Grrrrrr...
Nov. 25th, 2002 09:47 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
joflasherMy salt water tank is infected, not with just one pest but with two. Now everytime I look at my tank, I growl. GGGrrrrrr.
Pest 1: Glass Anemone. Aiptasia. The clear little spawn of Satan himself. Its actually kind'a pretty. Its a small anemone, about 1/2 - 3/4 of an inch big and perfectly clear, except for some white rings on its tenticles. Boy thinks its neat. And it is, for being the scurge of reef aquariumist everywhere. They multiply faster than rabbits, they have a toxic sting that can kill just about any of the other anemones or corals in your tank and if you leave even 1 tiny piece left alive when you kill one, it regenerates. If you leave 2 pieces alive but they aren't touching? You get two new ones. Bastage things.
I noticed one a few nights ago and put off killing it cause, hey, its only one and its pretty cool looking. Some people never have them multiply out of control in their tanks. Maybe we'd be lucky and only have one cool little clear anemone. Then I saw the swarm. Across the cave from where the big one lived was an area about an inch square covered in little bitty ones. GGrrrrrr. So I pulled the rock out and squirted all I could find with boiling water. MUHHAHAHAA. Dead anemones everwhere. Murder, mayhem, little clear bodies slothing off of the rock. I win.
Except for the part where the adult one was out and feeding this morning. Bastard doesn't even look singed. The little ones, thank goodness, seem to be staying dead. Next try, extremely basic solution injected into the stalk. Time to go get some lime and a hyperdermic needle.
Pest 2: There is a distinct *click* sound coming from my tank. And that can be only one thing. A mantis shrimp. Also known as a pistol shrimp. Any of you who have snorkled or scuba dived have heard them in mass. Its the critter that makes the famed "frying bacon" sound in warm waters. I've caught a brief glimpse of it but nothing more. Luckily, it will only become a bad pest when we get corals in the tank. They eat corals if they can. As Boy pointed out, in a month or two, it will be bigger and therefore easier to catch. And until then, our tank has a percussion section.
We bought a bunch of snails and hermit crabs this weekend. Yay, critters. Its neat to watch everything scurry about and we now have trails going up the glass where the snails have eaten the algea. There's also a little harmless anemone on the new liverock with the clam. Its not happy though and keeps moving around. I think it needs more water movement than our tank has.
In other news, we went up to the farm for the first time in two weeks. I took Apache out on the trails this time. Apache is a 3 year old appy whose only been ridden about two dozen times in his life. Luckily, he's completely relaxed about having the saddle and a rider. Could care less what you do as far as plopping things on his back and hopping on. He just doesn't like the bit. Really doesn't like it.
A young girl (about 13) had been riding him in the ring for about a month now, mostly with just a halter and reins. Note, Apache has run away with people while wearing this set up. I refuse to ride him that way. Halters while riding are for horses you trust, not greenies.
The girl and Carol insisted that they would be perfectly okay out on the trails with the Boy and I last time we rode. Our choice was either let her ride with us or have her go out alone. Not much of a choice. Keep in mind that Boy was riding Majic, who is hyper horse out there and I was on Kavort, who is a challenge, to put it mildly. We're not exactly set up to babysit if she started having trouble, since our own horses tended to be handfuls. I figured we'd be okay, though. I was green breaking by the age of 13. She'd been riding for 4 years or so, she said. I didn't realize she meant 4 years on dead broke lesson ponies. Needless to say, she got into trouble. I don't know why she thought she could control him when she had no clue how to force a horse to stop. And he was only TROTTING away with her. Not even running, just putzing along at a slow trot and ignoring her. Jesus, girl, grab one rein and pull his head into your knee until he STOPS MOVING! Instead, she decided to jump off...or she just lost her balance at a trot and fell off. I'm not sure which. Results were the same though. Her on the ground with a broken wrist.
Anyways, I asked Carol not to put anyone on Apache again until I taught him some basics about reins and manners. It took us a good 40 minutes to get him to take the bit. Definitely need to work on that. Out on the trails, Apache and me fought evertime I asked him to turn. Stopping he had no problems with. Turning always started a fight. Luckily he hasn't fully hit his growth yet. Whenever he reared on me, I could still force him to the ground. Once he's full grown, I don't think I'll have the weight to do that. He's going to be HUGE if he ever grows into those feet. Anyways, by the end of the ride, I could ask for a turn, he would stop and consider, then we would turn. Much better than at the start when we would go 10 feet in any direction but the one I wanted and he would bounce and rear and kick about it. So it looks like I'm on Apache for a few weeks. I think I'd rather have Kavort. He may be a handful but he's not deliberately fighting me out there. He's just scared of everything.
Afterwards I lunged Sage with the chain again. He sulked about it the whole time but I'll be damned if I let that horse give me any more rope burns or pick up any more bad habits. Even with the chain, he kept kicking at me while out on the circle. Funny thing is, though, as dangerous as he acts out on the line, as soon as you put the whip up in the air and yell "come in", he comes trotting into the center and puts his head against you for pets.
Didn't ride Sage. I put the saddle on him and did ground work, including having him stand at the mounting block while I put weight in the stirrup. The ground was just too muddy for me to try the rodeo thing in the ring. Its bad enough out on the trails where, if you go down, you only hit the ground. Getting stuck between a horse and a fence is not fun(tm).
We had Sage's bridle hanging on the fencing and once I took the saddle off, he went running over to it and started chewing on it, like "hey, aren't we using this piece?!?!?!" I put the gear away while Boy put the bridle on, took it off, put it back on, took it off...you get the picture. Sage is so certain that the bit is a chew toy. You take the bridle off of him and he snatches at the bit. You can just give it to him and drop the whole leather set up and he'll hold it there and be perfectly content. I've never seen a horse so happy to have a bit in his mouth.
