Just to give a quick update: in the last month, my mom and brother came to visit for 10 days over Thanksgiving, and the footing in the large paddock at the Parkland barn became so deep that it was like slogging through snow for the horses; even on the lunge Lily struggled to work through it. The footing in the other paddock was slippery to the point where Lily refused to canter, and I did not force her. She's smart enough to not do something that may result in an injury, so I wasn't going to cause it for her. The only riding option, then, was to walk her all the way down to the equestrian center arenas. This became old very, very quickly, especially when I had to hand-lead her down. This was a 20 minute walk so that THEN I could get on. I did not want to ride her down and risk her acting up in the middle of the street again and having to dismount for safety's sake, further reinforcing negative behavior. However, after leading her down, by the time I got on at the arena, I was already tired. Add to this the fact that Lily had not been herself much since we had arrived at Parkland-she was becoming herd bound, and she continued to be very "up" when riding at the equestrian center arenas. (This was still after doubling her B1 dose and starting her on Mare Magic). Even after 45 minute workouts, she would still not relax and listen. She wasn't bad by any means, just very "up" and even more pogo-stick-ey than usual. By the time we got back to the barn, bathed her, cleaned her stall and dragged myself into the car to drive back home, I was utterly done. The end result: Lily did not get ridden much for 2 weeks, just lunged.
On another front, everyone (Elizabeth, Dianne, and Mark) left M's barn and moved back to the old barn, now under a new name. Mark called me up and begged me to come back, promising to move my stall mats with his teeth if I did. What he didn't know was that Judy, who remember, is now in charge of both the Parkland barn and our old barn, had already called me up and offered me a nice deal on board at our old barn, and I had accepted. (Judy needed my Parkland stall for another full boarder, and knew I'd be interested in returning to our old barn after everyone else had come back.) So poor Mark was going to have to move the mats after all. He didn't care, though-him, Dianne and Elizabeth were so excited, he offered to move Lily on a Saturday I was working, just to get me over there already. This resulted in him throwing out his back, but Lily and the mats did get move. His back was the cause of endless joking. Ex: good thing he tried to move the mats with his hands and not his teeth-the chiropractor was open on Saturdays, but not the dentist!
Lily settled in within 24 hours, and went back to being her usual easygoing self. Our rides have been terrific and getting better, but on Lily's personal front, she's having a hard time integrating in the new little herd. Christa has become very attached to Pink, as they are in adjoining stalls, so she is not so fond of Lily anymore. We still turn them out together sometimes at night, but there can't be any kind of hay or feed on the ground, or Christa will mercilessly chase Lily, preventing her from eating anything at all, even if the hay gets separated into different piles far apart from each other. So Lily often times gets turned out in the side paddock while Christa or Christa and Pink get turned out in the arena, with hay on either side of the fence so they can all get used to watching each other eat without attempting to steal Lily's hay. One Sunday morning we turned all 3 mares out in the arena, and I stood by the gate with Elizabeth's lunge whip. I did nothing, just said, "Go Pink!" (I knew she responds to this from the one time I raced her down the powerlines) and waved the lash of the whip in the air. All 3 mares took off galloping around the arena, Lily in the lead. It was beautiful to watch; Dianne and Mark were also at the barn that morning, and they stopped what they were doing to watch the horses running. Around and around they went for a good 5 minutes or so. Afterwards, Pink and Christa came to a stop by the gate to nibble on some leftover hay on the ground, while Lily, good girl that she is, continued to walk herself around the track surrounding the dressage arena to cool herself down. However, when she tried to join Christa and Pink by the gate, both mares pinned their ears at her. Lily spent the next hour hanging out by the back wall by herself, with a forlorn expression on her little face. Here are some pics of the event. Lily demonstrated her Thoroughbred breeding by staying in the front the entire time!
Lily leads the way in their first lap around the arena!
And she stayed in the lead after that. Pink was racing as hard as she could to catch up to the lead, but Christa and Lily, being much fitter, stayed in front effortlessly
Lily was coming out of a buck in this one, while Christa was going into a buck! Note Pink flat out trying to gain on the front runners.
For this lap, Pink figured out that if she cut through the dressage arena, she could cheat her way into second position. *lol*
Our lesson with Judy later that morning went excellent, though-Lily trotted several laps of the dressage arena with her nose almost to the ground in her closest and longest imitation of a stretchy trot yet, while I worked hard at posting energetically to keep her momentum, while maintaining everything else absolutely quiet and unchanging (leg pressure, rein pressure, my posture in the saddle). 3 days later and I'm still sore from that lesson! Lily had her teeth done that afternoon, and as it turns out, not only were her teeth so sharp that it took the technician an hour to rasp them down, she also had wolf teeth that needed to be pulled. I started her on bute that night and gave her the next day off, as she was still having problems chewing, and yesterday I longed her in the morning with just her halter, then rode her in the afternoon for an hour at the walk on a loose rein. She did not object to just having the bit in her mouth and had been eating normally, so I took it as a sign that she felt better.
We'll see how she does on our next ride!
Poor girl! She immediately tried to eat her hay after having her teeth done, so I had to lock her outside while I removed her hay from the stall. She was still dopey from the tranquilizer and there was a risk of choking if she tried to eat before waking up fully.
Friday morning was even chillier than Thursday. :) Love, love, LOVE this weather!! I wore a long-sleeve thin cotton shirt under one of my microfiber workout shirts that I normally wear to the barn. Elisabeth is out of town for the weekend, and she asked me if could ride Christa Friday for her. My lesson wasn't until that evening, so I tacked up Christa and rode her down to the field.
Christa just went into heat and has been particularly sassy (trying to bite passers-by when she's in her stall), and actually bucked for Elisabeth under saddle Thursday when asked to canter (she never does this for her mom). She's been particularly sensitive to touch on her lumbar back, flanks and belly. So my plan was to just take her down to the field for some walk and trot to exercise her, but not instigate her crankiness/soreness with cantering. Plus I've never ridden her myself outside of the arena, and I wanted to see how she'd behave for me. I know she's an angel for Elisabeth.
Tacking up, she stood with a wrinkled nose, which I thought was funny. Cranky mare. As soon as I stopped what I was doing and approached her head, her nose would relax. So I would pet her and talk to her, and continue what I was doing. Wrinkled nose again. *lol*
Wrinkled nose
I expected her to be sassy getting on, too, so I tightened the girth, placed the dressage whip in my right hand, and put weight on the stirrup. She whirled her head and swished her tail in protest, but no buck-I figured out she bucks if the saddle shifts when I put weight on the stirrup. I tapped her with the whip on her right hip, and she stopped. I only had to do this 1 more time, and she allowed me to get on. We then walked down to the field. She was a little "up" going down the driveway, and looky, but once on the street she relaxed into her usual easygoing self. I like Christa. She's a good girl, but she's got some personality.
We had a great workout. After a nice relaxed warmup, I asked her for more collection and we worked on shoulder-ins, circles, spirals, and then doing long diagonal and straight lines using the entire field at a good energetic trot while still maintaining a frame. She did excellent! She only complained once while I was asking her to extend even more, but a tap with the whip corrected that. We only worked on walk and trot, as her feet were long and I didn't want her straining anything. As if on cue, when we arrived back at the barn, Elisabeth's farrier had shown up to do another horse and Christa, so she did get a nice pedicure.
My lesson was at 6:30pm. The weather was a little warmer than that morning, but still cool (for us) in the low 70s. I returned to the barn early to set up part of the dressage arena (corners, and a couple of rails on the sides to create an illusion of an arena). I also clipped Lily's legs, face and bridle path, and tacked her up afterwards. I already had show jitters. We were going to practice our tests today.
Judy arrived and I took Lily outside to get on. She became very fidgety at the mounting block, which is highly unusual for her. July held her while I got on, and then Lily tried to walk off before I had my right foot in the stirrup. I'm not really sure what happened next. Apparently Julie quickly reached for the reins to halt Lily, and Lily panicked. She gave 3 enormous and completely unexpected bucks, slamming me to the ground. I jumped back up from the concrete-like footing (after all the rain, the sand in the arena was packed as hard as cement!!), fine but already feeling the ginormous bruise I was going to have on my right thigh. Immediately the entire barn was standing at the arena gate. One of the girls anticipated that I would need the longe line and brought it out for me before I could ask for it. I clipped it on, and proceeded to longe Lily. Calmly, quietly. She was still skittish when approached, and extra-willing to trot out. I had her canter, and then do a balanced, controlled gallop, but she did not offer to bolt or buck anymore. We changed directions and repeated the same process. She relaxed enough where I felt better about getting on again. Mounting up was uneventful, but Lily was SUPER tense, a stark contrast to the relaxed willing mare I'd ridden the day before! Judy had us walk around the arena, working on some light bending, and then pick up a trot. Her trot was a total reversal to day 1: like riding a pogo stick. I could not get her to push forward and stretch. We tried this for a few minutes, but any leg pressure caused her to jump, a touch on the reins made her pop up her head. And then Judy told me to just stroke her neck. Lily instantly gave a big long snort and dropped her head. The tension in her body was reduced by about 50%. Wow. And duh! I know how well she responds to praise, but I was so tense myself that I wasn't thinking either. Ater that, the lesson improved. With a lot more praise, Lily almost relaxed to where she had consistently been the last few weeks. Then Judy wanted us to canter. I made a face; I didn't feel comfortable. We discussed it. Judy really felt it would help her relax more. I asked if I could do it in 2-point-it's the only way I can safely canter her when she's this jumpy. Judy said this was fine. She also said we didn't need to canter if I didn't feel confident. But after thinking about it for a minute, I felt better about the idea. So we cantered. I brought her into the gait from the walk, and asked her to canter with the verbal cue, "Up." She popped right into the canter, and we did a lovely canter around the entire arena, me in 2-point with a light contact on the reins, stroking her neck, her snorting happily with every stride. It worked: her following trot was a lot more relaxed. We then changed directions and repeated. She was just as good. Afterwards we practiced Intro A & B. Lily didn't want to bend, but we at least finished the lesson on a good note. By then, night was falling, nad Judy and I ended up agreeing to practice Intro C Saturday morning at 9:00 am.
