations.  Rusty's a lover, not a fighter, so he just does his best to stay out of the other horses' way.  I think our guys will be glad when he leaves, too.  You can almost feel the tension.

The thing is, his next visit will probably be a lot easier.  It's very interesting to observe, and things went pretty well over all.  If my sister-in-law does buy that farm, the horses will have 'met' and be used to each other on trail rides.  We shall see.  In the meantime, I'm enjoying just looking at him.  He classes up the joint (sorry Sadie, Joe, and Ollie!).