A (not so) brief history: the co-op barn was founded, well, sort of by myself and Donnie, the guy who lives in the attached apartment. Donnie had been living in the apartment, taking care of the barn's only inhabitants at the time, 3 ex-Standardbred racers. Since the Equine Studies program was founded at VTC, the idea had been tossed around of making the run-down 10 stall barn a co-op facility for college students to board their horses at. Someone else was originally in charge of seeing the necessary repairs and fix-up happen, but I was in desperate need of a place to bring Ernie after having him break loose from the boarding facility he was at fall semester of my freshman year, so I took it on.
Donnie and I worked almost exclusively by ourselves to make the place usable. We single handedly tackled the WRECK of a tack room (as we say often, "I wish we had pictures"....seriously, NOBODY would believe how bad this place looked); we re-insulated the walls and ceilings and put up OSB board for walls, put up 10 saddle racks, a bridle wall, storage shelves, a medicine cabinet and a couple blanket racks, and Donnie made two fantastic wooden grain bins. We leveled 3 different stalls and put in rubber mats. We fit 3 or 4 stalls with nice sliding doors. We turned one stall into a hay storage stall. We put up more blanket racks. We raked, cobwebbed, dusted, weeded, put up fencing, made pastures, put up stall doors on the walk-outs...we did everything. "Construction" is always ongoing, but we have put so much time and energy into that barn that it's hard not to be proud of it.
As a side note, the college doesn't own the barn. It's on the same piece of property as the facility the school leases, but is owned by the farm owner's ex-husband. He's, to say the least, an eccentric millionaire who owns the ex-racers, was into all sorts of weird herbal/alternative medicine, and never cleaned anything. If he couldn't find something, he didn't look for it, he just bought another. Technically, the co-op barn is for sale and could be bought at any point; the owner agreed to let us use it so long as his horses were cared for and the place was kept up. And so we have.
I take a lot of pride in this place (what, you can't tell?) I went for a visit today; Donnie and I had planned to put dutch doors on Ernie and Stella's stalls. Both have walk-outs, which is great except during nasty weather when the wind blows through or it snows or rains heavily. We got Stella's door done, but as Donnie so nicely pointed out, I failed to buy any wood screws period. We used what he had, but I need more to do Ernie's. No problem! I said. I'll be back down a few times in the next couple weeks to do some more clean-up, weedwacking, etc. The one bonus of all this labor? I learned a few things about basic carpentry and power tools.
Anyway, I know pictures have been long overdue. Please forgive some of the mess; the barn has been vacant all summer, so it hasn't been quite as kept up as usual. All the same, welcome to the Co-Op Barn Virtual Tour: Part 1!
This is the main aisle. Yes, those are real dirt floors!
Stella's stall (Donnie LOVES John Deere, so he made us all name plates for our stalls - in John Deere colors, of course!)
Ernie's stall; all the junk inside is in preparation for the dutch doors...
I made these dry-erase boards myself; a simple Word document that I printed 10 of and had laminated. The "On vacation in Aruba!" is a barn joke...Donnie drinks a LOT of Mountain Dew, and on bitter Vermont winter days we joke the can money is going towards tickets to somewhere warm...
The outside of Stella's stall
The outside of Ernie's stall...after I pulled a TON of nasty weeds, including some Burdock...
A view from Ernie's stall
The Tack Room: this is where trunks and tack go; all those bags will be gone soon, but I had to put the trash somewhere for now.
The saddle racks
The bridle wall
Community Wall O' Stuff: this is for shared items; hoof conditioner, buckets, gloves, paper towels, reading materials, lunge equipment, syringes, etc
Community fridge, microwave and general foodstuffs area
This is the student's grain bin
The inside; there are 7 different compartments, one for each stall so each horse's grain is separated; we also tacked up the name of the grain and the nutritional info for each one inside
This is Donnie's grain bin, AKA the grain bin for the ex-racers, custom made by Donnie himself. Like the paint job? So do we!
Inside of the John Deere themed grain bin
The Community White Boards and Wall of General Awesomeness
Back entrance
I took some pictures of the original residents, the three ex-racers G.I, Waco and Hippie. However the pictures aren't that great, and since this is kind of picture overload, I think I'll do a separate post on them.
In other news, the lady who I board with right now, AKA the lady who sold me Stella, saw me ride her the other day. We did some basic W/T stuff around the ring, a little bit of turn on the forehand, nothing huge. I thought I would share, though, that the lady posted on my wall on Facebook, saying how GREAT Stella looked and how she was kicking herself a little for selling her. I'm all grins. I love that mare, and to be honest, I knew she'd be special as soon as I saw her.
Ernie is doing OK. We're taking a break right now; he doesn't look terrible, but I was more weight on him, and he has been generally lethargic as well as still being off on that RH. I have found no abnormal swelling (he's always more stocked up than the average horse), heat or anything triggering, so my next thought is he threw a hip out, which happens more than I'd like. I'd like to have the chiropractor out, but I just can't afford that guy that's around here, so I'm waiting until he goes back to school. The guy in Randolph is just as good, if not better, and a LOT cheaper. In the meantime, Ernie is happy at pasture, being groomed and fussed over daily, and getting lots and lots and lots of calories.
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