Your mare is absolutely beautiful @Tex Dennis She sounds and looks like the ideal horse. One of my favorite things to do was shoot rattlesnakes off a trained horse. I have friends that have a couple of great cow horses, but both are a bit nervous with gunshots, even a .22. They developed the skill of using their reins to snap off a rattlesnake's head. They only use their revolvers if they go out on their ATVs.
Me too! Here are some of my family that still hold to that tradition. It is an annual event on the ranches south of me. Many families coordinate branding, vaccinating, and castrating time so for about a month, it is the same large bunch going from ranch to ranch. Now with the internet, the schedule is posted online and easier than mailing it or announcing it in the rural paper. Lunch is always served and the day ends with a chuckwagon-style cookout. Sometimes guitars, mandolins, banjos, and harmonicas are brought out and the younger carry on until dark. The older head home, shower, and then drop exhausted and soon sound asleep only wakened by aches and pains.
And, just think, there are those that think this is "cruelty to animals". Such BS, but raised in the "big city", it could be understandable.
Although I enjoyed pushing cattle down to fall pasture, it wasn't recreational since I got paid to do it.
-- She about dumped me with her U turn after the cow, note loose reins on bosal I always ride her with no bit just a bosal or halter only, the avatar picture was just a piggin string only no nothing, saddle or anything. It was about 1/4 mile to house. This was team penning at church on my mare.
Due to all the horsing around on other threads, I finally found this thread and decided to exhume it.
While my riding was mostly work-related, I did enjoy some trail riding behind my log cabin. I could ride for miles without seeing another person. I never attempted it, but a friend an avid trail rider and horse breeder had purposed a trail ride that would start at the Washington southern border and end at the Nevada north border making a north-to-south trip across Oregon. We would ride the back trails across ranches (with permission), allotments, BLM, and forest service roads the entire way. My favorite riding jeans were the super high-waisted ones. I liked the ones with high back pockets but loved the ones with no back pockets or what we called bareback. Over the last two years, I have replaced all my jeans, now at 22 pairs, with USA-made high-waisted, cowgirl cut roomy seat, tough denim jeans. 16 of the jeans are bareback and I find them more comfortable for horsing around typing on this computer than the ones even with high pockets. Female riders these days can only wear those low-rise skinny jeans because they are lightweight and very stretchy. Here is a photo from last year of me wearing barebacks. I am just posing by the horse for effect.
I did design clothes for myself when I sewed. It was just 2 years ago I got on the kick to replace all my jeans with USA-made vintage mostly from the 80s and 90s. I have enough now to last me until I die.
That's great, and I'm sure the quality is way better. Good that if they need any kind of stitching you are definitely qualified.