Healthy horse standing in pasture with environmental water conservation symbols, promoting sustainable horse keeping practices.
Message from Alayne: Goodbye, Summer!
Healthy pasture managed sustainably with rich plant diversity for horses and water quality.

I can’t believe summer is in the rear-view mirror! It was fun, but seemed to go by in the blink of an eye. All I had to do was scroll through the photos on my phone for a trip down memory lane, recalling everything that went on and all that we did. Here’s a micro photo montage of some of our summer busy-ness:

Horse rider practicing land management and sustainable horse keeping on a sand arena, promoting healthy land use and reducing mud runoff.
Matt and our new horse, Royal

A New Horse for Matt

Meet Royal. He was bred as a cow horse, trained as a reiner, and Matt is going to re-train him as a quiet ranch riding horse. At least, that’s the plan—but so far so good! Hopefully you’ll see him at shows and clinics down the road.

Lots of Trail Rides

Lots of Horse Shows

Horse riding lesson promoting sustainable land management practices for horse owners, focusing on pasture health and manure management.
Matt and Royal at a Horse Show

Bolender Horse Park

One of the highlights of our past summer was the obstacle course clinic we attended with 10 friends in SW Washington State. We all set it up six months in advance and, as any group effort does, it took a bit of effort to coordinate but was so worth the effort. It was great fun and an excellent learning opportunity for each of us. The clinic was at Bolender Horse Park with Mark Bolender as the clinician. His place is a magical paradise for horse people, with many amazing obstacles to challenge you and help you build trust and confidence between you and your horse.

This trip was the inaugural use of our brand-new horse trailer. We got it so we could have a bigger tack room with a swing-out saddle rack, and more flexibility for trailering our horses. It’s a stock trailer, which makes it roomy for the horses.

That also means our old horse trailer is for sale now, in case you’re in the market. We loved the heck out of it, but it’s still in great shape! (We’ve got photos if you are interested.)

Just this last weekend, I traveled to Missoula, MT, to teach a workshop about pasture management and winter horse keeping. And if you live in the Nampa area, it’s not too late to join us this Wednesday to learn about keeping your confinement areas mud free at the last session of the FREE Sweet Pepper Ranch summer educations series. And don’t miss the opportunity to join in on our fall HCW Online Masterclass, which starts next week! Live, online classes are recorded so if you miss one you can easily follow along with the recording. Includes PDFs of the presentations and many of HCW’s excellent tip sheets, too!

Enjoy the nice fall weather while it’s still here and get out with your horses!

Alayne

Picture of Alayne Blickle
Alayne Blickle
Alayne Blickle is a lifelong equestrian, ranch riding competitor, and the creator and director of Horses for Clean Water. Well-known for her enthusiastic, down-to-earth approach, Blickle is an educator who has worked with horse and livestock owners since 1990, teaching manure composting, pasture management, mud and dust control, water conservation, chemical use reduction, fire preparedness, and wildlife enhancement.  Blickle and her husband raise and train their mustangs and quarter horses at their eco-sensitive guest ranch, Sweet Pepper Ranch, in sunny Nampa, Idaho.
Picture of Alayne Blickle
Alayne Blickle
Alayne Blickle is a lifelong equestrian, ranch riding competitor, and the creator and director of Horses for Clean Water. Well-known for her enthusiastic, down-to-earth approach, Blickle is an educator who has worked with horse and livestock owners since 1990, teaching manure composting, pasture management, mud and dust control, water conservation, chemical use reduction, fire preparedness, and wildlife enhancement.  Blickle and her husband raise and train their mustangs and quarter horses at their eco-sensitive guest ranch, Sweet Pepper Ranch, in sunny Nampa, Idaho.

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