What's black and white and eats grass?

Did you say "cows" as your answer?!

One day a few years ago when my friends and I were taking a walk down our country lane, my friend John pointed to some black and white animals in the pasture that were eating grass, and he said "those are some strange-looking cows". I responded, "That's because they're not cows--they're our horses!"

We have two paint horses: QT, the mother, is 28 years old, and her daughter Mia is 8 years old. They look a lot alike and spend most of their time together.  

Mia (left) and QT (right) in the pasture by the river in 2009.

We move them from time to time to different fields on the ranch, depending on the time of year and the feed that is available. In June, they spent about 3 weeks in a partially-fenced, partially-roped-off area right by our house. They are usually in that area once a year, to eat down the tall grass that's in the open area between our house and the ditch, which is mostly used for trailer parking. They did a great job eating down the grass and weeds, and Josh supplemented their feeding a few times a week with the grass clippings he'd acquired from mowing lawns, too. It was nice to have them so close for a while; we liked seeing them every day and Josh and I could hear them move around and neigh from our bedroom window at night. They were in that pasture with the neighbor's horse Bella, who's about the same age as Mia. One night in June, as well as the following morning, Bella escaped from the fenced area and ran into the field above our house, and it made our horse QT go crazy. She was whinnying and running around in circles both times that it happened, and didn't stop until Bella was brought back. That was when we knew it was time to move the horses again, this time down to the field south of our home. The following afternoon, Josh got the horses ready to be moved to their new feeding location. Bella never does well staying in that field, so he had to move her to a different spot, but since she doesn't let anyone ride her and she's hard to catch to even be haltered, he had to use QT and Mia to guide her to her new spot before bringing them back to the field they would be in. Kanyon and Micah had been asking to ride the horses, so Josh put the saddles and riding gear on our horses so the boys could ride them as they were being moved. 

It was a little bit stressful at first, trying to guide Bella, and Mia wasn't cooperating very well (she's got a wild streak in her), but the horses calmed down after a bit, and the boys had a good ride after that. I'm so glad Josh took the extra time to saddle them up before moving them in order for the boys to have the opportunity to ride them, as they only do it about once a year.

Look how cute Micah and Kanyon were, both riding QT back in 2009!