April 28, 2025
Jan Swan Wood
The teenage years are fraught with anxiety for most kids, and mine were no exception. My folks had finally decided to let me have a date with a boy who had been asking, so, I was on edge despite the boybeing a longtime friend. My folks had to be gone, so I had a lot […]
April 22, 2025
Jan Swan Wood
My Dad had a weakness for a horse with a fast walk. I swear, he’d have bought a horse from a gypsy peddler if it just walked really fast. So, sometimes he got burned due to this weakness of his. As he gotolder, he didn’t allow for his aging body and limitations and when looking […]
April 15, 2025
Jan Swan Wood
My time in New Mexico working on a ranch holds some pretty special memories. Some good, some bad, but overall, it was a great experience. Funny occurrences seem funnier now, 40 plus years later.For those who don’t know, when you are working for a big outfit and have a string of horses assigned to you, […]
April 10, 2025
Jan Swan Wood
It had been a long winter, having started in November and being cold and snowy clear until March. Wedidn’t need the March blizzard that dumped feet of snow and made drifts higher than our eight foot windbreak fences, but we got it anyway. It was an ordeal just to get the stock fed in the […]
March 29, 2025
Jan Swan Wood
Many years ago we went to a draft horse pull. It was held in the winter in a warm facility, and promised to be a fun day off the place. It didn’t disappoint.The horse pull was a big one, as nearly 30 years ago it was a pretty big thing in the region. There wereprofessional […]
March 27, 2025
Jan Swan Wood
It had been a rather rough winter and spring. A hard winter had led into March blizzard that had beenhard on livestock and people alike. Our cows weren’t calving yet, so we hadn’t lost any calves in thestorm, but when turned out to get out of the mud and drifts in the corrals, some of […]
March 13, 2025
Jan Swan Wood
I recently told you about some of the daring ideas that a kid will come up with when teamed up with agreen colt. Son Colin’s filly was two and he was 10. He had officially “started” Callie in August, but he’dbeen sneaking off to ride her bareback in the pasture for months before that, so […]
March 6, 2025
Jan Swan Wood
Calving was starting and my son was gathering the cows at night while I fed them some good hay in agrass lot. Colin was 12, and he was riding his filly Callie who was a three year old. He had officially“started” her the summer before, but unofficially, he’d been sneaking off and riding her bareback […]
February 21, 2025
Jan Swan Wood
It’s starting to crack and is too fragile now to use, but I have a bridle that has intrinsic value to me. Itwas my Dad’s. He was born in 1926 and got the headstall and a set of reins for his 13th birthday I believe.He told me the story of going to the Denver Saddlery […]
February 15, 2025
Jan Swan Wood
Back in the olden days when I was young and single, I had a very high powered gelding that I was trying to make a barrel horse out of. Back then you had to just go get some runs on a horse, somewhere, as it was before there were anything like 4D barrel races and […]