I was at the barn early Saturday morning to longe Lily before the lesson, and she was back to her normal self. We longed fully tacked with side reins on, and she did very well; the best I've seen her so far on the longe. Judy arrived when I was half-way through, and she was impressed with Lily's movement. After a brief warmup under saddle, we practiced the dreaded C test: I was afraid Lily was going to take off when asked to canter on the circle. She surprised me by keeping her cool, picking up the correct lead and relaxing into the circle within 2 strides. I felt much better about our test. As it turns out, you CAN show in Open and Novice in the same level, in the same show.
Today was a longer arena workout, as tomorrow I work and thus Lily will have the day off; most of this coming week I will be working alternate days. It is rare that I ride her 4 days in a row, because it is even more rare for me to get that many days off in a row from work, but that is why we alternated harder and easier workouts this week.
We worked on transitions from and to the halt today, the first time we had really focused on this outside of a lesson. Lily did great. Since my abs were sore from yesterday (because I'm a workout fiend, I couldn't just stop at the run/walk session, I also had to hit the free weights at home afterwards) I knew exactly when I was using them! Givng with the inside rein when she engages has also produced wonderful results-it is a much better reward for her, much more appreciated and understood, than just patting her on the withers. It is also easier for me to do without undoing everything we've achieved!
We would trot, working on flexion, then halt, back up, then back into a trot. We also did canter-halt-back up-canter transitions, which produced the most WONDERFUL uphill canter! She had never moved like this before. Probably not perfect to someone watching, but I could feel the difference-it is a big step in the right direction. But I realized today just how much she needs to learn the proper canter cue-she knows which lead to pick up on the circle, but halting in the center of the arena and asking to pick up a specific lead brought some confusion on her part. I had to use my seat firmly to cue her as well. We will have to work on polishing this up some more in the future, but for today, she did wonderful. She is so amazingly sensitive, and not in a bad way-she is always paying attention, and any slight shift or movement on my part will cause a reaction on her part as she tries to understand what I'm asking. I have to say that my mare is a joy to ride. I just have to work on cleaning up the way I communicate with her.
We did long free walks in between the more intense parts of today's session so Lily wouldn't get mentally tired. At one point, I had her stand still, and tried to see if I could get her to move just one hind foot at a time, while the rest of her remained still. I touched her belly with my right heel and shifted my weight to get her to move her left hind to the left. The result was her doing a leg yield to the left and then backing up when I asked her to stand. I love her. She tries so hard! I repeated the cue, but a lot more gently this time, and stayed centered in the saddle so she wouldn't think she was supposed to leg yield. She took 2 steps to the left with her hind legs. I gave the cue again, same gentleness, now to the right, and she took the one step. Lots of pats and a loose rein! Again to the left, and she got it! We also worked on reversing; I wanted her to step back as a result of me just shifting my weight backwards. She had improved significantly on this by the end of the session.
Elisabeth joined me in the arena, and after she worked Christa on transitions, we walked the girls around the perimeter, talking. Every once in a while, Lily would get ahead of Christa. I'd shift my weight back, and she'd shift gears, reverse, and then continue forward when I centered my weight again. I gave her a liniment bath afterwards and turned her out to eat grass with Christa. We did treat stretches for her neck, to both sides, her chest, and between her front legs. I then stretched each leg individually. She has gotten used to this and enjoys it; she always touches her face to mine when I'm stretching her front legs. My girl is just about the sweetest horse on the planet, I think.
Lily and I warmed up in the arena yesterday again, but did a different warmup consisting of walk/trot/canter on a loose rein before even attempting to get busy working. She felt GREAT with front shoes on! What a difference! She was engaging more in both directions; no more significant problems to the left. And then we tried something different: haunches in. She was confused at first as to what I wanted, but she was doing her shoulder-ins so well, that just switching the leg pressure and maintaining the bend, she understood. After another round of w/t/c asking her to be more on the bit, we changed directions to the left at the trot, did a shoulder-in at the trot, then I asked her for the haunches in. She nodded one time as if to say, "Mom, you drive me crazy, but here goes", then the hind legs came in, and she did it, all the way around the corner! I immediately brought her down to a walk on a loose rein with lots of pats-we were done with our arena work; she had done way more than I expected, way faster than expected. My little girl had tried her heart out and she deserved a reward! We had only been in the arena for 15 minutes.
A video demonstrating the differences between shoulder-in, haunches-in, and renvers-our next project! (This video is not mine, it belongs to a Youtube user that goes by the name PrinceElmelund. Their website is http://www.paardenbegrijpen.nl. Prince Elmelund is also the name of the 4-year-old Frederiksborger gelding in the video demonstrating these moves in hand.)
Elisabeth had arrived at the barn and was tacking up Christa to go out. Lily and I joined them and we left the barn together, walking all the way to the park, then around the park road and through the pretty side trails, where we trotted. Coming back out of the trails, we came face to face with the children. There were school buses of kids at the park. We walked past a large group of them "Oh the horses! Look at the horses!" There were adults with them, so the children didn't even think to come running towards us-my greatest fear. This happened to one of our boarders: a group of campers ran towards her and her horse one day in the park. Just to pet the horsie. This woman was riding bareback with no helmet, and her horse is a very, very nervous old man. Upon seeing the tidal wave of kids heading his way, the horse spooked and bolted, and she ended up in the hospital with a pretty serious head injury.
The children called to us and waved, and we smiled and waved back, like riders in a parade. Christa and Lily walked on like nobody's business. We came onto the smaller field of the park, which has several small rolling hills. There is a small shelter next to it, which was also full of children having a birthday party; a clown was talking loudly and making noises. On the other side of the small field, there was an enormous tractor/lawn mower that looked like something you'd use to cut hay. I'd never seen anything like it, and if filled the air with a deafening noise. Lily's ears flicked every which way, but she remained attentive to me and did not spook or shy. I asked Elisabeth if she wanted to work the mares in this area; I wanted to test Lily to see how much she'd focus. Christa was fine; she's one of the most bombproof horses in the barn. We trotted large circles in one of the little valleys, and I was inmensely surprised when Lily arched her neck and engaged in a very forward and long trot, despite the 3 million and one reasons she could've used to be distracted/nervous/jiggy. Feeling brave, I asked her to canter. She gave me beautiful round canter, better than anything she had done yet at home! We worked in both directions, then joined Elisabeth and Christa on top of one of the hills. Lily received a lot of pats and thank yous.
We then meandered our way down to the other side of the park, cantered down one of the straightaways, and arrived at the power lines. With a big grin, Elisabeth asked me whether I wanted to trot or canter. We were facing home, and I knew that no matter which gait we chose, the mares would go faster than if we'd been going in the opposite direction. I let Elisabeth choose, and she said that Christa will try to gallop if cantered in this direction, but she thought she could control her. So canter we did. I let Christa go in front and held Lily back so the mares wouldn't think they were racing side-by-side. The wind whistled in our ears; it was a breezy day, and the palm trees were dancing. As we flew past the first electric post, I realized that Lily's stride was getting bigger. I shortened the reins more and sat up straighter. Lily did not slow down. I half-halted her to make her pay attention, and right at that instant, Christa spooked and dove sideways off of the powerline track and onto the grassy drop to the right of the track. Elisabeth flew off. Lily shied at Elisabeth's fall and went in the opposite direction, onto the grass on the left side of the track. I lost both stirrups, and lost my balance but somehow managed to get myself back upright in a nanosecond (I think I grabbed mane), at the same time I called out, "Whoa Lily!" Lily slowed and in 2 strides came to a stop by the bushes next to the grass on the left side of the track. Christa was cantering away, and Elisabeth sat up. Thank God she was okay; I had flashbacks of that student's fall a month or two ago. Lily was now very jumpy; I tried riding her over to Elisabeth but my mare felt like she was about to explode. I had her stop and she was trembling. She had no idea what had just happened; I don't think she'd ever witnessed someone fall from another horse, and on top of that, her friend had just run away in the middle of a very stressful situation. I firmly told her to whoa 3 times before I trusted her to stay still long enough for me to hop off. The minute my feet hit the ground, I saw Christa trotting back to us. Thank God again! I'd been afraid Christa would run all the way out of the park and onto the road to get back to the barn. "Christa!" I called softly, holding my hand out to her. She came to a stop right in front of me and let me grab her reins. Elisabeth was still sitting in the grass. She looked okay, not in pain at all, but she had a bewildered expression. "Are you okay??" I asked her. "Yes." she said, "what happened?" "Christa shied to the side, and you came off. I have no idea what scared her." There had been nothing there-nothing had flown by, there had been no changes in terrain or anything lying on the ground that could frighten her. All I could think was that she had heard something in the wind.
