Kal-El
I rescued Kal at auction, saving him from slaughter, as part of J&M Acres Horse Rescue on September 25, 2011. I bought him as a 14 y/o Percheron x Quarter Horse gelding around 15,2hh. He caught my eye immediately. Oh yeah, and his auction tag was #37 - my favourite and lucky number. I named him Kal-El (aka Superman), because I am a huge nerd and it makes sense for my first horse to be named after my favourite hero of all time and I know Kal would save me in a lot of ways - and he has. I also decided that since I have no idea what his official birthday is, I created one for him. Since he is named after the Man of Steel and since the first Superman comic book which was finalized on April 18 1983.
For those of you who don't know, I fell in love with him at the sale immediately and when he was about to sell for meat, I knew we couldn't let that happen so Julie and I brought him home despite the fact that his details said he needed an experienced rider, which sent up a wall of red flags for us. That night, I found out from a friend of the rescue that she had tried Kal-El (previously named Earl) the night before the sale and that he bucked like a banshee, but I didn't regret my decision.
It didn't take me long to learn that he was previously on a dude string (no wonder he was a bucker) and that he was then used as a pack horse. I had our chiropractor out for him immediately to discover he was extremely misaligned and we deemed it was likely from ill-fitting saddles and unbalanced riders.
Due to his bucking issues and sourness and anxiety under-saddle, we spent the first two or three months of our relationship riding bareback from the trails to the ring. We even did our local Christmas parade in December 2011 bareback. After the parade, we decided it was time to start working him with an actual saddle and from there, I worked on fixing his bucking habits as well as his anxiety and herdboundness issues.
It didn't take me long to learn that he was previously on a dude string (no wonder he was a bucker) and that he was then used as a pack horse. I had our chiropractor out for him immediately to discover he was extremely misaligned and we deemed it was likely from ill-fitting saddles and unbalanced riders.
Due to his bucking issues and sourness and anxiety under-saddle, we spent the first two or three months of our relationship riding bareback from the trails to the ring. We even did our local Christmas parade in December 2011 bareback. After the parade, we decided it was time to start working him with an actual saddle and from there, I worked on fixing his bucking habits as well as his anxiety and herdboundness issues.
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We spent our first Summer together (2012) riding almost every other day and with that consistency and work, we fixed the bucking issues and sorted out the majority of his anxiety.
It has now been almost a year and a half and the bucking issues are a long way behind us as well as 90% of his anxiety and herdboundness. He still has his moments where he is nervous or unsure, or just plain old feeling good, but my horse is exactly who he is. The good parts and the bad parts and I will take him as everything he is. We have very few bad rides these days and still, to this day, I still cannot believe that my amazing boy was almost shipped off to slaughter that day. Kal will be celebrating his 16th birthday this April and I feel blessed to be a part of making that possible for him. I really don't know what my life would be like without him and I am glad that I took the challenge to lead us to become the pair we are today. |
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