Petticoats & Pistols » Horses http://petticoatsandpistols.com Romancing The West Thu, 24 May 2012 07:00:15 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 A Boat With REAL Horsepower http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2012/02/20/a-boat-with-real-horsepower/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2012/02/20/a-boat-with-real-horsepower/#comments Mon, 20 Feb 2012 06:17:56 +0000 Winnie Griggs http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=30399 The other day I was doing a bit of research into ferry travel in the nineteenth century and came across a little snippet of information that immediately sent me down a rabbit trail to find out more.  Did you know that ferry boats were powered by horses at one time?  I didn’t.  Of course I knew about the horses and mules that walked along the banks of the Erie canal, tethered to barges that they pulled along.   But this is something entirely different.  These boats had either a turntable or treadmill type device mounted on or below the deck of the ship.  These platforms were connected to a gear which was in turn connected to the paddle wheels that propelled the boat forward.  When horses walked on the platforms of these mechanisms it set the whole thing in motion.  A number of these horse-powered boats, of several different designs, could be found on the waterways of North America starting in the late eighteenth century and continuing through the early years of the twentieth century.  They reached their heyday in the 1840s and 1850s.  During the early years of our country they were used on any number of rivers and lakes in the northeast, especially Lake Champlain and the Hudson River.  From there their use spread west to the Great Lakes, to the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers as well as other waterways that fed from these.  Of course they were generally only used for journeys of a few miles.  These boats came in various sizes.  One of the largest was powered by eight horse and could carry 200-plus passengers at about the same speed as a steamboat of its day.  There were a number of factors that led to the decline in the use of horseferrys, most notably the industrialization that occurred in America during the latter part of the nineteenth century.  With the expansion of bridge construction and railroad networks, there was less need for ferrys of any sort.  And when the internal combustion engine came along the death knell was finally sounded.  The only known surviving example of one of these horseferrys sits beneath the murky waters of Burlington Bay on Lake Champlain.  It was discovered during an underwater archaeological expedition in 1894 and today is part of Vermont’s Underwater Historical Preserve System.  It has also been added to the national Park Service’s National Register of Historical Places.  So is this something you already knew about, or was it as new to you as it was to me?  And are there other unusual ways you’ve heard of animals being used to power manmade devices that you’d like to share?  ]]> http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2012/02/20/a-boat-with-real-horsepower/feed/ 18 Riding Camp http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/08/08/riding-camp/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/08/08/riding-camp/#comments Mon, 08 Aug 2011 09:00:12 +0000 Donna http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=25582 http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/08/08/riding-camp/feed/ 16 Life at the Livery http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/07/15/life-at-the-livery/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/07/15/life-at-the-livery/#comments Fri, 15 Jul 2011 06:00:50 +0000 KarenW http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=24948 Women. You'll find nary a one. That's because the livery stable was a man's domain. Females flocked to dry good stores, dress shops, milliners, and drug emporiums but avoided the masculine hub known as the livery. Why? Mostly because of the smell. And the likelihood of stepping in something no lady would want clinging to the sole of her shoe or staining the hem of her skirt. For a man, however, this was the western version of an English gentleman's club. A masculine sanctuary, a place to pass the time discussing crops or swapping stories by the potbellied stove. So what if the air was a bit gamey? A little manure never hurt anyone. The only nags were out back in the corral, and they didn't seem to mind if a fella was of a mind to spit his tobacco juice on the floor or wipe his nose on his sleeve. But the livery was more than a gathering place for men who wanted to escape their womenfolk for a time. It was a place of business. The liveryman kept prime horseflesh on hand for harness or riding, maintained a respectable selection of carriages and wagons for rent, pitched hay, tallied accounts, and even dealt with colicky critters when the need arose. Travelers stopped by to board their mounts or rent a saddle horse for the day. Young swains coughed up hard-earned coin to impress their gals with romantic country drives in a rented rig. The livery supplied an essential service to the townsfolk. As I researched livery stables for my debut novel, I came across a fabulous find in one of our local library's genealogical collections—a transcribed log book from a livery in Bonham, Texas dating back to 1885. Not only did I learn what prices were charged, I also gained insight into the types of services offered. Here is a sampling:
  • Horse rental per day - Petticoats & Pistols » Horses.50
  • Horse and buggy rental - .00
  • Carriage and team - .00
  • Carriage and driver - .00
  • Buggy to depot - .00
  • Horse to pasture - Petticoats & Pistols » Horses.50
  • Feed - Petticoats & Pistols » Horses.25
  • Bucket of oats - Petticoats & Pistols » Horses.50
  • Stall rental - .50
  • Stall plus hay - .50
  • One month board on horse - .00
  • Currying horse - Petticoats & Pistols » Horses.10
  • Saddling horse - Petticoats & Pistols » Horses.25
  • Repairs on carriage - Petticoats & Pistols » Horses.50 to .50 or higher depending on extent of repair needed
  • Fee for lost horse blanket - Petticoats & Pistols » Horses.75 for regular blanket, .00 for double blanket
In addition to accepting cash for payment, this log book also chronicled a variety of barter offerings. Customers were known to pay in corn or cords of wood. One fellow who had accrued a rather large debt paid with a big black sow. If a man had no goods to offer, he might pay in services like hauling hay in from area farms, working the nightshift at the stable, working as a carriage driver, or painting the livery. Yet as the 19th century faded into the 20th, and the horse no longer held sway as the primary mode of transportation, what happened to all these livery stables? Did they simply fade away into the yore of yesteryear? Some may have. But many enterprising livery owners adapted successfully to the times and converted their stables and wagon yards into garages for the newfangled horseless carriages that dominated the streets. So the next time you take you car to the shop, try to picture the mechanic with a handlebar mustache, hat, and boots. Who knows, maybe one of his great-great-grandfathers owned your town livery.]]> http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/07/15/life-at-the-livery/feed/ 27 Meet a Little Sweetheart ~Tanya Hanson http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/06/01/24159/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/06/01/24159/#comments Wed, 01 Jun 2011 06:07:28 +0000 Tanya Hanson http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=24159 Mucking at the horse rescue the other day let me meet baby Jasper for the first time. He’s two months old now and the sweetest thing. When he was eleven days old, he and his mama Bella were rescued along with six pregnant mares from a trip to a Mexican slaughterhouse. The other six were rescued by other sanctuaries. He’s a little fireball who loves people, loves carrots (the pieces have to be really small; think baby carrot broken into three or four pieces), loves to play with his toys, and is learning how to wear a lead as well as a small saddlebag on his back. The sanctuary’s ultimate goal is to get him and Mamma adoptable.  Since I’m just a wanna-be, I thought I’d check into just what goes on with a newborn foal.  Jasper likely stood up within an hour of birth to start nursing and probably fell over many times until he figured out just what legs are and what he was supposed to do with them. These days, his rump is higher than his forelegs, a natural progression of growth.  Hopefully nursing started within two hours and he found Mama’s milk by instinct. He needed the colostrum she provided.  At the rescue, his temperature would have been checked often; normally just one degree higher than an adult, and blood  samples are closely monitored.  For the first few weeks, he followed right next to his mama before getting bolder. I was told his mama, due to the trauma of capture, didn’t produce as much milk as she would have in less stressful times, so Jasper started in on “mature” food sooner than he likely would have. Nonetheless, his intake is closely monitored, as too much rich food in a foal causes “founder”, an ailment similar to gout. But Jasper’s grazing instincts have always been good.  He and mama spend time now in the round turnout, which is carefully tended and free from rocks and sand. Because he’s still learning, his natural grazing instincts would have him chewing on such stuff, too.  Although he and his mother have a nice-sized stall,  he needs plenty of room to run and play like any kid. He has a jump-ball , the big rubber ball with a handle on it, that he loves.  Oh, and he has managed to nibble on Mama’s mane a little bit. It’s great entertainment for him. He also likes such things as traffic cones.  And as yucky as this sounds, apparently the foal has needed to chomp a little bit on mama’s manure…his gut has no bacteria  naturally to break down food.  The two lovely ladies in charge of him have already started halter-breaking, and he’s quite a champ. In a foal, halter breaking starts at about one month because he needs to have strong-enough neck muscles. Walking him helps wear him out and gets him used to people.  Jasper will be vaccinated and weaned between four and six months. And by now, his hooves have hardened enough to be picked clean and brushed.  I hope you enjoyed meeting this little sweetheart.

