Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

homestead - Re: [Homestead] Equus Asinus

homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: Homestead mailing list

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: "Lynda" <lurine AT com-pair.net>
  • To: <homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Homestead] Equus Asinus
  • Date: Thu, 21 May 2009 21:37:56 -0800

Yeah, same beasties but slight differences if you compare what is here and what is there. Thomasina came over a group of horses that were imported from Bahrain. Pentaque was rounded up by the BLM up between California and Nevada.

Thomasina was much finer boned and Pentaque was stockier, not just the masculine/feminine thing.

Training to the cart was easy. Just walked him around with the harness at first, then drag poles (PVC pipe works great, its cheap and if it breaks they don't get hurt and you aren't out the big $$) and then the cart. Also "drove" him from the ground in the round pen (bridle, surcingle, over-check, crupper, long lines). Then drove him from the ground behind the cart with a 50# bag of feed in the cart, then 100#. After a couple of weeks we were off and about.

From there the training for riding is easy cause they are already use to the
bridle, a cinch and going where you want them to go. I broke all my horses from the ground and to cart first. Tie a sack of grain on the saddle to get them use to the weight. Plus we always used blankets with tennis balls on the babies so they were never touchy about their legs. Because they were used to the "bouncing balls," the hanging human legs were no big deal.

I've never had an intact male donkey or horse bother the babies. The weanlings, sometimes, but the babies never. The only problem I ever had with an intact male anything was a Suffolk ram (I do NOT like Suffolk, btw <g>) and he would head butt the horses to get to their feed. He stopped when an old gelding picked him up and tossed him.

Lynda
Members of Congress should be compelled to wear uniforms like NASCAR drivers so we can identify their corporate sponsors.
----- Original Message ----- From: "EarthNSky" <erthnsky AT bellsouth.net>

This reminds me...someone asked me the other day what the difference was
between a burro and a donkey...
the magazine discusses this, but here is the scoop...
The 'burros' of the Western US are not indigenous. Burro is the Spanish
word for donkey, and when Spain colonized the Americas, they brought
with them the same donkey, the Jerusalem ass, technically the African
Wild Ass (I just love that name!<snicker>) as a pack animal to mine for
gold in Mexico and California, etc. The donkeys were later abandoned
and became feral 'burros'. The term burro is not used for the mammoths
or the minis, only the traditional size animal. It would seem to me
that if you got a feral animal from the BLM it would be a burro right up
until you take it home, when it would become a donkey...lol...or a burro
if you speak Spanish...lol..

When you say you broke him to pull a cart...how did you do that and was
it hard? Or do you mean you broke him to ride and trained him to pull?
Jack is independent and stubborn, but very sweet in a manipulative kind
of way-quite pathetic and adorable....not mean at all. One of the
things I read was that they are great with kids and with the
handicapped, so your experiences are spot on with both animals.

The article says that you should not use an intact Jack as a guardian,
that they are too aggressive. I just don't see aggression in Jack, but
then, I have never seen him react around lambs or kids. All I have seen
is his behavior with geldings/horses.

--
"The budget should be balanced, the Treasury should be refilled, public
debt should be reduced, the arrogance of officialdom should be tempered
and controlled, and the assistance to foreign lands should be curtailed
lest Rome become bankrupt. People must again learn to work, instead of
living on public assistance."

--Cicero, 55 BC
http://erthnsky.blogspot.com/
_______________________________________________
Homestead list and subscription:
http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/homestead
Change your homestead list member options:
http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/options/homestead/lurine%40com-pair.net
View the archives at:
https://lists.ibiblio.org/sympa/arc/homestead





Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page