Balanced.. Training?

I've always been curious about the Pessoa lunging system.  It is way out of my price range for a gadget that I may not actually like.  I'm also not big on lunging as I want to get the physical benefits out of riding for myself as well.  With four horses at varying stages of training though, it looked to be something that might help spread me around better.

I had a neck stretcher that I'd bought at Dover that was decent enough, but again, I'd been choosing to ride and not lunge when the opportunity presented itself.  For my "tougher" horses (Mango and Piper), I'd bought a german martingale that only acts when they lift their head and serve as a quiet reminder to stretch down.  It works great with both of them as they're rather clever.

This is the trying out of the Balance System from State Line Tack in the pictures.  Piper did really well with it and I was able to adjust it to help her balance better at the canter with minimal contact.  Katy didn't get much out of it and Mango was just ok.  It didn't sell me on the item at this time, but as the horses get more advanced and I buy more essentials that are more important I may consider getting one just to help exercise them out.

Field Trip For Arthur

As much fun as I'm having playing with Katy and Piper, I believe my future lies with Arthur in some shape or another.  As such, I've stepped up his training and decided that I needed to have "lessons" to help make me get on him.  To be honest, the idea of riding him freaks me out.  Its not exactly fear or lack of trust in the big guy.  Its more a lack of trust in myself and my training abilities.  What I've been doing with him is different than I've done with other horses, but then again, I broke my rules and bought a "known" bucker so naturally I had to work outside my comfort zone.  Of course, he's really turned into a calm and quiet boy that's taking it all in stride and seems to be completely relieved to have his life simplified.

Which just leaves working on the mounted work.

I'm the type where repetition brings about confidence.  Once I've done it enough times then I own it.  Logically I have a checklist with him and a wonderful online help source to guide me on this journey.  Even for perfectionist me, I have to admit he's running out of ground work things and needs to be upgraded to a riding horse.  

When I thought about how I overcame some minor issues on cross country as a kid, I reminded myself I did best with people that told me to "just do it."  There's not really lessons for this training I'm doing so finding someone that could yell at me but also be knowledgable about what I've worked on seemed to be a daunting task.

Then I recalled I have a friend who's husband does this sort of thing.  I asked her if he'd be willing to help me out and to my shock, he agreed - for free!  I was so happy I could cry.  Due to our unnaturally wet year in Texas, I was only able to make it out there one time before May but Arthur was a rock star.  He acted the same there as he did at home.  We even got our first time in the round pen and he completely transferred all our training over to the round pen without missing a beat.  Shane rode him first and there were a few issues that I'd run into in the past few months so he showed me how to work it out.  He also said a round pen would help this along much fast and I frowned.  It was obvious but I didn't see that in the cards financially but I'd figure out something even if it was trailering places to use theirs.

I was so proud of my boy though as he did a great job being in a strange place, doing things that had bothered him before, and recalling his training so well.  We still have a fair amount of work to do on his exiting the trailer, but we made progress!

Springtime Blow

 Here's a quick run down of things we've done this spring:

Pierce was rocking his lessons with Erica on Katy.

Katy and I had our first over the top, full on sweaty ride of the year.  Yummy!

Mango started to look less like a Hereford cow.

Mango got more work on not looking like a Hereford cow.

Katy finally put on a ton of weight, hooray for the green grass!  She's up to about 1100lbs now!

Arthur started working on "pressure" training.  Namely neck stretcher, lunging aids to learn to go forward with contact.

The horses died.  Wait, no.  Sunbathed a lot :) 

Katy went from looking bay last year to kind of rabicano.  This year when she shed out it was a full on roan.  Go figure old lady!

Pony Clubber?

As a teenager, I didn't do Pony Club.  My parents were NOT horse people and after wishing and begging for a horse for 10 years, they acquiesed adn let me have a horse as part of a bribe package.  I'm not sure they were aware of what they had done.  During the four years of high school that I owned that horse, I worked my tail off, took lessons, and absorbed everything I could possibly absorb from the adults around me.  There were no other kids at the barn I was at so I had to behave and work as hard (or harder) than them by default.  All this was amazing but it made it a bit mystical to me when I went to clinics.

Due to my age, I naturally was grouped with the Pony Club kids.  They seemed like good kids, happy and loving their social group.  I don't recall longing to be part of that, but I did envy the fact that they were part of a "program."  Adults helping you with ratings and other things like that?  A book to follow?  Based on European standards?  Man, that sounded amazing for a workaholic teen like myself.

But I never did Pony Club and ended up pretty successful without it.

With my son, I'm trying to do some things differently.  First, I discouraged him from the horses.  Its expensive, dangerous, time consuming and while there are real life lessons to be learned, its a tough road to go.  Naturally he wants to ride.  And show the dogs, so whatever.  He started out earning the ride by doing grooming and other odd jobs.  We started doing lessons and then Erica took over them and his form got to look really really good really really fast.  Additionally, I was never a social kid.  I never craved companionship except from one or two close friends, my animals, and my imagination.  My son is not that way.  He's outgoing, confident, social, and easily dazzles people.  This all means I'm forced to interact with other adults about my kid.

So Pony Club sounded like something I might like to get involved with.  It paralleled my changing focus from "family friendly/only trail riding luls" to eventing.  Much better than the catty parents at coop sports events, the Pony Club people were very kind, welcoming, and almost over the moon for us to come out.  This was at a Jumper Charity event they had put on locally.  The leader invited us to try a meeting/rating day that was coming up so we did.

Naturally both the pony and Katy were feeling frisky when the rains came in but Pierce didn't seem to notice.  Since both horses are a little too much for Pierce on his own and I wanted to avoid a train wreck with another child's horse, I made arrangements to be the handler for Katy.  She was a turd for all the rail parts, but once we stared doing poles and she had a "job" she was easily ridden by Pierce.

Overall it was fun and Pierce loved it (but he loves most outings).  The horses need some more work and I want Pierce better prepared with his riding skills but I'd say Pony Club might be something in the next year or so.  I'm also looking at the 4H program (we already have most all the critters and gear so why not?) so we'll take it all one step at a time.  The right answer always presents itself in good time. :)

Arthur's First "Bad Ride"

As satisfied as I was with Arthur, Erica and myself previously, this weekend was a bad one for Arthur and myself.  Oddly enough it started with warmer (70 degree +) and our wind that won't go away.  Nothing bad, but apparently enough that all the horses were a bit "up."

Arthur was a bit "off."

In Arthur terms, this means everything is out to get him.  Saturday started with him being tied to his tree.  I moved my arm and he reared and pulled back so we began desensitizing to waving things, running things, scary things that a human can do (bunny hopping!), and anything that I could do with myself and a rope.  He ended the session standing still but not as relaxed as I would like.  We tacked him up an hour or so later and let him stand still.  When it was his turn, I worked on his groundwork and he did decent for him.  I don't like his slight movements but he is fully relaxed while it is happening so I feel we're dealing with him anticipating but not thinking things through.  So basically this was a "break the trust, rebuild the trust" sort of day.

Sunday started out great.  Well, until Katy decided to rear up... and over while being groomed.  (Seriously what was WITH this weekend!).  Naturally Arthur thought everyone was dying and he too reared up and back.  Both horses broke their lead ropes and so had to be re caught.  Awesomesauce.

Once more tied up (Arthur in Katy's spot and she in his this time for her sake), we got to work.  Arthur was last to go and was a rock star all day despite the start.  He was really laid back (almost to the point of not paying attention... sigh) and did great when I did his groundwork.  We've been adding in a jump where he goes next to it, around it, I stand on it, anything I can think of.  Since I suck at working him constructively from a fence, I worked him from an 18" cross rail.  He ended up straddling it while I rubbed him down from "above" and he was relaxed and engaged about it all.  I decided to pop Erica on him and try for a boring repeat of last time.

The mounting block was again an issue but he worked through it with me simply standing on his offside.  Erica systematically worked through getting on him and he was aware but good for it.  Until he decided that this was boring and wanted to eat grass.  UGH!  I kept reminding him of his "job" and he'd go Oh, Right! and pay attention again.  I made sure he was aware when she tried to get on and his head raised somewhat when she finally sat down and fixed her stirrup on the offside.  His head went right back down though and all was well.  I moved out in front of him and then... it happened.

A slow motion oh crap sort of thing.

