Catlow's turn

I rode Catlow this evening after working on physics most of the day. I took her down to the arena for her first saddled ride of the season. First I let her run around without a leadrope and get used to it, then I tried to get her to pay attention to me, so I spent time putting pressure on her when she was evading me and trying to draw her to me when she'd face up. It worked, but the slightest provocation and she'd be off flying around again. I think I should work with her a lot more. She definitely would rather not be with me, which is so different than working with Chico. I think Catlow is with me because she has to, but generally, Chico is with me because he wants to. She does find relief when she does finally get with me, but I think she doesn't completely understand differences in my body language. I'll have to work to be more clear with her. She doesn't always get when I'm asking her to just stand and relax while I do something stressful (like swinging the rope while looking away or ignoring her) versus when I am actually asking her to move off (direct energy toward her by facing her head on an advancing while swinging the rope). I think she focuses more on the rope stuff than on me.

I let her air up for a bit then rode her around at a walk, trot and canter. While trotting, I tried to get her to make nice circles in the corners of the arena. This is only the second time I've worked with her in an arena, so of course, her circles were not great, and she was distracted because she could see her herdmates on the opposite hill.

Here are pictures of us trotting (my dad was watching). Catlow looks nice, but please don't make fun of my riding form! I know it's no where near perfect, but it works!



While cantering, I just let her go wherever, but I wanted her to keep up a steady cadenced canter. She did get a large circle going on after a while and quit trying to change direction in odd places. By then she was pretty tired because we had been at it for a while, so I walked around, did backing and sidepassing, then took off and rode her around our property on the trails in the woods. She was nervous out there by herself, but she wasn't too bad. We trotted and cantered and she was a bit more relaxed toward the end. She always obeys my requests when she's nervous, but sometimes I have to ask twice or redirect her attention because she gets so concerned with which way is back toward the barn.

After I got back, I put her cooler on and hand grazed her in the field for quite a while. Then my dad and I talked about where to string the fence to extend their pasture. We'll probably get to it in a few weeks. I might wait until the grass has grown in long before I turn them onto the pasture. And I'll probably have to do it slowly. Once the weather warms up a bit more, the grass in their pasture will really start to grow and they won't be able to crop it down so short. Right now, they are eating it as fast as it grows.

Horse time

I need to be brief because I really should be working on physics right now. I took my dad to the hospital for his post-op checkup this morning(he's doing great).

Then I spent all afternoon and evening with the horses! Yay! It was so warm (lower 70's) that I just HAD to get out and play. The hardest decision I had to make today was which horse to work with because I know I'd only get time to do one. I chose Chico, since I decided he needed some extra attention after trying to not be caught yesterday. I saddled him up (first time this year with the saddle), and took him to the neighbor's outdoor arena. My neighbor and I talked about liberty work, then I let Chico loose and let him move around and explore, then asked him to lunge around me. When he stayed close and came to me when asked, I gave him a treat. He will do anything for a treat. If I'd had a treat on me yesterday, he probably wouldn't have evaded me...little turd. Then I mounted and walked, trotted and cantered the cloverleaf pattern to get him to slow down and pay attention and collect himself through his turns a little. There is definitely room for improvement, but he did better toward the end. He got pretty sweaty since it was so warm today. At the end, I let him air up and we practiced leg cues and side passing. He is now tuned up on leg cues and will move off a one leg cue rather than jumping to the trot like he was before.

