This year's breedings

We've hemmed and hawed for some time now over arrangements for this year's breedings; we knew which stallion we wanted to put with which mare, but having opted for AI, it remained to determine how that would be achieved. Initially we didn't want them to have to go away but realised this was the only practical solution, especially when using frozen semen for one of them and the attendant need to have the mare scanned every six hours. That would make for a pretty meaty vet bill in no time flat, and AI is not a cheap option. If we could drop everything at a moment's notice to get the boys off to stud so that we could use fresh, it wouldn't necessarily be such an issue, but we don't, and so it is. Live cover starts to look increasingly appealing :)

We had the mares scanned on Friday, with the aim being to try and coordinate the girls being inseminated at near enough the same time. Alfama was nearly ready and Xacra a while off so the vet left me an injection to bring forward her season to give yesterday, and arrangements were made to take Alfama (and by association, Gualter) to the vet's today, and Xacra on Wednesday. Made arrangements with Madeleine for chilled semen from Tigre (for Alfama) and frozen from Q (for Xacra) to be delivered tomorrow, and dashed about getting a single breast bar for the trailer etc yesterday in preparation.

Alfama loaded like a pro this morning but Gualter wasn't having any of it. We tried everything during the course of a pleasant few hours but in the end called in reinforcements (thanks Dan!) to bodily lift him on to the trailer. Once in he was fine and they travelled really well. I can now say, as a result of my maiden voyage with such newly minted and precious cargo on board, that I can clench my butt continuously for a whole 50 minutes or so that it took to get to the vets, while studiously ignoring the long tail plume of followers we accrued while negotiating some truly appalling road surfaces.  I can also reverse the trailer down a narrow road with parked cars along one side when the sat nav sends me up the wrong street, with anxious neighbours looking on who are well accustomed to horse boxes reversing carefully down their narrow road with their cars parked along one side while they look for the clinic.

Alfama has been scanned again and pronounced ready; the semen will arrive tomorrow, so fingers are crossed that all goes well. And I look forward to doing the same again with Xacra and Golfinho on Wednesday.

Meanwhile back on the homestead things have been busy and productive. Knickers did her first complete solo lunge session with Q and did beautifully, so I am almost as pleased with and for her as she is with herself :) Q was an absolute superstar too. That boy is worth his weight in gold. Sid is finishing off the logo and the web site is coming along. We shall be spending a good deal of time trailering horses around in the next few days; T remains at stud next week having more semen frozen down, and we collect him on Saturday. I guess we will be collecting Alfama and Gualter on Friday evening, and Xacra some while later.

So, fingers crossed that all goes well and that the girls can be confirmed in foal without too much ado!

And oh yes, there is the festival in Lisbon to look forward to in about three weeks' time; 5 days of sun, Lusos, friends and stud visits to wallow in - bliss!