Whoops. I got leapfroged. No matter. Tuesday:
I was feeling quite silly so instead of longlining colonel with a bit I decided to get out a longeing caversson and use the rings on it instead. Turns out those things are complicated. Colonel stood more or less patiently while I tried to figure out what goes where. There was some kind of throatlatch thing that was either too small for colonel or else I just couldn't figure it out. So I took it off. Anyway, longlined as usual and it was the same with the bit as without. Which is nice to know, thus maybe justifying my ridiculousness? Meh, Robert didn't catch us, so he didn't have an opportunity to react, and thats what matters.
Much later I got around to tacking up Star. I set up a really pretty little crossrail with ground poles on each side. She was a little worked up having Niki in the arena, she was a little worked up about the jump, but she eventually calmed down to what I considered to be suitible levels. Then we worked on the jump.
I have this fear that she will forever and ever stop and look at a jump before she goes over. I have some reasons to fear this. She still has to look at the bridge when we go over it for the first time that day. Lord knows I cant quite get her to the hay barn most days without her stoping or at least slowing down.
The short version (which I may update later, but probably not) is that I kept turning her around when she stopped instead of letting her think and then go over it. I did this under saddle and on the ground. The times she went over it under saddle, I let her think about it instead of turning around. On the ground, only after Alyssa came in and reminded me what we learned with nicki, did I let her stop and think about it and ask her to go over, and pop, over she goes. So, I learned my lesson. Star learned nothing or maybe worse. Hopefully just nothing.
Saturday, August 8, 2009
Friday, August 7, 2009
Late start but productive
I had a late night and couldn't drag myself out of bed in a timely fashion, so I arrived at the barn around 11. Robert was fixing stuff today so we sat and chatted for about half an hour. He told me to do horse stuff. Poor Brandon had gotten there at ten and managed to sweep and cut some weeds down, but was having problems with allergies and his chest started hurting, so Robert sent him home before I even got there.
So I dutifully went onto horse stuff. Grabbed Keno and tried putting my dressage saddle on him (still too tight in the shoulders, I'll have to find something to pad it up with). We went out in the field with him being way more snorty than usual, and something by the Morgan pasture made him spin and bolt and dance. I am not so much with the confidence so I hopped off and made him work on the ground (mini lunge circle, leading, etc) until he was not so jiggy and high-headed. Then hopped back on and walked home. We worked in the outside dressage arena until he was willing to give me his head. There was a lot of unauthorized trotting and bucking. He was basically a jerk and it was highly frustrating. I took his bridle off and put him in the crossties and then went to go see kittens. Alef and Dalet were in the forklift seat as usual. Mamacat emerged from behind the hay and let me pet her! She hasn't let us do that for months, since Robert nearly caught her in the live trap. I did catch a glimpse of a small kitten.
Finished untacking Keno, rinsed and put him back, ate lunch. I dragged out two poles and two small standards. One pole went between the standards, and the other one was perpendicular to the first pole, but by a standard. I grabbed Niki.
Niki did *not* want to walk at first, which makes some kind of sense because she's a hot little mare and it was a cool day. So we did a lot of long-trotting and I experimented with how much I could slow down her trot by slowing down my posting, which wasn't inconsiderable. We cantered (mostly on her own initiative) to the left the whole way around the arena, without popping out her shoulder and dragging me towards the gate. I gave her some slight directions and she took them, loose rein and fairly comfy canter. It was awesome! I tried trotting her over the pole against only one standard and she was unhappy about the idea, so we walked over it a couple times and then she trotted the other one, both directions, no problem. Ears perked, no rushing, definitely looking down at it. I tried cantering right lead and we had more problems than left, but we did get it eventually. Her "whoa" is getting worse, so I need to spend some time on that. We did some of the mugwump stuff, where as soon as she moves we go back to work, and I think she started to get the idea.
