I AM BACK!

Posted on May 10, 2012 by denlore

It’s been some time since I posted here but life has been busy and ever changing. After thirty four years of employment the company I worked for decided to pull up roots and move from West Lebanon New Hampshire to Denton Texas. Although I was offered work if I moved to Texas, I declined. I was unemployed for four months before I found a new job but now things are back to normal and I am back writing about things that I hope interests you.
I think that maybe I should write a book on how to get re-employed in four months regardless of age but who is really interested? One thing that is coming up for me is a meeting with the Vermont Archeological Society about doing a dig at The Justin Morgan Home Site. This site is something we have found and now we need to prove the location. A dig will hopefully find something to establish that fact. Stay tuned to this blog because more items are coming.

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Look For Good Hay!

Posted on February 22, 2012 by denlore

Selecting the right hay for your horse is not always an easy chore. Hay can be very different from year to year even if you are getting it from the same fields that you know have been well taken care of. There are many reasons why this happens however most horse farms purchase their hay and we look for suppliers that provide us with the best quality hay possible but we have no control producing it. Every year I buy my hay from the farmer up the road. He sells it to me at a lower price because he doesn’t have to put it in his barn he just brings the hay wagon down to me and leaves it for me to unload. This is great for me but it may not always be the greatest for my horses. I know the grass in these fields are wonderful but I always take things into consideration like how much rain we have had and knowing the farm where the hay comes from allows me to see at what part of the field the farmer is cutting hay for me.

Again not everyone who buys hay has this advantage and good looking hay does not always mean good quality hay. If you want to know how good your hay is for sure, have it tested. If you know the quality of your hay you then should know what kind of grain you need to feed and this is where many people fall short in managing their horses.

As a small Morgan Horse Breeding facility I like to keep my horses on the lean side. By that I mean that I like to see a little ripple of the ribs on the sides of my horses and I like to see a nice shine to the hair and alert eyes. I like my horses to have energy but not crawling out of their skin and I feed them enough feed to keep them happy and still have them clean it all up.

Difficult? Not really! Horses that are fat do not perform or breed well and they don’t live a long life so here is how I manage the feed in my barn.
I like good quality hay that is dust free and smells fresh. I don’t care about the content of the hay so I don’t test my hay I simply use it as feed that provides chewing time for my horses. Since I have no control over the nutritional content the hay provides I compensate for it in other ways and the main way is grain. Grain provides you with everything your horses need so knowing what is in the grain you purchase are very important.

Let me explain further. This past winter I was feeding pellet feed that was 10-3-6. That means that it contained ten percent protein, three percent fat and six percent fiber. My horses started losing weight as the winter went on and I found that I was feeding a lot of hay and grain to try and keep their weight on. This spring as breeding season rolled around and as horses were being worked more I knew I would have to make a change so I did. I changed my grain to a Blue Seal Feed named SBP 12-10. This grain contains twelve percent protein, ten percent fat and fifteen percent fiber which means that SBP 12-10 is a high fat, high fiber, textured feed containing shredded beet pulp, corn oil and is used for active horses or hard keepers.

Are my horses hard keepers? No, but I needed to compensate for what my hay was lacking to keep weight on so I made the adjustment. My horses are now at the body weight I want them to be and I actually feed less so I will keep them on the SBP 12-10 and I will adjust the amount I am feeding them to keep them balanced.

Many people feel that less fat and less sugar is better for our horses but this is a people thing. In some cases a little fat and a little sugar may be good for horses.

Do I feed supplements? No, I think most supplements don’t do much of anything but that’s a whole different article which I will discuss in the future. In the meantime if you’re not happy with the way your horses look or act, take a look at the grain you feeding and compare it to other feeds on the market. You might find something that does a better job and cost less money.

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Need A Web Site For Your Business?

Posted on January 8, 2012 by denlore

This is not directly related to the equine industry but I have some information that might help those of you who are in the industry and have a web site or are going to have a web site built.
I know that some people like to save money and produce their own web site. There are many online companies that offer web browser development web site packages and if you’re looking just for a web site that you can send people to just to view your horses then this is just right for you. However if you want a web site that draws potential customers to your site then you really need someone who can produce a web site that is written correctly for search engine placement. This is where you want a professional web designer. Some are expensive, but if you look around I am sure you can come up with a deal.

First of all you need a web designer that writes html language. Why? Because some designers use software that allows them to place text and pictures where they want it on the web page by dragging and dropping. I call this WYSIWYG software (what you see is what you get) and many web designers use this type of software. The problem with it is that the software generates the html language and in the process the software also includes un-needed language. Search engines favor a web site that is short and sweet and full of content and this will help your site place better when submitted to search engines. It’s called traffic and that’s what we want a lot of if we are doing business on the internet.

When you look for a web designer you want one that will guarantee that they will update your site within a time frame. The biggest problem with some web designers is that they want your money to design your site but they don’t want the hassle of updating your site. Sorry folks but if a web master gets your business and your web site is hosted on his/her server then they should update your site as requested in a timely fashion.
One last thing. Tell your web designer that you want a tracker on your web site that you can go look at. Many designers will tell you that they have a tracker on your site that you cannot see but they can tell you how much traffic you’re getting any time you request it. What they don’t tell you is that the tracker they look at is on the server where you site is being hosted. That tracker tracks all activity on that server including the ten or twenty other sites that reside on that same server. So if you own an Arabian Horse Farm for example and your web designer tells you that your site was viewed 30,000 times last month you must demand a personal tracker on the site so you can see those views because the search term “Arabian Horse Association” had 18,100 inquiries this month on Google for example and a breed association will usually get more hits than a farm. As a web site owner and business person you need to know how many views you’re getting to your web site and you need the count to be accurate not fabricated or inflated with faults numbers or push through traffic. You make money when your Arabian web site gets traffic from people who are looking to purchase an Arabian or who may wish to breed to your stallion or train a horse at your farm and not from traffic who happened there from clicking on an unrelated link.

I hope this helps you with your web site. If you are getting price quotes on a web site for your business, give us a try and go to www.denlorewebdesign.com

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Finding a Log Cabin

Posted on December 25, 2011 by denlore

Some of you may already know a lot of the Morgan Horse History however many people do not, and some of you who may have information may find out that your information is inaccurate. The information we have on Justin Morgan had to be accurate because we had to verify everything in some way, shape or form otherwise we would have never found where Morgan’s Log Cabin Home Site was located. The fact of the matter is that we have found what we believe to be the foundation location of Justin Morgan’s Cabin. We have stood by the cellar hole location of Justin Morgan just like Alan Thompson did and wrote about over one hundred and forty years ago. Now the next phase must come soon. We have been looking for someone to do an archival dig at the location and we hopefully may have found someone. We should know within the next several months if this is going to happen for sure but doing a documented dig cost money and this is where I am hoping that the Morgan Horse Community steps up to the plate when the time comes. Let me explain to you why.

The Morgan Horse has played a huge role in the development of this country. From clearing the land, taking the family to church, to the trail horse or show horse of today the Morgan Horse has touch the lives of thousands of people. Many Morgan Horses were lost during the Civil War but it was the sturdy Morgan mount that was the governments choice for its solders.
All of this was started because of one man who was a breeder of fine horses, a land speculator, a Tavern Keeper, a Town Clerk, a composer of Music, who loved his wife and his children and who died before his time. Morgan knew he had a special colt. He had tapped the colt on the shoulder several times exclaiming his worth. Yes Justin Morgan the man started it all and even though the horse foaled in Massachusetts his story starts in Randolph Vermont but the story needs a place of beginning. We need to know more than that he settle in Randolph Vermont we need to know where he settled in Randolph Vermont. We need to know this is where he lived and this is the pasture the Morgan Horse roamed when Morgan brought him to Vermont. We need to document it and we need to mark it so that generations will be able to come to this location two hundred years from now and longer.
We know where it is and we have been there. Now we need to prove it and we hope there are some of you willing to help support it. Come back to this blog often and I will continue to keep everyone updated.

