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| "Joined" Maggie Moo and Michele |
When Michele Cole emailed me the other night to commission a painting of her 4 year old Mustang. I asked her what pose she would like. She gave me free rein and then said” Just a good picture of her that shows her strong loving and loyal personality.”
She also did some thing else that really helps me. She sent me lots of photos to draw from. Photos that showed the wonderful relationship that Michele and her Maggie Moo have. Then Michele gave me the only one real instruction. She likes Purples! My creative juices started flowing…and my imagination took over.
This is an awesome opportunity to paint that intimacy that mustangs are capable of when they "join up" and totally trust their person. For the uninitiated the term "join up" means that a strong connection of trust is established between a horse and its handler. Its often based on respect of space and understanding the nature of horse behavior. When a horse is ready to come to the person on their own the bonding begins.
There has been a lot of debate as to whether Mustangs are more happy in the wild or more happy near a good food source and warm barn. I say mustangs are not stupid. If given the choice in a non abusive situation they are going to choose the good food source and warm barn. It’s a plus if they have the freedom to come and go as they choose, except for the occasional ride and quality time with their human
However you have to get them past their fear of a strange place, past the adjustment time of their first confinement and step beyond archaic traditional force based training methods to get them there into patient and gentle degrees of trust.
Generally speaking for a new Mustang Owner who has never trained a horse its always good to read as much as possible about how to successfully gentle a wild horse, go to clinics when ever possible, and it is especially important to find a trainer that will work with you and your horse, that specializes in and knows the needs of the wild horses.
The majority of successful adoptions of wild horsse are because the new adoptive owner received good instruction and over sight on how to gentle their horse. The majority of failed adoptions are because the new adoptive owner was in over their head and never sought out the help needed to learn the finer points of working with a Mustang.
Michele received Maggie Moo for the adopton process when Maggie was 6 months old. Maggie Moo had been rounded up from the Twin Peaks round up in 2007. It is with great pleasure that I feature the two of them as the final painting for the miniseries “Happy Adoptions Part 1. And Mustang A Day Challenge Painting #60
Part 2 will be in a few weeks. Please recommend horses for that one. We are looking for a total of 10 Happy Adopted Mustangs. We currently have 5. There will also be several more opportunities to have your horse featured as well. So dont hesitate to email me at contact@llmartin.com Comissions help fund the project and also help a number of Mustang related Charities.
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