Star was one I had been plotting about the last couple days after watching the jumping session, and the reason why I actually pulled out the poles and standards. She didn't want to get caught but I guess that's not strictly unusual. She wanted to hesitate at the hay barn but didn't, so that was nice (no whip), and I am either less gentle about saddle pads and saddling than Gillian is, or I'm just not authorized to tack her up, because there was a lot of flinching. Mounted in the arena, and she didn't walk off immediately. It took a couple seconds, so that was an improvement from the last time I rode her. Gillian's saddle is hellish. I'm surprised I don't have bruises on my thighs today, actually. Star's a much bigger mover than any of my horses- they're all very smooth and flat-moving, so that took a lot of adjustment, and I didn't want to post off my thighs because oh god the pain. But we worked it out. She tried squirreling out over the first ground pole and I didn't let her, so she resigned herself to trotting over it, and then trotted over the one between the standards with little hesitation. We cantered- I like her canter!- and she went over the poles fairly willingly, even after she stumbled over one. The first time she broke to a trot but she kept her forward, and she kept her rhythm steady after that (other than when she knocked it). I was listening to my iPod and a slowish song came on but she matched her canter to that, it was very well done on her part.
Untacked her and put her back as Colleen was taking Rocky out. Rocky was very clearly sore on at least one of his hooves. Nothing in his feet, no heat in his legs, but he was standing very uncomfortably and his face showed a lot of pain. Robert and I immediately went to "founder." But he was willing to trot. We hosed off his feet and he seemed to do better on that. Right now he's getting a flake of hay and downgraded to a handful of grain. I don't know how he's doing today.
I was feeding and Robert was hosing off Rocky when Bella and Jessi came in. Jessi was really upset at Bella and I asked what happened- I think Bella bucked her off, Jessi was definitely not walking right. She was untacking Bella and I offered to hop on, since putting her back was not an option she wanted to take. Jessi made noises and Robert interjected to say that yeah, someone needed to put the fear of god in her. I grabbed my helmet and handed my cell phone to Jessi.
Bella was deeply offended by me smacking her to have her keep up with me on the leadline, and hyper sensitive. She was *mad*. I swung up and she almost immediately started trotting away. Bella was trying to duck out towards the gate by popping her shoulder and bulling her way over, shaking her head, etc. Her saddle sucks for me because I can never get a solid seat in that big of a saddle, and it hurts my seatbones. But I was not coming off that mare. In about ten minutes I had her saying "yes ma'am" and working off my seat, legs, and opening reins. We cantered both directions, which she was absolutely shocked by, but didn't have any bucks. I got bored of randomly changing directions at the trot and stopped letting her have the rail because that made life too easy. The ground poles were still out so we trotted through one each direction. Bella did not want any part of this. I felt her trying to evade but I closed my legs and she didn't even dramatically change her rhythm. According to Colleen, though, her legs were crossing over every which way to try and run out. We got some pretty good trot-halt-trot transitions too. After about twenty minutes or half an hour she was soaked in sweat (I wasn't far behind) and had some of the fire taken out of her.
I talked to Jessi briefly about having Gillian and/or me put some training rides on her, because Bella is a nice enough horse, she just needs some whoopass, especially as green as she is. Jessi's not a bad rider but she hasn't been riding for very long. I've got way more stick, determination, and knowledge at this point (though she has more balls, I wouldn't have the guts to ride in her shoes). Robert mentioned it, apparently, so I'll talk to him on Saturday about it. I'm not riding for free directly for her, because that makes me have divided loyalties and time. I won't ride for pay directly for her either because I want to keep my ammy status! So Robert and I will have to work out an appropriate fee for him to ask. It'll probably be something like ten or fifteen bucks per ride, and I think 2x a week would be plenty.
