Fason - a Round Thoroughbred in a Round Pen

I'm very pleased to report that while I've been occupied with a couple other training horses for a few weeks, Fason has been enjoying life in the long paddock.  He is working his butt muscles as he marches up and down the hill and he has gained great weight eating pounds and pounds of mash and hay until his heart's content.  I love to see the Thoroughbreds bloom when they start eating so well and their muscling changes more to regular horse muscling rather than speed-event muscling.

Yesterday I was visiting with Fason over the fence introducing him to some clients, and he is just a gem.  Gentle and sweet, he comes right over to us to have his ears scratched and his chest rubbed.  While he's eating up this affection, Highboy throws a temper tantrum in the next paddock.  He can see that Fason is being admired and loved on, and Highboy cannot STAND it when he is not the center of attention.  As soon as I put a hand on Fason, Highboy twenty feet away would pin his ears and stomp his front feet.  If I rubbed Fason's ears to make his lips wiggle in pleasure Highboy would rear up, then kick out with his hind legs.  It was obvious the connection, as soon as I took my hands off Fason and looked over at Highboy he would freeze, ears forward, and stare at me.

I went into the paddock with Fason and went to stand next to Highboy to give him some attention over the fence.  Highboy was pleased and went to his normal smoochy self, nuzzling my hair and taking deep breaths while touching my hands or face with his nose.  When Fason came over Highboy was cordial to him, unless I reached out to touch Fason.  Then Highboy would pin his ears, tense his nose, and give Fason the stink-eye until Fason backed away from me.  Highboy resumed nuzzling and smooching.  Horses aren't supposed to feel complex emotions like jealousy, but I suspect that's an old wives' tale.

To minimize the consternation in the Thoroughbred herd, today I took Highboy to the round pen to play first.  He was overjoyed at being out with me and the dogs.  He ate a bunch of carrots, then ran around the round pen all on his own, absolutely LEAPING probably four to five feet in the air over the six inch high cross rail jump that was set up on one side.  I've never had a horse who enjoyed jumping this much, he does it purely for the joy of flight.  He flies over, then drops his haunches and slides to a stop leaving long elevens in the sand.  He does a rollback, then flies over the jump the other direction, repeating this over and over all on his own while the humans and the dogs watch.  He takes the fence from any distance, he jumps it high, he jumps it low, he jumps it long, and he jumps it short.  He really loves running and leaping the way his body is built to do.

In contrast, after Highboy was done playing, I took Fason out to the round pen for some recreation.  With his blanket off it is obvious that he has gained significant weight over the past month and his muscle soreness is dissipating.  All his angular body parts' are now looking rounded and he is able to lift his back, lowering his head to show off an extremely special extended trot that you don't often see on a horse just a month off the track.  He sniffed around the small jump, and hopped over some ground poles.  He had a nice roll in the sand, making it all the way over with only a short turtle moment entirely on his back.

After this brief and mellow unstructured playtime, he came right over to the fence where we humans, dogs, and Sabbath the cat were standing observing.  Fason loves people and wants to be wherever we are, socializing and hanging out together.  He even inspected Sabbath.

There seems to be a button in his ears that cause his lips to wiggle.  Some video of his face and ears being scratched can be seen here:
https://www.facebook.com/kim.leonard.100/posts/10209046360413647

I am so pleased with how his let-down period is going and how nicely his body and mind are acclimating to the quiet life here in Colorado at Bit of Honey.  This horse is very special, but don't tell Highboy I said so.