REALLY!!!!????

I took Misstack on her mini trail ride, and I got past the fence line and she did NOT want to go any further. There was a drain pipe in front of her and when she looked at it she would back up a good twenty to thirty feet. I got her going forward again after she was done backing up every single time... which was about five times until she started backing up a little less each time. Well, I got her to stand near the drain pipe and got off. I led her infront of the pipe then  loneged her around the pipe, and infront of it. Then we went across someone's driveway to the other ditch and another drain pipe. There I loosened the sinch got the apple, and gave it to her. She stood pretty nicely next to that pipe. After a little bit, we walked home.

Old Thoughts

Have you ever looked back to the beginnings of your blog and been like "why oh why did I ever post that?" or "That could be way better."
That's how some of mine are. I also noticed how a few of my ideas have changed. Like instead of making Ana do the gait we want her to, at the speed we want her to, we let her pick the gait and speed. She is a lot calmer, and she doesn't try to canter anymore. My theory is that she has always been told the gait and speed she's to go at, so she finally got so fed up with it that she would get ancy, creating the hyper horse we have now. She has improved drastically too.
I also noticed that some videos I wanted to post never got put up. Oh well.

Score!

I accomplished something today. I rode three horses in an hour and a half. This just does not happen. Usually I don't ride all three in one day, and usually it could take a couple hours for each horse.
I started with Santana. I switched out his bit so that I could start training him to listen to the bit better. I used a twisted wire snaffle (mostly cause it was the bit available).
I found out that he has a bigger hole in his bridle training than I thought. He does neck rein, but doesn't respond as quickly as I would like. He is really hard to turn at the canter, but he did get better. I also found out that he stops on whoa. I don't have to use the reins. No sliding stop, but he still stops. He can't back up real well either. I got it a little bit better though.

I rode Misstack next. All I did was tack her up, put an apple under the cantle of the saddle, behind me (it stayed), and started going up the drive. I got her almost to the end of the pasture fence, and she was walking nicely. I stopped at the fire hydrant, got off, loosened the cinch, and gave her the apple. When she was done, I led her back to the barn. I'll do it again the next time I ride. This is actually a huge improvement in her. Last year, when I tried to get her to cross the drive into the alfalfa field, it took a half hour to do less than 100 feet. And forget about going up the drive. We would either stand there for eternity, or get into a fight about it. Usually the fight. The crazy thoroughbred has improved.

And then Ana...
I rode her bareback. I almost fell of numerous times, and did an emergency dissmount once. When I tried to get back on she moved, so I fixed that and was able to jump up and hook my leg over, but I was too lazy to finish the action and she stood still, so I got back down, went to the little water trough, stepped on that and got on. Ahhh... much easier. She even stood still. I cantered her too. Ya know when I try to convince myself to kiss Ana in to a canter it's hard. The trot is worse, but somehow the canter seems worse. But once I just make myself get Ana into a canter, I am amazed by the feeling. It's like nothing I have ever experienced before. It's Amazing...


I worked with the fillies too. I worked on leading at the walk and trot. And have I ever mentioned that they can do a perfect turn on the hindquarters. It's soo cool!  Toffy was the best. She walked away from the other horses pretty good, and when we turned around, and I asked her to trot, she did it right away without me pulling on the lead rope. We trotted back to the other horses and I let her loose. I was thinking that this might make a bad habit, but right now, it's using their natural desire to get back to the heard to teach them how to trot. I think that eventually we'll just have to keep them trotting though the heard to get it so it doesn't become a bad habit.

...

I cantered Ana bareback today.
It was the best birthday present ever.
And that stupid horse has the nicest canter!
That also completed one of my goals.
And it's true that cantering is easier than trotting.

Bareback and bridleless

I rode Misstack and Ana yesterday. With Misstack I rode her over the tarp, the fence, and the tires. I didn't do the plastic bag, because by the time I got her to go over the tarp and fence consistently, we were riding for two hours. I got Misstack to always face the tarp. She could back up and stand still. I would ask her to go forward, and as long as she went forward I didn't care how far she went. I tried getting her to go over it, but all I could get was her to stand next to it, so I got off and led her across. Then I got on when she was going across good, and we did the tarp again. She did it this time. Then we went to the fence. This took a lot less time. After maybe ten minutes she was walking over it. We opened fences too.

