An afternoon at Windrock Farm after the kids play a game of baseball, practice hitting golf balls and playing capture the flag.  Wyatt celebrated his 12th birthday in style with hot dogs from Four Brothers and apple pie with vanilla ice cream.  Fiona is handing out birthday carrots to the mares.

Last weekend, our youngest student, Vanessa, age 3 rode Rex’s three year old stud colt who has only 16 rides on him,he is a lovely horse who proves if you start them correctly with no mistakes, you have a super horse.

Levi is a confident bold jumper, he has a motor, great personality,

loves cross country, uncomplicated to ride, super event, dressage or hunter prospect.

Congratulations to Chip for his first foal of the season, this handsome colt is beautiful, smart and has a great sense of humor at one month old.  We just returned from a quick road trip to VA to drop off a horse and pick up a pony and have a quick layover at Chip’s farm in Berryville where Spring is in full bloom.

Does your horse stand quietly in the cross ties, does he wait patiently at the mounting block, does he step off only when you ask him, is he on your aids when you ask him to go, whoa, move laterally?  If not, come to a clinic this Spring and learn how to teach your horse to be so obedient, even a monkey  could ride him.  Check the web site for dates and availability.

Diego has no fear of horses because he is growing up around them and loves to sit on the biggest horses in the barn.  Fiona is riding Peadar who is a kind gentle horse and Simon is on Shadow, with Lauren giving him some pointers.

The genome of a domestic horse has been successfully sequenced by an international team of researchers.

The work, published in the journal Science, may shed light on how horses were domesticated.

It also reveals similarities between the horse and other placental mammals, such as bovids – the hoofed group including goats, bison and cattle.

The authors also found horses share much of their DNA with humans, which could have implications for medicine.

Horses suffer from more than 90 hereditary diseases that show similarities to those in humans.

“Horses and humans suffer from similar illnesses, so identifying the genetic culprits in horses promises to deepen our knowledge of disease in both organisms,” said co-author Kerstin Lindblad-Toh, from the Broad Institute at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, US.

“The horse genome sequence is a key enabling resource toward this goal.”

To generate a high-quality genome sequence, the researchers analysed DNA from an adult female thoroughbred named Twilight.

The horse’s DNA was sequenced using capillary DNA sequencing technology (known as Sanger sequencing) to reveal a genome that is roughly 2.7 billion “letters”, or nucleotides, in size.

In addition to sequencing the genome of a thoroughbred horse, the researchers also examined DNA from a variety of other horse breeds.

These included the American quarter horse, Andalusian, Arabian, Belgian draft horse, Hanoverian, Hakkaido, Icelandic horse, Norwegian fjord horse, and Standardbred breeds.

The team surveyed the extent of genetic variation both within and across breeds to create a catalogue of more than one million single-letter genetic differences in these breeds.

This is slightly larger than the genome of the domestic dog, and smaller than both the human and cow genomes.

So far, scientists have also sequenced the genomes of the platypus, mouse, rat, chimpanzee, rhesus macaque and, of course, human.

Horses were first domesticated 4,000 to 6,000 years ago. Over time, as machines have become the chief sources of agricultural and industrial muscle, those roles have shifted to sport and recreational activities.

As a result of working in film for nearly 4 decades, Rex Peterson has designed several products to make horse training more efficient and safe. The Neck Rope designed and made by Rex Peterson can be used for many purposes, including ponying kids on their first few trail rides across country. It is important to get out of the arena as soon as possible for the rider as well as the horse. You can see in this video how easy it is to control the pony when he speeds up or wants to turn the wrong direction. This method allows the kid to feel the independence of riding while having a safety line for any errors.

Wash and dry the area and apply. You can bandage over this as well. The main thing is keeping the area soft and dry.

These amounts are approximate ratios-they do not need to be exact.

1 tube Lotramin (athlete’s foot cream) 1 tube hydrocortisone cream 1 tube triple antibiotic ointment aloe vera gel ( equal to 1 tube amount above) contents of 4-5 vitamin A capsules, vitamin D capsules, and Vitamin E capsules

Mix well and store in any type empty jar or plastic container.

Last weekend Joa was third in the open Training Level division at Town Hill Horse Trials, after placing 6th in dressage, Joa went on to jump a flawless show jumping round and a clean cross country round on Kestrel. Although Kestrel looked at a few fences on the cross country course– the log over the ditch and the water, Joa rode him beautifully around the course. All of the training and hard work has paid off with this team finishing the season in top form.

This is Tuff, owned and trained by Rex Peterson.  Tuff is one of Justin’s sons (Justin played Black Beauty), who was featured as Jeremy Irons horse in Ed Harris’ film Appaloosa.   Come meet Tuff at the AQHA Quarterfest in May, where you can help celebrate the American Quarter Horse.

May 1-3, 2009 Tennessee Miller Coliseum Murfreesboro, Tennessee

There is only one way to ride when it is this cold, bareback!  Improve your balance and feel with your horse while staying warm on your hack.  Luckily, the forecast calls for warmer days. 

Check out the January issue of the Yankee Pedlar which features RJ aka Hidalgo on the cover with an interesting profile story about the Horse Wisdom Training DVD\’s now available.

Vanessa is already following in her parents hoofprints.

It is never too early to start to ride.

Winston Churchill said “No hour of life is wasted that is spent in the saddle.”

Last week I had the pleasure to view the new film “The First Saturday in May” about 6 Kentucky Derby hopefuls.  Here is the press release from the American Horse Council:

“With the Triple Crown races fast approaching, we wanted to make sure you know about a unique documentary film that will be shown in more than 20 theaters over the next few weeks.

The award-winning film is called “The First Saturday in May,” and it features a captivating, behind-the-scenes glimpse of six trainers and their horses as they take aim on the 2006 Kentucky Derby. Barbaro is one of those horses.

The film, produced by John and Brad Hennegan, has won numerous awards and rave reviews at film festivals throughout the country. It will open in 20 theaters Friday, April 18.

In a generous gesture to “give something back to the industry,” the Hennegan Brothers have decided to donate 25 percent of box office revenues to Grayson-Jockey Club Research Foundation, the worldwide leader in equine research.

To see a short preview of the film or to get additional information, including an up-to-date list of theaters and starting dates, visit www.thefirstsaturdayinmay.com or http://www.grayson-jockeyclub.org/tfsim.asp .

And you may wonder what happens to all the horses who do not make the grade?  Here is an example of a TB bred for racing, the grandson of the uber race horse Secretariat, Mashantum failed miserably at the track, however he went on to qualify for the Atlanta Olympics in Three Day Eventing and then pursue a career in Dressage.

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Rex Peterson showed off RJ Masterbug’s favorite tricks last week.

Photo by Esther-Grace Simson

Last weekend, Rex returned to Windrock Farm to teach a clinic on how to improve the communication with your horse. Rex worked with several young horses to improve the connection and balance, two horses were backed for the first time and two horses with spooking issues. He also tuned up his best stunt horse, RJ May 15-18 for another clinic, contact cari@cariswanson.com for availability.