Posts Tagged ‘horses’

The Crazy Horse I Had to Own

February 27, 2026
Jan Swan Wood

The first time I ever saw the horse I stopped in my tracks. He was the vision of a using horse that hadlived in my head for several years. The guy who owned him was using him in the sale ring at the cattlesale. As the day went on, I watched the roan gelding without […]

Pretty Shadow Cowboys

January 27, 2026
Jan Swan Wood

The word had been put out in the area to keep an eye out for a heifer missing from a ranch a little out ofmy neighborhood. Yearling heifers can sure cover some country when they take the notion, so I had been watching for her. I was still riding on about 1800 head of cattle […]

Saddle Horse Warthog

October 28, 2025
Jan Swan Wood

Back in our steady day working days, my then husband and I had two royally bred mares who were just phenomenal saddle horses. His was a bay Thoroughbred called Holly and mine was a bay roan, speed bred Quarter Horse called Lily. They were tough, reliable, honest mares that were a true pleasure to do […]

A Bond Between a Boy and a Horse

September 18, 2025
Jan Swan Wood

We’d gotten a call to go help at a branding the next day, so my boy Colin went out in the pasture to catch his horse to have her in for an early start. His horse was turned out with the broodmares on thehayfield by the house, so he headed out across the hayfield with […]

Crippling Kelly, Blind Fox and Cows

September 12, 2025
Jan Swan Wood

It had been a long, hot and dry summer grazing season and it was a relief when the yearling cattle I’dridden on all summer had been shipped. I was short of horses as I’d lost my top horse to lightningmidsummer and had sent the outside horses home that I’d been putting miles on. I still […]

Born Broke Horse

September 5, 2025
Jan Swan Wood

It had been a busy spring and early summer. Foaling was over so it was breeding season for our mares and two studs. The outside mares added to the workload, plus it was a dry time and I was irrigating the hay ground and pastures on top of fencing projects, a big garden, and getting […]

A Lifetime of Being a Good Horse

August 20, 2025
Jan Swan Wood

The realization that I’ve aged out on most of the work I used to do is bad enough, but watching the good horses I used to do it on is harder in a way. Seeing their once strong bodies get stiff, lame at times, and with more defined bone structure is difficult. My favorites have […]

Tough but not that Tough

August 2, 2025
Jan Swan Wood

Attitudes sometimes need adjusted in all species. Horses are no exception. I’d raised a mare who had many good qualities and was very people friendly. Her mother had been an outstanding using horse andthis young mare was on track to be the same. Her mother had also been the boss mare on the place. Not […]

The Outlaw, “Silver Mane”

July 23, 2025
Jan Swan Wood

In the 1920s my grandad, Bill, was what would be described as an all around type of cowboy andrancher. He was a tough bronc rider, due to the fact that the horses he traded for were usually outlawtypes. He could ride horses that other men couldn’t work in harness, plus he could work them in […]

Bad Start on a Good Colt

July 9, 2025
Jan Swan Wood

We were working on a ranch in Nebraska where part of our job was to get a small group of young horses started riding in preparation for a horse sale late summer. The youngsters had been raised there and the unstarted ones were two and three years old. There were a couple of four year […]