I walked out to the alfalfa field and sat against the fence by the horses. Ana came up to me for my apple but I kicked her out of my space. My apple. When I was done I threw it to Misstack. Then Santana came and said hello, and he hung out by me for a little bit.
The horses moved to another part of the alfalfa field and I followed. I was standing next to the herd and Ana came up to me all happy faced and I entertained the idea of getting on. The most prominent thing in my mind was that two years ago, Aleythia got on her and she started cantering off, but I was like, why not? So I swung up on her indian style. She immediatley put her ears back, but she didn't move. She wanted to eat, but I wanted to see what would happen if I asked her to go. So I asked her to go forward, and she tried to bite my foot. She got kicked in the nose for that, and every other time she tried that. I got her to walk by kicking her. That's different, usually she's really sensitive. All we did was walk around the herd, and I made every direction she chose, my idea with leg pressure. I was able to stop her too. I did this twice, and the last time, I got off. It was so cool! I've said it before. Ana is the most calm with the least amout of tack... Crazy horse. (sigh)

Interesting Past-Times

It's sad really. I have been riding these horses for over three years (some longer), and I am still finding out stuff about them. Like Santana is an awesome trail horse! Another is that he doesn't respond really well to the bridle at top speeds. Misstack is a nut job. (I already knew that, I just get it confirmed almost every time I ride.) I can't get her to listen at higher speeds either. Turning... sure. Stopping... Over my dead body!
I will now explain.
Yesterday we went trail riding with a friend (H). She rode Santana, because I figured he would be the best behaved. And also because with one previous trail ride I knew he would be okay.
We trailered out to a park that is about five miles away. Well, I had H ride Santana in the paddock before we left just so she could check him out, but anyway. We got to the park we took them out and bridled them. We had already put saddles on at home. We took the dividers out so that they would fit comfortably in the trailer. And we started our trail ride.
We soon figured out that Misstack hated to be in front. We also had to cross a bridge and none of the horses would do it. I got of Misstack and tried to lead her across, but obviously her trust in me is a little lacking. So, I handed Misstack's lead to H and led Santana across (what a perfect little boy). After that Santana was our leader for most of the trail ride. He only had to be led across on our third bridge, then he was fine. I love horses that are sensible. Ana stayed in the back for a lot of the trail just because she wouldn't try to run in the back. Once when Ana was in the front she was getting all prancy so Aleythia put her in the back and Ana gave a  big sigh and started walking, resigned to her fate.
We also figured out that deer trails do not make good horse trails. In fact even the trails that were man made were not the best to ride in because the branches were too low for a rider to pass under comfortably. Mostly it was close your eyes and let your horse follow the one in front. We did see deer by the way. Three of them. One when we started, and two fawns near the end of our ride.
There was one time that Misstack was in the front for quite a while, and that was when we were coming back on the path we just traveled. It was right next to the field and Misstack wanted to go faster, so I let her. She ran down that path like the race horse she is. Actually she could have gone faster, but I didn't want her to go too fast because it was H's first ride with Santana and I didn't know how they would fare.  Well, I was trying to pull her up, and she wouldn't slow down. It was probably ten seconds of me pulling back on the reins before I was like, shoot it, she's not slowing down, so when we got to a more open area I was able to turn her. H was grinning about the run. She exclaimed that Santana could go fast! She was used to the slow easy canter of camp horses. She hadn't ridden a horse that did what you asked right away. Usually it takes some kicking. I was happy that she could experience a little part of what a barrel horse was like. We cantered once more, with Ana in the front, and that was all the cantering we did.
There are like no hills. None. I want to go somewhere were the terrain is a little more challenging.