 (Thanks to this website for some cool foal info.) http://www.diamondcequestriancenter.com/foalcare.html

]]> http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/06/01/24159/feed/ 31 A Different Kind of Horse for a Different Kind of Cowboy http://petticoatsandpistols.com Romancing The West Thu, 24 May 2012 07:00:15 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 Petticoats & Pistols » Horses http://petticoatsandpistols.com Romancing The West Thu, 24 May 2012 07:00:15 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 A Boat With REAL Horsepower http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2012/02/20/a-boat-with-real-horsepower/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2012/02/20/a-boat-with-real-horsepower/#comments Mon, 20 Feb 2012 06:17:56 +0000 Winnie Griggs http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=30399 The other day I was doing a bit of research into ferry travel in the nineteenth century and came across a little snippet of information that immediately sent me down a rabbit trail to find out more.  Did you know that ferry boats were powered by horses at one time?  I didn’t.  Of course I knew about the horses and mules that walked along the banks of the Erie canal, tethered to barges that they pulled along.   But this is something entirely different.  These boats had either a turntable or treadmill type device mounted on or below the deck of the ship.  These platforms were connected to a gear which was in turn connected to the paddle wheels that propelled the boat forward.  When horses walked on the platforms of these mechanisms it set the whole thing in motion.  A number of these horse-powered boats, of several different designs, could be found on the waterways of North America starting in the late eighteenth century and continuing through the early years of the twentieth century.  They reached their heyday in the 1840s and 1850s.  During the early years of our country they were used on any number of rivers and lakes in the northeast, especially Lake Champlain and the Hudson River.  From there their use spread west to the Great Lakes, to the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers as well as other waterways that fed from these.  Of course they were generally only used for journeys of a few miles.  These boats came in various sizes.  One of the largest was powered by eight horse and could carry 200-plus passengers at about the same speed as a steamboat of its day.  There were a number of factors that led to the decline in the use of horseferrys, most notably the industrialization that occurred in America during the latter part of the nineteenth century.  With the expansion of bridge construction and railroad networks, there was less need for ferrys of any sort.  And when the internal combustion engine came along the death knell was finally sounded.  The only known surviving example of one of these horseferrys sits beneath the murky waters of Burlington Bay on Lake Champlain.  It was discovered during an underwater archaeological expedition in 1894 and today is part of Vermont’s Underwater Historical Preserve System.  It has also been added to the national Park Service’s National Register of Historical Places.  So is this something you already knew about, or was it as new to you as it was to me?  And are there other unusual ways you’ve heard of animals being used to power manmade devices that you’d like to share?  ]]> http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2012/02/20/a-boat-with-real-horsepower/feed/ 18 Riding Camp http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/08/08/riding-camp/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/08/08/riding-camp/#comments Mon, 08 Aug 2011 09:00:12 +0000 Donna http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=25582 http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/08/08/riding-camp/feed/ 16 Life at the Livery http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/07/15/life-at-the-livery/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/07/15/life-at-the-livery/#comments Fri, 15 Jul 2011 06:00:50 +0000 KarenW http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=24948 Women. You'll find nary a one. That's because the livery stable was a man's domain. Females flocked to dry good stores, dress shops, milliners, and drug emporiums but avoided the masculine hub known as the livery. Why? Mostly because of the smell. And the likelihood of stepping in something no lady would want clinging to the sole of her shoe or staining the hem of her skirt. For a man, however, this was the western version of an English gentleman's club. A masculine sanctuary, a place to pass the time discussing crops or swapping stories by the potbellied stove. So what if the air was a bit gamey? A little manure never hurt anyone. The only nags were out back in the corral, and they didn't seem to mind if a fella was of a mind to spit his tobacco juice on the floor or wipe his nose on his sleeve. But the livery was more than a gathering place for men who wanted to escape their womenfolk for a time. It was a place of business. The liveryman kept prime horseflesh on hand for harness or riding, maintained a respectable selection of carriages and wagons for rent, pitched hay, tallied accounts, and even dealt with colicky critters when the need arose. Travelers stopped by to board their mounts or rent a saddle horse for the day. Young swains coughed up hard-earned coin to impress their gals with romantic country drives in a rented rig. The livery supplied an essential service to the townsfolk. As I researched livery stables for my debut novel, I came across a fabulous find in one of our local library's genealogical collections—a transcribed log book from a livery in Bonham, Texas dating back to 1885. Not only did I learn what prices were charged, I also gained insight into the types of services offered. Here is a sampling:
  • Horse rental per day - A Boat With REAL Horsepower.50
  • Horse and buggy rental - .00
  • Carriage and team - .00
  • Carriage and driver - .00
  • Buggy to depot - .00
  • Horse to pasture - A Boat With REAL Horsepower.50
  • Feed - A Boat With REAL Horsepower.25
  • Bucket of oats - A Boat With REAL Horsepower.50
  • Stall rental - .50
  • Stall plus hay - .50
  • One month board on horse - .00
  • Currying horse - A Boat With REAL Horsepower.10
  • Saddling horse - A Boat With REAL Horsepower.25
  • Repairs on carriage - A Boat With REAL Horsepower.50 to .50 or higher depending on extent of repair needed
  • Fee for lost horse blanket - A Boat With REAL Horsepower.75 for regular blanket, .00 for double blanket
In addition to accepting cash for payment, this log book also chronicled a variety of barter offerings. Customers were known to pay in corn or cords of wood. One fellow who had accrued a rather large debt paid with a big black sow. If a man had no goods to offer, he might pay in services like hauling hay in from area farms, working the nightshift at the stable, working as a carriage driver, or painting the livery. Yet as the 19th century faded into the 20th, and the horse no longer held sway as the primary mode of transportation, what happened to all these livery stables? Did they simply fade away into the yore of yesteryear? Some may have. But many enterprising livery owners adapted successfully to the times and converted their stables and wagon yards into garages for the newfangled horseless carriages that dominated the streets. So the next time you take you car to the shop, try to picture the mechanic with a handlebar mustache, hat, and boots. Who knows, maybe one of his great-great-grandfathers owned your town livery.]]> http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/07/15/life-at-the-livery/feed/ 27 Meet a Little Sweetheart ~Tanya Hanson http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/06/01/24159/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/06/01/24159/#comments Wed, 01 Jun 2011 06:07:28 +0000 Tanya Hanson http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=24159 Mucking at the horse rescue the other day let me meet baby Jasper for the first time. He’s two months old now and the sweetest thing. When he was eleven days old, he and his mama Bella were rescued along with six pregnant mares from a trip to a Mexican slaughterhouse. The other six were rescued by other sanctuaries. He’s a little fireball who loves people, loves carrots (the pieces have to be really small; think baby carrot broken into three or four pieces), loves to play with his toys, and is learning how to wear a lead as well as a small saddlebag on his back. The sanctuary’s ultimate goal is to get him and Mamma adoptable.  Since I’m just a wanna-be, I thought I’d check into just what goes on with a newborn foal.  Jasper likely stood up within an hour of birth to start nursing and probably fell over many times until he figured out just what legs are and what he was supposed to do with them. These days, his rump is higher than his forelegs, a natural progression of growth.  Hopefully nursing started within two hours and he found Mama’s milk by instinct. He needed the colostrum she provided.  At the rescue, his temperature would have been checked often; normally just one degree higher than an adult, and blood  samples are closely monitored.  For the first few weeks, he followed right next to his mama before getting bolder. I was told his mama, due to the trauma of capture, didn’t produce as much milk as she would have in less stressful times, so Jasper started in on “mature” food sooner than he likely would have. Nonetheless, his intake is closely monitored, as too much rich food in a foal causes “founder”, an ailment similar to gout. But Jasper’s grazing instincts have always been good.  He and mama spend time now in the round turnout, which is carefully tended and free from rocks and sand. Because he’s still learning, his natural grazing instincts would have him chewing on such stuff, too.  Although he and his mother have a nice-sized stall,  he needs plenty of room to run and play like any kid. He has a jump-ball , the big rubber ball with a handle on it, that he loves.  Oh, and he has managed to nibble on Mama’s mane a little bit. It’s great entertainment for him. He also likes such things as traffic cones.  And as yucky as this sounds, apparently the foal has needed to chomp a little bit on mama’s manure…his gut has no bacteria  naturally to break down food.  The two lovely ladies in charge of him have already started halter-breaking, and he’s quite a champ. In a foal, halter breaking starts at about one month because he needs to have strong-enough neck muscles. Walking him helps wear him out and gets him used to people.  Jasper will be vaccinated and weaned between four and six months. And by now, his hooves have hardened enough to be picked clean and brushed.  I hope you enjoyed meeting this little sweetheart.

 (Thanks to this website for some cool foal info.) http://www.diamondcequestriancenter.com/foalcare.html

]]> http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/06/01/24159/feed/ 31 A Different Kind of Horse for a Different Kind of Cowboy http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2012/02/20/a-boat-with-real-horsepower/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2012/02/20/a-boat-with-real-horsepower/#comments Mon, 20 Feb 2012 06:17:56 +0000 Winnie Griggs http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=30399 The other day I was doing a bit of research into ferry travel in the nineteenth century and came across a little snippet of information that immediately sent me down a rabbit trail to find out more.  Did you know that ferry boats were powered by horses at one time?  I didn’t.  Of course I knew about the horses and mules that walked along the banks of the Erie canal, tethered to barges that they pulled along.   But this is something entirely different.  These boats had either a turntable or treadmill type device mounted on or below the deck of the ship.  These platforms were connected to a gear which was in turn connected to the paddle wheels that propelled the boat forward.  When horses walked on the platforms of these mechanisms it set the whole thing in motion.  A number of these horse-powered boats, of several different designs, could be found on the waterways of North America starting in the late eighteenth century and continuing through the early years of the twentieth century.  They reached their heyday in the 1840s and 1850s.  During the early years of our country they were used on any number of rivers and lakes in the northeast, especially Lake Champlain and the Hudson River.  From there their use spread west to the Great Lakes, to the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers as well as other waterways that fed from these.  Of course they were generally only used for journeys of a few miles.  These boats came in various sizes.  One of the largest was powered by eight horse and could carry 200-plus passengers at about the same speed as a steamboat of its day.  There were a number of factors that led to the decline in the use of horseferrys, most notably the industrialization that occurred in America during the latter part of the nineteenth century.  With the expansion of bridge construction and railroad networks, there was less need for ferrys of any sort.  And when the internal combustion engine came along the death knell was finally sounded.  The only known surviving example of one of these horseferrys sits beneath the murky waters of Burlington Bay on Lake Champlain.  It was discovered during an underwater archaeological expedition in 1894 and today is part of Vermont’s Underwater Historical Preserve System.  It has also been added to the national Park Service’s National Register of Historical Places.  So is this something you already knew about, or was it as new to you as it was to me?  And are there other unusual ways you’ve heard of animals being used to power manmade devices that you’d like to share?  ]]> http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2012/02/20/a-boat-with-real-horsepower/feed/ 18 Petticoats & Pistols » Horses http://petticoatsandpistols.com Romancing The West Thu, 24 May 2012 07:00:15 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 A Boat With REAL Horsepower http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2012/02/20/a-boat-with-real-horsepower/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2012/02/20/a-boat-with-real-horsepower/#comments Mon, 20 Feb 2012 06:17:56 +0000 Winnie Griggs http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=30399 The other day I was doing a bit of research into ferry travel in the nineteenth century and came across a little snippet of information that immediately sent me down a rabbit trail to find out more.  Did you know that ferry boats were powered by horses at one time?  I didn’t.  Of course I knew about the horses and mules that walked along the banks of the Erie canal, tethered to barges that they pulled along.   But this is something entirely different.  These boats had either a turntable or treadmill type device mounted on or below the deck of the ship.  These platforms were connected to a gear which was in turn connected to the paddle wheels that propelled the boat forward.  When horses walked on the platforms of these mechanisms it set the whole thing in motion.  A number of these horse-powered boats, of several different designs, could be found on the waterways of North America starting in the late eighteenth century and continuing through the early years of the twentieth century.  They reached their heyday in the 1840s and 1850s.  During the early years of our country they were used on any number of rivers and lakes in the northeast, especially Lake Champlain and the Hudson River.  From there their use spread west to the Great Lakes, to the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers as well as other waterways that fed from these.  Of course they were generally only used for journeys of a few miles.  These boats came in various sizes.  One of the largest was powered by eight horse and could carry 200-plus passengers at about the same speed as a steamboat of its day.  There were a number of factors that led to the decline in the use of horseferrys, most notably the industrialization that occurred in America during the latter part of the nineteenth century.  With the expansion of bridge construction and railroad networks, there was less need for ferrys of any sort.  And when the internal combustion engine came along the death knell was finally sounded.  The only known surviving example of one of these horseferrys sits beneath the murky waters of Burlington Bay on Lake Champlain.  It was discovered during an underwater archaeological expedition in 1894 and today is part of Vermont’s Underwater Historical Preserve System.  It has also been added to the national Park Service’s National Register of Historical Places.  So is this something you already knew about, or was it as new to you as it was to me?  And are there other unusual ways you’ve heard of animals being used to power manmade devices that you’d like to share?  ]]> http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2012/02/20/a-boat-with-real-horsepower/feed/ 18 Riding Camp http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/08/08/riding-camp/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/08/08/riding-camp/#comments Mon, 08 Aug 2011 09:00:12 +0000 Donna http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=25582 http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/08/08/riding-camp/feed/ 16 Life at the Livery http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/07/15/life-at-the-livery/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/07/15/life-at-the-livery/#comments Fri, 15 Jul 2011 06:00:50 +0000 KarenW http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=24948 Women. You'll find nary a one. That's because the livery stable was a man's domain. Females flocked to dry good stores, dress shops, milliners, and drug emporiums but avoided the masculine hub known as the livery. Why? Mostly because of the smell. And the likelihood of stepping in something no lady would want clinging to the sole of her shoe or staining the hem of her skirt. For a man, however, this was the western version of an English gentleman's club. A masculine sanctuary, a place to pass the time discussing crops or swapping stories by the potbellied stove. So what if the air was a bit gamey? A little manure never hurt anyone. The only nags were out back in the corral, and they didn't seem to mind if a fella was of a mind to spit his tobacco juice on the floor or wipe his nose on his sleeve. But the livery was more than a gathering place for men who wanted to escape their womenfolk for a time. It was a place of business. The liveryman kept prime horseflesh on hand for harness or riding, maintained a respectable selection of carriages and wagons for rent, pitched hay, tallied accounts, and even dealt with colicky critters when the need arose. Travelers stopped by to board their mounts or rent a saddle horse for the day. Young swains coughed up hard-earned coin to impress their gals with romantic country drives in a rented rig. The livery supplied an essential service to the townsfolk. As I researched livery stables for my debut novel, I came across a fabulous find in one of our local library's genealogical collections—a transcribed log book from a livery in Bonham, Texas dating back to 1885. Not only did I learn what prices were charged, I also gained insight into the types of services offered. Here is a sampling:
  • Horse rental per day - Riding Camp.50
  • Horse and buggy rental - .00
  • Carriage and team - .00
  • Carriage and driver - .00
  • Buggy to depot - .00
  • Horse to pasture - Riding Camp.50
  • Feed - Riding Camp.25
  • Bucket of oats - Riding Camp.50
  • Stall rental - .50
  • Stall plus hay - .50
  • One month board on horse - .00
  • Currying horse - Riding Camp.10
  • Saddling horse - Riding Camp.25
  • Repairs on carriage - Riding Camp.50 to .50 or higher depending on extent of repair needed
  • Fee for lost horse blanket - Riding Camp.75 for regular blanket, .00 for double blanket