Jack was out today with Colleen because Charlie was sick. First Rocky came up lame, and then everyone just had to come watch me work Bella, so it was 4:30 by the time I dismounted. Jack wanted to sit on a horse so Robert pulled out Keno, then suggested I put a bridle on him, then suggested I take Jack for a ride instead of just having a pony ride. Keno was good! He stood like a champ and wasn't too unhappy that we weren't letting him eat his hay. He did his little WP horse jog and Jack likes it better than Sunny's trot, he says.
We put Keno back and I was heading to the tack room to change when I got called back to look at the new kittens. Robert, predictably, says they're all keepers. (::headdesk::) There are two tuxedos and a "dalmatian kitty" and possibly one more, but I only saw three. I was tired enough to be insistent that we work on catching them, so Robert agreed to put a hardcore press on the kitten excavation project on Saturday. We will see.
So I dutifully went onto horse stuff. Grabbed Keno and tried putting my dressage saddle on him (still too tight in the shoulders, I'll have to find something to pad it up with). We went out in the field with him being way more snorty than usual, and something by the Morgan pasture made him spin and bolt and dance. I am not so much with the confidence so I hopped off and made him work on the ground (mini lunge circle, leading, etc) until he was not so jiggy and high-headed. Then hopped back on and walked home. We worked in the outside dressage arena until he was willing to give me his head. There was a lot of unauthorized trotting and bucking. He was basically a jerk and it was highly frustrating. I took his bridle off and put him in the crossties and then went to go see kittens. Alef and Dalet were in the forklift seat as usual. Mamacat emerged from behind the hay and let me pet her! She hasn't let us do that for months, since Robert nearly caught her in the live trap. I did catch a glimpse of a small kitten.
Finished untacking Keno, rinsed and put him back, ate lunch. I dragged out two poles and two small standards. One pole went between the standards, and the other one was perpendicular to the first pole, but by a standard. I grabbed Niki.
Niki did *not* want to walk at first, which makes some kind of sense because she's a hot little mare and it was a cool day. So we did a lot of long-trotting and I experimented with how much I could slow down her trot by slowing down my posting, which wasn't inconsiderable. We cantered (mostly on her own initiative) to the left the whole way around the arena, without popping out her shoulder and dragging me towards the gate. I gave her some slight directions and she took them, loose rein and fairly comfy canter. It was awesome! I tried trotting her over the pole against only one standard and she was unhappy about the idea, so we walked over it a couple times and then she trotted the other one, both directions, no problem. Ears perked, no rushing, definitely looking down at it. I tried cantering right lead and we had more problems than left, but we did get it eventually. Her "whoa" is getting worse, so I need to spend some time on that. We did some of the mugwump stuff, where as soon as she moves we go back to work, and I think she started to get the idea.
Star was one I had been plotting about the last couple days after watching the jumping session, and the reason why I actually pulled out the poles and standards. She didn't want to get caught but I guess that's not strictly unusual. She wanted to hesitate at the hay barn but didn't, so that was nice (no whip), and I am either less gentle about saddle pads and saddling than Gillian is, or I'm just not authorized to tack her up, because there was a lot of flinching. Mounted in the arena, and she didn't walk off immediately. It took a couple seconds, so that was an improvement from the last time I rode her. Gillian's saddle is hellish. I'm surprised I don't have bruises on my thighs today, actually. Star's a much bigger mover than any of my horses- they're all very smooth and flat-moving, so that took a lot of adjustment, and I didn't want to post off my thighs because oh god the pain. But we worked it out. She tried squirreling out over the first ground pole and I didn't let her, so she resigned herself to trotting over it, and then trotted over the one between the standards with little hesitation. We cantered- I like her canter!- and she went over the poles fairly willingly, even after she stumbled over one. The first time she broke to a trot but she kept her forward, and she kept her rhythm steady after that (other than when she knocked it). I was listening to my iPod and a slowish song came on but she matched her canter to that, it was very well done on her part.
