Horsing Around

Sorry for the awful title, but we've really just been playing around this week which is kind of bad considering that we were planning on going to a dressage show next weekend. So I guess that it's kind of good that I got waitlisted for the show? Since when does that ever happen for an unrecognized dressage show? I'm not too bummed about it though.

It's rare to catch her napping mid-day!

Monday we just goofed around in western tack. Don't ask me why, but for some reason I decided that Misty needed a completely new western set up. So she got new dark teal boots, a gray and turquoise/teal pad and a new headstall (of course with a turquoise buckle). I'm obsessed. It looks great on her. Now I just actually have to ride western more often?

So adorable

I've been searching for a pad these colors for forever!

The headstall is a little iffy since it's an orange-y light brown that doesn't match my saddle whatsoever. I gave it a few coats of Hydrophane darkening oil and there was only a marginal difference. I'm going to give it a bit more, then maybe think of ordering some actual stain since the leather isn't finished anyways and I just want it to match my saddle.

Anywho, any advice is appreciated on how to darken this awful color of leather without stain.

Then yesterday I lunged Misty and then we played around with a new yoga ball that was left in the "toy corner". I can't remember if I've ever introduced Misty to a yoga ball, but if I did it was over two years ago. She acted like she didn't remember it (if she had ever seen one) and while she wasn't scared of it, she definitely wasn't interested in touching it.

I kicked the ball around and we followed it around a bit to get her confidence up, then tried to get her to kick it. No luck. She got very good at avoiding it at any and all costs, still not scared of it, just not understanding. Eventually she realized it wasn't awful if the ball touched her legs and it was kind of neat that she could kick it around. By the end, I could direct her at the end of the lunge line towards it and she'd do a pretty good job of tracking it and kicking it by herself without too much input from myself.

We finished up by lunging over some barrels. I've been trying to do more lunging jumps to improve both her confidence and fitness. So it was a fun day! At least for me :)

Ponies' Got Hops

I had so much fun free jumping the beasts yesterday evening! I decided that I would free jump Misty because we'd never done it before, then I'd ride Jetta.

Note: There are pictures, but they are pictures of a still on my camera. I was too lazy to actually upload them to Youtube and/or put them on my computer and screenshot them. So very poor quality. But cool! Also, I couldn't take pics because somehow I forgot the batteries for my remote. Oops. So I had to do vids. 

I set up a 2' vertical, 2 strides, then a 2'6" X for her to jump. First challenge: getting her to go in the chute. She showed off her most fancy cowhorse/reining moves - sliding stops, spins and fast turns, all to avoid going in the chute. Finally I got her to jump over the first fence, then she hopped over the side which was taller (3') but apparently less scary than the X. After getting her to awkwardly go through a couple times and stuffing her with treats each time afterwards, she finally decided that it wasn't THAT awful, and she could potentially forgive my meanness for making her jump if I provided her with enough treats.

Cuteness!!

Once she felt more comfortable I upped it to 3'3" (I thought it was only 3' but afterwards I measured and found all of my estimations were way off!). She cleared it but it was a definite stretch for her. I think as a jumper pony 3'3" would probably be her max schooling height with 3' her comfortable show height, but hey, maybe once she builds more strength she could do more. I was super proud of her anyhow!

With all the time it took convincing her to jump, I didn't have as much time as I'd like to ride Jetta but she was looking so eager at the jumps so I stuck her in the arena, where she immediately started trotting around. I love how excited she is to jump :)

No bigs

I popped her over the 3'3" jump with no problem. She barely put in any effort. Easy peasy for her. So I bumped it up to what I thought was 3'6" (but it turns out was actually 4'3") and that was definitely more work, but still fairly easy for her. So I ran her over that a few times. That's the highest I'd ever free jumped her.

A little bit better effort

But on a whim, I decided to bump it up one more notch since she seemed game. It looked HUGE. I thought it was 4'6", maybe 4'9" but after measuring it after I put Jetta away, it turns out that it was ALMOST FIVE FOOT ONE INCH. Dang. I could never imagine jumping anything that big.

HOLY COW. I can't stop staring at this picture on my Instagram...

Jetta trotted in all lazily despite my insistence that she might want to have a bit more impulsion, but after sitting back and looking at it she launched and cleared it!!! Crazy. I was super excited. I gave her some pats and treats then put her away, thrilled. I just love this horse.

