Horse-Lover Zone for Pony Pals

Have you visited THE HORSE VOICE - a Place for Pony Pals? This fun site offers how-tos, holiday ideas and other horsey items, particularly for young horse lovers.

Check it out! (Be sure to forward the http link to your favorite young horse lover.)

There's even a peppermint pony craft for Christmas.

Christmas Auction Benefits Stolen Horse International

Christmas Auction Benefits Stolen Horse International


Have you started your Christmas shopping yet? You can skip those crowded holiday sales and shop online for your favorite horse lovers.

Stolen Horse International (NetPosse.com) is holding an online auction this month.

(CTRL-click here for more information.)

Proceeds from the Stolen Horse International Charity Auction will support efforts to recover stolen horses, tack and horse trailers by providing education and increasing awareness of horse theft and offering online networking to facilitate the finding of missing, lost or stolen horses and equipment.

Many items have been donated by well-known trainers for the online auction for Stolen Horse International:

Randy Abernathy,
Clinton Anderson,
Mike Branch,
Helge Buflod,
Elizabeth Graves,
Rick Lamb,
Ken McNabb,
Lynn Palm,
Pat Parelli,
Tracey Porter,
Monty Roberts,
Tom Seay
and many others.

Additional items continue to be added.

(CTRL-click here for more information.)

Products to be auctioned include tack, training equipment, equestrian apparel, horse training videos and even admission to equestrian training clinics.

Be sure to check out the auction . . . for some great gifts and helpful horsey products.

You can
simplify your
Christmas shopping
by shopping online
this holiday season!


For additional creative horse lover Christmas gifts, be sure to check out the unique items offered by Canter Banter and Canterberry and equestrian themed apparel at Pony Up 4 Fun.

Terrific Horse Treats

Do you like to bake your own horse treats for your equine friends? How about whipping up a batch of horse cookies for your favorite four-legged companion for Thanksgiving or Christmas?

(Photo used by permission.)

The holidays may be a particularly appropriate time for sharing treats with our horses.

Horse lovers may enjoy exchanging thoughtful presents with one another too. At our barn, some of us like to hang up stockings on our stalls – just in case Santa might stop by with peppermints, carrots, apples or horse treats. What could be more welcome in a horse's Christmas stocking than a bundle of home-baked horse cookies?

(Photo used by permission.)

My friend Gina, a horse lover and natural horsemanship enthusiast, was kind enough to share her own recipe for delicious horse cookies. Last week, she made these marvelous molasses morsels for her own herd, including her beloved buckskin, Cruiser (pictured here).

“The house smells of bubbling molasses,” Gina recounted, as her own horse cookies baked. “It makes me giggle to see the horses lined up outside looking up at the house with such longing ... like little kids waiting for the Toll House Cookies.”

With Gina’s permission, I’m posting the horse cookie recipe here (with links for purchasing organic ingredients). These treats are organic and even acceptable for human consumption – particularly for cookie dough snitchers.

“Here is the horse cookie recipe,” Gina said. “Please feel free to share it. These treats are amazing and so healthy!”

(Photo used by permission.)

Gina’s Horse Cookies

8 C Rolled Oats
3 C Wheat Bran
1C Flax Seed Meal
1C Flax Seeds
1C Barley (whole grain)
1C Bulgur Wheat
1C Corn Meal
1C TVP (textured vegetable protein)
1C Quinoia Flour
1C Oat Flour
1C Teff Flour
1C Kosher Salt

Preheat oven to 350 degrees (F).

Mix all dry ingredients in a large bowl and divide the contents in half. Put half of the mixture into a mixmaster, and add these ingredients:

2.5 C Blackstrap Molasses
¼ C Vegetable Oil
¼ C Hot Water

(Sprinkle in a little more flour, if the mixture is too gooey.)

Mix well. Add remaining dry mixture, and continue mixing until fully blended.

Spray mini muffin tins with vegetable oil spray (such as Pam spray).

Put one tablespoon of the horse cookie batter into each space in the mini muffin tins.

Press mixture into spaces, and bake at 350 for 7-10 minutes.

Allow horse cookies to cool a bit in the pans. Then turn them out onto cooling racks.

Options:

• Add 2 cups of prepared Beet Pulp for those horses that can afford to add a few pounds.

• Add shredded carrots, apples, sunflower seeds or dried fruit, if desired.

• Add a bit more molasses and dark corn syrup to camouflage equine medicine doses, if needed.

• Add a bit of apple muffin mix to make treats that rise and look like little muffins.

Allow horse cookies to cool to a comfortable temperature before feeding them to horses.

Delicious horse treats for delightful horses!

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Equine Thanksgiving

Equine Thanksgiving

I am thankful for my horse/s! In fact, I am thankful for horses (in general) and for the ability and opportunity to enjoy them.

How about you?

Just for fun, try this Thanksgiving horse trivia quiz. (Try to answer all of the questions before scrolling down for the real answers.) Be sure to leave a comment, and let us know how well you did!

Thanksgiving Horse Trivia Quiz

1) In the 1998 motion picture The Horse Whisperer (starring Robert Redford, Kristen Scott Thomas, Scarlett Johansson, Sam Neill and Dianne Wiest), what was the name of Grace MacLean’s injured horse?

2) What team will host the Oakland Raiders on Thanksgiving Day 2009?

3) In what modern country did the ancient Trojan Horse appear? (Hint: Are you hungry yet?)

4) Which thoroughbred racehorse won the 2009 Kentucky Derby? (Hint: His name might make one want to dig deeper into the Thanksgiving turkey for a bit more stuffing.)

5) The first two giant Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade balloons appeared in 1927. Was one of these first giant Macy’s Thanksgiving Day balloons really a horse?

6) The zodiac sign that corresponds to the end of November (including the Thanksgiving holiday time) is Sagittarius. Sagittarius is pictured as a centaur with an archery bow. What is a centaur?

7) What old-time dance may have mimicked turkeys practicing an equine gait?

Happy Thanksgiving!

Now . . .

are you

hungry

enough

to eat

like a horse?

(Scroll

down

for the answers

to the

Thanksgiving

Horse

Trivia

quiz.)

Answers to Thanksgiving Horse Trivia Quiz:

1) The horse’s name was Pilgrim in the film. Actually, he was a 1987 American Quarter Horse named Hightower.

2) The Dallas Cowboys will host the Oakland Raiders on Thanksgiving 2009.

3) According to Classical literature (such as The Aeneid, by Virgil), the Trojan Horse appeared in Troy, which was located in what is now Turkey.

4) Mine That Bird won the 2009 Kentucky Derby, with jockey Calvin Borel aboard.

5) The first giant Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade balloons were Felix the Cat and a dragon.

6) Greek mythology portrayed centaurs as hybrid creatures (part horse and part human).

7) The turkey trot is a ragtime dance, which probably originated in the early 1900s.