Elisabeth stood up and came to take Christa's reins. I studied her every move as she walked over and reached for Christa, and she still seemed fine; she was moving and speaking normally. I was still kind of freaking out; Elisabeth is 59 years old. "My goodness, I'm so glad I always wear a helmet!" she said. She had felt her head bounce off the ground. She was lucky she'd dropped on a nice soft patch of grass too; if it had been on the hard track it might've been a different story. After making 100% sure she was okay, I helped her get back on Christa. Lily stood still while I mounted up. "I guess we should do it again?" Elisabeth said, "we can't just end it like that." "I don't think we should canter them, though, " I said. "They are both nervous now and the wind isn't helping." I suggested we do a nice, slow sitting trot down to the park gate, then trot back up the powerlines and leave through the other exit. This way we could reinforce a positive experience as well as not let them think that just because they had had a bad scare, they'd get to go back to the barn right away. Both girls were very good both ways. Afterwards, we made our way across the big field at a walk. Elisabeth was still a little shaken up and nauseous, but I kept her talking to distract her. We made it out of the park okay, but rounding the corner onto our street, she stopped speaking mid sentence and just looked very pale and weak. I brought Lily in closer to Christa, "Are you okay?? Do you need to stop, get off? Please don't faint" I had all the intention of catching her if she started to slide off of Christa. She insisted she was fine; she was just very nauseous, but she didn't want to stop for a break. "Please don't tell me you don't want to ride with me again, " she said. This made me laugh; it caught me so by surprise! "I was going to say the same thing!" I said. I love Elisabeth; she is like a German version of my own mother. She has that same quiet serenity that can make everything okay just with her presence. Every time we hang out together, I feel at home.
After what felt like a thousand years (but was actually just 5 minutes), we made it back to the barn in one piece. Christa spooked again on the driveway, for no apparent reason again. Lily did not react at all. I actually reached over to grab Elisabeth. She just laughed and said, "This is why I keep saying that Christa is the first in this barn that needs to be desensitized!" We had been talking about doing a sort of obstacle course as an exercise for the horses to get them used to scary things/situations.
I helped Elisabeth untack Christa and brought her water. Her hands were shaking; I opened the bottle for her. Around that time, her daughter called on her cell (intuition maybe? The timing was perfect), and Elisabeth sat down in the rocking chair by the barn entrance to talk. She seemed much better sitting down and I didn't want to hover, so I took Lily outside for a bath. When I was finished, I returned to check on Elisabeth and found her lying down on the clubhouse sofa, which frightened me. She opened her eyes when I came in, and assured me she was fine before I could open my mouth to ask. After about 10 minutes, she came back out and finally seemed normal; she got to work mucking Christa's stall. At this point it felt okay to stop watching her obsessively.
I made a point of hugging Lily and thanking her for having stopped when she did, for listening.
Afterwards, we ended up going to our local tack shop to check out the consignment dressage saddles. Our tack shop is pretty awesome. It has been in the same spot for 25 years, always with the same owner. The owner competes nationally in dressage, and her trainer also works at the store part-time. Thus, there is usually a large selection of good quality consignment dressage saddles. Elisabeth talked to the shop owner about her mare and what she is looking for (the owner is also a certified saddle fitter), and she brought out some of the saddles that might fit Christa for Elisabeth to sit in. She took her time with the more affordable ones (there was one consignment saddle going for $2600! I don't want to know the cost of it new! It was in good condition, however, and had the super cushy seat and giant thigh blocks that are so desirable now) and she finally settled on a beautiful Dominus. It must've been used only a handful of times, it barely had wear marks on it. I knew for a fact that that saddle had been in the store over a year, and explained to Elisabeth that she might be able to talk the owner down on the price based on that alone. That afternoon, we tried it on Christa. (Elisabeth was really and truly fine after all-she was 100% herself when we met again at the barn) It seemed to fit okay. Not perfectly, but not horrible. I explained this to Elisabeth. Behind her shoulders it fits well, and I could not feel any bridging underneath it. I felt that the panels did not follow the contours of Christa's back as nicely as mine, but they did not seem to dig into her back either. There was full clearance of the channel over her back, but the front of the saddle was a good 5 fingers above Christa's withers (she basically has no withers), which is considered excessive. I'm not sure why this is a bad thing, but when she came out to do fittings on my previous horses, the store owner had explained to me that you don't want that much clearance either. I placed my saddle on Christa to show Elisabeth, and also to compare them for myself. There were minuscule details that indicated my saddle was still a much better fit. Not a favoritism issue at all, just a reality. Of course, I'm not a professional fitter either and I could be completely wrong. I'd just like Elisabeth to find something that fits as well as possible-I think this will help Christa tremendously with her back problems. My verdict for Elisabeth was: try the saddle, see how it feels so that she'll have an idea what she likes for herself as well, and then have the store owner come out and take a look at it on Christa before making any offers on the saddle.
Afterwards, I took Lily out to try some of Buck's training on her (I'm totally hooked on that movie right now). I had her walk next to me on the lead rope. I would stop, expecting her to stop next to me. Distracted, she would keep on walking until she was in front of me and then swing around to face me. I corrected her twice with a gentle tug on the lead rope when I stopped, to indicate she was to stop too, and she understood. Afterwards, I just kept a loop in the lead rope with a very light hand. I would then take one step forward and halt. She would do the same, staying next to me. I would walk fast and she would accelerate; I would then stop and so would she. I did a very slow walk, moving my legs in slow motion, and had to laugh when she actually did the same, moving her legs slowly too. I brought her to a stop, stood in front of her, and with one hand pointed the direction I wanted her to go in. She went. But this is something she's already good at-this is how we change directions on the longe; all I need to do is point in the direction I want her to go, and Lily understands.
I would then bring her to a halt facing me, and would walk forward towards her shoulder. She instantly backed up as I stepped forward. It was like a dance, and I was smiling from ear to ear when I took her back to the barn. I don't know if someone trained her this way-to pay attention, or if Lily is just unusually sensitive by nature, but it is really one of my favorite things about her-she is so tuned-in to my body language and emotions it's almost like she can read my mind sometimes. When I broke my toe, right around the time I became Lily's owner, I got around at the barn by hobbling or with crutches. Lily was absolutely amazing at the time. She would walk very slowly and carefully as I clutched a handful of mane with one hand and used her as support when leading her to and from the turnouts or to longe her.
Back home that evening, I decided to go for a jog. I have not done this in a year and a half. At that time, I had a personal trainer and a gym membership, and I worked out like a fiend, hard-core, 6 days a week. I lost 10 lbs and welcomed my 30th birthday the fittest I have ever been in my life. That changed when I got a horse. The money that used to pay the personal trainer went to pay board, and the money that went towards the gym membership became more useful as hay money. Around that time, I also finished tech school and started working full time. Between the job and the barn, I am on my feet up to 16 hours a day, 7 days a week. I make healthy food choices and Charles and I try to cook at home when we have the energy and motivation to do so (not as often as we'd like, but this comes with the territory when we have opposite sleep schedules and we both work crazy 12 hour shifts...). The 10 lbs have stayed off, and my arms are as defined, if not more, than when I had the personal trainer. However, I have not done worthy cardio (running, Spinning, plyometrics, etc) in 1.5 years, and it has been nagging at me. Horseback riding is hard work; it involves a lot of core and leg strength, and while I can post forever at the trot (everyone tells me this is like crazy unusual), I get wiped out after a good canter. I've been thinking about how much better I'd be if I were getting some real cardio in. So I went for a jog. "Jog" by my definition involves intervals of walking and running. I have to work very gradually into steady continuous running, as I hurt one of my Achilles tendons pretty badly a long time ago while training for my first 10K. Go too long too soon, and it will flare up again in a matter of days. So I did 1 minute running, 2 minute walking intervals for 20 minutes. Not a lot, but it was getting dark fast, and I didn't want to overdo it the first day either. I was surprised to discover that cardiovascularly, I had no problem running hard for the 1 minute, and was recovering within a minute of slowing to a walk. Not bad after such a long time without formal cardio! I guess all that walking, lifting and riding has been worth something after all. I did quickly remember muscles that I had forgotten existed. And of course I was sore today, but I was ready to go again for a short run this afternoon after the barn...except it started raining at 4:00 pm and is not supposed to stop until sometime early next week. *sigh*
Yup, welcome to the "Sunshine State." Right.
Christa & Lily enjoying the grass. And the sun, while it was still shining!
