Round pen~That's My World 081109

Do you really want to see my world? Well, here it is! It's the round pen up at the horse ranch in the mountains above Palm Springs! This is where I spend the majority of my mornings. On this day, my cousin came over to help me with my gelding, Sunni. He's a quarter horse, a PMU gelding. PMU stands for "pregnant mare urine", which was used in premarin, a drug for women with menopause. The mares are kept pregnant, in pens, for MONTHS (the normal gestitation time for a mare is 11 months). Some were kept in very narrow stalls and are not even allowed to move! Sunni is the "unwanted byproduct" (i.e. the foal). I adopted him several years ago and he is now in serious training! He is a wonderful, kind, intelligent horse, even if he was "unwanted". United Pegasus, a horse rescue, went up to one of the PMU ranches and brought Sunni home as a yearling, along with several other PMU horses and took them to their Hemet ranch for adoption. I adopted him a year later. So, now that my back is better (I injured it last summer riding a friend's horse) I'm back to working with my horses and continuing their training. Here he is in the round pen learning to "stay". My cousin uses both verbal and hand signals to train all her horses and she's helping me train mine this way. Look how shiny he is! GOOD BOY! So, if you want to find me in the mornings, I'm up at the ranch! That's My World for August 11, 2009.