In addition to accepting cash for payment, this log book also chronicled a variety of barter offerings. Customers were known to pay in corn or cords of wood. One fellow who had accrued a rather large debt paid with a big black sow. If a man had no goods to offer, he might pay in services like hauling hay in from area farms, working the nightshift at the stable, working as a carriage driver, or painting the livery. Yet as the 19th century faded into the 20th, and the horse no longer held sway as the primary mode of transportation, what happened to all these livery stables? Did they simply fade away into the yore of yesteryear? Some may have. But many enterprising livery owners adapted successfully to the times and converted their stables and wagon yards into garages for the newfangled horseless carriages that dominated the streets. So the next time you take you car to the shop, try to picture the mechanic with a handlebar mustache, hat, and boots. Who knows, maybe one of his great-great-grandfathers owned your town livery.]]> http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/07/15/life-at-the-livery/feed/ 27 Meet a Little Sweetheart ~Tanya Hanson http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/06/01/24159/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/06/01/24159/#comments Wed, 01 Jun 2011 06:07:28 +0000 Tanya Hanson http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=24159 Mucking at the horse rescue the other day let me meet baby Jasper for the first time. He’s two months old now and the sweetest thing. When he was eleven days old, he and his mama Bella were rescued along with six pregnant mares from a trip to a Mexican slaughterhouse. The other six were rescued by other sanctuaries. He’s a little fireball who loves people, loves carrots (the pieces have to be really small; think baby carrot broken into three or four pieces), loves to play with his toys, and is learning how to wear a lead as well as a small saddlebag on his back. The sanctuary’s ultimate goal is to get him and Mamma adoptable.  Since I’m just a wanna-be, I thought I’d check into just what goes on with a newborn foal.  Jasper likely stood up within an hour of birth to start nursing and probably fell over many times until he figured out just what legs are and what he was supposed to do with them. These days, his rump is higher than his forelegs, a natural progression of growth.  Hopefully nursing started within two hours and he found Mama’s milk by instinct. He needed the colostrum she provided.  At the rescue, his temperature would have been checked often; normally just one degree higher than an adult, and blood  samples are closely monitored.  For the first few weeks, he followed right next to his mama before getting bolder. I was told his mama, due to the trauma of capture, didn’t produce as much milk as she would have in less stressful times, so Jasper started in on “mature” food sooner than he likely would have. Nonetheless, his intake is closely monitored, as too much rich food in a foal causes “founder”, an ailment similar to gout. But Jasper’s grazing instincts have always been good.  He and mama spend time now in the round turnout, which is carefully tended and free from rocks and sand. Because he’s still learning, his natural grazing instincts would have him chewing on such stuff, too.  Although he and his mother have a nice-sized stall,  he needs plenty of room to run and play like any kid. He has a jump-ball , the big rubber ball with a handle on it, that he loves.  Oh, and he has managed to nibble on Mama’s mane a little bit. It’s great entertainment for him. He also likes such things as traffic cones.  And as yucky as this sounds, apparently the foal has needed to chomp a little bit on mama’s manure…his gut has no bacteria  naturally to break down food.  The two lovely ladies in charge of him have already started halter-breaking, and he’s quite a champ. In a foal, halter breaking starts at about one month because he needs to have strong-enough neck muscles. Walking him helps wear him out and gets him used to people.  Jasper will be vaccinated and weaned between four and six months. And by now, his hooves have hardened enough to be picked clean and brushed.  I hope you enjoyed meeting this little sweetheart.

 (Thanks to this website for some cool foal info.) http://www.diamondcequestriancenter.com/foalcare.html

]]> http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/06/01/24159/feed/ 31 A Different Kind of Horse for a Different Kind of Cowboy http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/08/08/riding-camp/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/08/08/riding-camp/#comments Mon, 08 Aug 2011 09:00:12 +0000 Donna http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=25582 http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/08/08/riding-camp/feed/ 16 Petticoats & Pistols » Horses http://petticoatsandpistols.com Romancing The West Thu, 24 May 2012 07:00:15 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 A Boat With REAL Horsepower http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2012/02/20/a-boat-with-real-horsepower/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2012/02/20/a-boat-with-real-horsepower/#comments Mon, 20 Feb 2012 06:17:56 +0000 Winnie Griggs http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=30399 The other day I was doing a bit of research into ferry travel in the nineteenth century and came across a little snippet of information that immediately sent me down a rabbit trail to find out more.  Did you know that ferry boats were powered by horses at one time?  I didn’t.  Of course I knew about the horses and mules that walked along the banks of the Erie canal, tethered to barges that they pulled along.   But this is something entirely different.  These boats had either a turntable or treadmill type device mounted on or below the deck of the ship.  These platforms were connected to a gear which was in turn connected to the paddle wheels that propelled the boat forward.  When horses walked on the platforms of these mechanisms it set the whole thing in motion.  A number of these horse-powered boats, of several different designs, could be found on the waterways of North America starting in the late eighteenth century and continuing through the early years of the twentieth century.  They reached their heyday in the 1840s and 1850s.  During the early years of our country they were used on any number of rivers and lakes in the northeast, especially Lake Champlain and the Hudson River.  From there their use spread west to the Great Lakes, to the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers as well as other waterways that fed from these.  Of course they were generally only used for journeys of a few miles.  These boats came in various sizes.  One of the largest was powered by eight horse and could carry 200-plus passengers at about the same speed as a steamboat of its day.  There were a number of factors that led to the decline in the use of horseferrys, most notably the industrialization that occurred in America during the latter part of the nineteenth century.  With the expansion of bridge construction and railroad networks, there was less need for ferrys of any sort.  And when the internal combustion engine came along the death knell was finally sounded.  The only known surviving example of one of these horseferrys sits beneath the murky waters of Burlington Bay on Lake Champlain.  It was discovered during an underwater archaeological expedition in 1894 and today is part of Vermont’s Underwater Historical Preserve System.  It has also been added to the national Park Service’s National Register of Historical Places.  So is this something you already knew about, or was it as new to you as it was to me?  And are there other unusual ways you’ve heard of animals being used to power manmade devices that you’d like to share?  ]]> http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2012/02/20/a-boat-with-real-horsepower/feed/ 18 Riding Camp http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/08/08/riding-camp/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/08/08/riding-camp/#comments Mon, 08 Aug 2011 09:00:12 +0000 Donna http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=25582 http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/08/08/riding-camp/feed/ 16 Life at the Livery http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/07/15/life-at-the-livery/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/07/15/life-at-the-livery/#comments Fri, 15 Jul 2011 06:00:50 +0000 KarenW http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=24948 Women. You'll find nary a one. That's because the livery stable was a man's domain. Females flocked to dry good stores, dress shops, milliners, and drug emporiums but avoided the masculine hub known as the livery. Why? Mostly because of the smell. And the likelihood of stepping in something no lady would want clinging to the sole of her shoe or staining the hem of her skirt. For a man, however, this was the western version of an English gentleman's club. A masculine sanctuary, a place to pass the time discussing crops or swapping stories by the potbellied stove. So what if the air was a bit gamey? A little manure never hurt anyone. The only nags were out back in the corral, and they didn't seem to mind if a fella was of a mind to spit his tobacco juice on the floor or wipe his nose on his sleeve. But the livery was more than a gathering place for men who wanted to escape their womenfolk for a time. It was a place of business. The liveryman kept prime horseflesh on hand for harness or riding, maintained a respectable selection of carriages and wagons for rent, pitched hay, tallied accounts, and even dealt with colicky critters when the need arose. Travelers stopped by to board their mounts or rent a saddle horse for the day. Young swains coughed up hard-earned coin to impress their gals with romantic country drives in a rented rig. The livery supplied an essential service to the townsfolk. As I researched livery stables for my debut novel, I came across a fabulous find in one of our local library's genealogical collections—a transcribed log book from a livery in Bonham, Texas dating back to 1885. Not only did I learn what prices were charged, I also gained insight into the types of services offered. Here is a sampling:
  • Horse rental per day - Life at the Livery.50
  • Horse and buggy rental - .00
  • Carriage and team - .00
  • Carriage and driver - .00
  • Buggy to depot - .00
  • Horse to pasture - Life at the Livery.50
  • Feed - Life at the Livery.25
  • Bucket of oats - Life at the Livery.50
  • Stall rental - .50
  • Stall plus hay - .50
  • One month board on horse - .00
  • Currying horse - Life at the Livery.10
  • Saddling horse - Life at the Livery.25
  • Repairs on carriage - Life at the Livery.50 to .50 or higher depending on extent of repair needed
  • Fee for lost horse blanket - Life at the Livery.75 for regular blanket, .00 for double blanket
In addition to accepting cash for payment, this log book also chronicled a variety of barter offerings. Customers were known to pay in corn or cords of wood. One fellow who had accrued a rather large debt paid with a big black sow. If a man had no goods to offer, he might pay in services like hauling hay in from area farms, working the nightshift at the stable, working as a carriage driver, or painting the livery. Yet as the 19th century faded into the 20th, and the horse no longer held sway as the primary mode of transportation, what happened to all these livery stables? Did they simply fade away into the yore of yesteryear? Some may have. But many enterprising livery owners adapted successfully to the times and converted their stables and wagon yards into garages for the newfangled horseless carriages that dominated the streets. So the next time you take you car to the shop, try to picture the mechanic with a handlebar mustache, hat, and boots. Who knows, maybe one of his great-great-grandfathers owned your town livery.]]> http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/07/15/life-at-the-livery/feed/ 27 Meet a Little Sweetheart ~Tanya Hanson http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/06/01/24159/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/06/01/24159/#comments Wed, 01 Jun 2011 06:07:28 +0000 Tanya Hanson http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=24159 Mucking at the horse rescue the other day let me meet baby Jasper for the first time. He’s two months old now and the sweetest thing. When he was eleven days old, he and his mama Bella were rescued along with six pregnant mares from a trip to a Mexican slaughterhouse. The other six were rescued by other sanctuaries. He’s a little fireball who loves people, loves carrots (the pieces have to be really small; think baby carrot broken into three or four pieces), loves to play with his toys, and is learning how to wear a lead as well as a small saddlebag on his back. The sanctuary’s ultimate goal is to get him and Mamma adoptable.  Since I’m just a wanna-be, I thought I’d check into just what goes on with a newborn foal.  Jasper likely stood up within an hour of birth to start nursing and probably fell over many times until he figured out just what legs are and what he was supposed to do with them. These days, his rump is higher than his forelegs, a natural progression of growth.  Hopefully nursing started within two hours and he found Mama’s milk by instinct. He needed the colostrum she provided.  At the rescue, his temperature would have been checked often; normally just one degree higher than an adult, and blood  samples are closely monitored.  For the first few weeks, he followed right next to his mama before getting bolder. I was told his mama, due to the trauma of capture, didn’t produce as much milk as she would have in less stressful times, so Jasper started in on “mature” food sooner than he likely would have. Nonetheless, his intake is closely monitored, as too much rich food in a foal causes “founder”, an ailment similar to gout. But Jasper’s grazing instincts have always been good.  He and mama spend time now in the round turnout, which is carefully tended and free from rocks and sand. Because he’s still learning, his natural grazing instincts would have him chewing on such stuff, too.  Although he and his mother have a nice-sized stall,  he needs plenty of room to run and play like any kid. He has a jump-ball , the big rubber ball with a handle on it, that he loves.  Oh, and he has managed to nibble on Mama’s mane a little bit. It’s great entertainment for him. He also likes such things as traffic cones.  And as yucky as this sounds, apparently the foal has needed to chomp a little bit on mama’s manure…his gut has no bacteria  naturally to break down food.  The two lovely ladies in charge of him have already started halter-breaking, and he’s quite a champ. In a foal, halter breaking starts at about one month because he needs to have strong-enough neck muscles. Walking him helps wear him out and gets him used to people.  Jasper will be vaccinated and weaned between four and six months. And by now, his hooves have hardened enough to be picked clean and brushed.  I hope you enjoyed meeting this little sweetheart.

 (Thanks to this website for some cool foal info.) http://www.diamondcequestriancenter.com/foalcare.html

]]> http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/06/01/24159/feed/ 31 A Different Kind of Horse for a Different Kind of Cowboy http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/07/15/life-at-the-livery/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/07/15/life-at-the-livery/#comments Fri, 15 Jul 2011 06:00:50 +0000 KarenW http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=24948 Women. You'll find nary a one. That's because the livery stable was a man's domain. Females flocked to dry good stores, dress shops, milliners, and drug emporiums but avoided the masculine hub known as the livery. Why? Mostly because of the smell. And the likelihood of stepping in something no lady would want clinging to the sole of her shoe or staining the hem of her skirt. For a man, however, this was the western version of an English gentleman's club. A masculine sanctuary, a place to pass the time discussing crops or swapping stories by the potbellied stove. So what if the air was a bit gamey? A little manure never hurt anyone. The only nags were out back in the corral, and they didn't seem to mind if a fella was of a mind to spit his tobacco juice on the floor or wipe his nose on his sleeve. But the livery was more than a gathering place for men who wanted to escape their womenfolk for a time. It was a place of business. The liveryman kept prime horseflesh on hand for harness or riding, maintained a respectable selection of carriages and wagons for rent, pitched hay, tallied accounts, and even dealt with colicky critters when the need arose. Travelers stopped by to board their mounts or rent a saddle horse for the day. Young swains coughed up hard-earned coin to impress their gals with romantic country drives in a rented rig. The livery supplied an essential service to the townsfolk. As I researched livery stables for my debut novel, I came across a fabulous find in one of our local library's genealogical collections—a transcribed log book from a livery in Bonham, Texas dating back to 1885. Not only did I learn what prices were charged, I also gained insight into the types of services offered. Here is a sampling:
  • Horse rental per day - $0.50
  • Horse and buggy rental - $1.00
  • Carriage and team - $2.00
  • Carriage and driver - $4.00
  • Buggy to depot - $1.00
  • Horse to pasture - $0.50
  • Feed - $0.25
  • Bucket of oats - $0.50
  • Stall rental - $1.50
  • Stall plus hay - $2.50
  • One month board on horse - $10.00
  • Currying horse - $0.10
  • Saddling horse - $0.25
  • Repairs on carriage - $0.50 to $1.50 or higher depending on extent of repair needed
  • Fee for lost horse blanket - $0.75 for regular blanket, $2.00 for double blanket
In addition to accepting cash for payment, this log book also chronicled a variety of barter offerings. Customers were known to pay in corn or cords of wood. One fellow who had accrued a rather large debt paid with a big black sow. If a man had no goods to offer, he might pay in services like hauling hay in from area farms, working the nightshift at the stable, working as a carriage driver, or painting the livery. Yet as the 19th century faded into the 20th, and the horse no longer held sway as the primary mode of transportation, what happened to all these livery stables? Did they simply fade away into the yore of yesteryear? Some may have. But many enterprising livery owners adapted successfully to the times and converted their stables and wagon yards into garages for the newfangled horseless carriages that dominated the streets. So the next time you take you car to the shop, try to picture the mechanic with a handlebar mustache, hat, and boots. Who knows, maybe one of his great-great-grandfathers owned your town livery.]]> http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/07/15/life-at-the-livery/feed/ 27 Petticoats & Pistols » Horses http://petticoatsandpistols.com Romancing The West Thu, 24 May 2012 07:00:15 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 A Boat With REAL Horsepower http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2012/02/20/a-boat-with-real-horsepower/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2012/02/20/a-boat-with-real-horsepower/#comments Mon, 20 Feb 2012 06:17:56 +0000 Winnie Griggs http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=30399 The other day I was doing a bit of research into ferry travel in the nineteenth century and came across a little snippet of information that immediately sent me down a rabbit trail to find out more.  Did you know that ferry boats were powered by horses at one time?  I didn’t.  