It has finally made the transition to fall seemingly. I LOVE fall, except for the whole "leads to winter" thing. Days are a lot cooler. Which is what I'm blaming for the recent spastic nature of a certain roany paint pony...
Since I've been short on time and motivation, I've really enjoyed just hopping on Misty bareback for a ride in the field. But for some reason, this particular field just makes her all excited. I can ride her outside anywhere else and have a perfectly behaved pony, but for some reason this one gets her all uppity.
I thought the first time it was a fluke. I took her out bareback and she was walking along, a little tense, head up and looking around, but nothing indicating a looming explosion. Suddenly she reared up and spun around for absolutely no reason. Okay... Weird. I stayed on at least. We go back to our walk. And she does it again. And then again. Not okay.
I am so glad that even being out of shape for riding I still have some strong thighs and a sticky seat because I needed it all to stay on that night! She got worked quite hard and I decided that next time a saddle would come in handy.
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| Bad pony, pretty sunset. |
Next time rolls around and I saddle her up and take her out. This time I was prepared for her shenanigans. She certainly wasn't as bad, but there were a few times she tried to give a head toss and be naughty for no reason and even once almost tried to bolt after I had her jump the ditch out there. Geez mare. Lots and lots of figure 8's and serpentines to get her to loosen up and pay attention to me. By the end of our ride she was being absolutely perfect, but I'm still not sure what gets into her when we're out there.
On the flipside, she's been an absolute angel in the arena. I've been having some really good dressage rides and I had one of the best rides to date on her over fences the other day. I was over the moon. One goal this month was to jump her once a week to prepare for the show and just get her going better (more on the show later) and I mostly stuck to that plan, save for one week.
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| She looks dwarfed by 3' |
Anyways, this particular ride I just set up the barrels and a vertical. Warmed up at 2'6", bumped it up to 2'9" and finally finished it off at 3'. She was a little looky and wiggly towards it the first time at 3', but every single time after that she jumped it like a champ. No chip-in's or long spots, no knocking the rail or rubs, just perfect jumps. We jumped it a handful of times in both directions and it gave me a lot more confidence for the upcoming debut at Novice... Which didn't last by the way.
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| Poor neglected Jetta |
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