Rina: Our Blood Bay Barometer

Those two verses are one of the most foolproof weather gauges of all time, it's never wrong. I've used it for years and it has always held true; of course that was before we got our little four legged weather woman. While I am well aware that all horses tend to "take it up a notch" when there is a shift in the weather pattern, Rina seems to take it to a whole new level. She is, in essence, a panic attack looking for a place to happen on days it's going to storm.

The photo on the right shows her standing at full equine alert on one such day (she's 3 in this picture and still in her "gangly" phase :o) While she doesn't run around like a raving lunatic, she is definitely edgy and easily agitated. The full alert in the photo was her response to my saying her name softly; I only wanted her to look at the camera (Xanax anyone??)

You can see that the skies are clear in the background, although we did indeed have thunderstorms that day...she doesn't often miss.

To be honest, it took me awhile to catch on to the meaning behind the behavior. I spent lots of time wondering, what on earth is wrong with you today, Rina? As well as some personal eyeball rolling and thoughts like, you are such a total goose girl, sheesh!

The strangest day turned out to be the one in which Rina completely transcended edgy by plopping herself down on the ground in front of the water trough right at breakfast time; what on earth?!?

That was the day a tornado passed over our house, and talk about scary. God was very good to us; aside from a neighbor's metal arbor being squashed flat, there was absolutely no damage done here and yours truly developed a much deeper respect for Rina's forecasting capabilities.

This morning's breakfast report was pink skies and a pingy Rina. Hmmm...guess we're in for some stormy weather today, huh? :o)



If you are interested in exploring equine body language (I'm totally fascinated by it), please see my lens on Squidoo (it took me forever, but I think it turned out pretty well :o) http://www.squidoo.com/EpicFarmsBodyLanguagequidoo.com/EpicFarmsBodyLanguage Thanks so much for stopping by!