Little Girl

Little Girl

This page dedicated to Little Girl.
For the short time she was with us, she blossomed.

Her Story:

Little Girl was originally named Aurora.
It didn't fit her and neither did Little Girl, but it just stuck.
We called her Girl or whatever went with Little Girl.
We'll use Girl for this page.

Girl came to us as a trade for Lakota.
The girl (we'll call her "Amber") who wanted Lakota wanted
a calm and gentle natured horse because
Girl was too hot for her to handle.
At the time, it seemed like the ideal arrangement.
Sara had been wanting a horse to work with
that she could take to barrels because
Ricky was old and had been retired to be Cameron's mount.

It was a done deal.
Girl's owner brought her to our ranch
and when she was unloaded,
our jaws about hit the dirt.
Out stepped a very underfed
mare that had seen happier days.
"Amber" said that she'd never been able to get weight on her.

Girl is of unknown breeding,
but we feel that she was Thoroughbred but
with the way she carried herself, she could
have been a warmblood cross. She was tall!
Upon closer inspection, Girl had quite
a few scars that would tell a tale of a rough life.
The scars weren't just on the outside either!
She'd been pinfired, had a scar
across her spine by her hips and it looked like
her ribs had been fractured at one time.
When asked, "Amber" said that the guy that
she got her from had said that it was probably
from a stallion being too rough.

Girl settled into her life here.
Her eyes brightened, her coat glistened and she was regaining that spark.
We fed her a mix of 12% horse and mule and Equine Senior.
This brought the weight back on.
It turned her angles into curves!

Sara couldn't wait until she had enough
weight on, to start working with her!
This mare showed alot of promise!
She was in for a shock, when she
finally got the chance to saddle her up!
Little Girl was raring to go and WOW! Could she GO!
With each step, it was confirmed that
Girl had been on the track in her past life....
Not a horse could go by her without her wanting to jet!

We took her to barrels, anxious to
see what she could do.
Girl was fast but she had no turn.
We knew what we had to work on.
The days continued like that.
Trails and barrels with lots of love
and feed in between to keep the weight on her
and the spark in her eye.

We kept in constant touch with "Amber".
Checking on Lakota and making sure everything was going well.
What we didn't know, broke our hearts!

Here is where Girl's story takes a sad turn.

At the beginning of this whole ordeal,
we had a signed adoption agreement with very strict guidelines.
They were to come into play.

"Amber" had decided that she didn't
want Lakota anymore.
He wasn't fast enough.
"Amber" wanted to know if we'd take one of
their other horses as trade-back so that they
could keep Lakota and have Girl back.
We were getting suspicious.
After months of glowing reports about all the activities
and fun they were having,
"Amber" had decided that she was going to
sell Lakota and offered him back to us first, per the adoption contract.

At the time, it didn't occur to us that the reason
that the sparkle had been gone from Girl's
eyes was because of the lack of good care she'd received from "AMBER"
....we'd believed the story about the PREVIOUS owner not feeding her!
We were soon to witness the truth of the matter!

Upon agreement, we loaded Girl up and took her to "Amber".
"Amber" was tickled to see her....and why not?
Girl had gained a LOT of weight
and was looking very fit and fancy......Gorgeous, infact!
"Amber" was amazed at how much she had changed.
Isn't it amazing what a little TLC will do !?!

Hind-sight is always 20/20.
When we saw Lakota, we were deeply saddened.
He had lost weight and just wasn't himself.
Upon looking around, we noticed that Lakota
wasn't the only one in sad shape.
There wasn't a FAT horse to be seen!
Imagine our horror at seeing a
3 yr old filly, bone skinny and malnurished,
NURSING an 8 month old filly colt!
Do the math!
Totally disgusted, we loaded Lakota and headed home.
We contacted "Amber" see if she would
sell Girl so that we could get her away from that place.
Little Girl was already gone.....
"Amber" had wasted no time in selling her.

We have no idea who bought Little Girl
and can only PRAY that she has gone
to a LOVING and CARING home.

The essential joy of being with horses is that it brings
us in contact with the rare elements of grace, beauty, spirit, and fire.
~Sharon Ralls Lemon