After the arena work, I decided to go for a ride. My dad was at home (a couple miles away on the other side of our tiny "village" (only a couple hundred people at most live there). I though he might like a little visit from Chico and I, so we braved the very busy interstate bridge (had to go under it), road signs for construction, fire hydrants, lots of cars, grates covering culverts, and the super scary horse eating manhole covers. He was eager to go, but was very uncertain about all these new things. Chico's never been around this stuff before! We usually ride in the canyon, or take lessons at a facility in the country. These were all firsts for him. He was uncertain, but went ahead and was pretty level headed. The one thing that really unnerved him were the manhole covers. Some were in the roads, but most of them that we encountered were actually in the grass alongside the country road. All of the area we rode through has recently been annexed into the village, so they put in "city" water. I finally got sick of circling him around them until he wasn't afraid, so finally, on one of them, I dismounted, led him to it, knelt down and patted it with my hand, then he was brave enough to walk up and sniff it (I'd shown him it wasn't going to hurt us). Once we got to our place, my dad snapped a photo and fed Chico an apple. You can see that he was quite alert and watchful.


On the way back, he was much more relaxed, walked much more slowly, and this time, actually approached and checked out all the things that were making him concerned when we went through the first time. He's such a cool horse. It seems like everything was new at first, so he was on high alert, but after the trip back, it was the second time he'd seen things and he hadn't died yet (I showed him that the scariest thing was actually okay), so then he approached the others to assure himself that they were okay too.

After we got back, I led him to the pond because I thought he might roll in it. He was very excited about the water and pawed and pawed at it. Once he almost laid down in it, but I think he just wasn't quite comfortable enough. Maybe next time he will.

He was back to his usual self after I turned him loose...he waited for his pat before he walked off.

Oh, and tomorrow, I am heading to Madison for the Midwest Horse Fair. I have tickets to watch the EMM finals Saturday night. I'm excited, but it looks like I'll be heading down alone. That's okay.

Well, so much for being brief.

My Dad is in Idaho!

This afternoon, my Dad arrived in Idaho! This was the first time I got to see the new horse trailer he found and we took Catlow to a riding lesson.

Taking Catlow to a riding lesson accomplished many things. I was able to take her to see the trainer/friend who I've been watching train horses and get some help with my own riding form. Catlow had a good first trailering experience. She went to a completely new place for the first time, and found out that it wasn't that scary. It was a really good experience for both of us.

When I loaded Catlow at Todd's mom's place, she calmly walked right into the strange trailer without a bit of hesitation. Then I turned her around and led her back out. Then turned around and took her right back in. It was raining, so we didn't mess around with in and out anymore, we just tied her, closed the divider and took off. Three miles down the road, we stopped to open her window and see how she was doing. Her eyes were wide, and she had her legs spread to keep her balance and she was definitely nervous, but she was okay, so we just continued to the lesson. She rode very well. There was no pounding coming from the trailer and she did not paw when we stopped. She was much calmer by the time we got to the lesson. When I opened her divider, I just stood next to her and scratched her for a few minutes to make sure she was calm and didn't learn to expect to get right out of the trailer whenever the doors open. She was alert, and high headed, but okay. Then I lead her to the door so she could stand and look out. She nickered at the white arabian stallion who had ambled over to check out the new trailer occupants.

Then we exited the trailer and I continued to walk her around the trailer until she calmed down completely, which she did! She was high headed and alert for about 2 complete circles around the truck, but then I let her graze and we continued to walk and she really calmed down. She was alert and not completely relaxed, but really really good. If at home she is relaxed enough to be a 0, and when she sees cows on a trial ride she becomes a nervous 10, at my lesson, she was about a 2-3 which is how she normally is when I take her on a ride by herself.

We got there really early (partly because she loaded so well and it was raining so we left right away, but part was on purpose to give Catlow a chance to check out the place). So I was able to walk her around a lot, and take my time with saddling her up.

This picture is before the lesson, right after I saddled her up (it was actually a bit lighter outside than that, but the flash made it look like it was midnight).



I'm just really happy that my dad is here and so is my horse! By the way, I can't believe how much like my mom I look in these pictures. It's uncanny.



Then Katie got home from work, so we went to the arena. There are lots of objects (tractor parts covered in a tarp, an arena grader, just lots of stuff) near the door, so she needed time to absorb that (very uncertain and wanted to get out of there if given the choice). Katie opened the arena door and that scared her a bit, but she just jumped then watched as the door rose up.