That hind end...

Desensitization Extravaganza

No ride for the poor ponies yesterday. It's dead week which means I literally feel like death. Can this term be over pretty please? Today started off rather well with me waking up early (not a morning person) to get to my one class today. Only to walk all the way across campus and show up at an empty classroom. Huh, guess I forgot to remember that class was cancelled today? Oh well it was a nice walk I guess.

At least I got to see my favorite flowers blooming everywhere!

Anyways, onto the ponies. Goals for Queenie today:

• Mounting: She has no problem with me jumping up and down besides her, throwing myself at her or bouncing in the stirrup but as soon as I throw my leg over she has a minor melt down. Not okay, I don't particularly enjoy the feeling of sitting on a bomb about to explode nor will it inspire confidence in anyone who comes to look at her and the first thing she does is spook.
• How we're going to fix it: lots of mounting! Get on, wait for her to settle, give her a treat and lots of scritches, then get off. Get back on, wait for her to settle, give her a treat and lots of scritches, then get off. Rinse, repeat until she decides that it's not such a bad thing. 
• Halting: I don't know what was done to her but halting scares her. I pull on both reins, albeit gently, and she sucks back and stops suddenly then moves her feet all over the place. We established an emergency one rein stop as soon as I got on her for our first ride (thank GOODNESS I decided to work on that first, it's a lifesaver). The one rein stop doesn't bother her one bit, she stops and stands nicely. 
• How we're going to fix it: lots of stopping! I feel like this is something that just has to be done over and over and over again because there's not a lot else to do to fix this. Once she finally plants her feet she's fine, just the first 30 seconds to a minute she dances around and I don't want to have to rely on a one rein stop. 
• Spooking at Everything: She literally spooks at everything. Oh poor mare. I promise that not everything is out to get you. Hence my title for the day.
• How we're going to fix it: Expose her to lots of scary stuff! I'm going to go buy a little 5x7' tarp this weekend, going to bring a plastic bag to tie on the end of my carrot stick to work with her with, I'm going to set up a mini "trail course" with poles and barrels and flowers and such, and we're going to go for a scary walk outside over to the weigh station (I want to see how much this beast weighs!) During all of this we're going to work on ground manners because blowing through the halter is not okay. She's in a rope halter but she still doesn't listen to it and I hate chains so I never want anyone to feel like they have to use one one her so she needs to learn how to respond to a plain halter.

Goals for the Jetta monster:

• Steadier in the bridle: She was driving me nuts the other day with her playing with the contact. I told her last time I rode her that if she can act like a grown up the next time I ride her then I will set up jumps on Friday. We'll see how that goes.
• Desensitizing! Like I stated in my last post, Jetta has the spring spookies. She's not typically a spooky horse. So like Queenie, she's going to get the whole nine yards of desensitization. Remember the whole running away with the ribbons thing? Yeah, those ribbons are coming back and we're going to work on that. I am sorely tempted to just tie them to her bridle and set her loose in the arena until she figure out that they're not going to eat her but I figure that's unusually cruel so we'll just work on me rubbing and fluttering them on her face until she decides they're not worth the effort of spooking.

If all goes well with Jetta being a grown-up (she is after all almost seven so I can't pull the baby horsey card anymore) we will jump on Friday and then I will decide what classes to enter for the jumping show at the end of this month! It's actually an indoor event derby - they will have show jumping classes and indoor xc classes. I feel comfortable doing beginner novice at 2'7" both show jumping and xc, and I feel pretty comfortable doing novice at 2'11" for show jumping but I'm not quite sure if I should test the waters and try xc. I'm still a bit of a scaredy cat after she dumped me over that novice coop last summer. Plus I don't know if I should spend all the money doing all four classes since they're $20 a pop. Decisions, decisions.

And in a slightly more random note, please someone buy this horse:

This is Dusty. He boards at my barn and I'm in love/in serious want with him.

He's four years old and get this: he's a 1/2 Arab, 1/2 Missouri Fox Trotter. Now, I don't like either of those breeds typically, I'm just not a fan. I don't have anything against them, they're just not my thing. But I LOVE Dusty.

The owner just dropped his price to $2250. I wish I could afford him but my budget for horses tends to be $500 or free. And I can't rationalize another project for that much when I have several at my disposal that are free.