South Floridians are an interesting group. They are made up of a large group of Northeasterners, Caribbean, Central and South Americans, crammed into a small, flat area of mostly swamp land covered in cement, and cooked in the broiling sun about 350 days out of the year. The result: a melange of crazy, nasty, angry people, who drive too fast (ever seen an Argentinean drive in their native country? Ever see how New Yorkers drive in the city? Not much difference. This is the kind of driver that inhabits this part of the state) and have no patience or cordiality toward their fellow human being, despite the entire area being a fascinating cultural melting pot ("melting" is a key word here). They talk about Seasonal Affective Disorder in the North, but somebody needs to do a study on the effect of the heat on people's tempers in densely populated areas. I'm pretty sure they'll find a trend. Maybe we could call it Thermal Affective Disorder, or TAD. Cuz we're all just a TAD bit angry down here: South Florida is known to have one of the meanest group of people, overall, in the country. You can identify non-natives a mile away because they are usually so cheery and polite! "Natives" is a another interesting term in South Florida, as there are very few true "native" South Floridians, whose families were born and raised here for generations prior to the Cuban immigration. You will find the true Floridians further north, often riding around in a red pickup truck with a Confederate flag across the back window. The give new meaning to the term "deep South".
You're considered a native South Floridian after living here for 3 years. That's how little it takes for you to get stuck here, because once you move in, you can't ever afford to move out again. Unless you find a job that pays for your relocation. Like the Army. Almost everybody comes from somewhere else, either recently moved themselves or born here with families who moved in from another country or state. This brings us to the language barrier. Its funny to hear the first experience of, say, a Virginian getting lost in Hialeah. If you've ever been to Hialeah, you know exactly what I'm talking about. If you haven't, well, here's the run-down: Hialeah's streets run around and sideways-not the traditional grid pattern of streets everywhere else in the US. This problem is compounded by street numbers that follow no rational order. The problem is further compounded by the fact that Hialeah is 99% Cuban. Cubans who have lived there since Fidel came into power. Cubans who never bothered to learn English because they never had to: they now own most of the gas stations, convenience stores and grocery stores in the area, and have populated those same confusing streets. However, knowing Spanish doesn't guarantee that you'll have a better chance down here. Don't venture into the heart of Miami without a recently updated GPS, or you could wind up getting lost in the middle of the Haitian ghettos. Why is this bad? #1. It's the ghetto. #2. Haitians don't speak Spanish. They speak Creole, their own French dialect. Good luck with that! My school in downtown Miami was one wrong turn away from the Haitian ghetto. After making that one wrong turn and experiencing a minor panick attack, I invested in a nice Garmin.
A satellite view of a Hialeah residential area
Now, don't get me wrong: I have met some really nice people here. Some of them turned out to have an agenda, but I have made more real friends while living here than anywhere else I've lived before, including Puerto Rico, where I lived for 18 years! However, this brings me to South Floridian horse people. Of all the groups here, I think they are an entire species apart, with some pretty unfathomable possibilities in the realm of crazy. I have met some horsey people here that are worthy of being preserved and placed in a museum as part of the exhibit "Tribute to Insanity". The best time of year to catch these specimens is late summer/early fall when the effects of TAD are at their highest. The heat makes these people have arguments with their barn managers and fellow boarders, getting them evicted or just enticing them to go searching for a new barn to torment. I mean, board at. I swear it's a pattern. At every barn I've been at, the crazies really do seem to come out of the woodwork at this time of year.
We are dealing with one of these specimens right now at our barn. This woman is older (early 60's), has 3 horses, and is built like a bull. She vomits words. You know what I mean-one of these people who literally cannot not tell you something. Every single thought going through her head spills out of her mouth. Add to that a dogged persistence-she will not shut up, but she will not let you walk away either. Then toss in a dash of irresponsability, a sprinkle of thirst for money, and a whopping dose of short fuse, and you have...a monster! This woman has a reputation that has preceded her on our street for over a year, when the first boarder arrived fleeing from her presence. Said woman has been at 3 different barns in the last year, and is trying to make our barn her 4th. Even though she can't afford my barn manager's rates, even though we don't have 3 empty stalls available to begin with! She showed up in person, without an appointment, the first time she came to see our barn, and pretty much ambushed my barn manager as she was getting out of her car. Making my barn manager nervous right off the bat is not a good way to get off on the right foot with her. My barn manager explained the rules at our barn and board rates were discussed. Just from looking down the aisle, you can see that there is only 1 stall available. This woman started to make plans to move in that weekend with her 3 horses! My barn manager had to call her and tell her no, and explain again that we don't have available stalls. The woman sends her friend over a week later to bring my barn manager a deposit check to hold the stalls. Despite there not being 3 stalls available. My barn manager explained the situation again. The friend called my barn manager again the next morning (today) begging a third time. The woman won't call herself; she has her friends do the dirty work. My barn manager is officially feeling harassed, and starting to get angry. We'll see how this plays out. South Floridian barn life always involves some kind of drama.
I rode Lily this morning. We had our make-up lesson this past Saturday, and she was very resistant to bend to the left, to the point where Judy had us only work to the right (this decision was made based on the fact that the farrier is coming out Wednesday to evaluate her). We did a lot of 20 meter circle cantering, where Judy had me sitting back in the saddle and placing more weight into the inside foot, as I now have a tendency to step out in the circle, which prevents Lily from bending correctly. This was a new thing for me-for years I would lean into the turn when riding jumper courses, and my instructors always told me to step out to balance the horse coming into the jump. So I corrected the bad habit, and created a new one for dressage. *lol* You just can't win sometimes. All Judy wanted was for me to have my weight evenly distributed on both feet. This proved to be exceptionally hard, especially when you added in the sitting back in the saddle part. Lily was cantering fast, but her strides were big, which is what you want in dressage. I felt like an ugly mess, but with Judy's encouragement I started to do better. She's very understanding and patient. I <3 my trainer! We practiced halting from the canter, using my abdominals and seat to bring Lily's weight back onto her haunches when stopping. This proved to be hard for Lily, too, but she was a good girl and tried her best-she was giving me 3 short walk strides into the halt, but she was rocking back correctly and her halts were almost square. After the halt, we would back up, and go immediately into the trot, and after achieving balance at the trot again, we would go back into the canter. After the 2nd time of this sequence, Lily was anticipating it, and her trot became faster expecting that canter. I laughed-she's really starting to have fun with our workouts and it was cute to see her looking forward to canter. This was a first! She's also started giving big snorts at the beginning of the session as she starts to warm up, an indication of tension release. She did it for the 2nd time at the beginning of a lesson.
Today I took her into the arena to warm her up. She REALLY wanted to work today, which made me smile! Her warm up walk was long and loose, head down with the reins on the buckle. We worked on bending at the walk, which she did very well today-no signs of stiffness to the left. We did large circles at the trot, cantered in both directions, me trying to focus on sitting back more and get my weight even on both feet. We then trotted more, but instead of being looser, Lily felt more stiff to the left at the trot. I brought her down to the walk and we did some shoulder-in and light leg yields, and she was excellent again. To the right, she was bringing her head down and working nicely. Can't wait for the farrier tomorrow; I'm hoping this will even her out.
Afterwards, I took her to the park. She was so cute going down the driveway-she actually walked FASTER when we reached the street! And this was her first time going out by herself in over a week. No hesitation, no barn sourness! I asked her to trot as soon as we hit the powerlines, and trotted all the way around, down the by the street that leads to the petting zoo. Lily was very "up", but her trot wasn't too choppy, so I pushed her forward, trying to get her to extend, but she moved chest first. Her shadow looked like it belonged to a jumper galloping towards her fences-her head was that high. I could've tried to force her head down, but didn't want to get into a fight with her-it was important to me that she continue to have fun today, so I just shortened my reins and had her continue to go forward. There were cops stopping cars on the highway next to the park, but the flashing lights and sirens didn't faze her. We did some shoulder-fores, but she was too "up" to focus, so we ended up doing some circles in the grass by the road. Her head immediately came down, her back came up, and her hind end engaged. Beautiful. As soon as we went back to working in a straight line however, the head came up and the back hollowed. *sigh* At least she was having fun today. I guess I can't expect too much when this is our first real working outing in the park.
There is a big light show exhibit held at the park every year between Thanksgiving and New Year's, and the lighted figures were spread out on the grass on both sides of the road further ahead.
Taken at last year's light show exhibit. These reindeer were actually laid out on the grass today when we walked by-Lily had the opportunity to get a good look at them
I had her slow to a walk so she could see the figures. She did her one-eye one-ear head cock at them, but continued on without even a sidestep. Good girl! As we rounded the bend, however, we heard heavy machinery at work. As in knocking down trees types of sounds, with crackling and roaring. We hadn't heard it before because of the wind blowing the sound in the opposite direction. Lily jumped and half spun around. I made her turn back and brought her to a stop. She was not having it, and honestly, from the way the machinery sounded, I didn't really want to try to force her through; I had no idea what we would encounter. I calmed her down, we did a big circle at a walk, and then we slowly turned around and started our way back. More light figures on the grass for her to look at. We trotted back up the powerlines then looped around over the hills, around one of the lakes, and back by the gazebos. I let her canter down the straightaway that goes past the entrance to the main trails, and then we walked all the way down the powerlines and back to the barn. We had ridden for an hour total, including the workout in the arena. It was the perfect day for a long workout, though-very sunny with a clear blue sky, and a tremendous cool breeze blowing-neither of us broke a sweat. Lily got a bath at the barn, and I let her graze in the parking lot while I prepared her lunch. She also got dewormed today! She hates it, but I caught her by surprise, so this time she received her full dose without spitting most of it out!
