Catching up

Labor Day my hind end!  It's been nothing but busier than a one legged man in a butt kickin contest for me since my last post!  I did manage to get a little time in with the horses though!  Friday Brother was a bit limpy in one of his front feet but I figured it was just tender from all the work the farrier did on him.  Sure enough it seemed better later in the day and was gone Saturday.  He's still got the shoes on!  Keep your fingers crossed that he manages to keep them on at least until his poor bruised feet can heal up! 

Sunday I watched a few Ken McNab shows where he demonstrated how he teaches his horses to follow his movements when being lead instead of pulling the horse along by the lead rope.  It seems so silly basic but I realized how often we have to twirl the rope at one of ours while we're leading them somewhere because they get those I-don't-wanna sticky feet.  This was the subject of Nugget and Brother's first training session since it really is so basic and would be easy enough on their couch potato-like present stamina! 

The goal is to keep the horse's head roughly even with your shoulder with you leading from their left side.  You want them to move with you as you move, to read your body language to figure out which way you're going to go.  When you lean forward as if starting to walk off if the horse doesn't move with you reach behind with a *insert your own training tool here* (I used a dressage whip) to wave at/tickle/tap the girth area to get them moving forward with you.  When you back up if the horse doesn't step back tap the ground in front of their feet, escalate to tapping their front legs if you have to, until they back up.  To turn left you simply turn left and tap their hindquarters away if they don't move with you.  If you want to turn right turn into their head/neck and push it away to make them move over for you.  Seems simple enough, right???  

Nugget didn't really get it, maybe she just doesn't want to get it?  I don't know how to tell the difference yet.  She caught on to how to go forward with me, though I had to keep correcting her for getting ahead of me, and she kinda sorta got backing when I walked backwards.  Actually she caught on to taking one step back if I tapped her front legs firmly but she wouldn't progress to two steps.  To give her legs a break from all the tapping I tried turns which didn't go well at all.  When I tried to turn right she was really dull to me pushing her head away like she didn't care and was perfectly content to be pushed.  Turning left was worse since she overreacted to me tapping at her butt like I'd thrown a rattlesnake at her.  After awhile I was getting a little frustrated so did a few more backing steps and ended with lots of forward to give me an excuse to give her lots of praises and pats.  Maybe next time will be better. 

Brother, on the other hand, was my big super star with this exercise!  After not being trained at all for so long I had to stop fairly often to reassure him that he was doing a great job because he kept blowing out hard like it was scary to him.  He got the general idea very quickly on all four directions though which was very gratifying.

Tina got a break but I decided I needed to do a little riding.  I just did not feel like lugging the saddle out so instead I took a ride with Traveller bareback.  I didn't know if he'd ever had someone on him without a saddle so I stood on the ladder I mount from with one leg slung over his back for awhile to see how he'd react.  He really wasn't bad, seemed more surprised than anything, and stayed quiet after a moment of shifting around a bit.  I eased the rest of me onto him and voila! 

If you've never tried riding bareback I heartily recommend it!  It's not something I'd want to do all the time but it's definitely one more fun thing you can do with your horse from time to time.  I also really think that at some point when you're learning to ride riding bareback is a very valuable learning experience!  You can feel SO much more of how the horse moves and holds himself, you can learn a ton about your seat and how to move with the horse, and it really forces you to improve your balance. 

With the first few steps I learned that I've been sitting too far forward on my pelvis because I was like a weeble wobble!  When I rolled my pelvis so I was closer to sitting on my jean's pockets I was way more stable.  That last trainer I worked with told me a few times to "sit on [my] pockets" but I didn't truly get it till I felt it on Traveller the other day.  I may've brought my knees forward too bringing them out of line but I couldn't really tell and since I felt so much more secure I kept at it.  All in all it was loads of fun and I think my riding made a step in the right direction.