What I love about him: he has gorgeous conformation. That picture doesn't quite show it, but he's got a neck that's to die for. And he has lovely gaits. I was quite surprised to see him move, he's got a floaty trot and canter and he oversteps by several inches without even trying when he walks and trots. Dressage prospect!! He's only been ridden western but I think he'd make an awesome dressage horse and be versatile enough to switch back and forth from dressage to western.

Only thing I don't like about him is he's very mouthy. Not bitey, but just loves to lick and lip you at all times. Definite pet peeve of mine, but he's like a puppy. You can't get mad with those big brown eyes looking at you.

Another girl at the barn just started "working" with him cause his owner doesn't have time to ride him. She just posted on facebook about this new "colt" she was putting "training" on and "starting" him under saddle and that he'll make a nice horse for gaming. Oh dear, first of all he's already been started, second of all you aren't going to increase his value with gaming training. Please someone save this poor guy. He doesn't want to be a gamer he wants to be a fancy dressage horse!

Major PITA

As I'm sure you are all aware, Jetta can be a major PITA. Which she has been the past couple days. Roller coaster I tell 'ya.

Saturday was yet again another crazy day. I woke up too early at 6am to go get Jetta and have a lesson with KB. While at our last lesson Jetta was too forward - running and anticipating the canter - Jetta was more on the lazy side this time. There is no middle ground with this horse.

I got there early and lunged and when I got on she was behind my leg and not really wanting to move out. Sigh... She was also doing the nasty rooting thing which I can't stand. I know she's doing it because of nerves, but the past few lessons (before our most recent with TS) she was perfectly fine. I really want to haul her to a different barn and just school her so she learns to cut it out.

Despite Jetta being a complete brat for the lesson I got some good pointers, as always. The two things we worked on were our leg yields and canter transitions.

For the leg yields, KB said I was bending Jetta's neck too far in order to get her to move her hip over. This was disappointing to hear because I felt that our leg yields were getting so much better! But they're not :( It makes sense though. So to fix this I just need to ask for a straighter neck then we need to work on getting her more responsive to my leg for stepping over. Because straight neck = less yielding to my leg in Jetta's book.

Next up was canter transitions. KB's contribution on finding that "perfect" cue is to ask three times with each of my aids - outside leg, inside leg, seat - and then if she's still trotting nicely then she's allowed to canter. This really, really pisses Jetta off and she ended up kicking the wall. What a fantastic way to make an impression right?

But we'll see how it goes. It makes sense to me, I'm just worried about desensitizing her too much and having her blow me off when I do ask for the transition. We did get some lovely ones, it was tough though.

Today was more of the brattyness. I lunged Jetta then had a quick ride. She was ok - not actively bad but not her best either. Then the plan was to do a white lightning soak on her back hooves, wash her tail and start pulling her mane.

Problem? Getting her into the wash rack. She flat out refused. And it's not because she's afraid of it or anything. She tolerates baths pretty well. No, she just likes to argue with me for the sake of arguing. I argued with her for over 30 minutes using everything in the book to convince her to get in the wash rack. She'd stick one front hoof in, I'd praise her, then when I asked her to go further in, she'd back out.

This is the problem with having a dominant horse. I love her to death but she drives me nuts because she's always seeking a way to get back on top. I finally lunged her in the arena so she didn't get a break and the wash rack would be a more relaxing place, then resorted to flat out bribery.

I grabbed a armful of hay, plopped it down at the back wall of the wash rack and sat down, studiously ignoring Jetta but making sure to rustle the hay a lot. She had the most adorable look on her face - she wanted that hay so bad but still didn't want to step foot in the wash rack. Finally I held a handful out under her nose and she stepped both front feet into the wash rack, then the back feet followed.

Looking so pitiful as she decides whether or not to step into the wash rack

Two feet in...

And we have all four feet!

I'm not sure who won this round - me or her?

She cleaned up all the hay, so I left her in the cross ties and put everything  (that I didn't get to use...) away. Then I stood with my back to her until she stopped pawing and bobbing her head, handing her treats whenever she stood still.

She is such a piece of work.

I think this week we'll be tacking up in the wash rack until she decides it's no big deal.

Struttin'

Jetta has been having fun free lunging and I enjoy watching her strut her stuff.

Sometimes I think I am so lucky to have found this horse ♥

Being a dork. Someday she's going to flip her head and run into the wall, lol.

Look at that overstep!

