Jumping, Shots & Bits

Finally got around to jumping Miss Jetta yesterday. I decided to set out a jump (just a couple barrels) and then if she warmed up nicely, we'd jump them a couple times. She was super good warming up so I just put her on a 20 meter circle and started off to the left jumping the barrels. She was so good!

Usually with smaller jumps she still has a tendency to launch herself over for some reason but we didn't have any of that. I was able to see our distances and ride her to them. Jetta jumped the barrels quietly then was attentive when I asked her to return to the trot or halt. We started out trotting over the barrels then cantered.

When we went to the right it wasn't quite as pretty. Not our best direction. We had a hard time getting the right distance to the jump at the canter, especially as she got more and more tired. But overall, it was a really good ride and I was impressed with her quietness after not jumping in over a month!

Both girls got their shots yesterday too. Well, half of them. They got a West Nile shot and then I'll give the four-way shot next week just to spread it out. Both girls were fine for it. I'm so glad my horses don't freak out about shots. Especially because I like to give it in their butt muscle which is the prime location for you to get kicked. Queenie didn't even flinch.

Queenie was okay for her rides the past couple days. On Friday there was a brief break in the rain so all of the horses got turned out except for her since I was working with her. This normally isn't a huge problem, she gets a little worried then settles down. But the arena door was open and she was just losing it every time we passed by. "OMG there's a horse out there! And it's looking at meeee! OMGosh! There's a small child! Ahhhhh! OMYGOSH they let the dogs outside!" And on and on. Eventually we got her brain back inside her head and had a good ride where we worked on our canter transition with some very good results. It's almost to a normal canter! It's no longer an out-of-hand gallop, but more of an only slightly frantic fast canter.

I tried out a curb bit on her yesterday. We've been working on neck reining and she's starting to get an idea of what that is. Nothing too exciting happened. She wasn't a huge fan of it, but not bad for her first time. The main problem was getting the whole set up to fit. My curb strap wasn't big enough because I specifically bought small curb straps for my horses because all "normal" curb straps seemed to fit my horses like they were made for draft horses. And now I have a draft horse... But I found a chain that fit just fine.

What is this thing in my mouth?

Started out just asking her to turn and stop from pressure on the bit on the ground and then got on. She doesn't need a whole lot of bit use. She knows to drop her head when I raise my hands an inch or two, even without touching her mouth. She stops when I say "whoah". Mostly it's just steering issues because she's still not the straightest horse and will sometimes cut the corners or randomly decides to go off on the diagonal.