Ranahan Equine Services

07/23/2023

06/25/2023

This is whiskey a two-year-old gelding getting saddled for the first time. He did very well no buck,.Just wondered what I was doing to him. I need to do some adjustments on the saddle to make it fit him a little better but I’m gonna do this over and over and over.

06/16/2023

Horse Boarding available on three pastures that we rotate. Each pasture averages three acres. We have a 50 foot round pen with a sand base. One and a half acre holding area and I feed constant with 800 lb alfalfa/grass hay. Two shelters, four stalls and automatic waterer. We are Ranahan Ranch in the West Valley of Kalispell Mt., $335 month (406) 300-2313

06/07/2023

Putting a nice new layer of washed sand in the round pen 

06/01/2023

This morning we introduced Colter to Whiskey and Tangeray, and they’re getting along just great. Colter is such a big horse that he makes my two horses look like ponies.

05/15/2023

Introducing the young horses to an obnoxious dog it went very well. The horses were curious and the dog was calm

12/12/2022

12/09/2022

Horses need the minerals salt, calcium and phosphorus, Salt is lost through sweat and urine so it should be available free choice to the horse at all times. Calcium and phosphorus are needed for healthy teeth and bones. The ratio of Ca and P is always important when looking at horse rations. A ratio of two parts Ca: one part P is ideal, with a range of 1:1 to 6:1 being acceptable. Because phosphorous competes with Ca for absorption in the gut, total diets that are less than 1:1 or contain more P than Ca should be avoided..

04/18/2014

If you want to move your horse from a snaffle bit to a shank bit, a little Billy Allen with a medium shank is a nice bit to move to, whether you have a leather curb or a chain curb. Regardless of the curb, what is most important is how you handle your bit. When you take a hold of it, make sure he gets soft on it every time. The added leverage with the shank snaffle will make your horse seem lighter. You have to make sure that he is remaining light when you release the bridle. If you release the bridle and he returns to a position that you did not want, you didn't teach him to get soft. Instead, you just held him where you wanted while he was holding against you the whole time. When you release, you want him to remain where you asked him to be. You want him to want to be there, not just be there because the leverage of the shanks allows you to force him there.

08/29/2013

It's important that owners recognize relaxation vs. agitation in horses to be able to manage them well and stay safe in the process. With the exception of certain breeds, a relaxed animal has soft, brown eyes; he tips his ears forward; and his head is down. Signs of agitation and fear include swishing the tail in the absence of flies ("just before they kick your head"), high head carriage, sweating, defecation, and quivering of the skin/muscles. "The whites of the eyes show in a fearful animal."

Watch animals’ ears for warnings of impending responses to stimuli. Horses tip their ears toward whatever they're monitoring, a sort of "ear radar" an owner can monitor.
Animals tend to want to travel from dark to light (as from a dark barn toward the light of outdoors), but they do not react well in a transition to blinding light. A horse doesn't see depth well, and he will put his head down to look at something by his feet. Let the animal have an opportunity to take a look.

Animals differentiate between screaming and yelling more than equipment noise. Bottom line, don't scream and yell around horses and other livestock. Never surprise an animal, don’t do tickle touches. Make it feel like mama’s tongue. Don't do hard pats. Slow, gradual movements are best.
Factors impacting an animal’s "flight zone" (a term generally used with sheep and cattle to describe how close a handler can get to an animal before it flees) include genetics, previous experience with handlers, amount of contact with people, and the quality of that contact. Tame animals generally don't have a flight zone.
Avoid making sudden, erratic silent movements.
New experiences are both scary and interesting to animals and people should be cautious around the animal that’s lived a too-sheltered life: "Animals with flighty genetics are more likely to become agitated in a new place. You need to get animals accustomed to new things. An animal’s first experience with a new person, a horse trailer, needs to be a good first experience. They make '"fear memories.'"