In the afternoon I returned to ride Christa. I forgot my spurs, but got her to warm up at a nice working trot and rolling canter (no bucking today!) However, I could not get that extra titch of impulsion. Elisabeth was watching, so I had her hold Christa for me while I ran back inside and got my spurs. After that, she was perfect. After one turn around the arena, she was lifting her back and engaging, neck arched, going to the left. Even her tail lifts when she does this! Gorgeous! Going to the left, it took a little longer. Initially she braced, and kept getting distracted at the far end of the arena. There were lessons going on at one of the barns one property over, and she could see the movement between the trees and hear the instructor's voice. She would turn her head to look, so I turned this into a counterbend coming around the corner of the arena, and pushed her with my inside leg into my outside hand. Voila! Her head came down and her inside leg stepped up under herself. After that she stayed engaged to the right. Not as easily as going to the left, but still a huge improvement from earlier. Last week, Elisabeth had told me that Christa would be resistant to go straight when she rode her in the park and would bulge out in one direction. I had tried to explain to do a shoulder-fore in the opposite direction to help straighten her, but knew she didn't understand. I demonstrated a full shoulder-in for her, with her standing in the arena so she could watch Christa's legs performing the 3-track, first at a walk, and then a sitting trot, where I drove her forward with my seat. With the previous correct warm-up, Christa's shoulder-in at the trot was BEAUTIFUL and effortless!! In both directions! Again, I wish I had video! Elisabeth was thrilled. We ended the workout then, after half an hour, simply because Christa had done so good; I didn't want to overdo it.
For those of you who don't know what a shoulder-in is (since this is like the 4th time I've mentioned them), here is a video with Jane Savoie, demonstrating and explaining how it is done, and why it is so important. Jane Savoie has coached numerous US eventers and the Canadian 3-day event team at different Olympics.
Last night I was supposed to have a dressage lesson. I got to the barn early, armed with my clippers and a new set of blades, to see if Lily would tolerate being clipped. After giving Lily a hay snack while cleaning her stall, I put her on the crossties and turned on the clippers. She didn't care. I clipped her throat, and her entire belly in one smooth line, and was thrilled to see that she didn't even flinch. This is awesome! I love training horses from 0, but I'm not very experienced with body clipping in general, and it probably would've taken me the entire winter to get her trained to accept the clippers if she'd been afraid of them.
Elisabeth is one of Lily's greatest fans. (After me, of course!)
While doing this, Judy texted me, asking to reschedule the lesson. I told her this was okay, and rode anyway. Charles had come out with the camera to take photos and video of our now non-lesson. It mostly ended up being video, because it is already dusk at 7:15 pm, and the photos were pretty blurry. It was a really good ride, for the most part. Lily would get fast anytime we were circling towards the barn (everyone was being fed dinner...she forgot she had a snack 30 minutes before being ridden!) but she was otherwise excellent! She was soft and bendy right from the start, she cantered really well, and she didn't do her quick choppy trot during the entire session. She is just barely tracking up at the trot in the videos, but her whole body is nice and loose, no tension, and she is maintaining a nice, consistent working speed. And her head isn't sticking straight out with an ewe neck like it used to; her nose is starting to go into a more normal downward position while being ridden.
Warming up at a long walk on a loose rein. You can see how her neck is starting to develop right above her shoulder!Love that I can do this with her without being terrified she's going to explode at the slightest sound. This is only the 2nd time she's been ridden at dusk. Horses can see just fine in the dark, but at dusk and dawn they don't see too well.
Circling to the left, her stiffer side. You can see the tension in her neck and shoulder going to this side (she was still tracking up nicely, though!). I swear it's that little foot. I prefer to have a horse barefoot if possible, but I'm not a diehard barefoot fanatic-sometimes, especially with some breeds and some types of footing/climate/genes, you just need the extra support of shoes, especially when our horses aren't surviving wild in Montana anymore, where natural selection favors individuals with strong feet. I'm not going to have her get hurt just because I want her barefoot. The farrier comes out Wednesday. We'll see what he says.
Magic happens when I sit up straight. *lol* I almost have a true dressage seat in this photo, and her head is almost vertical! (Sitting up straight is still an enormous struggle for me-only been riding dressage 1 year after almost 20 in that forward jumper seat!)
When I first started riding her, she used to be completely all over the place at the trot-slowing down and speeding up every few seconds; it was very hard just to keep her at a consistent speed, and at any speed, it was like riding a jackhammer. Such a big difference! It felt so much smoother during most of the workout. She was more stiff than usual to the left, so I took it easier on her in this direction, keeping the circles slightly larger. She's not lame, but I think I'm really going to have to put those front shoes on her. It's been over 2 months since she was last trimmed, and she still has no hoof wall that can be trimmed! Her left foot seems to actually be getting smaller-she wears it down more, despite daily applications of Venice turpentine to all 4 feet. Front shoes will prevent this from happening. I think it's time. Boo...
Despite that, her trot was still loose and swinging. I was so happy with her! She actually had a nice sweat going when we were done (first real sweat in a while-it was cooler than it's been in a long time), and I think the partial clipping helped-she recovered quickly. I gave her a liniment bath and she finally got to have her real dinner.
Today I was at the barn early to work some more on clipping her before going on a trail ride with Elisabeth. I did the whole front end of her body (neck, shoulders, and chest) before Elisabeth arrived, then we tacked up and we were off.
That dark stuff on the floor in front of her is all the hair that came off of her shoulders alone! This was using a #10 blade, too!
We had been trying to go on a trail ride together for MONTHS, and our schedules never coincided until today. It was a lovely morning to be at the park-there was a nice breeze , and it was warm, not hot. There is a cold front coming down the East coast this weekend, which for us right now just means that nights will drop into the low 70s, but it also kills the humidity, which makes the daytime heat bearable.
These little pebble clouds never lie-they are usually followed by a cold front. They are only seen between October and April, and always make me smile!
We rode for a good 2 hours, mostly walking (I did want Lily to have an easy day today), with a little trotting and one canter down a straightaway. We talked about the barn and horses, and rode through our favorite trails. There are some very narrow trails at the back of the park, where I had not taken Lily yet. We ended up leading the way in, and she marched down them like she had done this every day of her life! We went up the powerlines and looped onto the park's back street, then took the pretty trail that I had shown Charles last time I rode with him. We trotted through the field among the baby pines. The grass was high, up to Lily's chest, but she just trotted on, ears pricked and head swaying with her motion, like it always does when she's happy and relaxed. I looked over at Christa, and she had a similar expression-I had to laugh: if they had been human, both mares would've been grinning from ear to ear! We continued on up the front of the park, around one of the lakes following the railroad ties, and back to the gazebo area. One of the paths that I really like leads around 2 of the larger gazebos by one of the main lakes. It's shady, often breezy, and involves riding straight through one of the gazebos. There is a bridge that leads over the lake, and Elisabeth wanted to know if we could cross it. I wasn't sure about its sturdiness, if it was meant to hold the weight of a horse, but there were no signs saying that it wasn't allowed. Elisabeth rode Christa up to the bridge but the mare wouldn't even put a foot on it. I got brave then, and asked if she'd let Lily and me try. Lily took one look at it, and stepped onto the bridge with all 4 feet! She'd never even seen this bridge up close, but she went right on. I was going to have her quickly trot across and see if Christa would follow, but I felt her hind feet slide on the bridge-it was dry, but unexpectedly slick. There was no way I was going to have her try to cross it if she couldn't get a grip on the wood. I had her back up off of the bridge. "I'm jealous!" Elisabeth said. Christa has always been known as the best trail horse, and today Lily outdid her. :) Elisabeth then got off to coax Christa up to the bridge. She just wanted her to place one foot on it, but Christa refused; she is very stubborn, and very claustrophobic-the bridge had railings, making it about a foot wider than Christa on each side. Elisabeth eventually got her to at least sniff at the bridge, and after that she got back on and we continued on our way. Elisabeth said that now she has a new project with Christa: to get her to just place a foot on that bridge!
We trotted back down the powerlines on the way home, and cooled the mares down by walking the rest of the way to the barn. I was kind of sad to have the ride end; I think all 4 of us had a really good time. Lily got a bath and her lunch, and I returned in the afternoon to finish body clipping her. Towards the end, she was tired of it, and started turning her head around to look at me, "Mooom, I'm bored! Are you done yet??" So cute! I turned her out for an hour as soon as we were done. I clipped everything except her ears (that's going to be another project altogether...she doesn't mind the clippers anywhere except on her ears), her forehead (hair is short enough) and her legs from the hocks and knees down (no winter shagginess there yet). I stepped out to her walkout to call Judy to see when we could reschedule last night's lesson. The side paddock shares the fence with our side of walkouts. Lily walked over to me and stuck her head through the fence to say hi before walking away to go back to grazing. This made me smile. Afterwards, I went to her, and she turned around towards me and placed her head in my chest. I love when she does this; I've never met such a lovey horse, and she's mine!