Untacked her and put her back as Colleen was taking Rocky out. Rocky was very clearly sore on at least one of his hooves. Nothing in his feet, no heat in his legs, but he was standing very uncomfortably and his face showed a lot of pain. Robert and I immediately went to "founder." But he was willing to trot. We hosed off his feet and he seemed to do better on that. Right now he's getting a flake of hay and downgraded to a handful of grain. I don't know how he's doing today.
I was feeding and Robert was hosing off Rocky when Bella and Jessi came in. Jessi was really upset at Bella and I asked what happened- I think Bella bucked her off, Jessi was definitely not walking right. She was untacking Bella and I offered to hop on, since putting her back was not an option she wanted to take. Jessi made noises and Robert interjected to say that yeah, someone needed to put the fear of god in her. I grabbed my helmet and handed my cell phone to Jessi.
Bella was deeply offended by me smacking her to have her keep up with me on the leadline, and hyper sensitive. She was *mad*. I swung up and she almost immediately started trotting away. Bella was trying to duck out towards the gate by popping her shoulder and bulling her way over, shaking her head, etc. Her saddle sucks for me because I can never get a solid seat in that big of a saddle, and it hurts my seatbones. But I was not coming off that mare. In about ten minutes I had her saying "yes ma'am" and working off my seat, legs, and opening reins. We cantered both directions, which she was absolutely shocked by, but didn't have any bucks. I got bored of randomly changing directions at the trot and stopped letting her have the rail because that made life too easy. The ground poles were still out so we trotted through one each direction. Bella did not want any part of this. I felt her trying to evade but I closed my legs and she didn't even dramatically change her rhythm. According to Colleen, though, her legs were crossing over every which way to try and run out. We got some pretty good trot-halt-trot transitions too. After about twenty minutes or half an hour she was soaked in sweat (I wasn't far behind) and had some of the fire taken out of her.
I talked to Jessi briefly about having Gillian and/or me put some training rides on her, because Bella is a nice enough horse, she just needs some whoopass, especially as green as she is. Jessi's not a bad rider but she hasn't been riding for very long. I've got way more stick, determination, and knowledge at this point (though she has more balls, I wouldn't have the guts to ride in her shoes). Robert mentioned it, apparently, so I'll talk to him on Saturday about it. I'm not riding for free directly for her, because that makes me have divided loyalties and time. I won't ride for pay directly for her either because I want to keep my ammy status! So Robert and I will have to work out an appropriate fee for him to ask. It'll probably be something like ten or fifteen bucks per ride, and I think 2x a week would be plenty.
Jack was out today with Colleen because Charlie was sick. First Rocky came up lame, and then everyone just had to come watch me work Bella, so it was 4:30 by the time I dismounted. Jack wanted to sit on a horse so Robert pulled out Keno, then suggested I put a bridle on him, then suggested I take Jack for a ride instead of just having a pony ride. Keno was good! He stood like a champ and wasn't too unhappy that we weren't letting him eat his hay. He did his little WP horse jog and Jack likes it better than Sunny's trot, he says.
We put Keno back and I was heading to the tack room to change when I got called back to look at the new kittens. Robert, predictably, says they're all keepers. (::headdesk::) There are two tuxedos and a "dalmatian kitty" and possibly one more, but I only saw three. I was tired enough to be insistent that we work on catching them, so Robert agreed to put a hardcore press on the kitten excavation project on Saturday. We will see.
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
Got there at 10, hung out with Robert for a while since it has been a fairly long time since I actually talked to him. I guess I've been in a funk lately? Who knows. Robert had decided to spend the day cleaning up the feed table, so I helped him move it and put some stuff away.
Suited myself up in riding gear. My iPod was dead, and usually the the only way I go out in the field is with said iPod, so I can distract myself from worrying with music. But, after little-blond-pony-inspired boldness, I grabbed my cell phone and a Keno. He was desperately happy to be out until he saw the saddle. We headed out and walked around once on a long rein. He was very unhappy over the hose monster, displeased that things had changed in the neighbor's yard with respect to the well drilling equipment, and could have cared less about the haymonster this time.
