The GOP in Owyhee

Sunday September 6 2009

Kazam is back: Jose's half brother, affectionately known as the Great Orange Pumpkin, or the Hamster.


He became known as the Great Orange Pumpkin because he's orange and he has, a time or two, been as round as a great pumpkin. Now he's slimmed down some...


but the name has stuck. He's built somewhat like Jose, moves somewhat like Jose, has a great personality just like Jose. He's got a long flowing beautiful mane that I've threatened Steph with a winter in Antarctica if she cuts it.

He's been back and forth between trainers enough the last two years - he gets trained, then doesn't get ridden, gets trained again, then hurts himself and doesn't get ridden - that he learns enough and forgets enough to still be green, at 8 years old. The heart is willing, but the mind needs a little molding yet. He's a work in progress.






He is remembering how to move off my legs - opening gates is good practice; he's re-learning how to go out by himself - we work on not jigging on the way home: transferring nervous energy into calm, energetic forward motion; he practices standing still until he's asked to move out; he makes his own way bravely through scary places - our jungle driveway, or the neighbor's Little Shop of Horrors yard; he's learning to keep the same pace on the trail until asked to change; on the trail he works on leading, following, moving beside a horse, cantering, backing up. He's not much of an 'uphill' horse yet - he goes better downhill - but he's getting the feel of digging in and getting up hills.

He has been known to buck, but so far (knock on wood!) he hasn't felt a need for that.



He's friendly and willing, likes looking around on the trail and stopping to observe the scenery (like Jose), likes getting out and going down the trail.

He's a good little horse. He's Jose's brother - what else is there to say?

Abandoned Child Syndrome

Wednesday September 2 2009

Princess has apparently decided, after two-and-a-half months, that she's done with motherhood. At least she lets Smokey nurse, and she lets Smokey stick her head under mom's tail to keep flies off her face, but she sure isn't much concerned with having a baby anymore.

Sometimes the other horses get tired of babysitting for an absent Princess.

Kazam - "Not my turn to watch the kid!"




Rhett - "Don't think so, kid."



Finneas - "Not a chance!"


Stormy -"Not MY turn again!"






One day Smokey couldn't find her anywhere, ran up and down the pasture whinnying and yelling in a panic for Mamma, who didn't answer.

Up ("Mamma! Mamma!")






down ("Mamma! Mamma!")



up ("MAMMA! MAMMA!")



down ("MAMMA! MAMMA!")




She ran back up and got Kazam and Sophie



stirred up to run with her back to the house - "Hurry! Come look for my mamma with me! Emergency! My Mamma's gone!"



The two elders followed Smokey up to the house, Smokey kept crying for Mamma, Mamma never did answer, Smokey's sides were heaving from running; I finally lead them all to the back pen where Princess had her head buried in the hay. Mamma never did look up, even when Smokey ran up to her still hollering, and started to nurse.

New poster went up in Owyhee today:

"One Cute Abandoned Child Up for Adoption.
Do you want to be my Mamma?"

Owyhee: Castle Creek Canyon Trail

Monday August 31 2009

Another gorgeous day of exploring the Owyhee desert on horseback, with Jose getting to escort two of his ladies up Castle Creek Canyon.

Starting in the Owyhee Mountain foothills, we rode along an old road beside the creek - possibly originally built by miners 150 years ago, or at least in the 1950's by homesteaders on the creek. We know it's at least as early as the 1950's, because we rode by an old rusted-out 1950's Buick, overgrown with weeds and sagebrush.

There are remnants of a couple of mines, and several homestead sites, some with wooden cabins or parts of them still standing, some with stone ruins. The leftover irrigation canals are still evident, all of them likely dug with a fresno scraper (invented 1883, a blade that scooped up the soil and deposited it on the side as it went along) and mule. There is still a live orchard (plums, apples), an old berry patch, a cemetery, and a few scattered poplar trees, which were popular among homesteaders.

It really made you think of those people who chose to eke out a living here in the middle of nowhere. It was an easy 7-mile ride for us up the canyon - after we hauled 11 miles to get to our starting point - and we hauled from Oreana, which really still is in the middle of nowhere. Back in the old days you wouldn't ride to the nearest town every day for a latte, and you wouldn't drive your wagon every week to the nearest town for a bag of groceries or a newspaper.

We found it quite beautiful - another hidden surprise in the high desert - a trail for recreation now. Wonder what the people who lived here a hundred years ago thought of it?

More photos of our Castle Creek Canyon ride at www.endurance.net/merri

Desert Storm

Saturday August 29 2009

Evening: a storm comes to the desert. Heavy blue clouds over the northwest flats. Thunder rumbles. A gray veil descends over the Owyhee mountains - rain is falling, working its way down Pickett Creek. Sun rays pierce the clouds, tinting them gold to the west and an eye-aching steel blue to the north.

The lightning flashes, so bright it eclipses the golden light. The thunder booms. I'm out walking in it. It's too beautiful not to. I'm not afraid this time... but then I'm not riding a horse in it, and I am sticking to the drainage, not up on the flats.