Today dawned super cloudy and wet. It had stormed all night and, looking out the window at 7:00 am, I thought surely I'd be lucky if I got to ride one horse today, let alone two, which was my original plan. I was at the barn by 9:00 am, and the minute I put on my half chaps, it started to drizzle. I killed time-catching up with the barn manager on the weekend's events (I worked both days this weekend, and whenever anything happens at the barn, it's usually on weekends when everyone is there), and then following Dianne around when she arrived to catch up with her. I felt like I hadn't seen her in forever. She's been going through a lot of change in her life. She's one person who should probably have her own blog-she is definetely a Superwoman who should share her secret with the rest of us mortals! She has 4 jobs and a horse; Charles says she must have Hermione's time turner to be able to squish the equivalent of 48 hours into 24, day in and day out. Hi Dianne! ;) (yes, she's one of my readers) Lily was so cute-she had scarfed her breakfast and poked her head out her stall door when I was walking by with an alert, questioning expression; "Hi Mom! What are we doing today? I'm BOOORED!" I've had her locked up in her stall with the stall guard up on her walkout because it has been raining so much for the last 3 days. The walkouts turn into quicksand/swimming pools when it rains this much. Suddenly, the drizzling stopped, so I dropped everything I was doing, got Lily out of her stall, and tacked her up before the weather changed its mind again. I rode in the arena, since she had had 2 days off (I was afraid she'd be too frisky to go in the field). We did more of the same we've been doing since our dressage lesson last Thursday, and BOY could I feel the difference!!! Lily was so much softer going into the trot today!! The eternal warm-up wasn't necessary today to get her supple. Right off the bat she started dropping her head for a couple of strides at a time, reaching for the bit. Her spirals were perfect, and she nailed the 20 meter circles at the canter, which she had not been able to do before; she always wants to use the entire arena. We then trotted the cavaletti, which were set as ground poles 12 feet apart, but I turned the 2 cavaletti in the center of the line into tiny little crossrails by setting 2 PVC pipes in an "X" on each of them. I should've taken pictures; I think it's hard to imagine unless you've seen our cavaletti. Basically these were crossrails that were about 6" high at their lowest, and about 1.5' at their highest. The point? To encourage Lily to trot through the center. She did okay. The first time she decided to stop and look at the cavaletti crossrails and tried to run out, but I turned her around and made her go over it. After that, she didn't hesitate again. She does slow her trot going through, but I think this is also my fault because I'm being too easy on her; I need to use more leg. She hasn't discovered yet how much fun jumping can be, so she is less than enthusiastic about grids. We'll get there. I also feel weird doing jumping-type exercises in my dressage saddle. After some more circling and changes of direction to end on a good note, I decided to take her down to the field. The gate out was partially open. She was so cute! She stuck her head and neck out to her shoulders, the part of her that fit through, and waited for me to swing the gate open the rest of the way from her back. She walked right on out of the arena and down the driveway. I laughed. I guess she's bored with arena work! We went down to the field, and once there, Lily acted like she had just come out of her stall. We had worked for 45 minutes in the arena, but she was not at all tired! So we did circles and lots of lateral work in the field at the trot. Her leg yields in the field were nowhere near as good as in the arena because she was so full of herself, so we did lots of shoulder-ins instead, until she was nice and bendy and paying attention. Afterwards, we walked down to the park just cause we haven't gone down in a week, then turned around and came back. She got a quick bath because it was threatening to rain again. In the afternoon, I was able to ride Christa after all despite on again, off again rain. Elisabeth arrived when I had her tacked up in the crossties, waiting for another bout of rain to stop. She got to see our entire workout, and Christa was EXCELLENT!! Waaay less stiff than our last ride, listening, and responding to my requests for more energy. I wish someone had taken video. Her trot was long and easy, she felt light in my hands, yet round and powerful-it's hard to describe the feeling if you haven't ridden a horse correctly before. It felt like Christa's 900 lb body was rolling along between my knees, held back by the lightest touch on the reins. It feels like you are riding a contained storm-all that power is harnessed between your legs and your hands. Pretty awesome! We demonstrated shoulder-ins for Elisabeth (I didn't even have to remind her how to do them! Christa remembered right away), and she was doing them so well that we tried a leg yield at the walk. Christa crossed her front legs, but her hind end was trailing. However, this was a very good first attempt from the mare that was so stiff a week ago. "Who says Christa can't do dressage!?" I said to Elisabeth. It made her day; she was grinning from ear to ear like a little kid and oh so excited to see her baby working so beautifully! Cantering was way better today too-not so heavy on the forehand, and a lot more responsive. She did buck twice going to the right again, but she really is doing it in response to the touch of the spur when she tries to slow down in front of the gate. Silly girl. I rode her through it both times and she did not attempt it again. It was a really, really nice ride and we finished right before it started to pour again. All in all, a truly awesome riding day :)
The vet came out Tuesday morning for Lily's first round of vaccines, and as it turns out, she is not 4 years old...she's 5.5 years old! I felt like an idiot-I can tell a horse's age by their teeth but I had never bothered to look because I have Lily's Coggins from last year saying she was a 3 year old at the time. I guess THAT vet (the same one that wrote her up as an Iberian horse...) didn't bother looking in her mouth. I probably could've guessed that, but oh well. Her body continues to change and develop; she's losing that filly look.
We had her Coggins, West Nile and Rabies done today. My vet doesn't use the 4-in-1 vaccines because they are more likely to cause adverse reactions, which I like, but due to the nature of my work, I get the heebie-jeebies about vaccines, too. Since Lily is still young and I'm not familiar with her vaccine history and possible reactions (all we got from the previous owner was her Coggins), I decided to split up her shots. I'll have her Encephalitis and Tetanus done in 2 weeks. She felt fine at end of day and yesterday; I iced the vaccination spot Tuesday evening in case it decided to swell (she jumped when she was poked with the needles, making it more likely she'd bruise) and I couldn't find any swelling last night. I love my vet, but he advised putting front shoes on her. She has been barefoot for 2 months, and is doing great-she has a flare in her right front which I think can be corrected with good trimming-I like my farrier and he does a beautiful job on shod horses, but I wish I could find a really good certified barefoot trimmer in this area...no luck yet.
Tuesday was also the second time ever that Lily has nickered at me in greeting. :) This is pretty exciting-I don't bring treats; she only gets them when being trained for specific things (such as trailer loading) and during her post-workout stretches. If a horse nickers at me, I want it to be because they are truly happy to see me, not because I bring food. This made my day. I gave Lily the rest of the day off, and rode Christa in the afternoon. Christa is the little paint mare whose mane I trimmed last week. She is owned by Elisabeth, a sweet German lady in her early 60's (she sooo does NOT look her age!) who has owned the mare since she was a 3-year old. Christa is now 9; Elisabeth's daughter, Stacey, a hunter/jumper rider with eventing goals who is going to UF for vet school, helped a lot with her training, and continues to help when she is on vacation from school. Christa used to be a hunter, and was year-end champion at one of the local schooling show circuits with Elisabeth's daughter a year or two ago. Elisabeth mostly rides her on the trails now that Stacy is in school, but just started taking dressage lessons with Judy-she is interested in taking her to a schooling show early next year, and also wants to see Christa continue to develop herself correctly. Elisabeth's previous trainer shunned working with Christa simply because she is a paint and she was thought to be lazy overall. I think this is ridiculous-a horse's breed and/or color does not determine its athletic capacity (see Klein mare), but it is the typical show mindset here in South FL (and in a lot of other places, I know)-if your horse isn't a bay or chestnut TB or Warmblood, it is considered useless in the hunter ring.
Christa's back is sore, and I had been told by Stacy that it has been sore for years. She is usually ridden in Elisabeth's endurance saddle; Stacy used to ride her in a Pessoa. I am not an expert at Western-type saddle fit, so I have not checked the fit of Elisabeth's saddle. But it is concerning that she has had back pain for so long. They do have her adjusted by the chiropractor every 6 months. I already knew this when I started grooming Christa. When I ride a horse for the first time, I like to establish a relationship. I will groom the horse top to bottom-if the horse lets me touch every inch of his/her body and stays still and relaxed in the crossties, you can *usually* count on them being fairly well-mannered in the riding arena. The grooming process is also my way of introducing myself to the horse and saying, "Hi, nice to meet you. I'm here to work with you and help you feel good." There are a lot of things that you can tell just by grooming a horse-conformation flaws that can affect performance (Ex: a horse that toes out in the back usually has weak hind end muscles and his/her stifles may hitch when circling/cantering), uneven wear of feet (this can indicate tightness/scar tissues further up the legs, shoulders, hindquarters or even the back), old scars (Pink, for example, has a knot on one hind fetlock-it is a joint effusion, and it does affect her when picking up her hind legs over jumps if she is not warmed up correctly. She has a hard time snapping up her hind feet, which is why, when she gets jumped (not often), it is only with proper prior conditioning, only over low jumps, and she gets boots or polo wraps on her hind legs in case she grazes the jumps), and you can identify sources of pain or knots in their muscles that may be a cause of misbehavior or lack of performance.
