Back to school

Today, Griffin learned some new things in the round pen.  First, we lunged, did desensitizing, yielding the hind quarters, yielding the forequarters, lateral flexing and backing.  He's done all that before, although it has been a long time since I've consistently asked him to do any of it.  But we worked on perfecting his response to all those cues. We also learned to back up with a wiggle of the rope today rather than just the lead signal.   Then, I used a small lightweight saddle blanket to desensitize him and get him used to wearing it on his back.  He did great with this.  I expected that since I've put a fleece cooler on him before without any problems.  Then I got out the surcingle.  I wasn't quite sure what he'd do with it, since the rings on it were very jingly, and there were strings hanging off it, but after the blanket, apparently the surcingle was absolutely no big deal.  I practiced pulling it tight without buckling it first (no reaction, he got a treat reward for standing), then buckled it up snugly, but not tight.  He paid no attention to it, even through flexing and lunging.  And he's now becoming more comfortable with lunging.  He's finally starting to understand that I'm not just chasing him around (he responds by snorting at first, whenever I begin asking him to lunge).

Griffin says "What do we do now?".

Friday was my first day of classes.  Silly, I know, since then we got a 3 day weekend.  But both Wren and I made it through, although not without tears on my end!  I'm really dreading the next 3 years.  It's going to be so hard to sacrifice my time with Wren to school.  But I'm focusing on the end.  We'll make it...I hope.

In the meantime, I really love blogging (posting what I'm doing and reading other's posts), but it takes a lot of time.  Now my schedule is even more packed and to keep up with all the things I want to do, I think I'm going to have to let the blogging slide.  I will still check in once in a while (probably once or twice a week), and I think I'll still post, when I actually get to do things with my horses (which I plan to try to do every weekend), but my posts might be more brief...and I might let the photos do the talking more than me.  We'll see.  I am just letting you know that I'm not going to dissappear forever, just become a lot less present. 

In the meantime, you can see more of my horses in the pasture, since that is the view that I will miss the most while I'm down in Madison during the week in school.  Well, that view and my daughter's beautiful face, but at least she is coming with me to Madison so I get to see her every evening and we'll be together all night long.  Daddy is the one who will be missing out the most.  He only gets to see us on weekends now.  And now, I must go and enjoy my long weekend home.

The herd heads back toward the barn...probably for water.

Griffin lags behind.

But the herd is lolly-gagging so he easily catches up.  He shows Kachina he's her boss by pushing her forward in front of him.

February 15th 2008

"Post from the Past"

February 15th 2008

Yesterday, I went out to Todd’s with the intention of us spending Valentine’s day together (making beer and playing with horses), but Todd didn’t feel very well, so I played with horses myself.

I had spent the previous week making rope halters with the new rope that I bought from D&B. I got a reddish brown with a tan tracer, and a bright purple with a white tracer. I thought the brown would be a perfect color to complement Catlow’s color. I ended up making 12 halters (also with some other leftover rope I had). I caught Catlow (feeding at the molasses licks which had been replaced in the pasture, much to my dismay, since last weekend). I took her in the round pen, then proceeded to try every halter on her. She was very patient. The halters are going to fit perfectly once they’ve been on a horse and the knots have tightened up…as is now, the unused ones seem too small around the nose, but really, they are perfect. I ended up using a dark neutral colored halter that Todd said was his favorite color, but he didn’t end up coming out to check on me until I was done working with her.

Since I started trying rope halters on her, I had her flex in a few of them. She actually flexed to touch me very quickly…hardly any wait period today! Either a break of 4 days did her good since our last session, or she likes that I didn’t do any desensitizing with her.

I did not do ANY desensitizing with her, and the difference in her attitude is amazing…I think that I may have to do a few experiments. Sometimes I need to do desensitizing first, and check her willingness to flex, then I also need to just start a lesson with flexing, and see how she acts. I think that perhaps she is shutting off a little bit when I do the desensitizing exercises and it really shows when I ask her to flex so that she will choose to hang on the halter instead of giving to me. She is much more willing when I do not make her uncomfortable by throwing the rope around. Maybe I need to stop “annoying” her with the desensitizing stuff…she’s not really afraid of the rope tossing, but it makes her uncomfortable.

The primary exercise that I worked on with Catlow was yielding the fores and the hinds and some side-passing. She remembered that she was to step across in front with both the fores and hinds when yielding. She pivoted very nicely, but I noticed that she was tending to get a little bit lazier with the hinds. I think mostly because previously I hadn’t asked her to do very many steps, so I worked on asking her to take more steps and quicken up her feet a bit. She really did quicken up fast when I poked her, and she stayed relatively calm throughout the whole process. When I would praise her and let her stop, she’d immediately look at me to see if she was going to get a treat for doing well. Sometimes I did give her treats, but I was trying to save them for when she did REALLY well. I was extremely pleased with her yielding the fores in a complete circle. She is really consistent about rocking back on her hinds and stepping around with her fores. She caught onto that very quickly. The only time she became confused was when I first started asking for a 360 degree pivot…she’d step across several times, but then when I kept pushing her, she’d start to step back…I had to just keep with her until she stepped across in front again and then reward her big. She did great today. It was calm and pleasant to work with her, and my overall impression was that she was trying for me.