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Figure

Have you ever ask yourself or wondered just who Justin Morgan was? Morgan was a passionate, loving man. I have no doubt that he would survive and adapted well if he were to return to this earth today. Unlike many of the tough heartless heathens that Vermont housed at that time, Morgan was a family man. He loved his wife with all his heart and when she died after the birth of their last child, Morgan was stricken with deep grief. His song “Despair” that he wrote later that year is truly an elegy for Martha Morgan.
Morgan’s love for good horse flesh was evident also. Morgan was so excited when he brought his colt home to Vermont that he asked several people to come and take look at him. Morgan must have known that there was something special about the colt named Figure because he stood the horse at stud in 1793, 1794 and 1795. Being the horseman that Morgan was, I don’t think he would have stood a horse that was inferior in any way.
It had been thought that Morgan had died in the home of William Rice in Woodstock in which Rice acquired the horse for taking care of Morgan but that was not the case. Justin Morgan knew he was very sick from consumption or lung fever and was on opium which was used at that time to control the cough as well as the pain so he sold the horse before he died. Morgan who had made little money as a land speculator purchased land in the undeveloped town of Moretown Vermont. Morgan’s value on the Town of Randolph’s grand list went down to zero in the same year that he had purchased the land in Moretown and he also no longer advertise his horse Figure standing at stud. Undeveloped land was valued at zero on the grand list where as a stallion of over the age of two was valued at twenty shillings or maybe a little more. It seems clear to me that Morgan sold his horse Figure to purchase the land in Moretown since the deed to the Moretown land is dated 1796 and Samuel Allen advertise Figure for stud in the same year.
A man who was a passionate man and not long to this world wanted something to give his children in his death. I’m sure Morgan felt that undeveloped land which was soon to be developed and which would drastically increase in value was what he wanted for his children so he sold his beloved horse in order to purchase land.
The few things that were listed in Morgan’s estate when he died were things like a few books, his land in Moretown and some clothing but he did not own Figure when he died and his land in Moretown never netted the money for his children he thought it might. Morgan never was very good at land speculation.

There is a state historical marker in Woodstock which was erected by The New England Morgan Horse Association that states

“On this site the progenitor of the famous Morgan breed of horses was owned by Sheriff William Rice about 1800. Justin Morgan took his name from that of the singing schoolmaster who originally brought him to Vermont, but who lost possession of the later famous horse to Sheriff Rice in payment of a debt.”

This sign needs to be taken down since it is very incorrect. It seems that Justin Morgan Jr. made a statement to the fact that his father died in the home of William Rice and that Rice did acquire the horse. I found in my research that there were many statements made by Justin Morgan Jr. that were faults and proven untrue. This was one of them but I seem to think that it was due to his young age of nine or ten when these events were happening and not understanding as a young person.
I found that the Morgan family was very friendly with the Edgerton and carpenter families. As a matter of fact Morgan had dispersed his children to the care of these two families after his wife had died. The Morgan children also married within these families so the ties within were very close. Morgan himself died in the Carpenter home and is buried in a cemetery in Randolph Center Vermont.
So who was Justin Morgan? In my three years of research looking for the location in which he and his family settled, I found Justin Morgan to be a loving, passionate man who was a little different than most men in Vermont at that time. He was well spoken, educated and had beautiful penmanship. He loved his family first and foremost but he also had a good eye and deep respect for a good horse. It’s clear to me that if he had not become so ill in health that he would not have sold his horse Figure and history would have been very different.
The research we have done on Justin Morgan was interesting. I hope you enjoyed this piece and the information in it. Please come back again.

Posted on December 6, 2011 by denlore | Comments Off

History Of The Morgan Horse

Posted on November 29, 2011 by denlore
Justin Morgan Head Stone

Justin Morgan Head Stone

I’m surprised as to how so few people who own a Morgan Horse are interested in the history of the horse. We all know that the Morgan can do just about anything. From trail horse to show horse the Morgan can do it all but what makes a Morgan Horse a Morgan Horse is its history.
In order to understand that comment you need to study Vermont and it’s culture around the 1788 time period. The reason is because without understanding the culture of the time you can’t understand how the horse started a breed by himself or how he survived long enough to start a breed.
The culture in this country changes every so often. To prove my point let’s take a look at how much the culture changed in this country from 1900 to 1950. The automobile changed our culture almost by itself. The light bulb and the washing machine were just a few culture changes. From 1950 to 2000 we had a huge culture change with the computer age and cell phones. So I am sure you can understand just how big the culture change is from Justin Morgan’s time in 1788 to 2011. That’s why when I went looking for the home site of Justin Morgan, I had to understand the culture of the time. The fact alone that the Morgan Horse survived at all during that time is amazing in itself so let’s take a quick look at Vermont’s culture during that time.
We are looking at a time period when the men were men and the women were too. By that I mean that you had to be extremely tough in order to survive. Justin Morgan himself came from Massachusetts just after Shay’s Rebellion happened in that state. Many seem to think that because the Day family (Morgan’s wife’s family)had been deeply involved with the rebellion that it was why they moved to Vermont but that was hardly the case. Shay’s Rebellion by the way was a revolt against the state of Massachusetts because of extremely high taxes. Yes folks, taxes have been an issue for over two hundred years. It was a case of a government that spent a lot of money fighting the Revolutionary War and was at the time only wanting cash as tax payment. Most people of the time might have a horse or a cow but they had little cash. Justin Morgan was a tax collector at that time and if you could not collect the taxes, you would have to pay them. Morgan was brought to court for non-collection of taxes and he then moved to Vermont later that year. My guess is that as a land speculator and horseman he was fed up with taxes and moved to the Republic of Vermont. Vermont was on its own at the time and those who were unhappy with the way of life in Massachusetts moved to Vermont to settle land
One of the books I read was A Narrative Of A Tour Through The State Of Vermont from April 27 to June 12 1789 by Rev. Nathan Perkins. Rev. Perkins talks about his trip and how the food was poor, there were many fleas to deal with and there was little hay for his horse. We must also remember that the Royalton Raid happened just eight years before Morgan came to Vermont. One story I read about was a woman who became lost in the Vermont wilderness. She roamed the woods for over a week and the only way she survived was to drink her own breast milk.
Life in Vermont in 1788 was like something most of us today have never experienced. So who was Justin Morgan? Check back here next week and find out.

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How I plan to get my hay in the barn FAST!

Posted on November 20, 2011 by denlore

We don’t put in a lot of hay at our farm but we do purchase over a thousand bales every year. Needless to say that I hate hay season and would rather shovel snow then put hay way. It could be because usually my load of hay comes only on the hottest day of the year. We could have freezing temperatures three hundred and sixty four days our of the year and have only one day of one hundred degree heat and on that one day is when my hay would arrive. That’s just the way my luck is!
Of course it seems that no one is available on this particular day either. Everyone is usually very busy and they feel real bad that they can’t come and help. I totally understand. Who in their right mind would want to come and work their tail off in one hundred degree heat, Right? Well this summer I found a way to get all kinds of help any day that you want it. Listen up.
This last summer on the hottest day of the year I had a load of hay come in. Just as I expected it was the hottest day of the year and no one was available to help. I was able to get in touch with the young lady who was working horses for us and although she was at the river having a swim and cooling off, she did offer to come and help put hay away. That was very nice of her and I greatly appreciated it. Soon she arrived and she had slipped on her jeans over her bathing suit and had a tee shirt over the bathing suit top. She got on top of the hay load and I got in the top of the barn and as she put the hay on the elevator I would stack each bale in the barn. In one hundred degree heat and a few bales later she decided to take the tee shirt off and work in her jeans and the bathing suit top. I don’t think that is was a half hour later when I noticed that the traffic on our back hills Vermont gravel road had doubled. We even had a few of the neighborhood boys stopping by. Can you imagine that? People were stopping at the farm on hay day!
I now have it all figured out. Next summer I’ll ask this young lady if she has a friend she can bring along to help with hay right after they go swimming. I’ll pay them just to stand in front of the hay wagon and I bet my hay gets put in the barn faster than it ever has before. It’ll be the best investment since the hay elevator!

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Show That Horse!

Posted on November 7, 2011 by denlore

Anyone who knows us also knows that we are photographers (www.denlorephoto.com) as well as Morgan Horse Breeders. So I would like to share one thing that I have noticed in all my hours in the show ring watching many people such as yourself show. I have noticed that many people who get a blue ribbon have no idea what to do after they win it. They take their blue and their glory and they just leave the ring. Why would anyone do that??? After hours of work at home to order get your horse trained and skilled enough to show at it’s best, why would you just leave?

When we were campaigning Denlores Desert Storm as our breeding stallion we wanted him noticed. We would show boat him around at every and any show we could. We even went late to an in-hand class one time because the ring had a road that followed the back rail of the show ring that you had to take in order to get to it. The class was in the ring and the announcer was calling us for the class when down that road we came just trotting as flashy as could be and everyone was watching including the two judges in the ring. We won that class and ever since then we have taken every advantage there is to show our horse, in or out of the ring.
Now that I’ve wandered off of the topic a bit I just want to say that you should do that same type of show boat showing when you win the blue ribbon. Collect your ribbon and go to the far end on the ring so you can do your victory pass. Don’t forget to pose before hand for the photographer. You won you should at least pose for a victory photo. Stand your horse up according to your breed standard and have someone try to get ears forward on your horse. Turn towards the photographer and smile for your photo. When everyone has left the ring you should start down the rail at a trot making sure your ribbon is on your horse facing inward towards the photographer and give it the best trot down the rail you can give. Most of all…SMILE! Look like you enjoy what you do and are proud of your accomplishment.
The show ring is not the only culprit of taking the blue and leaving. I see it even more in carriage classes, dressage and jumping. In dressage many times they just have the rider come later after points have been counted and pick up their ribbon. There needs to be some type of ceremony where the ribbons are presented in front of the people during the show so all can see. The presentation of ribbons is the ceremony that promotes the breed, the show as well as the farms that come to present. So the next time you win a class at a show, take your blue ribbon, have your picture taken and take that victory pass you deserve.