Christa has perfect conformation with great musculature while still looking like the pretty girl she is, but her back continues to be sore. She flinched with the brush over her back, and tossed her head when I placed my saddle on her. I checked, and my dressage saddle fit her like a glove-perfectly. It was originally purchased for my TB cross gelding who had low withers and a rounded body like hers. It sat flat on her back, following her shape like an outline, with no pinching at the shoulders and no bridging under the saddle panels. Christa tossed her head and pinned her ears when I tightened the girth. I knew with her this was no bad habit-this was the truth. I didn't tighten it all the way at once, but took my time going from one side to the other, one hole at the time (my girth has elastic on both ends, so I can make it even), and then put her bridle on. She gave a big yawn for the bit and accepted it in her mouth cheerfully, which made me smile, as it showed her willingness to be ridden despite her back.
I led her outside to the arena, which she wasn't too thrilled about (I had already been told that she's not exactly excited about arena work) and gave a small half buck when I went to swing into the saddle. I could feel her stiffness with the very first stride. Even her neck is stiff-she holds it extended, and you can see the tension in the muscles on each side of her neck. Because of this, we did a very long warm-up-a good 10 minutes of walking, first 5 minutes on a loose rein just going around the arena, then another 5 minutes of more collected walk, adding in large circles. Still very stiff. We worked on trot, and more large circles. Christa's circles looked like eyeballs; it took a lot of leg to keep her tracking around correctly. We did this for another 10 minutes or so, changing directions a lot. We walked again, and Christa stretched her neck down, holding it below her withers. Good sign-she was feeling better and beginning to stretch her back, which proved that my saddle was not hurting her further. We then cantered. She picked up the correct lead without problems and was fine going to the left, but when we changed directions and cantered to the right, she bucked once-more of a kicking out. She broke the canter, we walked, regrouped and I asked her to canter again. In the next attempt, she swapped leads coming around the arena. We tried again. She bucked again, swapped leads again, bucked one more time. I corrected her each time, regrouped, and kept trying to just complete 1 uneventful circle around half of the arena without drama from her. She has a big canter for her small size (about 15.1 hands) and I just rode it in 2-point to stay off her back; she seemed to appreciate it. I wasn't 100% sure if the issues to the right were my fault (touching her accidentally with a spur? I focused really hard on keeping my legs absolutely still), her having issues with maintaining her balance in this direction because of her back, or just her being a brat (each time she broke the canter, either to swap leads or buck, we were riding past the gate). When I got the drama-free circle, we took a walk break. We did a slight shoulder-fore in both directions at the walk. She could do a full shoulder-fore to the right, but not so much to the left. The left side of her neck was very stiff in trying to get a bend, especially at the base of the neck and at the junction between her neck and head. I stopped and stretched her neck from the saddle in both directions-she knew what I was asking; I could tell has done it before. We did more shoulder-fores at both walk and posting trot, also asking for more collection. I have to hold her up for collection because she leans on the forehand so much-not her fault; her back pain is to blame for this, so I did not push her too hard. We trotted large ovals down the quarter lines of the arena in shoulder-fore, in both directions, then moved on to circling. Circles were WAAAAAY better this time; nearly perfect in both directions. Christa did a good job, and I felt her interested the entire time; she did not get bored by what I was asking her to do. We need to work on impulsion more, as she is a little lazy in the arena, but I was very happy with her progress flexibility-wise; big difference at the end, and I think the exercises helped her feel better. After walking out for 10 minutes, I got off and stretched her neck and all 4 legs. She was familiar with front leg stretches but not so much with back leg stretches, so I did not ask her for much. Her right hind is especially tight at the hip, which reflects on the issues of her left front/neck area. This could also explain her kicking out on the right lead at the canter. Horses are complicated. Of all animals, I think it would be the most to our advantage, as humans, if horses in particular could speak. I'm sure we'd get cussed out a lot, but I think it would revolutionize the way horses are trained and ridden even more. They do talk, but not everyone listens or understands. I have met "bad" horses, really "BAD" horses, but these horses were "bad" as a result of years and years of people riding them incorrectly and letting them get away with murder. Horses do get overfaced and will let you know when they are scared, and they will tell you when a bit, a saddle or the way you are riding hurts. But you can't just give up and put them away, to keep making the same mistake over and over. You have to work with them-change the way you ride, change your tack, your bit, don't let the horse spook and then proceed to get off and put them away-you will create a monster. By the time I came along and tried to correct these guys, these horses were already well aware of how big and strong they were, and would do anything to get me off once they realized I wasn't going to just dismount and put them back in their stall at the first hint of naughtiness. I got lessons in bronc riding from one of these guys, and then there was another individual in particular that reared 3 times on me, and when he realized that that wasn't going to get me off, he simply flipped over backwards on top of me. That did get me off. He was fine. I was out of commission for 3 months. Oh, did I mention that this was a horse rental barn? Yeah, these horses were rented out to random people of unknown riding background and allowed loose on the trails with no guide. One time they rented out 2 of the naughtier guys to a couple. The lady was riding double with her small child in front of her in a Western saddle. Can anyone else think of everything that can go wrong in that kind of scenario? I remember watching them go with my heart in my throat. I feared for the life of that little kid and her mom about as much as if I'd seen them ride away on the back of a grizzly bear. And the individual that flipped over on me? No one at the barn would touch him with a 10-foot pole-he was that bad. He was used for pony rides. Yeah, I know. Still, I would've liked to have heard his story if he could have talked; I'm sure it would've been something fit for the movies. A horse isn't born that way; it is made.
Back to Christa. Elisabeth arrived when I had just finished untacking Christa. She was very excited to see I had ridden her. I told her everything I had discovered about the little girl, starting with her back soreness, and demonstrated difference between soreness in saddle area (running a fingernail lightly down her back between withers & loins elicited a big flinch) and muscle soreness (pressing on her lumbar back or sacrum would cause her to drop her hips if she were sore. She was not). Christa was notorious for not engaging her hind end. I told Elisabeth I would check her saddle's fit, and recommended a good saddle fitter that I know in our area. If the saddle is making her this sore, she won't be able to engage her hind end-she needs to be able to lift her back to do this; this is why she is having problems. I showed her how this happens-her abs tighten so her hind legs can come up underneath her, allowing the back to round. I pressed upward on Christa's sternum, which normally causes horses to lift & stretch their back. Christa pinned her ears and tossed her head. "See? Her back hurts, so she can't lift it when she engages her abs and hindquarters." Elisabeth was surprised when she saw this, but thrilled by the amount of information I was able to give her from just one ride. I showed her where Christa's neck was tight, and demonstrated stretching exercises to do with her every day, to improve her flexibility, especially after riding when the muscles have been warmed up. One of my favorite stretches is called the carrot stretch, where you take a carrot (its length is ideal for protecting your fingers while encouraging the horse to reach for it!) and hold it even with the horse's flank. The horse must reach around for it while holding their body still. Ideally, they should be able to reach their hip bone with their lips, effortlessly. A lot of horses can't. I demonstrated it with Christa; she could reach the far end of her flank but not her hip. The good thing about this stretch is that the horse will only reach as far as he/she can; you aren't physically pushing them farther than their muscles can take. I also told her everything we had done during today's session and the reasons for it. Elisabeth is a great horse owner, and just wants to do what will be best for Christa. She mentioned having me ride her more often and paying me to do it, but I told her we can try just once a week for now and play it by ear-she has been taking dressage lessons with Judy on Christa, and I think these are just as important for both Elisabeth and Christa's development together. I know she can't afford both the lessons and multiple training rides.
It was a cool day overall. I like helping out horses and their owners.
