If six-week getaways and evenings in the city are your thing, stay away from the stables. Stable management is time-consuming and financially tough, but for those who love horses, it's the only way to go.
Nicky Overgaard is a teaching specialist who speaks to students about equine reproduction. "I've had horses my whole life," she says.
"[I] decided to make a career out of it when I graduated in 1991. I had gone to school for it and worked for several trainers and a few show barns, and had done quite a bit of showing," she says.
Just because you know how to ride doesn't mean you're cut out to keep the stables in top shape. Overgaard rides, writes and speaks about horses, but she also manages her own stable. Management, she says, is in a category of its own when it comes to the equine professions.
"[It's] totally different! Managing the stable, you're going to hopefully have a lot of knowledge in business as well as the horses, obviously. Be able to get along with the public."
As it turns out, stable management doesn't unleash the entrepreneurial side in Overgaard. While she loves the horses, she doesn't love the owners who don't come through when payment is due. The business stuff is her least favorite aspect of the profession: "Collecting money from people that don't pay -- the business side of things."
All in all, Overgaard enjoys her work, though she recognizes its particular challenges. "I would say that if you love horses and if you want to work hard and make a career out of it, it's going to take a lot of hard work. Whereas the pay isn't that wonderful, at least maybe you're doing something you love."
Stable manager Lauri Kenny simply can't imagine doing anything else. "It's the horses I just love," he says. "I can't see anything else -- it's not a job, it's a way of life."
Kenny grew up with horses and many of his relatives were farmers. At one point, he jumped off the wagon and went into the electrical trade. Turns out he just couldn't stay away from farming -- it truly is his passion.
"I'm actually an electrician by trade," he says. "But as soon as I finished my apprenticeship, I just went back to farming and the horses. Couldn't keep away from it!"
There were times, says Kenny, when keeping away from the farm would have been a nice option. Simple pleasures, like going into town for a movie, aren't always an option for stable managers. Now that Kenny is married with a daughter, going into town for social reasons isn't as important -- but as a younger man, it was tough to miss out on.
"It was more difficult...before I got married. When you wanted to have a night life, a social life."
In addition to caring for the animals, Kenny cares for the land that feeds both the animals and his family. "We're kind of self-sufficient," he says.
"It's not just horses here. We farm, right now, about 400 acres. We do all our own hay as well. We do our own fencing....We've just purchased another 100 acres, and what we're doing is we're building a new house on it and we're building a new storage barn -- an eight-stall barn."