| At Oleander Acres, we raise our horses to be horses. Although our barns are full of roomy stalls, our horses see little of the inside. They tend to live out at pasture 24/7, the mares and geldings together in an exceedingly large pastures, while each stallion has his own roomy paddock. Our horses are never made to do anything that they do not want to do; our cues are subtle and gentle, asking rather than telling. We train a horse to yield from pressure, making them sensitive to even the slightest touch.
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Our schedules can be pretty exciting. Someone's hopefully up by 7:30 and feeding while they're still in their pastures, and then we all flock out to start grooming together — still at pasture. We have our first two rotations back-to-back, then lunch around 12:30 after putting the horses out with hay. We come back to do chores, letting the horses wind down before our last rotation. Bedtime hay, feeding, and grooming follows before we feed ourselves, a pair heading out every other hour after that to check the herd.
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