The rain arrives from up the canyon. Gentle at first, then big desert drops. It kicks up millions of miniature dust storms. It wets, then quickly soaks my hair, my shoulders, runs down my back, pours down my face. The rain releases the sharp incense of the desert - the sage, the rabbit brush, greasewood, the sand.

Lightning whirls in the sky, a bolt making a circle above the northwest bluffs. Two circles. Thunder chases the bolts around. I stare transfixed, pelted by rain, dripping now, like the desert. I'm part of the desert, looking skyward, soaking up the rain.

The heavy rain keeps on moving down Bates Creek, cleansing everything in its wake, taking the lightning storm with it. It finishes up with little sprinkles, just like it started.

The storm leaves in its wake the colorful sunset, storm clouds and rainbow: the visual orchestral finale of another Owyhee summer storm.

Owyhee: Wind Caves Trail

Thursday August 29 2009

Riding in the desert invariably makes you think of water: either you crave it, or you can imagine craving it; and you can always see the artistic handiwork and the results of great forces behind water - scare as it may be - after it has been there.

After reading Craig Childs' The Secret Knowledge of Water, I've never looked at the desert the same way again.

It was another day of exploring the Owyhee desert, another day of wandering about, and wondering about the secrets of water in the desert.

Three weeks ago some heavy summer rains in the Owyhee desert brought some flash floods through some drainages around here, and scoured some of the washes and canyons, uprooting sagebush and even some trees, and ironing out this particular wash that we rode up into a smooth, firm, sand highway.

Side washes left miniature alluvial fans that poured into the big wash. New rocks and roots were exposed; patterns were still left in the now-dry sand from swirling water, gouging water, pools of water. Channels of water - forces of weight and gravity and whimsy - sculpted extra-miniature carvings in the sand: shelves, bluffs, gorges, hills, cliffs, grooves - mirroring the desert landscape all around. One deep, winding wash revealed a 4-foot high shelf over a mini-amphitheatre - an awesome waterfall during the rains - now dry, waiting for the next gully washer.

Over the eons, water and wind have carved some of the rock/sandstone/rhyolite (I am coming back in one of my other lives as a geologist!) into Wind Caves or Gnome Homes... use your imagination.

At another place, water has tunneled a route through the rhyolite rocks to make a high-walled canyon. Right now it's overgrown with weeds - which naturally sprung up from the heavy rains a few weeks ago. Jose was obsessed with the tall clover-grasses (in another life, I'm coming back as a botanist!) - eating his way along as we bulled our way through the mile or two of narrow canyon. We crossed running water in the creek in some places; the water disappeared in other spots - and consequently, the weeds weren't so obnoxious there.

If you drove by this desert on the highway, you'd think it was mostly flat with a few hills. You wouldn't have a clue how much is out here.

Maybe it's a good thing to keep these treasures a secret, keep these secret places hidden except for special occasions.

Come ride the 5-day Owyhee Canyonlands in September-October, or the 2-day Hallowed Weenies ride October 31-November 1, and maybe we'll show you the Wind Caves trail and some of the secrets of the desert.


More photos from this ride at www.endurance.net/merri

Dudley Speaks

Friday August 28 2009

Dudley would like to issue the following statement from the Owyhee Spa Jail where he's currently incarcerated:

"I would like to apologize for causing such a ruckus (again).

I apologize for scaring some of you from Owyhee County (the "Owyhee Thief" and all) and the upcoming Owyhee Canyonlands endurance ride.

I can understand how my latest escape and escapades led some of you to think there is a thief loose in Owyhee County.

Truly, this is blasphemy. It is slander. I am not a thief. I am hungry.

Therefore I can not help it that a saddle got stuck to my foot (I mean - who makes stirrup sizes just slightly smaller than my front foot, honestly!) while I was following my nose for apple-flavored horse treats after I escaped. I mean - who the heck left treats in the saddlebag anyway??? Oh - wait - I was apologizing.

I meant to say, I really am sorry for all the trouble I got into and caused. (But dang, that alfalfa and those treats sure were good!)

Because of my Good Behavior and Signs of Remorse (I have that look perfected! See above picture), I got released from the smaller Round Pen Jail and put back in the Big Pen Jail. Of course I went straight back to the spot in the fence where I escaped Thursday night and started to let myself out again. I got a nasty shock this time. Are you happy? Don't you feel sorry for me?

If any of you feel, like me, that I have suffered enough by being banished to jail, and put behind an electrocuted fence, and if you feel sorry enough for poor little me (I am little, really, just depends on from which angle or through which lens you view me) and all the trouble I have been in and caused, please come turn off my electricity so I can try to escape again without getting shocked, and get out and eat some more alfalfa and treats because I am so hungry (I promise I will try not to drag somebody's saddle around in the dirt and gravel again).

Or, please when you do come to the Owyhee Canyonlands (your goods are safe, I swear... well, unless you leave them out with treats), show me how sorry you feel for me and come give me big hugs and big treats.

Sincerely,

Escape Artist Extraordinaire,
Dudley"