Being a good girl and coming into me when asked

"You called?"

Stretching...

Sorry for the overkill of pictures but I couldn't get over how lovely she looked!

Grounded

I have decided that this week Jetta is grounded. Or rather I am grounded. While I would love, love, love to ride, I just have no desire to try and ride a horse that's going to attempt to buck me off despite my best efforts to prevent it or teach her that bucking's not ok. Sigh. So this week we are taking a slight break and doing ground work. Lots of it.

Today I long lined her for the first time since over the summer and she was super good. I warmed her up on the lunge line so she could get the bucks out and had her hop over some barrels. Silly horse - she won't jump barrels when they are off the wall, she'll just go around it. She has no problem however with a cavaletti or other jump that is not on the wall. When I put the barrels on the wall, it's no biggie. Silly pony.

I'm also teaching her a new "trick". It's more of a command, not really a trick, but I'm pleased with how quickly she's learning it. I'm teaching her to "side up" to the mounting block so that when I get on the mounting block and say "side up" she will scooch over so that I can get on. It's a very useful thing to be able to do, something that Jazz had down to a science. I teach her by tapping her on the hip that is opposite of me so that she moves away from the pressure, in my direction. Once she aces that with only a light tap, I'll introduce the voice command to "side up".

Other than that, not much other excitement. It'll be tough sticking to my plan of being grounded for the week, but I hope by next week Jetta may have forgotten about this whole bucking thing. If I could be so lucky :)

We are Back in Business!

So I'm back up at school today, which is both a good thing and a bad thing. For one, I don't have to keep coming up to here to ride or get things (such as my textbooks. I think I drove up here three or four times last week!) but I don't get to hang with my family or my animals at home and I actually have to go to class. But I'm really excited for this term because I have better classes. I got rid of Animal Science 100 - Orientation, which was a total bore, as well as Global Women's Studies, which just wasn't my thing, and I have replaced those classes with some ACTUAL Animal Science classes: ANS 121 - Intro to Animal Science, which should be easy as I have raised beef, swine, horses and poultry at some point but nevertheless it should be enjoyable. I also added ANS 280 which is Companion Animals, which focuses on cats and dogs as well as a little bit with lizards, pet birds, rabbits and pocket pets such as hamsters. So I'm looking forward to it.

In other news, I went out and worked with Jetta. It is freezing today. I felt like I was going to end up with icecicles hanging off my nose. I just did ground work today - some free-lunging, then some work on the lunge line and working on getting Jetta to move her feet when I ask. She was super full of herself when I free-lunged her, though she still cantered around in a small circle around me. Which made me feel special ;) Lunging went ok, but she was not happy about having side reins- she kept leaning hard on them, then popping her head up, but I think they'll help with riding because then she only leans on herself and not me! She was kind of a brat about the ground work. She can be super pushy or just plain obnoxious when you're trying to do stuff with her. So I was asking her to move her shoulders, then her haunches, then back up, etc. She did really good on her near side, but the off side was terrible, so we'll have to work on that.

Wheee!

I think I've decided to keep the bridle. I love the quality and I had one of the ladies at the barn who rides dressage come look at it and she thinks it fits, but it's just a little stiff. I'm sure I'll get used to the chunky cavesson.

Poor Katy has a sinus infection. ML had the vet out because she was having a runny nose (which we figured was just a minor cold) which then evolved into a major runny nose with coughing. The vet gave her some antibiotics and she's also getting a vitamin C supplement, so I hope she'll get better soon.

That probably means that we aren't going to be going to the schooling show on the 15th, but we'll have to see. It would be the perfect introduction into showing and jumping at a show, it's close and cheap, but if Katy isn't better soon, we'll just have to cross that one off the list. But on the plus side there's a huge tack sale back home that we could go to. Not that I really need anything, but it can't hurt to look :)

Luckily there's another show on the 23rd that we can go to. It's slightly larger (translation: there'll be more people that I can embarrass myself in front of), not as close, and just a little more expensive, but still a good venue. I'm hoping to go to as many shows as possible, depending on how much $ I have, so we'll see. I at least would like to go to a Sporthorse Breed show and do some conformation classes and a Materiale class.

I was looking at the new 2011 tests online (my test booklet hasn't come in the mail yet) and they're hard to find! At least anything higher than intro is. I learned that intro now has three tests instead of just the two, and the third test has cantering! So we might be stuck at intro for a while until we can control our canter. I'm hoping to get a 70% or two before moving up to training level, just so I know that we've covered all of the basics.

