Well the sunshine and beautiful colors have returned once again to the Ottawa Valley and both of our locations. The horses are mostly at the Pembroke Campus so we haven't spent a lot of time riding in our beloved hills here at home. But the colors have been fabulous and we will be sad to see them go.
Regardless of the colors the trees have taken on, we have really appreciated is the roof over our heads during the rainy days. Lessons have been coming along well, and we still have some open slots available, email for times or more information. The great thing is that most of our Killaloe students have moved over to the Pembroke Campus and we have enjoyed watching them advance, some of them with new horses providing new challenges. Our hope is that these students carry on the good work and continue learning these new skills.
Our "Ladies Night" has been the most successful night of the week, by far. All the participants have been 'good sports' about learning our philosophies and the new skills we have to offer them. As facilitators of this program we are definitely observing the perks of these ladies working with their own horses. They are devoted to their horses and the horse-human relationships have the chance to grow during their time at home. This is proof positive that rapport means alot to horses. An old cowboy once "Horses don't care how much you know, until they know how much you care." We are looking at opening up a second night of the week for this as well, anybody who is interested should get an email to us soon before the spots fill up.
Now with us getting busier we have found ourselves in need of some well broke horses to use for our students so that each horse is being used but not over stressed. On that note we have brought in several excellent horses over the past few weeks. Each of these horses is being assessed and assigned to students that match their needs and skill level. We look forward to each of these partnerships advancing and growing so that both sides are learning as much as they can from the other. The most recent acquisitions are Willow 9 yr old Percheron/TB and Tango a 5 yr old QH. As a side note: Tango is actually related to our Copper (8 yr old QH). They have the same grand sire, and came from the same PMU farm. Copper was purchased as a yearling from the PMU farm in Manitoba by Larry& Leslie Stewart in BC, where 
Kate met him and we purchased him from there. We are very happy with all of our leased horses and I have to thank the owners for being so understanding and helpful throughout this whole process.We are looking forward to the coming months in Pembroke and the new developments we are making in our programs. For more information on any of the services we are offering please feel free to contact us via phone 613-638-2005 or email vanderbrookfarm@gmail.com. I hope you enjoy some of the photos, I took them yesterday in the afternoon. I love the way the light is playing on the horses.
Normally Natural,
Marie ;)