After one time around, I gathered my reins and asked for a trot. He gave me a nice one and gave me his head, but around the curves and then on the stretch towards home he got rushy and headflippy and disobedient. I sighed and kept him moving. When we trotted past the culvert he threw his shoulder out a bit, but then gave me a nice trot again. He kept it up on the path towards home the second time, I guess he figured out that going towards home doesn't mean going home.
At this point, he was going nicely, we were on the stretch next to the neighbors' driveway, I thought what the hell and asked for a canter. Not the lead I asked for, but calm and responsive. About halfway down the stretch it was still going well so I asked for a hand gallop. Wheee! He came back down when I asked him to, and got a little jiggy at the very beginning but walked through the curves and down the stretch at a nice forward loose rein walk. Good times.
I also took Niki out. She was pretty hyper but behaved mostly. Bella was grazing right next to the arena (which I hate) and she just gave that mare a bit of a wider berth. She walked over the little crossrail Gillian set up, and then trotted over it on the lunge. Not pretty, but calm! Under saddle she chilled out a lot, eventually. We posted the trot relatively calmly and slow. We were much better with steering for the most part, and when Star bolted right at us, we were unhappy but did not do more than dance to the side a bit (which meant we didn't get hit, I'm okay with this). We did canter! It wasn't pretty, and she ran into it, but there wasn't anything more than some humping her back up.
Suited myself up in riding gear. My iPod was dead, and usually the the only way I go out in the field is with said iPod, so I can distract myself from worrying with music. But, after little-blond-pony-inspired boldness, I grabbed my cell phone and a Keno. He was desperately happy to be out until he saw the saddle. We headed out and walked around once on a long rein. He was very unhappy over the hose monster, displeased that things had changed in the neighbor's yard with respect to the well drilling equipment, and could have cared less about the haymonster this time.
After one time around, I gathered my reins and asked for a trot. He gave me a nice one and gave me his head, but around the curves and then on the stretch towards home he got rushy and headflippy and disobedient. I sighed and kept him moving. When we trotted past the culvert he threw his shoulder out a bit, but then gave me a nice trot again. He kept it up on the path towards home the second time, I guess he figured out that going towards home doesn't mean going home.
At this point, he was going nicely, we were on the stretch next to the neighbors' driveway, I thought what the hell and asked for a canter. Not the lead I asked for, but calm and responsive. About halfway down the stretch it was still going well so I asked for a hand gallop. Wheee! He came back down when I asked him to, and got a little jiggy at the very beginning but walked through the curves and down the stretch at a nice forward loose rein walk. Good times.
I also took Niki out. She was pretty hyper but behaved mostly. Bella was grazing right next to the arena (which I hate) and she just gave that mare a bit of a wider berth. She walked over the little crossrail Gillian set up, and then trotted over it on the lunge. Not pretty, but calm! Under saddle she chilled out a lot, eventually. We posted the trot relatively calmly and slow. We were much better with steering for the most part, and when Star bolted right at us, we were unhappy but did not do more than dance to the side a bit (which meant we didn't get hit, I'm okay with this). We did canter! It wasn't pretty, and she ran into it, but there wasn't anything more than some humping her back up.
Sunday, August 2, 2009
Less burning, more learning
Just rode the one horse saturday. I rode Papillon bareback while Alyssa rode lady. Papillon was having a bad day arthritis-wise. When she finally got that through her head she was much more willing to work under my direction. Trot only on the long sides, round your back more, nice smooth transitions. Normally Papillon will round up at the walk and canter without my asking as long as I'm sitting basically correctly. At the trot, first I dont always sit quite as correctly as I'd like, and second Papillon is very unforgiving. On a bad day though, I think I will continue to insist that she do the right thing and ease the weight on her front end.
I have perfected the mounting without rolling the bareback pad, and even though the girth on the pad came undone it didn't move an inch while we were riding, it just made Alyssa twitch a little. I really like that bareback pad, its cushy and fuzzy for high friction.
