Todays visitor for Small Animal Week was Huey the hedgehog! Huey is nearly full-grown, and likes to investigate things. When he is scared, he curls up into a ball, which causes his quills to stick out. He is a little pokey to handle when this happens, so wearing gloves while holding him is recommended. To calm him down if he is scared, all you need to do is blow gently in his face, and he settles down.

When he is scared, Huey curls up into a ball.

Huey visits the campers in the Morgan group while they sit in a circle on the floor.

Huey coming out of his house.

Small Animal Week August 2-6

The day camp staff are thrilled to welcome a new group of campers, and some special animal friends this week! Everyday there will be a new animal guests for the kids to meet and learn about. Today, Quarter Horse group leader Nina brought her two Boston Terriers, Ivy and Gertie, to camp.

Bridget, the Small Animal Activity Leader, letting Ivy and Gertie explore. The two dogs are mother and daughter.

Ivy loves the attention!

Here are the groups we have this week:

The Falabellas

Group Leader: Josh

The Shetlands

Group Leader: Amber

The Pintos

Group Leader: Mackenzie

The Arabians

Group Leader: Leah

The Morgans

Group Leader: Lindsey (not pictured)

The Quarter Horses

Group Leader: Nina

It looked like we might get some sprinkles this morning, but by the time the bus arrived we could tell it was going to be a great day to be outside at camp! Todays activities included a scavenger hunt in nature, making sock horses in arts and crafts, and playing capture the flag in sports.

In horse fun, campers learned about horses' teeth in an interesting and tasty way-- using marshmallows and chocolate syrup. They learned that horses have grooves in their teeth that turn brown as a horse ages, and that the surface of the tooth becomes smoother as it is ground down through chewing. After all this learning they got to eat their "teeth". Mmm, who knew teeth were so tasty?

Jenna the riding instructor finishes teaching the Shetlands group about teeth.

Making marshmallow horse teeth models.

Tuesday

Today was a warm one! Our groups practiced more steering and stopping during riding, played 500 during sports, made watercolor silhouette pictures in arts and crafts, and went on a hike to see a pond full of frogs and tadpoles for nature. One lucky group got to help us put flower seeds in the planter behind the day camp barn.

Horse Lover's Week July 26-30

The first day of Horse Lover's week was a perfect summer day! This morning our groups got to know eachother and their group leaders, and participated in a variety of activities including arts and crafts, sports, nature, horse fun, horse science, and of course, riding. In nature, groups went looking for "gold" on a scavenger hunt in the woods, while in arts and crafts they made mosaic pictures. Many more fun activities are planned for the rest of the week, and many will be featured here on the blog, so keep watching!

Here are our groups for the week!

Falabellas

Group leader- Josh

Shetlands

Group Leader- Lindsey

Pintos

Group Leader- Nina

Arabians

Group Leader- Leah

Morgans

Group Leader- Mackenzie

Quarter Horses

Group Leader- Leah

Thursday

We had to run a rain schedule today due to severe weather. This is what camp looked like around 8:30 am-- before campers arrived:

Normally we don't have a river running down the hill, nor a lake in the arena.

The rain eventually cleared up, and after lunch we were able to ride and resume our normal activities for the day. Tie-dye had to be postponed til Friday, but other than that we still accomplished everything we planned to do today. One of the highlight activities was learning to rope. Campers used lariats to lasso the fence up by the barn. Some of them thought it would be a better idea to rope the counselors, but that proved to be much trickier.

Jenna, one of the Day Camp riding staff, demonstrates how to throw a lasso.

Rachel has great aim!

Wednesday

Riding was a blast on Wednesday! By now most of the groups have had learned enough riding skills to try trotting. All the horses line up so that we have more space for everyone to do their individual trot-work. Trotting is fun, but it can be very bouncy!

Holly, one of the Day Camp riding staff, instructs the Shetlands group on how to trot.

Individual trotting-- Quincy has a nice trot.

Slammer the miniature horse was a special guest in sports again today. Here he is in action, demonstrating the clover leaf pattern with our sports activity leader, Bridget: