Staying up with the baby.

In our last installment, I mentioned that the decision had finally been made to get Hannah away from Boss before she did him grievous bodily harm. We’ve done that, but we may have done it too late. Boss is now on the horse equivalent of baby formula, and a fresh batch has to be mixed up and brought to him every 3 hours. Guess who gets to do that?
Actually, I’m not complaining. I’ve taken off work through the middle of next week just to do this, because someone needs to. I’ve also gotten used to hanging out with the herd in the dead of night – there’s something relaxing about it. Tonight’s been just eerie, because there are some serious thunderstorms to the north – we’re talking way up in southwest Missouri – so we have a clear, starry sky…with tons of lightning. Kinda strange. For most of the foals, this is their first experience with lightning, so it’s a blessing in that they get to see it without hailstones beaning them 10 minutes later.

Boss is crashed out in his stall here. The adult horse on the left is his dad, J.R., who spends most of his time watching over the little guy and talking to him.

Here’s J.R. again, from inside Boss’ stall.

Before we removed his mother from his immediate vicinity, she seems to have either bitten or kicked Boss on the leg here. As a result, the leg is swollen and he’s having trouble getting around on it. Hopefully this isn’t a sign of infection, but so far the little guy isn’t running a fever.

At 2:00 am, Boss was up and about, ready and waiting, talkative and hungry! Just how I like him.

Also, Boss is no longer the baby of the herd. This is “little Mallie”…

…and this is Riyala’s gorgeous baby, born Monday night, solid black with one white sock and a perfect white star in the middle of her face. Here she is getting a midnight snack from Riyala.
More updates later – it’s time for me to go feed Boss again.