Earl is Feeling His Oats

10th November, 2008
Monday

Carriere, Mississippi

What do they mean by the saying "Feeling his oats"? What the saying means is to feel frisky or animated, to display self-importance.

Well, that was Earl yesterday. This is what happened.

I decided to finally put the hackamore on Elliot and get on his back again as he is now 19 months old. It was my second time on his back. Jim held onto his bridle while also giving me a leg up. But once I was on Elliot's back he didn't want to go anywhere. Jim went inside and got a carrot, hoping to entice Elliot into walking forward, but all El kept doing was turning his head back around and nosing my leg.

Deciding that I had been on him long enough and not wanting to push my luck, I dismounted, without Jim holding him, and decided we'd walk the perimeter of the pasture and have an easy training session.

Earl the donkey, watched as I walked out of the yard and into the pasture with Elliot. I figured he might follow, but usually that is the extent of his antics.

So off I go with Elliot and we practice walking, whoaing, and reining. Gus decides to join us and I think nothing of it as Gus does not bother the horse.

As I turn up along the fence line, I am enjoying my quiet time with Elliot, when my calm was interrupting with the barking of excited dogs. I glance up to see two of my neighbors dogs rushing toward the fence. They had gone under the barbed wire in the past, so I was nervous they would again and I would have some issues, if only minor ones, with Elliot.

They became the least of my worries when simultaneously, on the opposite side, I hear a deafening noise, like an mad elephant charging through the underbrush, and look up just in time to see Donkey crashing through the backyard brush in a full gallop, heading directly for the fence. Now remember, this is the same donkey the vet suggested I euthanize just a couple of months ago because his coffin bones had rotated and he was so lame and in so much pain until this farrier down here trimmed his hooves.

Gus, who had been just sniffing along the brush line, started to get frantic and so do I because Earl's new-found non-lameness has him doing more and one of those things is to try and chase down Blondie and Gus. Donkeys are known to be coyote killers, so being a dog killer is not a far toss.

At the same time, Elliot starts to whip around and snort and act a bit ditzy with all the craziness going on, all the while I am hanging onto him while also shouting to Gus to come, to trust in me, so I can protect him from Earl.

In the meantime, Donkey, spotting the neighbor's dogs on their side of the fence, still yapping in full steam, starts galloping up and down the fence line, head down, ears back, front hooves stomping, while also bellowing. I would have liked to have been a fly on the wall watching all this action.

Jim, who had been sitting in the rocking chair on the back porch saw the comotion unfolding, and commanding Blondie and Abel to stay at the house, came out to retrieve Gus, who had gone against all instincts, staying by my side in spite of Elliot twisting and turning and Earl bellowing and galloping, and hooving.

Jim hollered to me that I should start walking Elliot back towards the house once he had Gus protected and the neighbors dogs were on their own.

But even putting Elliot back in their pasture section was not enough to bring Earl back, so I hiked back into the pasture with a lead, but had to head toward the front of the pasture along the roadway, where Donkey had run. That damn donkey watched me as I approached him, making my way through the tall pasture grass, his head alert, ears up, nostrils flaring.

But, when I got within ten feet of him, he started to trot back toward the house. In the meantime, Jim had gone to stand by the pasture where Elliot was as he was running full speed, back and forth, barely stopping before coming into contact with the barbed wire fence.

Once in the yard, Earl let me approach him and walk him back to the pasture with Elliot.

After that chaotic workout, Jim and I sat down and had a drink.