She was also a lot more relaxed overall. When I let her go, she walked over to investigate my halter pile, and she even picked one up and tossed it a bit (which is not her personality at all…she’s the quiet hang back and watch horse). Then I let her eat hay with the weanlings in the barn after our lesson, and I laid down in the hay. She actually approached me to sniff at me, then continued eating. She usually doesn’t approach me when I give her the choice. I have been rewarding her with a treat when she walks up to me on request in the round pen. That’s probably helping her to be more interested in approaching me.

Well, I’d like to work with her again tomorrow. Doni might come out with me again. Hopefully, she’ll want to work longer than she did last weekend. Maybe I’ll see if she wants to work with Cody. I’d love to take both Cody and Catlow to the clinic at Katie’s in March. Actually, I’d love to take all three of my horses, but I’m not sure I want anyone else to work with Chico because he hasn’t been worked by anyone else yet, and he still needs quite a bit of work.

February 9th 2008

"Post from the Past"

February 9th 2008

It was gorgeous outside today. In Moscow, the temperature was 47 degrees F at 1:30pm. I worked with Catlow this morning for about 2-3 hours (I lose track of time when I’m out with the horses). I also trimmed just a bit off her heels on her front feet after our session.

I began with working on Catlow’s difficult side (her left side). I did everything on that side first before I moved to the other side, because I wanted to be sure that I spent enough time on it and moved forward before I got tired. I’ve been thinking about naming her two sides, since it is like working with two different horses, for the most part. I’m still thinking of names…one side is evil, the other side is good.

First, I tossed the rope until she became bored with it…which she is kind of doing now! But mostly, bored means she’s not glaring at me with her shut off eye, and she’ll actually look at me once in a while. I’m going to buildup the muscles on my right arm more because I work with her left side so much. We’ll both be one-sided! I wouldn’t say she was better than yesterday, but she wasn’t worse.

Then I played jump rope from her side and tossed the rope at her neck…she was very good with this…Always has been. Maybe it’s because I’m farther away, so she doesn’t shut down as much.

Then I worked with her lateral flexion. She definitely wasn’t any better today, and in fact may have been a bit worse…taking longer to yield. I started giving quick tugs on the rope because she felt like she could hang there all day. Also, if I cluck while she’s just hanging there, she will yield. I’m not sure if that indicates that she doesn’t understand what I want her to do, or if she does understand, but has no real incentive to do it. I generally cluck to her whenever I want her to move, whether I’m asking her to step across, or move out…cluck means “do something”, and she’s generally very responsive to it.

After flexing, I moved on to asking her to yield her forequarters and hindquarters. Today I used cues on her side and I am trying to be very consistent with them so that she’ll understand when she goes under saddle. Toward the back means yield the hinds, and in front of the girth area means yield the fores. She really was understanding this and I was very pleased with how much she retained from yesterday. I also began with moving her forequarters, and slid my hand back to in between the two cues to ask her to step over with both feet and she got it! She’s not perfect and I’m only asking for one good step with both front and hind right now, but with more focus on that lesson, I think she’ll be great.

I wanted to introduce her to the plastic bag on the stick today because she seems ready to try something a little more stressful for desensitizing. She was definitely uncomfortable at first, especially with the bag up around her head, but she settled down and at the end I was able to pass it all around her and over her head without so much as a flinch (although she was holding her head kinda high). She was even better when I did it on her other side.

I finished up with trimming her heels a bit…trying to reshape her feet again after the worn toes issue. Everyone says that she didn’t founder, but she definitely has some very distinct new growth on her hooves, and at this point I can definitely tell it isn’t the cuticle.

Tomorrow, Doni is going to come out with me and help/watch me work Catlow, and maybe Chico or Cody too.

February 8th 2008

Before we get to the "post from the past", I just need to complain a little bit. They closed the university today due to snow, but because I have a looming deadline for a project, I can't afford to take today off, so I have to go in anyway! It's not fair! Okay, done. And now, to our "Post from the Past".

February 8th 2008

Today really warmed up compared to yesterday. I think the high was around 40 degrees. There is a lot of melting going on. The roads are clear, but with all the snow, there may be flooding in the creeks. It was also raining a bit in the evening.

