A return to basics

Went out with Colonel to do some more lunging in the field. Soon the field will be mostly closed off for hay production. (I'll have a path all the way around, but few open areas to be in.) He went out calm, a little bit of snorting and occasionally forgetting his place and rushing ahead. In the dressage arena he was trotting pretty hot. He started coming into my space but when told to go out, he bucked and ran. OK, the ground was decent enough, he was sufficiently warmed up, so I had him canter some. When he came back down to the trot, push push up into the canter again. He was still pretty hot, but I wanted to get moving. He spooked at something and tried to run a circle around me. Not great but better than slamming into me with his shoulder. We lunged some more over by the scary propane tank all the horses love to spook at. Then we did something thats historically been tough for Colonel, we went over the second creek. He got pretty amped up but remained tolerable, just a lot of backing him back up. I found a spot where I could lunge him in a small walk circle. He calmed down right away. Just walking along, suspicious of his surroundings but no wrong steps. Coming back home he was really good. I tested him repeatedly and he almost always managed to stop with his ears at my shoulder.

I want to really start riding him a lot outside, I want him to be reliable on the loop around the field. That way we can do lots of straight work, build his confidence and sense of balance. My dream has always been to get a horse (and myself) to the point where we could canter all the way around the field. It would be awesome to get both Star and Colonel to that point.

Went out and plowed with Robert, Alyssa and Luca. I think Alyssa hit the nail on the head when she observed that Luca doesn't think of walking as a working gait. He really wanted to just get this all over with as fast as possible, so he tended to rush a lot. Robert says this is normal, and still seems to think Luca might be ready in time for the plowing show next month.

Then it was time for Star. She was pretty antsy, but she walked around the arena well enough. Then I asked for the trot. Boom! Head in the air, back hollow, counter-bending and running sideways. I brought her back down to the walk to try for another transition. This one was moderately better in that she went straight(ish). So I trotted a really pissed off horse around and around. She went through brief periods of calm (particularly when moving away from the gate and when not in view of Keno) but then worked herself back up again.

I asked for some canter in hopes that this would wear her down faster. She did some of her stoping and rearing thing but I got my hips lined up right and asked again, and I think she saw the crop stuck in my boot and she decided to move. The other thing that helped is I let her go a few strides before checking her speed. That was sortof a "well duhh" moment but, so it goes. We zoomed around at a pretty good pace. We did this both directions and I let her walk.

She walked relatively calmly with her head slung low. Then she saw Keno outside and I guess she just couldnt help herself. So around and around we went. I'm not sure how many times this happened, but eventually she was getting pretty sweaty, and it was hot out, so I got her to walk around reasonably well for a while and then I called it a day.

When I took off the saddle Alyssa pointed out that she had some dry spots, where the saddle was putting on too much pressure. I hadn't heard of this saddle fitting diagnostic tool before, but I like it. Plus its a good excuse to force myself to really work Star the way she needs to be worked. So I'm going to be playing around with different saddles and saddle pads. If all else fails I might shell out the money for one of those fancy saddle fitting pads with the adjustable shims. I really would like to be able to stop worrying about saddle fit finally.