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I love the barn!

Posted on October 20, 2011 by denlore

Lipstick The RoosterI love spending time in the barn. There’s just something about a horse farm that excites me. Maybe it’s the smell of horse flesh or the activity of the barn, I really don’t know but I like spending my time there. Our animals all have their own personality too and provide me with a day full of laughs and smiles. Last Saturday for example I head out to the barn to feed horses. Every feeding time our two Shiih Tzu dogs Harley and Harriet must come with me. As I am heading to the barn the horses can here me coming and everything comes to life. Everyone is grumbling or preforming some kind of action hoping that they will be the first to get fed. Of course the chicken coop is on my way to the barn and our rooster named Lipstick is crowing up a storm demanding that I let him and his hens out of the coop. Their pen which is made out of a chain link dog kennel with two by fours running across the top every four feet for support is one of the locations farm visitors like to stop.. I let the chickens out but of course Lipstick still has his attitude and has to crow several more times giving me hell for being so slow.
Harley and Harriet are off on one of their adventures and as I call to them I can see them running around the side of the barn with a piece of horse hoof hanging out of Harriet’s mouth. Harley is chasing her into the barn and as they go, I follow since the horses have grown that much more inpatient. I feed all of the horses and I turn Gaetano our stallion outside to spend his morning. I start cleaning his stall and I can hear all kinds of activity going on. Gaetano has his jolly ball in his mouth slapping himself silly with it and standing on his hind legs then running around like one big maniac. Harley and Harriet still have that piece of horse hoof and Harley is running down to one end of the barn with Harriet chomping at his back legs. As he drops it Harriet runs back down to the other end of the barn with Harley chomping at her hind legs until she drops the piece of hoof.
I then go to the door of the barn to see Lipstick the rooster on top of the two by four that runs at the top of the chicken pen, strutting his stuff back and fourth looking down at his hens in the pen. I yell to him “hey get down from there” and he stops long enough to look back over his shoulder at me and gives me hell with one log cockadodaldoo and drops back down into the chicken pen still giving me hell. He is one mean rooster with an attitude but he is very funny.
The barn is the center of activity at my farm and it provides be with many memories and tons of enjoyment. When I’m in the barn, life is good.

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Welcome To Denlore’s Blog Site!

Posted on September 29, 2011 by denlore

Laura & Dennis

We want to welcome you to our blog! We hope you find this site interesting and come back often. Our intention is to hopefully write about things that we do at Denlore that you can relate to. We wish to share our stories, interests and activities of Denlore Morgan Horse Farm and hope that you will visit us regularly regardless of what breed of horse you own. There will be articles on events we attend, shows we show at as well as activities that go on at the farm like working or breeding Morgans. We hope that some of the things we talk about you find interesting, funny, informational or maybe you just don’t agree with anything we say here but we are always open for comments.

We will also sometimes discuss photography. We’ll discuss things like great cameras to purchase or how to shoot horses, do wedding photography, portrait photography and how to take a great photo. Photography can be interesting and in all the years we have been shooting the equine industry we’ve had some very funny stories to tell. By the way, we are also an awesome wedding photographer as well so if you have plans of getting married, give us a call!

The big thing that we hope will set this blog apart from most others is that you may know us. We have done the photography at many horses shows of different breeds all over New England. From fair horse shows like at Hopkinton, Cheshire and Deerfield to breed shows like Vermont Heritage Days, New England Morgan Horse and The Arabian Horse Show of New England. We pride ourselves in the fact that we can shoot jumpers as well as park saddle and the Mini to the Friesian. Go to our web site http://www.denlorephoto.com and see our photo gallery.

Again, we hope you come back again and again to see what we have to say and we hope you enjoy this blog.

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