Of course I knew about the horses and mules that walked along the banks of the Erie canal, tethered to barges that they pulled along.   But this is something entirely different.  These boats had either a turntable or treadmill type device mounted on or below the deck of the ship.  These platforms were connected to a gear which was in turn connected to the paddle wheels that propelled the boat forward.  When horses walked on the platforms of these mechanisms it set the whole thing in motion.  A number of these horse-powered boats, of several different designs, could be found on the waterways of North America starting in the late eighteenth century and continuing through the early years of the twentieth century.  They reached their heyday in the 1840s and 1850s.  During the early years of our country they were used on any number of rivers and lakes in the northeast, especially Lake Champlain and the Hudson River.  From there their use spread west to the Great Lakes, to the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers as well as other waterways that fed from these.  Of course they were generally only used for journeys of a few miles.  These boats came in various sizes.  One of the largest was powered by eight horse and could carry 200-plus passengers at about the same speed as a steamboat of its day.  There were a number of factors that led to the decline in the use of horseferrys, most notably the industrialization that occurred in America during the latter part of the nineteenth century.  With the expansion of bridge construction and railroad networks, there was less need for ferrys of any sort.  And when the internal combustion engine came along the death knell was finally sounded.  The only known surviving example of one of these horseferrys sits beneath the murky waters of Burlington Bay on Lake Champlain.  It was discovered during an underwater archaeological expedition in 1894 and today is part of Vermont’s Underwater Historical Preserve System.  It has also been added to the national Park Service’s National Register of Historical Places.  So is this something you already knew about, or was it as new to you as it was to me?  And are there other unusual ways you’ve heard of animals being used to power manmade devices that you’d like to share?  ]]> http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2012/02/20/a-boat-with-real-horsepower/feed/ 18 Riding Camp http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/08/08/riding-camp/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/08/08/riding-camp/#comments Mon, 08 Aug 2011 09:00:12 +0000 Donna http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=25582 http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/08/08/riding-camp/feed/ 16 Life at the Livery http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/07/15/life-at-the-livery/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/07/15/life-at-the-livery/#comments Fri, 15 Jul 2011 06:00:50 +0000 KarenW http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=24948 Women. You'll find nary a one. That's because the livery stable was a man's domain. Females flocked to dry good stores, dress shops, milliners, and drug emporiums but avoided the masculine hub known as the livery. Why? Mostly because of the smell. And the likelihood of stepping in something no lady would want clinging to the sole of her shoe or staining the hem of her skirt. For a man, however, this was the western version of an English gentleman's club. A masculine sanctuary, a place to pass the time discussing crops or swapping stories by the potbellied stove. So what if the air was a bit gamey? A little manure never hurt anyone. The only nags were out back in the corral, and they didn't seem to mind if a fella was of a mind to spit his tobacco juice on the floor or wipe his nose on his sleeve. But the livery was more than a gathering place for men who wanted to escape their womenfolk for a time. It was a place of business. The liveryman kept prime horseflesh on hand for harness or riding, maintained a respectable selection of carriages and wagons for rent, pitched hay, tallied accounts, and even dealt with colicky critters when the need arose. Travelers stopped by to board their mounts or rent a saddle horse for the day. Young swains coughed up hard-earned coin to impress their gals with romantic country drives in a rented rig. The livery supplied an essential service to the townsfolk. As I researched livery stables for my debut novel, I came across a fabulous find in one of our local library's genealogical collections—a transcribed log book from a livery in Bonham, Texas dating back to 1885. Not only did I learn what prices were charged, I also gained insight into the types of services offered. Here is a sampling:
  • Horse rental per day - Meet a Little Sweetheart ~Tanya Hanson.50
  • Horse and buggy rental - .00
  • Carriage and team - .00
  • Carriage and driver - .00
  • Buggy to depot - .00
  • Horse to pasture - Meet a Little Sweetheart ~Tanya Hanson.50
  • Feed - Meet a Little Sweetheart ~Tanya Hanson.25
  • Bucket of oats - Meet a Little Sweetheart ~Tanya Hanson.50
  • Stall rental - .50
  • Stall plus hay - .50
  • One month board on horse - .00
  • Currying horse - Meet a Little Sweetheart ~Tanya Hanson.10
  • Saddling horse - Meet a Little Sweetheart ~Tanya Hanson.25
  • Repairs on carriage - Meet a Little Sweetheart ~Tanya Hanson.50 to .50 or higher depending on extent of repair needed
  • Fee for lost horse blanket - Meet a Little Sweetheart ~Tanya Hanson.75 for regular blanket, .00 for double blanket
In addition to accepting cash for payment, this log book also chronicled a variety of barter offerings. Customers were known to pay in corn or cords of wood. One fellow who had accrued a rather large debt paid with a big black sow. If a man had no goods to offer, he might pay in services like hauling hay in from area farms, working the nightshift at the stable, working as a carriage driver, or painting the livery. Yet as the 19th century faded into the 20th, and the horse no longer held sway as the primary mode of transportation, what happened to all these livery stables? Did they simply fade away into the yore of yesteryear? Some may have. But many enterprising livery owners adapted successfully to the times and converted their stables and wagon yards into garages for the newfangled horseless carriages that dominated the streets. So the next time you take you car to the shop, try to picture the mechanic with a handlebar mustache, hat, and boots. Who knows, maybe one of his great-great-grandfathers owned your town livery.]]> http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/07/15/life-at-the-livery/feed/ 27 Meet a Little Sweetheart ~Tanya Hanson http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/06/01/24159/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/06/01/24159/#comments Wed, 01 Jun 2011 06:07:28 +0000 Tanya Hanson http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=24159 Mucking at the horse rescue the other day let me meet baby Jasper for the first time. He’s two months old now and the sweetest thing. When he was eleven days old, he and his mama Bella were rescued along with six pregnant mares from a trip to a Mexican slaughterhouse. The other six were rescued by other sanctuaries. He’s a little fireball who loves people, loves carrots (the pieces have to be really small; think baby carrot broken into three or four pieces), loves to play with his toys, and is learning how to wear a lead as well as a small saddlebag on his back. The sanctuary’s ultimate goal is to get him and Mamma adoptable.  Since I’m just a wanna-be, I thought I’d check into just what goes on with a newborn foal.  Jasper likely stood up within an hour of birth to start nursing and probably fell over many times until he figured out just what legs are and what he was supposed to do with them. These days, his rump is higher than his forelegs, a natural progression of growth.  Hopefully nursing started within two hours and he found Mama’s milk by instinct. He needed the colostrum she provided.  At the rescue, his temperature would have been checked often; normally just one degree higher than an adult, and blood  samples are closely monitored.  For the first few weeks, he followed right next to his mama before getting bolder. I was told his mama, due to the trauma of capture, didn’t produce as much milk as she would have in less stressful times, so Jasper started in on “mature” food sooner than he likely would have. Nonetheless, his intake is closely monitored, as too much rich food in a foal causes “founder”, an ailment similar to gout. But Jasper’s grazing instincts have always been good.  He and mama spend time now in the round turnout, which is carefully tended and free from rocks and sand. Because he’s still learning, his natural grazing instincts would have him chewing on such stuff, too.  Although he and his mother have a nice-sized stall,  he needs plenty of room to run and play like any kid. He has a jump-ball , the big rubber ball with a handle on it, that he loves.  Oh, and he has managed to nibble on Mama’s mane a little bit. It’s great entertainment for him. He also likes such things as traffic cones.  And as yucky as this sounds, apparently the foal has needed to chomp a little bit on mama’s manure…his gut has no bacteria  naturally to break down food.  The two lovely ladies in charge of him have already started halter-breaking, and he’s quite a champ. In a foal, halter breaking starts at about one month because he needs to have strong-enough neck muscles. Walking him helps wear him out and gets him used to people.  Jasper will be vaccinated and weaned between four and six months. And by now, his hooves have hardened enough to be picked clean and brushed.  I hope you enjoyed meeting this little sweetheart.

