Who needs hay, just feed poop!

Suzi, the neighbor girl came over yesterday to work with Oakley and I took advantage of the decent weather and let her ride. Thought I would jump on Willie bareback, see how that went.

I told Suzi that she might see a rodeo as Willie had never been ridden bareback to my knowledge and I was not sure how he was going to be. He did OK, not great. He wanted to buck a couple times but I kept him under control.. had to spank him on the neck a few times and he did attempt to buck/kick at Oakley so I went a little "monkey-on-his-ass" and smacked the heck out of him and atop his head between the ears.. Not sure if it hurt his head or my hand worse! lol

As we walked around the little round pen, all the sudden Oakley started to act up. He spun around and was acting very flighty. I was nervous for Suzi at this point because Oakely was not himself. I looked off to the woods, didnt see anything that could be spooking him. So I jumped off Willie and grabbed hold of Oakley. By this time he is really worked up about something and I told her to just hold on, I would get him under control so she could get off. I realized that Oakley was getting worked up over the pile of poop that Willie had just dumped a minute earlier. So I led him over to it and let him sniff it out, but then he went right to eating it! WTF!!! I jerked his head up and he got pretty mad that I was not going to let him eat the poo.. I got him halted long enough to get Suzi off, gave her Willie to lead away and proceeded to spank the hell out of Oakley who was acting obsessed about this poop. He wanted that pile so badly, he was going to battle me over it and I really had to work to keep him focused on me and not the poop. After a couple minutes I got on him and rode him around, he was still battling me when I rode by the poop and he tried to buck/rear, I had no stirrups so I about came off but I worked it out and finally after 5 minutes, he calmed down and would walk past the pile w/o making a bee-line straight to it with his face!

Once we got back up to his corral, his attitude was back to care-free, so I asked Suzi to get back on and ride him around for a few minutes. I did NOT want her to end her riding session on such a sour note, she needed to have a good ride on him so she wouldnt focus on the bad. I am thinking it is time I consider having her parents sign a waiver because you just never know when a horse is going to be so stupid over something so unpredictable! Who would have thought??

It only took me a few seconds to realize why he wanted that poop so bad! I have been feeding Willie alfalfa pellets every day to help him put on weight, but Oakley gets none of it. Well apparently fat Oakley thinks he is starving and MUST HAVE ALFALFA, and is willing to do whatever it takes to eat it! Damn horses...