Daphne the Pony!

Holy potato, we got a pony!!!

I used to work for Crowley's Horse Auction and my old boss, Alice came in to town to buy cutting horses at the Fort Worth Stockyards and see the NCHA finals. She went to the consignment auction and saw this unbelievably adorable little mare who when the guy walked her in, he then stood on her back and cracked a bull whip off her... she didn't flinch. Good pony. Alice knows me really well, knows I like what she calls "exotics" and bid on her knowing I'd take her in two hot seconds. Which I did.

I got to the stockyards the next day and went to look at her... brought H.. maybe a mistake, she's never been to a sale yard and I did not prepare her properly. The first pen we walked up to was a kill pen.. not directly of course, you can't sell horses to kill anymore but you know where they will end up. The pen was maybe 15x15, dirt with cement water troughs that where not only empty but unplugged... water had no way of staying in even if someone wanted to fill it. No food, just dust. 7 horses where crammed in, all older & swaybacked except for one that looked like a fairly well bred standardbred in need of serious groceries. The pen next to them was same size and set up & had three palomino yearlings I couldn't even try to guess the breed of because they where so shrimpy from malnourishment. Across from them was Daphne, my pony and in the situation she looked just as pathetic as everyone else... we hoped that was situational but upon closer inspection she's in terrible shape. Her heels don't exist, her frog is completely compacted. She's got thrush in all four feet. She was 4 inches overgrown. She's about 75 pounds underweight and considering the size that's a pretty significant amount, the weight issue is probably only because she's wormy though. Finally, it's obvious that someone put a saddle on her, tight, and left it. She has bloody open cinch gulls and rot from the saddle staying on her back too long. I think she was probably on a pony wheel or something similar.

Personality, she's stand offish right now, but that didn't stop her from standing in the middle of our conversation the day we got her.. she will open up a lot I think.

I need to measure and see how tall she is, we've been trying to figure out the breed, the one time I rode her she seemed gaited but we where on weird footing. Can't wait to be back near Vale so I can go play with her.