If you need the new tests, here's a link that has all the tests from Training Level up, then this one has intro and misc tests, but you have to be a member and log in I think.

Stud Chains

Many times I am surprised that there are people who don't do ground work. They complain that their horse is a jerk on the ground, but when someone suggests doing ground work, they look at them in confusion or say "Why would I do that?" There are many reasons for doing ground work, including but not limited to teaching your horse manners, freshening up your training schedule, making your horse a dream to handle on the ground, preparing for doing things under saddle, and during times when you can't ride, ground work gives you something to do.

What is ground work exactly? Well, it's teaching your horse things like how to walk an appropriate distance from you, how to stop when you stop, turn when you turn, etc. Teaching them to step over when you need them to move, handle feet, ears, etc easily, introduce new objects. It's also lunging and long lining (or ground driving), and generally teaching them things that make it easier for you to handle them on the ground.

One thing I see a lot is horses who don't know how to lead. What I mean is that they don't stop when you ask them to, drag you around when they feel like it, won't back up or move out of your way and require a lot of strength to handle in general. Most of these horses end up with a stud chain. Why? Mostly I think its because I think the horses are either afraid of the horse or they see everyone else doing and think why not?

There are several different methods for applying a stud chain and while they can be used humanely (they are always advertised as "humane") most of the time they aren't, or are being used as a substitute for proper training.

Under the chin. Common for 'correcting' the
horse, but little other value.

Over the nose. Used in unruly horses who won't
stand still, run away with the handler or rear.



A lip chain acts against the gums and has very severe action.
Tell me, does this horse look happy?


  I can understand using a stud chain if you are an experienced handler who has a horse that has a lot of explosive energy some of the time and you can't control them with proper training or you are in a new situation and you have an excitable and naughty 1200lb horse charging across the arena. They can also be used in vet procedures if your horse decides, for instance, they would not like their eye looked at, but again training is a huge factor. Stallions are the most common recipient of the stud chain, thus its name, because a lot of people are afraid of them and these horses aren't trained to behave properly regardless of their hormones.

While the stud chain can be a tool to use humanely, most the time it isn't. Most of the time I see horses being jerked around with a stud chain that gives no release, it is yanked on very hard repeatedly for no good reason, the horse is trying to trot in a showmanship class but when it doesn't go fast enough it is pulled on, making the stud chain go into effect, and it is used as a band-aid, not a cure for poor training.

You shouldn't have to use a stud chain to control your horse. I use rope halters that give you a little more leverage than a webbed halter, but are still nice and soft with a generous release and no where near as severe as a stud chain. Horses are less likely to lean on a rope halter, but they won't be hurt by it. You can use just a tiny amount of pressure on a rope halter to communicate with your horse or a lot if they're being bad and you won't make your horse rear over backwards. When I mention maybe using a rope halter so that their horse will stop running away with them, people often won't consider it because rope halters are "hard on horses" when in reality they are WAY more humane than doing anything else. Your horse will thank you!

If my horse wants to take off, I can control them with a plain halter no stud chain needed. They know that steady pressure means to slow down or back up. I don't have to put a lot of muscle into it. If they're not paying attention to me then a sharp tug gets their attention and we're good. If you put some work into teaching your horse to lead properly then you'll get that same amount back with regards to your horse learning how to lead. With some people it just comes down to laziness. Why teach your horse to stay out of your personal space when you could be riding?

Jetta came from a farm where stud chains were used on all the horses as a matter of principle, so she came to me with no respect for my personal space and unless you used a stud chain, pressure meant nothing to her. I think it only took two or three sessions working with her until she understood how to stand still and move with me, how to stop from a trot and keep her focus on me, not the other horses gallavanting around the pasture, and that she should respond immediately to a small amount of pressure.

Overall, stud chains do have a (very, very) small limited amount of circumstances in which using them are appropriate. Otherwise though, training can result in a horse that doesn't need one despite the situation. Regardless, everyone has their different views. Here for pro stud chains are Eventing Nation (look for the Shank You Very Much article), I think she makes some very valid points and Kristine Oakhurst, who I don't agree with at all. But there you go. If you need a lot more leverage, an alternative is the Humane Stud Chain.