I didn't sleep much last night, worrying about that beginner girl leasing Bella. People in South FL are a sue-happy bunch and you just never know what can happen when giving riding lessons, especially when the horse being used for the lesson has no patience for beginners. Just last week we had a serious accident involving another trainer's student on one of the barn manager's horses. This horse in particular is a big sweetie who is on the lazy side in the arena under normal circumstances, and has proven to be a pretty good lesson horse. However, on that day, said horse had a bucking fit when asked to trot by this rider. The rider, a beginner, fell and couldn't get up. We had to call 911; an ambulance and a bunch of cops showed up. The rider was taken to the hospital, where it turned out she had a cracked vertebra and would need surgery to repair it. We were all pretty shaken up; nothing like this had ever happened at our barn, and none of us individually had ever witnessed a riding accident so serious that the rider needed to be whisked off in an ambulance. The barn manager understood when I talked to her; she was the one who had been pretty unnerved by that accident. She said she would have the parents transfer the lease to Tater Tot, the other lesson pony. He's an ornery little guy, but at least he doesn't rear or spook with beginners on him. It was broiling hot today, despite it being the morning. I tacked up Lily, hosed her down, and decided to take her out for a solo ride, since I hadn't had a chance to take her off the property by herself in 2 weeks. The minute I got on, she balked. She does this sometimes, but today was the worst she's been! She would take one step and balk. I would thump her with my legs. She'd take another step and stop. We made it across the parking lot, but she tried to back away from the driveway. I swung her around and made her back up away from the barn, down the driveway. One awesome thing about her is that Lily backs up almost as well as she goes forward. However, halfway down the driveway, she pauses and I see her ears tense up. When she has her little crowhopping fits under saddle, she gets this funny expression with her ears-they point straight up, super-stiff, with the front of the ear facing back. It makes her ears look almost like antelope horns. Well, right now she had THAT look, and the thought crosses my mind, "What naughtiness are you thinking?" There was one moment of hesitation, and she half-reared! It was a slow rear, if there is such a thing-she was showing me that she did NOT agree but at the same time she was being careful. A good thing, as we were halfway down the driveway, our backs facing the slope! "LILY, NO!!" I yelled at her. Her feet touched the ground, I spun her around, kicked her forward, and she marched down the driveway and off the property without another complaint. I kind of had to laugh because the little rear had been so tentative, like a half-hearted attempt at seeing if I would give up. Nope. Lily-0, Me-1. We made it down to the park uneventfully. Entering the main gate, I texted the husband to let him know where I was going and for how long I'd be out. He had gotten home from working an overnight, and said he would wait the hour until I was due to call him back, to make sure I made it back okay. I love him. :) Once inside the park, I wanted to trot. Lily wanted to stop and observe. We had a small disagreement. She trotted. Lily-0, Me-1. Then she startled at a patch of dark brown mud in the grass. There were a lot of mud patches because it had rained the night before. We were stop and go all the way up to the first hill, her trot extremely choppy (the more tense she gets, the more uncomfortable her trot is). We did hill sets-trotting up the hill and walking down. That kept her mind busy-she has to concentrate to go downhill correctly, but is getting better and better at rocking back on her haunches while coming down. There is a valley behind that first hill, and I asked her to trot again with the intention of doing some long and low work, circling, in the valley. More mud patches, more stops. She would NOT step on the mud patches (I think she was seeing them as giant holes in the ground) but she would trot past them after realizing that nothing was going to reach out of the mud and grab her as she went by. I decided to adjust my stirrups while in the saddle. The stirrup tapped her side while I was yanking at the strap, and she gave a giant jump and tried to walk forward. My heart leaped into my throat, as I had one leg propped up on the saddle to adjust the stirrup. I stopped her. The stirrup tapped her again when I finished ajdusting it, she startled again. I stopped her again. I got off to adjust the other stirrup, and made it tap her side on purpose. Not even a flinch. She was really out of sorts today. I got back on. Lily-1, Me-0. We did more sets on the next hill, which is steeper than the first, then walked down to the powerlines, where we trotted in a straight line all the way down, and all the way back up. She was a really good girl on the powerlines, dropping her head and extending her trot. Then I had her follow the street that winds around the park. This street eventually leads back out of the park, but first it goes past a petting zoo. The petting zoo has some farm animals on it, including a miniature pony the size of a labrador retriever, who she thinks is bat out of hell dressed as a small horse, and 2 spotted cows with zebra-striped fly masks. She HATES those cows. She thinks they are carnivorous mutants that like young fillies for dessert. I headed that way on purpose. Last time we had come through there, we were with Beau and Mark. Beau had freaked out about the cows, but Lily had walked right on past like nothing. The first time we had gone through by ourselves, I had to back her up past the cows. *lol* She would not go forwards past them that first time. I wanted to see how she would behave now, though I was expecting her to be a freak this time as well given her behavior during most of the ride. We worked on working walk and free walk on the way there. She always relaxes on the free walk, so I made sure there was slack in the reins as we approached the cow enclosure. It made no difference; she tensed up the minute she saw their stalls and stopped. She hadn't even seen the cows yet. I made her take a step forward and asked her to stop myself. Before we started fighting, I got off and led her over to them. She followed right next to me without hesitation (I love how she trusts me!) and we stood right outside the enclosure fence and stared at the cows for a few minutes. Her ears were way forward, eyes big and nostrils flaring. But she stood right next to me without even trying to turn away. The cows didn't even look up; they continued grazing slowly. I think we're going to have to do this a couple of more times, though, before she's completely over the Horse-Eating Cows. I also led her over to the paddock where the Ferocious Tiny Mini Pony was also calmly grazing, and let her stare at him too. We have 4 minis at our barn and they are all right across from her stall. You'd think she'd be used to them. Ahhh, baby horses. I made a point of getting back on her right outside the cow enclosure, and we headed back to our barn. It was so hot. I could see the rain clouds starting to gather to the east, and thunder rumbled in the distance. My head was throbbing from the heat, and Lily was panting, even though we had barely worked. I hate South FL summers. I hate them so much I had my husband convinced that we needed to join the Air Force just so someone would pay us to leave this part of the state (among other reasons, but that was one of them!) THAT'S how much I hate these summers. I always vowed that if I moved to the US, it would be to a state with 4 seasons, where it got COLD in the winter. South FL is just like living in Puerto Rico, except it's hotter, muggier, and there are no real mountains. Once back at the barn, hubby got a call to let him know we had made it back alive, and Lily got a nice bath and was hosed off until she had stopped panting-she had been walked out for 15 minutes. When it's this hot and humid, walking them out longer makes no difference. I also massaged her neck and back as an apology for taking her out when it was so hot. She closed her eyes for that. So cute. I brought her in and cleaned her stall. The clouds had really rolled in then; thunder was close. The barn manager and I were the only ones there, and we both ran down to the manure pile to empty our wheelbarrows. The heavens opened up as soon as we were back inside. It was like cheap special effects-it looked like someone was tossing down buckets of water from the sky. The walkouts, paddock and arena all looked like swimming pools within 5 minutes. Thank God for our barn being built higher than the properties next to it-everything drains quickly as soon as it stops raining. We locked the horses in their stalls though, so they wouldn't be standing in the mud outside in their walkouts. The horses had their lunch and I headed home. By the time I got home, the sun was out again. At 4:30pm I left the house to go to a nearby horsey warehouse to get a pair of thinning shears. Elisabeth had asked me to trim Crissy's mane-she has a fungal/bacterial infection going on in her mane and it needs to air out. It was bright sun when I stepped out of the house. When I turned on the street, however, I saw this:
See the light glinting off of the cars in the first photo? And then see the storm up ahead? In the second photo, it looks like The Nothing. Yeah, that's a Florida summer for you. These storms come out of nowhere every single afternoon. I swear we give Washington State a run for the money when it comes to the amount of rain that falls here. If you ever come to visit South Florida, don't come in the summer ("Summer" being defined as April through October). Whoever called it the "Sunshine State" obviously did not live here!
At the barn, I took Crissy out and crosstied her in front of Lily's stall. Lily and Crissy are best friends, which is funny because they've only been turned out together once. But it was love at first sight between those two, like long-lost sisters reunited. They have always liked each other, and even though they are several stalls apart, they call to each other when one leaves or returns. They are of similar height and build, with the same slender legs and feminine faces, but Crissy is a registered Paint. She is so pretty! She has a pink nose and her liquid brown eyes look like someone did her up with eyeliner. She's stall-aggressive, though, and does not like people standing outside her door and trying to make advances. She will pin her ears, roll her eyes, and might even bare her teeth at you. But when you walk into her stall, she pricks her ears and looks at you curiously, standing very still.
I brushed her mane out on the crossties to get any loose hair out. She had such a pretty mane. Elisabeth noticed something was wrong when she found the mare with half of her mane all tangled up in a knot, and had it all fall off in her hands when touched. Some more fell out while brushing it out today. However, you can barely see the bald patch with it brushed out. It's to the left of her brown streak in this photo:
It's a nasty infection, though. The area at the root of the mane is pink, oozing, and has crusty scabs. It almost looks like a hot spot. It was worse than yesterday, though, which concerned me-it's getting larger. Elisabeth had washed it with an antifungal shampoo yesterday and then applied triple antibiotic ointment. I really wanted to wash it again, but our wash rack is outside and it was thunder and lightning. I cut off half of the mane with regular scissors, then got to work getting it the length I wanted with the thinning shears. I have NO patience when it comes to pulling manes-I've never been able to do a whole mane like that, but I'm really good with a sharp knife and thinning shears. Crissy's mane was done in 15 minutes. I pulled parts of it so it wouldn't look so crisp, but the vast majority was trimmed with the thinning shears alone.
I applied iodine solution to the wound-it's very oozy and iodine helps to dry up moist wounds while killing almost everything. Hopefully its better tomorrow. Poor Crissy. :( We'll see. I added more shavings to Lily's stall to make it extra-cushy, since she'd be spending the night cooped indoors due to the rain, and she received an extra pad of hay to keep her busy longer. Hopefully the good weather lasts longer tomorrow...