Horses and other animals associate such fear memories with sensory experiences: "pictures," as in a horse afraid of black cowboy hats (and not white ones) because he had alcohol sprayed in his eyes during a veterinary procedure; specific sounds and touch sensations, as when a horse has had an unsavory experience with a jointed bit. Animal fears are very specific, A man on a horse and a man on foot are different things to horses.

For the horse that becomes very agitated or fearful, maybe at a veterinary clinic, let it calm down for a half an hour. It takes a half an hour for an animal to calm down after it's gotten scared. Give it time to calm down.

08/21/2013

When grasses are cut for hay, the plants continue to respire for some time, so all stored forage will experience some loss of dry matter (the fiber, proteins, sugars, vitamins, minerals and everything contained within the plant except the water). The dry matter loss is primarily a loss of soluble carbohydrates. However, most of the dry matter and nutrient losses from hay in storage occur within the first month or two. Hay typically loses only about 5 percent of its original dry matter during the first year of storage---assuming that it is kept in a dry environment, not exposed to direct sunlight or precipitation. Beyond that time frame, further losses of dry matter, protein and energy are negligible, so hay that is 12 to 24 months old will have nearly the same protein and energy value as hay that is six to eight months old.
One nutrient of particular concern is carotene, the precursor to vitamin A. In horses, vitamin A helps with cell growth and healing and is important for vision, particularly at night. The carotene concentration in hay declines rapidly, especially when exposed to sunlight and much of that loss occurs within the first three to six months of storage. Some loss of carotene will even occur in the field between the time of cutting and baling. It’s important to be aware of this possible deficiency when feeding horses hay that is more than a year old; a vitamin A supplement may be needed.
Hay kept in storage for a long time will lose its field-fresh smell, but that will not affect its protein or energy nutritional value. However, if the hay is stored in an area that is not well ventilated, the dry forage can soak up moisture in the air. This creates a musty odor, and the hay may develop mold, especially if flakes are in direct contact with the floor. This problem is more common in the colder, northern climates, where barns may be closed up in the winter without proper ventilation.

08/20/2013

Horses put their ears back for a few reasons:
1. They are very self-confident and know they can intimidate the human. Therefore, they act like they can boss people around. It's a dominant (left-brained) behavior.
2. They are fearful and defensive, therefore when cornered they are fighting for their life (in a very real prey animal sense).
3. They have learned that they can "drive" you, and they are dominant at times, but not always. These kinds of horses surf the line between confident and non confident. They are defensive/aggressive whenever pressure comes on (and even when feeding) but at other times they are quite calm and friendly.

08/10/2013

Training sessions

08/10/2013

"Skip Star Rocky" I got this APHA gelding for a steal at just under 2 years old after he broke his original owners back when she tried to "break" him, so I started him and I kept him and re-named him Bo**er because he was a little bo**er and he had allergies when he was young. He needs more work on cattle but he is a bombproof keeper, besides we share the same birthday. This is "Bo**er" at 2 years, he filled out real nice and is a big boy now.

08/09/2013

This is Roulette (little wheel), I bought her as a yearling. In this pic she is two and this is the day I started her. After bucking for about half an hour we had no more problems, but you can see from my tight rein that I was expecting a buck at any moment..... a few days later and she still does buck when she gets excited but that will diminish with more time in the saddle and her new owner is the one to put that time in ...July 2013

08/09/2013

Horses don’t learn from pressure; they learn from the release of pressure. Whatever your horse is doing the second you release the pressure is what you’re rewarding.

08/07/2013

When you first introduce Backing Up exercises to your horse (Method 1: Tap the Air; Method 2: Wiggle, Wave, Walk and Whack; Method 3: Marching; and Method 4: Steady Pressure), spend just three to four minutes each training session working on each method. Backing up is not natural for horses (think about the number of times you've seen a horse back up on his own) and is a very difficult thing for them to do both physically and mentally. So it’s best to keep backing sessions short, rather than drilling on it for an hour and a half. Also keep in mind that all horses will have one method of backing up that's not quite as good as the others. Work on that method a little bit more every day until it is as good as the others.