Buggsy

It is a blustery afternoon and there is not a lot going on, other than baking horse cookies for Christmas, so I thought I would write about Buggsy. 'T was this week three years ago that Buggsy joined our family. He was Dan's wrangler horse at Grapevine Canyon Ranch for about 9 months before the Ranch owner decided to sell him to us.

It is customary for the wranglers to ride and/or train the new horses the Ranch buys, prior to adding them to the string for the guests. Buggsy had been bought from the local Baptist Camp where Buggs had been giving kids rides into the Cochise Stronghold. The horse program there ended, so Buggs came to Grapevine.

There were a lot of trust issues to be resolved. Kids are often not kind to animals, and Buggsy was very afraid. He bonded well with Dan over time, and it was a joy to see them come in after a guest ride: Dan and Buggsy in the lead, the horse obviously proud to be carrying Dan. But time came to give Buggsy to a guest to ride, who was selected by Dan to be a good rider and who would not jerk the horse around.

The guest, the Ranch owner and some other guests took their horses to the Chiricahuas on the other side of our valley for a ride. After the ride the horses were turned loose, thinking that they would stick around munching the nice green grass over there. But something happened and Buggs took off, not to be caught by man or beast, with the saddle on and the guest's rain slicker. Everyone returned to Grapevine when it got too dark to be looking for Buggsy any longer and Dan was informed of what had happened.

After a sleepless night on Dan's part, he and the barn boss drove to the Chiricahuas to try and find the horse. They informed a local rancher and left hay, but no Buggsy. The barn boss then decided to take his RV and camp out and spend his days looking for the horse. Meanwhile, hunters had reported seeing him, with the saddle now on his belly and dragging the slicker, but no one was able to get close. The rancher left his corral open which had a water tank and a trick gate that would close should an animal wander in to drink.

Adam was about to spend his first night when the rancher's daughter caught the horse in the corral, unharmed and apparently no worse for wear. Buggsy returned to Grapevine, but Dan was able to convince management that he would not be a successful guest horse, that he was a "one person horse", and guess who that person might be? So it happened that Buggsy joined us, right before Christmas in 2005.

Buggs had never had friends while he was at Grapevine, but he fell in with Bueno and Cody quite readily. He and Bueno spar playfully, and he and Cody are fast friends who eat from the same lunch hay pile. While Dan still worked at the Ranch, he would take Buggsy with him from time to time and use him as his wrangler horse. Buggsy would return from the ride and then be tethered to the trailer while Dan got ready to go home. Buggs would stand out there looking out over his former colleagues and have the air of: I am a private horse now, and I don't have to deal with you guys any more. He would be delighted to jump in the trailer to go home. Going to work was not such fun though: when he was loaded into the trailer, and still when we load only Buggsy, he would shake so hard, the truck would even move. I think he still fears having to leave us.

We think Buggsy is happy here: happy with his own stall and with kind and consistent treatment from us. In turn, he is a gentleman as a horse. We can put any guest on him and he gives them a quiet and secure ride, but when asked, he can be our Ferrari. It is great fun for us to see him leave his stall after breakfast and run around in the playpen, shaking his head and prancing like the Arabian he is.