I did some ground work with her first, and explained to Katie how she seemed to shut down if I pushed her to much, especially at the canter so I didn't canter her much when lunging, mostly just trotting and changing directions. Katie suggested that I need to continue to up the degree of stress that I place on her so that she learns to accept more and won't retreat within herself and shut down. I guess that I have done this with her with other things, but not with the ground work stuff. I'm happy with how she works, so I sometimes don't even do ground work. I did work with asking her to canter while lunging, but I could hardly get 3 good stride out of her before she'd fall back to the trot, and she broke into a canter very spurty-like, with a tucked tail. I think that Katie is right that I just need to do it with her more and be sure to reward her lots when she maintains a canter.

Then I mounted and we warmed up at the walk and then the trot. The guineas were in the arena roosting on the beams, and at one point they went into a screeching fit, and that freaked Catlow out quite a bit for about two seconds (she jumped and froze), but she got over it really fast and ignored them after that, even when they flew down from their perch to walk across the arena and move to a different perch.

So, we worked at walk, trot and canter and did circles for bending in the corners, and also worked on canter-walk transitions. It took me a couple circles to get the hang of just the right amount of leg pressure for her, but then she did really good with bending and circling at the walk and trot (she's just really sensitive to leg pressure so will move off it well). She was also very cadenced at the trot (well, good for being her first time with arena work - most of the time we work on the trail - her trotting was mostly very cadenced, but occasionally she lost focus and became a bit confused about what she was to do, so would lose momentum). She especially would lose momentum in the circles because she wasn't sure how to circle properly at first - she would sort of drop her shoulder and almost seem to pivot on it such that she was swinging her hind end out and around to help her complete her circle. She did quit doing that after a few circles.

Once she was going well at trot-circles, then we moved up to cantering. First we just cantered around the outside of the arena until Catlow was maintaining a rhythm and slowing down. When I first asked her to canter, she shot forward with a strong leap into the canter, and then cantered strongly around, cutting corners and really leaning into her circle. I had to slow her down, help her straighten up, and move her to the rail with leg pressure. She responded well. Once she was cadenced, then Katie said to try a smaller circle in the corner of the arena. The first two times we tried it, she dropped to a trot and I could not get her to pick the canter back up until she was on the rail again, but by the third circle she had balanced herself enough to keep cantering through the circle. Katie said I need to pull up on the inside rein (with my palm upward) to keep her from dropping her shoulder and to also keep urging her through the circle with my outside leg. After the first couple rough circles, she at least maintained a canter through all the circles and many of them felt really nice. Then Katie asked me to bring her to a walk, and Catlow responded by halting them jumping into the walk. Katie alerted me to the fact that Catlow's response was due to my sloppy riding - she stopped fast because I overcued her, and when I lost my balance, my heels dug into her and so she shot forward again. So we worked on canter-walk transitions in between canter-circle exercises. By the end, with a simple deeper sit into the saddle (with my feet forward to keep my balance and not touching reins at all), Catlow was coming smoothly down to a walk.

Catlow was pretty tired at the end, and really had calmed down a lot and was understanding what I was asking of her and how she was expected to respond. I walked her to cool her down and I could tell when she had caught her breath. As she aired up more, she became more and more aware of the scary things in the arena (not bad, but she because uncertain of how she should respond - but this also could have been due to the next lesson horse entering the arena and walking around the center).

After the lesson, she did hesitate just slightly before loading back into the trailer - slight hesitation, but with a calm insistent pull on the halter, she put one leg in the trailer, then scratched her sweaty head on her knee for 30 seconds. Then I asked her to come all the way in and she did without hesitating. Once home, I stood with her for a while before unloading her. She was very calm by the end of this trailer ride.

I think Catlow had a very good first away from home experience. Tomorrow, I have to work, but then my dad and I will be loading up all my horse stuff and readying our intinerary for Thursday morning when we leave!