I worked with Catlow a total of 2 hours. I started with rubbing her with the stick and string, which she accepted very well, then progressed to tossing the string over her back, legs, and neck. I worked on her easy (right) side first, and she accepted the string tossing very well. I was even working with the lead line lying on the ground, so she stood there accepting the string tossing without being held there. Then I moved to her left (bad) side. She definitely wasn’t as comfortable with it, and as soon as I began the first toss, she sidestepped away, so I had to hold the rope so that she knew she couldn’t avoid the situation. Then the only reaction I got was the raised head and hard eye. She didn’t even attempt to move after I held the rope. She did start to soften her eye just slightly, but barely. The head stayed up. I could tell after tossing and resting then tossing again for a long time, that she was relaxed enough to look at me occasionally, and her glaring eye wasn’t quite as hard as usual. She was trying to push her wall down and peak at me over it, but that wall is high. It will take some time. I also smacked the ground with the string all the way around her and standing in front of her and she didn’t offer to move at all…this is a first!

I rubbed her a lot, and once I was satisfied that she was okay with the string tossing, I backed off and played “jump rope” with her. I also tossed the rope toward her head and body so that it would bump her on the chest, neck, and nose, and she did really well. She only jumped the first time that the rope touched her nose, and that was before we even began the jump rope activity. She is surprisingly good at this game. I feel like it is because she looks at me with both eyes. I do notice, that when I am more toward her left side, she will often turn her head further to the right…that is her trying to avoid accepting the world from that eye…she tries to turn away from me. I also wanted to see how she would accept me running up the rope at her. I began with her facing head on, and she backed off a step or two at first, but she caught on quick and didn’t move at all as I ran up the rope straight toward her head and started rubbing her face. I progressively moved out a couple steps at a time until I was running at her from her right side to her shoulder to rub her. I even threw in a few crazy jumps and arm waves and hisses as I ran at her, and she accepted it! I did the same thing again moving toward her left side, and again, she wasn’t as good at it. She tended to want to move away from me more and turn her head away as I ran toward her, but she did accept it toward the end. I didn’t push it with jumping and hissing at that side. We’ll work more on that.

Then we worked on lateral flexion. She is getting a little better every time, but not as much as that first time after I had to make her uncomfortable to want to give to the rope. She is definitely trying harder, now that she understands, but it still takes some waiting for her to give…only a few seconds, but still waiting. After we practiced for quite a while, she was giving faster. She is still slower on her left side. I also practiced having her flex with me standing on her off side with the rope laying over her back. She seemed to want to try to flex toward her left, when I was asking her to flex toward her right. The other way around was very easy.

After flexion, I worked on getting her to yield her forequarters properly. Last time, when going around to the left, she wanted to pivot on her forequarters and spin her hind end around, instead of the other way around. I had to tap on her shoulder to convince her to step across. We worked on this quite a bit, and she was really starting to get it toward the end…rocking back on her hindquarters and stepping across with her fronts. She also had to be tapped to step across going to the right, but she was a bit better to this side. I would still like to work on this more, but she improved quite a bit, so I didn’t push it much more. I also gave her treats when working with her this time. She knows when she did something right. As soon as I tell her “Goood Giirrl!”, she cues into me…I can see her mind whirling trying to connect what she did, and she watches me to see if I’m going to give her a treat for it. I then yielded her hindquarters once on each side…still works (she’s very good at this as it is the first thing that I taught her last year when I began working with both her and Chico). Then I wanted to see how difficult it would be to teach her how to side-pass. She actually caught onto this very very quickly, seeing how she doesn’t quite have the pivoting on the fores down perfectly. I just held my hand up next to her eye while clucking to her (like when I ask her to yield the fores), and added in pushing her on her side where the girth would go. She knew she was supposed to move because I was clucking, and I had my hand up near her eye. She also from before, knew that if I poke her in her middle, she is supposed to yield her hinds. So put the two together, and she side-passed! It wasn’t necessarily pretty or exactly sideways, but she did step over with both the fores and hinds crossing in front. At one point, she did try moving first the fores, then the hinds, until I got the cues better so she understood, then she stepped across. She got big praises for that, and treats. She did it all with a rather calm demeanor…she wasn’t panicking to get out of my way, she was trying to figure out what I was asking. This is great. I’m already thinking that when I get started riding her, she will understand some cues better than Chico currently does. Chico doesn’t know how to side-pass from the ground…I’ll have to work on him some more.

The head dropping is going great. She’s not quite automatic yet, but getting closer. It really is keeping her calm, and also serves as an indication to me how she’s feeling inside. If something is bothering her and I ask her to drop her head, she is more likely to resist first before she does it. I noticed that when other horses where fighting while I was working with her. I feel like being worked with is not torture anymore for her. I think I was just doing it wrong. Catlow and Chico are too different for the same method to work on them the same way. Catlow needs more close work, and I will continue to move her around to keep her respect. Then when I feel like the trust foundation is solid, I will move to lunging her.

I do think that I need to step up the desensitizing. I think next time I’ll try a plastic bag on the end of the stick.