Most of the day was spent grilling Robert on his training ideas. You have to grill him if you want an efficient flow of information. He has a vast warehouse of information at his disposal, but the retrieval can be a little inconsistent. Lucky for me he's "going back to basics" with Reno to re-establish better bending and balance. To do this he's doing something I've been curious about for a while, namely, rollbacks. He's doing them on longlines and manages to keep Reno, stiff as he is, to keep his hind end mostly in place. At this point the rollbacks seem to be mostly turns on the hind end, but that is OK with me if it gets the job done.
I think I'll be pretty successful in getting Robert to teach me how this is done. Then I can practice on Reno and on poor Colonel, bwa ha ha ha ha. Supposedly Colonel knows how to do this. We shall see.
This next part is where I try to hash out what Robert and I are discussing. Its technical (I hope) so feel free to skip it.
Right now Robert is on a big kick about The Wither. I'm taking this to mean more physiologically thoracic vertebrae 1 through 8 or so. We've been talking about the lateral ark of The Wither. I'm going to represent it with ( and ) for pointing left and right respectively. The idea is that if the whither points left ( then the horse will go forward to the right because that is the way that they are bent.
Those of us who ride are painfully aware that a horse can have his neck bent to the right and still quite easily go left by poking out his left shoulder and dropping his right shoulder and away he goes! To my mind this is prevented by having the wither longitudinally balanced straight up and down. Then they cant drop the inside shoulder. I'm not really clear on this part. Maybe its an issue of the wither being more exaggerating of course, due to the limits of the symbols available to me. We all know they can do a leg yield bent smoothly in the opposite direction of travel. They can do a sidepass bent in the same direction of travel. ( I may have this backwards, but, no matter.) Maybe they have their wither straight | and are just bending their neck in front of the wither? I will have to clarify this more on tuesday.
I have perfected the mounting without rolling the bareback pad, and even though the girth on the pad came undone it didn't move an inch while we were riding, it just made Alyssa twitch a little. I really like that bareback pad, its cushy and fuzzy for high friction.
Most of the day was spent grilling Robert on his training ideas. You have to grill him if you want an efficient flow of information. He has a vast warehouse of information at his disposal, but the retrieval can be a little inconsistent. Lucky for me he's "going back to basics" with Reno to re-establish better bending and balance. To do this he's doing something I've been curious about for a while, namely, rollbacks. He's doing them on longlines and manages to keep Reno, stiff as he is, to keep his hind end mostly in place. At this point the rollbacks seem to be mostly turns on the hind end, but that is OK with me if it gets the job done.
I think I'll be pretty successful in getting Robert to teach me how this is done. Then I can practice on Reno and on poor Colonel, bwa ha ha ha ha. Supposedly Colonel knows how to do this. We shall see.
This next part is where I try to hash out what Robert and I are discussing. Its technical (I hope) so feel free to skip it.
Right now Robert is on a big kick about The Wither. I'm taking this to mean more physiologically thoracic vertebrae 1 through 8 or so. We've been talking about the lateral ark of The Wither. I'm going to represent it with ( and ) for pointing left and right respectively. The idea is that if the whither points left ( then the horse will go forward to the right because that is the way that they are bent.
Those of us who ride are painfully aware that a horse can have his neck bent to the right and still quite easily go left by poking out his left shoulder and dropping his right shoulder and away he goes! To my mind this is prevented by having the wither longitudinally balanced straight up and down. Then they cant drop the inside shoulder. I'm not really clear on this part. Maybe its an issue of the wither being more exaggerating of course, due to the limits of the symbols available to me. We all know they can do a leg yield bent smoothly in the opposite direction of travel. They can do a sidepass bent in the same direction of travel. ( I may have this backwards, but, no matter.) Maybe they have their wither straight | and are just bending their neck in front of the wither? I will have to clarify this more on tuesday.
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