It's been said that we old time ranchers and cowboys can't remember our phone numbers or our birth dates but ask us the names of the horses that have graced our days, and we have no problem at all remembering an equine partner of 40 years ago.
Last week, my husband and I started listing the names of horses in our history as we drove home from shopping. It's a 30 minute drive and it took all that time and I still think we missed some.
Buckshot, my first horse, a 3 yr old bucksin gelding.
Chaparral
Spacey, a cute little cowpony I owned for one night, because my Dad told me to take him back, two horses were enough!
Navajo Tom, an Appaloosa gelding I showed in Western Pleasure and barrel racing
Bar None, my wonderful mare who helped me set arena records all over Arizona back in the early 1970's
Blue Wing Penelope (Penny), an Appy mare we bought and broke to ride and turned out to be a very trustworthy mount.
Misty, her daughter, sired by a reg. Thoroughbred stallion, a grandson of Man O' War.
Joker, a tough, ugly Appaloosa gelding and a darn good ranch horse.
Jackson, a grandson of a Million Dollar Futurity Race winner at Ruidoso Downs, I broke him to ride at 5 years old.
Hank, an older bay gelding who kept up on the ranch with any cowhorses we rode with.
Rocky, bought for $550 at a horse sale in Las Vegas, NM, and a nice fellow but had lots of "baggage" and never made a good horse, too nervous.
Blue (#1), half quarter horse and half Percheron, he was a good and big rope horse for Pete.
Knight, a black ex-cutting horse that couldn't cut it on the ranch and we sold at an auction where he turned out to be the high selling horse of the day.
Blue (#2), a son of Impressive, he was beautiful like his daddy, but would buck any chance he got, and he got a lot of chances.
Misty #2, one of my best horses, I bought her as a 3 yr old from an auction, where her dark, dapple grey color made her a stand out. What a cowhorse she turned out to be!
Cody, a flashy paint horse with big, pie-pan feet and a great heart.
Molly, a little Palomino mare our son rode many miles. Hard to shoe, we had to lay her down on the grass to "get 'er done."
Smokey, a bay gelding I traded for when we worked on a Wyoming ranch. He was fair...a good boy but not exceptional.
Jubilee, a little black mule we just packed.
Applejack, a medium sized black mule I broke to ride. He was a great ride in the mountains, but once you stepped off, he sure didn't want to let you back on.
Shadow, he was the horse I owned the longest, 12 years. A pretty "Medicine Hat" Paint, he and I became such close partners as we rode more miles than I could estimate in the high country of Washington State wilderness.
Amigo, a 1500 lb. Appaloosa who turned out to have been "loco'ed" (he'd ingested locoweed) and thought yer grandma could ride him most of the time, he was a maniac at the most unsuspecting moments.
Chubby, a dapple gray Shetland pony and
Fancy, Chubby's team mate.
Sugar, a sorrel mare who'd been owned by Kris Kristofferson for the first five years of her life, I traded out $500 worth of yardwork for her, and she turned out to be the most amazing cowhorse I could ever hope for.
here's one whose name I can't recall, a fancy, large Paint pony my husband picked up for $50 at a horse sale in NM, and though he never really worked out well for kids, I rode him a lot leading out dudes and liked him a lot.
Sis, a dun mare who came off the track, I bought her and didn't like her much, so sold her and made a tidy profit.
Another Hank, a big grulla ranch horse
Primo, a black gelding I bought and trained out, sold for a profit, nice little boy.
Another one I can't recall the name of: a nice bay gelding I took on trade for the mule, Applejack.
A nice, safe ride, I'd took him because he'd be good in our dude string. But ended up selling him to a Spanish friend who was 78 yrs old and needed a dependable gelding to keep a check on his cattle.
Oh, another one whose name allludes me, a sorrel gelding owned by a guy named Sheldon, who owed us $200 for hay he'd borrowed. I knew we'd never get the $ from him, so when he offered the monorchid (one testicle) horse that was too wild for him to handle, I took him. In a day, I was riding him down the road to check the mail and soon sold him to a good home as a riding horse.
And a pony whose name I can't recall, we bought for our son when he was six months old! A pretty chestnut color with a blond mane and tail, I guess he didn't hang around long enough to burn his name into my brain cells.
Pete owned a few before I met him, in his previous life. I don't recall those names even though he told them to me the other day...
[I had to come back on today because last night, I thought of another good Buckskin gelding we had awhile down in NM named Pecos. He was Pete's horse, he thought the world of him. Pete started him and I rarely rode him. I couldn't resist, so I counted them up: 36 horses over the years. Not counting the ranch horses and horses I took in to train.]
That's all I can remember, these horses that we actually owned. Soon, I'll add on a list of ranch horses we didn't own, but seemed like ours in spite of a lack of bill of sale. And colts I broke, the ones I can remember. It would not show my respect for them if I didn't name them as well, some of them, at least.
There's not a photo album out of the many, many we have from our 35 yrs of marriage, which doesn't contain at least one horse photo, except those from the last two years.
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