 (Thanks to this website for some cool foal info.) http://www.diamondcequestriancenter.com/foalcare.html

]]> http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/06/01/24159/feed/ 31 A Different Kind of Horse for a Different Kind of Cowboy http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/06/01/24159/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/06/01/24159/#comments Wed, 01 Jun 2011 06:07:28 +0000 Tanya Hanson http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=24159 Mucking at the horse rescue the other day let me meet baby Jasper for the first time. He’s two months old now and the sweetest thing. When he was eleven days old, he and his mama Bella were rescued along with six pregnant mares from a trip to a Mexican slaughterhouse. The other six were rescued by other sanctuaries. He’s a little fireball who loves people, loves carrots (the pieces have to be really small; think baby carrot broken into three or four pieces), loves to play with his toys, and is learning how to wear a lead as well as a small saddlebag on his back. The sanctuary’s ultimate goal is to get him and Mamma adoptable.  Since I’m just a wanna-be, I thought I’d check into just what goes on with a newborn foal.  Jasper likely stood up within an hour of birth to start nursing and probably fell over many times until he figured out just what legs are and what he was supposed to do with them. These days, his rump is higher than his forelegs, a natural progression of growth.  Hopefully nursing started within two hours and he found Mama’s milk by instinct. He needed the colostrum she provided.  At the rescue, his temperature would have been checked often; normally just one degree higher than an adult, and blood  samples are closely monitored.  For the first few weeks, he followed right next to his mama before getting bolder. I was told his mama, due to the trauma of capture, didn’t produce as much milk as she would have in less stressful times, so Jasper started in on “mature” food sooner than he likely would have. Nonetheless, his intake is closely monitored, as too much rich food in a foal causes “founder”, an ailment similar to gout. But Jasper’s grazing instincts have always been good.  He and mama spend time now in the round turnout, which is carefully tended and free from rocks and sand. Because he’s still learning, his natural grazing instincts would have him chewing on such stuff, too.  Although he and his mother have a nice-sized stall,  he needs plenty of room to run and play like any kid. He has a jump-ball , the big rubber ball with a handle on it, that he loves.  Oh, and he has managed to nibble on Mama’s mane a little bit. It’s great entertainment for him. He also likes such things as traffic cones.  And as yucky as this sounds, apparently the foal has needed to chomp a little bit on mama’s manure…his gut has no bacteria  naturally to break down food.  The two lovely ladies in charge of him have already started halter-breaking, and he’s quite a champ. In a foal, halter breaking starts at about one month because he needs to have strong-enough neck muscles. Walking him helps wear him out and gets him used to people.  Jasper will be vaccinated and weaned between four and six months. And by now, his hooves have hardened enough to be picked clean and brushed.  I hope you enjoyed meeting this little sweetheart.

 (Thanks to this website for some cool foal info.) http://www.diamondcequestriancenter.com/foalcare.html

]]> http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/06/01/24159/feed/ 31 Petticoats & Pistols » Horses http://petticoatsandpistols.com Romancing The West Thu, 24 May 2012 07:00:15 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 A Boat With REAL Horsepower http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2012/02/20/a-boat-with-real-horsepower/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2012/02/20/a-boat-with-real-horsepower/#comments Mon, 20 Feb 2012 06:17:56 +0000 Winnie Griggs http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=30399 The other day I was doing a bit of research into ferry travel in the nineteenth century and came across a little snippet of information that immediately sent me down a rabbit trail to find out more.  Did you know that ferry boats were powered by horses at one time?  I didn’t.  Of course I knew about the horses and mules that walked along the banks of the Erie canal, tethered to barges that they pulled along.   But this is something entirely different.  These boats had either a turntable or treadmill type device mounted on or below the deck of the ship.  These platforms were connected to a gear which was in turn connected to the paddle wheels that propelled the boat forward.  When horses walked on the platforms of these mechanisms it set the whole thing in motion.  A number of these horse-powered boats, of several different designs, could be found on the waterways of North America starting in the late eighteenth century and continuing through the early years of the twentieth century.  They reached their heyday in the 1840s and 1850s.  During the early years of our country they were used on any number of rivers and lakes in the northeast, especially Lake Champlain and the Hudson River.  From there their use spread west to the Great Lakes, to the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers as well as other waterways that fed from these.  Of course they were generally only used for journeys of a few miles.  These boats came in various sizes.  One of the largest was powered by eight horse and could carry 200-plus passengers at about the same speed as a steamboat of its day.  There were a number of factors that led to the decline in the use of horseferrys, most notably the industrialization that occurred in America during the latter part of the nineteenth century.  With the expansion of bridge construction and railroad networks, there was less need for ferrys of any sort.  And when the internal combustion engine came along the death knell was finally sounded.  The only known surviving example of one of these horseferrys sits beneath the murky waters of Burlington Bay on Lake Champlain.  It was discovered during an underwater archaeological expedition in 1894 and today is part of Vermont’s Underwater Historical Preserve System.  It has also been added to the national Park Service’s National Register of Historical Places.  So is this something you already knew about, or was it as new to you as it was to me?  And are there other unusual ways you’ve heard of animals being used to power manmade devices that you’d like to share?  ]]> http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2012/02/20/a-boat-with-real-horsepower/feed/ 18 Riding Camp http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/08/08/riding-camp/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/08/08/riding-camp/#comments Mon, 08 Aug 2011 09:00:12 +0000 Donna http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=25582 http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/08/08/riding-camp/feed/ 16 Life at the Livery http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/07/15/life-at-the-livery/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/07/15/life-at-the-livery/#comments Fri, 15 Jul 2011 06:00:50 +0000 KarenW http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=24948 Women. You'll find nary a one. That's because the livery stable was a man's domain. Females flocked to dry good stores, dress shops, milliners, and drug emporiums but avoided the masculine hub known as the livery. Why? Mostly because of the smell. And the likelihood of stepping in something no lady would want clinging to the sole of her shoe or staining the hem of her skirt. For a man, however, this was the western version of an English gentleman's club. A masculine sanctuary, a place to pass the time discussing crops or swapping stories by the potbellied stove. So what if the air was a bit gamey? A little manure never hurt anyone. The only nags were out back in the corral, and they didn't seem to mind if a fella was of a mind to spit his tobacco juice on the floor or wipe his nose on his sleeve. But the livery was more than a gathering place for men who wanted to escape their womenfolk for a time. It was a place of business. The liveryman kept prime horseflesh on hand for harness or riding, maintained a respectable selection of carriages and wagons for rent, pitched hay, tallied accounts, and even dealt with colicky critters when the need arose. Travelers stopped by to board their mounts or rent a saddle horse for the day. Young swains coughed up hard-earned coin to impress their gals with romantic country drives in a rented rig. The livery supplied an essential service to the townsfolk. As I researched livery stables for my debut novel, I came across a fabulous find in one of our local library's genealogical collections—a transcribed log book from a livery in Bonham, Texas dating back to 1885. Not only did I learn what prices were charged, I also gained insight into the types of services offered. Here is a sampling:
  • Horse rental per day - A Different Kind of Horse for a Different Kind of Cowboy.50
  • Horse and buggy rental - .00
  • Carriage and team - .00
  • Carriage and driver - .00
  • Buggy to depot - .00
  • Horse to pasture - A Different Kind of Horse for a Different Kind of Cowboy.50