Today I looked around the barn for whatever odd stuff I could find for Misstack to get used to. We had three tires, a tarp, a horse blanket, a couple exercise balls, a plank, some wire fence, a tin garbage can, and a horse eating monster.
It was extremely windy so we put boards on the edge of the tarp to hold it down.
I went and got Misstack from the alfalfa field and let her loose in the pen. She jumped the tires, jumped the plank, hesitated at the wire fence layed on the ground and jumped it, and I forgot the rug, she jumped that too. There was also a board layed on the ground and she stepped over that. We had the tarp more towards the center of the pen, so she just kinda ignored it. After a little while of having her running around she was stepping on the board, the wire fence, and the rug. I caught her again and led her over everything. She did very well. The tarp actually wasn't a really big issue for her. She took one step on it, I let her stand, backed her up, stepped on again and walked across. She stepped over the plank, stepped on the wire fence, and stepped across the rug.
Then came the horse eating monster... She hated it. She would freak out over it touching the air around her, and if it was anywhere near her head and she couldn't go anywhere be watchful of flying hooves. After a good forty-five minutes of waving the horse eating monster around on the end of the whip she was still freaking out if it went anywhere near her head. I was finally like, I can't get anything accomplished with this crazy wind. I took her inside the barn. I desensitized the air space around her head with the plastic ba-horse eating monster. Before this I took it off the whip because it was more of a pain than it was worth. I could rub her cheek with the bag and was eventually able to work my way over her eye, to her forehead, to her poll, around her ears, and eventually around her nose. Next time I'll do the obstacles while I ride. I'll probably review the plastic bag too.

What a Mess

We didn't ride but we did start organizing the trailer.
The trailer has a compartment with a bunch of horse stuff in it (also serves as a bench). So Aleythia and I, after taking some folding chairs and sitting in the paddock for a while, decided to organize. I have always wanted to know what was inside that, but it's so messy it's not easy to look through.
We found a bag of bits, bell boots, leg boots, jackets, umbrellas, horse blankets, a fly mask, an extension cord, clippers that probably don't work, a lunge line, latigos, some stretchy thing you put over your horses head and neck, some rope, and a green lead rope.
With the stretchy thing we plan to put it on Ana when Terry's not around. I can't wait to see what he'll say.

Terry went to the vet's today to pick up some dewormer. He ended up getting vaccines too. The vet said that she had three horses with West Nile disease. One of the three will more than likely not make it. It was caused by a misquito. Terry thought that with the fillies being out in the grove there might be misquitos out there, more than in a pasture.
He bought a vile that is less than two inches tall, and he said it probably costs around $100. There's stuff for the West Nile disease, tetanus, and I think that there is something for strangles too. I probably missed something. It's enough for ten horses, and they all get 20 ccs of it.
We fed the fillies, and when they were pretty much done we gave them all shots. They did very well.
We also did the three other mares.
Flicka was hard to catch, and she was NOT respecting our bubble space. She wouldn't stop when we stopped, and she was set on running us over. Aleythia had her and she couldn't get her to get out of her space, so... I went to get the whip, mwhahahaha!
Aleythia tried getting her to get out of her space, but she just isn't mean enough. I tried. I wiggled the lead rope, and then proceeded to wack her on the chest with the whip. She went forward, and I just kept wacking her (not very nicely either). Eventually she realized that walking forward wasn't working and stopped. Still not good enough, and I kept wacking.
And then, it happened. The unthinkable happened. My fat, lazy, bossy, unsensitized horse took one tiny step backwards.
Did I mention that when I was waking her she gave a little kick? I just kept wackin.
After a little more practice, she was licking her lips, and I handed her back to Aleythia.
She was moving her hindquarters, and she kicked. I yelled to Aleythia to hit her harder and make her feet move!
Flicka's limping. Not because of what we did. We noticed it when we called them in for food.

I have been cured. Cured of just looking at one trainer for my training. Thankyou mugwump.
"No one trainer has the complete right answer."

I have been inspired to try and see how my body language effects a horse. What I want to do is let one of the horses out in the paddock by themselves with no halter or lead rope. Then I will see what I can get that horse to do without the help of a halter. It should prove to be interesting