First steps were fine, then he was less fine, then fine, then NOT FINE.  Since he's trusting me so much, I had 16.3h of scared baby traumatized horse coming at me while I tried to protect my rider.  Erica was unbalanced away from me and with Arthur turning towards me I was out of options.  She flew off, landing on her shoulder/neck but was moving immediately.  Arthur flexed to a halt and immediately began relaxing.  Erica was "fine" and got up quickly.  We were both puzzled and went through the pre flight checklist.  Naturally I had a dog training client show up right about that time, so I handed him to Erica to being checking out his issues.

After my training session, Erica had returned and simply said "I had spurs on."  While relieved that there was a "reason" I was worried about my rider, frustrated about the idea that I had another thing to add to my million issues list (not that it wasn't on there already), frustrated that I let this happen (not that I had a ton of control but I could have done more groundwork or something), and grumpy about the future with Arthur.  Erica was fine though and Arthur was readily back to dopey relaxed baby horse so I got over it and decided that we have to work some more.

Things on my to do list:

• Fix the shifty foot thing
• More "scary" and "unpredictable" human things mixed with desensitizing - aka spurs
• Work on trot poles/interesting distractions/problem solving to help with boredom
• A million other things and trust building
• Not kill my rider

Arthur's "First Ride"

Overall, Arthur has been doing well with his training.  I can work him through the basic ground work stuff and he's willing and eager to work.  There are a few things that can be more perfect but as a perfectionist I could be dwelling on those for a long time.  Basically, how good is good?  When is enough enough?

We've progressed with leaving him tied while we work the other horses and he does great with that consistently.  I started grooming him this weekend while tied and he enjoyed it.  He's really starting to be a horse now and its pretty cute but in true gelding/young/clueless horse manner that means he's "Getting into trouble" with mouthing, nuzzling, etc so we're working on showing him the boundaries on that.  He's catching on well though without startling or resentment.

After an unremarkable set of weeks and a lot of planning and freaking out (on my part), I've decided that it was time to increase his training.  My rider, Erica, has volunteered to ride him and while I'm not comfortable with that at this as a go get 'em method, I rationalized that having her on him while I did groundwork would be a nice bridge and that he was ready for that.

I worked him in her saddle and worked up to her mounting.  Naturally I spent a lot of time on mounting and addressing any small glitches but he seemed quite good about the whole thing.  She mounted uneventfully and I moved him out on lead.  My nice calm Arthur was there and ready to work.  He worked through walk/trot on the lunge line easily and listened as well as he does without a rider.  Erica raising her hand was a little cause for concern, but by lowering and raising it until he was fine with it solved that and she was able to ride with an outstretched arm in short order.

After 10 minutes or so he was plenty relaxed so we started walking again and I let Erica flex and ask for some leg cues.  Both of which he responded readily and was a rockstar.  We worked on her maneuvering him near and away from me and he had little issue.  The biggest problem was me near his haunches where he wanted to disengage and move away but quickly figured out when the focus was on Erica.

I'm not going to breath a sigh of relief and proclaim him fixed, but its a new step and that's rewarding.  Now we just need to repeat it 1000 more time successfully.  Baby steps, very small baby steps.  I'm also ready for some backsliding as we get to better weather/daylight and I can work him more.

I'm a Cross Country Beast!

For such an epic day, this will be a relatively short post :P

I'd been dying to get a lesson in out at Pine Hill for well over a month but weather and schedules were not working.  My desire to get out and jump things over rode my "need" to be escorted around by someone.  Erica and I loaded the mares up for a fun schooling day at Pine Hill.

The objectives were pretty easy: expose them to the varying types of cross country obstacles.  These were jumping flat, jumping a drop, jumping a bank, and then... just jumping.  I was hoping to loosely jump anything beginner novice or lower as we felt it fit.  It had been raining so we had to check the footing for everything but that allowed for plenty of rest time.

We jumped banks, drops, roll tops, boxes, benches, ditches, logs, logs on an incline, stadium jumps (including our first one stride in and out and oxer wooo) plus we hit the dressage ring for a "fake" test run to let the mares see an arena.  Three hours later we felt tired but like rock stars.

It was a great day of baby jumps!

Tired Ladies!