  • Feed - A Different Kind of Horse for a Different Kind of Cowboy.25
  • Bucket of oats - A Different Kind of Horse for a Different Kind of Cowboy.50
  • Stall rental - .50
  • Stall plus hay - .50
  • One month board on horse - .00
  • Currying horse - A Different Kind of Horse for a Different Kind of Cowboy.10
  • Saddling horse - A Different Kind of Horse for a Different Kind of Cowboy.25
  • Repairs on carriage - A Different Kind of Horse for a Different Kind of Cowboy.50 to .50 or higher depending on extent of repair needed
  • Fee for lost horse blanket - A Different Kind of Horse for a Different Kind of Cowboy.75 for regular blanket, .00 for double blanket
In addition to accepting cash for payment, this log book also chronicled a variety of barter offerings. Customers were known to pay in corn or cords of wood. One fellow who had accrued a rather large debt paid with a big black sow. If a man had no goods to offer, he might pay in services like hauling hay in from area farms, working the nightshift at the stable, working as a carriage driver, or painting the livery. Yet as the 19th century faded into the 20th, and the horse no longer held sway as the primary mode of transportation, what happened to all these livery stables? Did they simply fade away into the yore of yesteryear? Some may have. But many enterprising livery owners adapted successfully to the times and converted their stables and wagon yards into garages for the newfangled horseless carriages that dominated the streets. So the next time you take you car to the shop, try to picture the mechanic with a handlebar mustache, hat, and boots. Who knows, maybe one of his great-great-grandfathers owned your town livery.]]> http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/07/15/life-at-the-livery/feed/ 27 Meet a Little Sweetheart ~Tanya Hanson http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/06/01/24159/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/06/01/24159/#comments Wed, 01 Jun 2011 06:07:28 +0000 Tanya Hanson http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=24159 Mucking at the horse rescue the other day let me meet baby Jasper for the first time. He’s two months old now and the sweetest thing. When he was eleven days old, he and his mama Bella were rescued along with six pregnant mares from a trip to a Mexican slaughterhouse. The other six were rescued by other sanctuaries. He’s a little fireball who loves people, loves carrots (the pieces have to be really small; think baby carrot broken into three or four pieces), loves to play with his toys, and is learning how to wear a lead as well as a small saddlebag on his back. The sanctuary’s ultimate goal is to get him and Mamma adoptable.  Since I’m just a wanna-be, I thought I’d check into just what goes on with a newborn foal.  Jasper likely stood up within an hour of birth to start nursing and probably fell over many times until he figured out just what legs are and what he was supposed to do with them. These days, his rump is higher than his forelegs, a natural progression of growth.  Hopefully nursing started within two hours and he found Mama’s milk by instinct. He needed the colostrum she provided.  At the rescue, his temperature would have been checked often; normally just one degree higher than an adult, and blood  samples are closely monitored.  For the first few weeks, he followed right next to his mama before getting bolder. I was told his mama, due to the trauma of capture, didn’t produce as much milk as she would have in less stressful times, so Jasper started in on “mature” food sooner than he likely would have. Nonetheless, his intake is closely monitored, as too much rich food in a foal causes “founder”, an ailment similar to gout. But Jasper’s grazing instincts have always been good.  He and mama spend time now in the round turnout, which is carefully tended and free from rocks and sand. Because he’s still learning, his natural grazing instincts would have him chewing on such stuff, too.  Although he and his mother have a nice-sized stall,  he needs plenty of room to run and play like any kid. He has a jump-ball , the big rubber ball with a handle on it, that he loves.  Oh, and he has managed to nibble on Mama’s mane a little bit. It’s great entertainment for him. He also likes such things as traffic cones.  And as yucky as this sounds, apparently the foal has needed to chomp a little bit on mama’s manure…his gut has no bacteria  naturally to break down food.  The two lovely ladies in charge of him have already started halter-breaking, and he’s quite a champ. In a foal, halter breaking starts at about one month because he needs to have strong-enough neck muscles. Walking him helps wear him out and gets him used to people.  Jasper will be vaccinated and weaned between four and six months. And by now, his hooves have hardened enough to be picked clean and brushed.  I hope you enjoyed meeting this little sweetheart.

 (Thanks to this website for some cool foal info.) http://www.diamondcequestriancenter.com/foalcare.html

]]> http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/06/01/24159/feed/ 31 A Different Kind of Horse for a Different Kind of Cowboy http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/05/09/a-different-kind-of-horse-for-a-different-kind-of-cowboy/ http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/05/09/a-different-kind-of-horse-for-a-different-kind-of-cowboy/#comments Mon, 09 May 2011 10:20:54 +0000 Donna http://petticoatsandpistols.com/?p=23677 When I started writing HONEYMOON WITH THE RANCHER, I figured that a special kind of cowboy – an Argentine Gaucho – rode a special kind of horse. Turns out I was right, and today I’m going to introduce you to the Criollo. This native horse of Argentina descends from the horses of the Iberian conquest. When parties went to explore and conquer South America, horses were shipped to the river Plate from Iberia, and as in all the Spanish and Portuguese conquests, they brought the toughest, hardiest horses they could. Conditions were tough on such voyages with insufficient food and water. Many horses died or were unable to regain health. Whether it was the primitive characteristics that cropped out under the wild conditions in the New World, or whether some of the shipments were of rather primitive Iberian horses in the first place, fact is that until fairly recently, the Argentine Criollo and the Criollo in general, bore a considerable resemblance to the ancient Sorraia wild horse of Portugal and Spain (zebro, or encebro). During long campaigns with Indians, many horses escaped or were turned loose. Also after destruction of Buenos Aires by Indians, many horses were driven into the wild. Natural selection resulted in physical hardiness and the survivors became the progenitors of the Argentine Criollo breed. The Criollo horse is still the choice of the South American cowboys, the best-known of which is Argentina's gaucho. On cattle drives or gathers, the Criollos are usually ridden for a week, then returned to pasture and substituted by new ones. All along, the native grass is their only feed. Horses on the ranches are not necessarily registered Criollos, in fact, they seldomly are. The registered Criollo horse has become too valuable to be exposed to the dangers and hardships of many ranches, but those horses used for ranch work are still criollos in the original sense of the word. It is a bit confusing that the breed carries the name of a horse that, traditionally, was not a breed, but a wild or semi-wild horse without a pedigree. Now the pedigreed horses carry that same name: Criollo. In that respect, too, the situation is similar to that of the mustangs of North America, where mustang also described a wild-living horse without a pedigree, but registries exist that use the term to describe their registered animals. Just like from the work of the North American cowboy, several events resp. contests have derived from the South American herdsmen's work, some are similar to those in North America, some are quite unique. The Criollo horse excels in all of them. Criollos of Central and South America were the basis for several specialized breeds, such as the different Paso breeds, or the Mangalargas of Brazil. If you’ve never seen a Paso in motion before, it’s a real treat. I never got to ride one but my sister did, and she said it was like gliding on a magic carpet. The Criollo horse became only really known beyond its homeland through the famous ride by Swiss Aim Tschiffely with two Criollos from Buenos Aires to New York City. The two horses, Mancha and Gato, were 15 and 16 years of age, respectively, when he set out. He was received by the U.S. president in Washington when he arrived there three years later, after approx. 13,500 miles that took him, among other hardships, over the over 18,000 feet high Condor Pass in Bolivia. That both, Mancha and Gato, afterwards lived to be over 40 years of age is further testimony to the extraordinary toughness and vitality of the Criollo horse. In some ways, I learned that the Criollo is practically a symbol for the strength and resilience of the Argentine people. HONEYMOON WITH THE RANCHER is out now from Harlequin Romance. *info provided by http://www.horseshowcentral.com/horse_breeds/criollo_horse/421/1]]> http://petticoatsandpistols.com/2011/05/09/a-different-kind-of-horse-for-a-different-kind-of-cowboy/feed/ 11