Pest 1: Glass Anemone. Aiptasia. The clear little spawn of Satan himself. Its actually kind'a pretty. Its a small anemone, about 1/2 - 3/4 of an inch big and perfectly clear, except for some white rings on its tenticles. Boy thinks its neat. And it is, for being the scurge of reef aquariumist everywhere. They multiply faster than rabbits, they have a toxic sting that can kill just about any of the other anemones or corals in your tank and if you leave even 1 tiny piece left alive when you kill one, it regenerates. If you leave 2 pieces alive but they aren't touching? You get two new ones. Bastage things.
I noticed one a few nights ago and put off killing it cause, hey, its only one and its pretty cool looking. Some people never have them multiply out of control in their tanks. Maybe we'd be lucky and only have one cool little clear anemone. Then I saw the swarm. Across the cave from where the big one lived was an area about an inch square covered in little bitty ones. GGrrrrrr. So I pulled the rock out and squirted all I could find with boiling water. MUHHAHAHAA. Dead anemones everwhere. Murder, mayhem, little clear bodies slothing off of the rock. I win.
Except for the part where the adult one was out and feeding this morning. Bastard doesn't even look singed. The little ones, thank goodness, seem to be staying dead. Next try, extremely basic solution injected into the stalk. Time to go get some lime and a hyperdermic needle.
Pest 2: There is a distinct *click* sound coming from my tank. And that can be only one thing. A mantis shrimp. Also known as a pistol shrimp. Any of you who have snorkled or scuba dived have heard them in mass. Its the critter that makes the famed "frying bacon" sound in warm waters. I've caught a brief glimpse of it but nothing more. Luckily, it will only become a bad pest when we get corals in the tank. They eat corals if they can. As Boy pointed out, in a month or two, it will be bigger and therefore easier to catch. And until then, our tank has a percussion section.
We bought a bunch of snails and hermit crabs this weekend. Yay, critters. Its neat to watch everything scurry about and we now have trails going up the glass where the snails have eaten the algea. There's also a little harmless anemone on the new liverock with the clam. Its not happy though and keeps moving around. I think it needs more water movement than our tank has.
In other news, we went up to the farm for the first time in two weeks. I took Apache out on the trails this time. Apache is a 3 year old appy whose only been ridden about two dozen times in his life. Luckily, he's completely relaxed about having the saddle and a rider. Could care less what you do as far as plopping things on his back and hopping on. He just doesn't like the bit. Really doesn't like it.
A young girl (about 13) had been riding him in the ring for about a month now, mostly with just a halter and reins. Note, Apache has run away with people while wearing this set up. I refuse to ride him that way. Halters while riding are for horses you trust, not greenies.
The girl and Carol insisted that they would be perfectly okay out on the trails with the Boy and I last time we rode. Our choice was either let her ride with us or have her go out alone. Not much of a choice. Keep in mind that Boy was riding Majic, who is hyper horse out there and I was on Kavort, who is a challenge, to put it mildly. We're not exactly set up to babysit if she started having trouble, since our own horses tended to be handfuls. I figured we'd be okay, though. I was green breaking by the age of 13. She'd been riding for 4 years or so, she said. I didn't realize she meant 4 years on dead broke lesson ponies. Needless to say, she got into trouble. I don't know why she thought she could control him when she had no clue how to force a horse to stop. And he was only TROTTING away with her. Not even running, just putzing along at a slow trot and ignoring her. Jesus, girl, grab one rein and pull his head into your knee until he STOPS MOVING! Instead, she decided to jump off...or she just lost her balance at a trot and fell off. I'm not sure which. Results were the same though. Her on the ground with a broken wrist.
Anyways, I asked Carol not to put anyone on Apache again until I taught him some basics about reins and manners. It took us a good 40 minutes to get him to take the bit. Definitely need to work on that. Out on the trails, Apache and me fought evertime I asked him to turn. Stopping he had no problems with. Turning always started a fight. Luckily he hasn't fully hit his growth yet. Whenever he reared on me, I could still force him to the ground. Once he's full grown, I don't think I'll have the weight to do that. He's going to be HUGE if he ever grows into those feet. Anyways, by the end of the ride, I could ask for a turn, he would stop and consider, then we would turn. Much better than at the start when we would go 10 feet in any direction but the one I wanted and he would bounce and rear and kick about it. So it looks like I'm on Apache for a few weeks. I think I'd rather have Kavort. He may be a handful but he's not deliberately fighting me out there. He's just scared of everything.
Afterwards I lunged Sage with the chain again. He sulked about it the whole time but I'll be damned if I let that horse give me any more rope burns or pick up any more bad habits. Even with the chain, he kept kicking at me while out on the circle. Funny thing is, though, as dangerous as he acts out on the line, as soon as you put the whip up in the air and yell "come in", he comes trotting into the center and puts his head against you for pets.
Didn't ride Sage. I put the saddle on him and did ground work, including having him stand at the mounting block while I put weight in the stirrup. The ground was just too muddy for me to try the rodeo thing in the ring. Its bad enough out on the trails where, if you go down, you only hit the ground. Getting stuck between a horse and a fence is not fun(tm).
We had Sage's bridle hanging on the fencing and once I took the saddle off, he went running over to it and started chewing on it, like "hey, aren't we using this piece?!?!?!" I put the gear away while Boy put the bridle on, took it off, put it back on, took it off...you get the picture. Sage is so certain that the bit is a chew toy. You take the bridle off of him and he snatches at the bit. You can just give it to him and drop the whole leather set up and he'll hold it there and be perfectly content. I've never seen a horse so happy to have a bit in his mouth.
