MacGyvermore

-
The weather has been awful for the trails. More ice than snow creating a bunch of depressed shut-ins trying to make arena time palatable. Even those with four winter shoes and cleats are condemned to the indoors.

I did have one good ride this week when the mild weather made the trails all slushy. But we are now back to the deep freeze, and so we are stuck again. Despite driving two hours to get to the barn, I did not want to ride. Which just seems ridiculous.

So I figured I would try my new hackamore and MacGyver my bridle to keep the cheek pieces away from his eyes. It worked pretty well and it continues to impress me how good the brakes are with the curb strap. I lift, he halts. We did a few transitions halt-trot-halt and I got off after 15 minutes. No need to drill that today.

I also took some pictures of his warts and markings, keeping a watchful eye on any potential sarcoids growing. And thought I would share a pic of his Prophets Thumb on his neck. Of course my thumb fits, but his indent is small enough to probably fit most thumbs. I circled it so it could be a bit more obvious.



Comments

  1. TeresaAJanuary 5, 2020 at 5:54 PM

    It can be hard to stay motivated in an indoor. Maybe use poles and cones to make some obstacles?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Nat DJanuary 15, 2020 at 9:20 AM

      Yeah, I really fail at indoor "work". My perspective is that the indoor work is only to make my trail rides safe and fun. If I can get safe and fun without the work, all the better.
      Most of the time, that is where I am at. ;-)

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

What the whip?

-
Image
Im no stranger to spurs, whips and nosebands and I understand their purpose. However I have chosen the slower path to training objectives and have foregone all of the above in my work with Q. Which has been working well so far, in part because Q has a lot of try and is very sensitive. Despite the icy trails, I still made the trek to the barn today and was planning on riding in the arena because ... I just realized I havent cantered in 2 weeks! Partly because of poor trail footing, partly because of rambunctious Q, partly because of slower training objectives. Regardless, I woke up this morning with a mission. A canter mission. We were in the arena with two other trainers, one in reining, and the other in dressage. All was good, and it was just about managing traffic and keeping left-to-left despite their circles, spins, canter half passes, and protruding dressage whip, etc. I had a good session with Q and I was really happy with his canter-to-trot transitions from my seat. We
Read more

Gloomy November

-
Image
I feel like I am in good company when I say that life and work has taken me away from riding these last few weeks. I finally made it back to the barn during an epic windstorm with over 1,000,000 homes without power. No surprise that I didnt ride that day. I did make it out to the woods yesterday for my first time in two weeks and boy has the scenery changed. From golden colors to barren trees, from sandy trails to muddy bogs, from blue skies to hail storms. It’s time to be well dressed, with jackets, gloves, and good socks. I have been dutifully practicing the long reins every day for 15 minutes, and Q is a quick study. We now do nice transitions between collected walk to collected trot, and during one of our teardrop turns Q offered me a leg yield to my squeal and delight. He stopped and raised his head to me, saying that if I was going to squeal that much he deserved a mint. I obliged. He also taught me a lesson today. Yesterday, I was doing our standard trick at the fri
Read more

The Arctic Winter Riding Handbook

-
Image
Annual Trail Rides: 29/200 Here in Quebec, Canada, we have variable weather patterns in winter from springlike sunny days of +10C to arctic freeze of -40C. While winter officially goes from Dec 21 to March 20, we find that it really begins on November 1rst to April 30th. SIX MONTHS OF WINTER! Our other three seasons are much shorter as a result. Aside from the cold, winter also brings a new set of challenges for footing. Deep snow, sheets of ice, crusty snow can bring about dangers to horse and rider and also increase fatigue and injury if not careful. For the truly committed, a set of four winter shoes with studs and plastic snowball inserts, can make a world of difference. Particularly if icy conditions are commonplace and restrict turnouts. I currently keep my horse barefoot, and as a consequence there are a cumulative 2-3 weeks a year where turnout is limited if not impossible and trail riding is off the table. I also benefit from an indoor arena when this happens, so it really is
Read more

Trust, a two-way street

-
Image
Lots of things happened this week, to me and around me. Our local H/J trainer got bucked off and kicked in the face, fracturing her jaw and ribs on a young colt on his first ride. She was wearing a helmet and of course it could have been much worse. But we have all been a bit shaken by the event. She doesn’t remember what happened or how it happened but the owner was holding the horse, she put her belly on his back and boom! Next thing she knows she is sitting in an ambulance. I saw her today and she is a true warrior. Ive gotten to know her lately as Ive been helping her with her own 2 year old gorgeous Hanoverian colt in introducing the more difficult obstacles like the teeter totter and the waterbox, and helping her improve her groundwork skills to tackle the difficult obstacles. The colt is learning quickly, and she is building a new language of ask/release that is starting to work miracles. So much so, that one of her clients asked me to help her with the teeter totter. I knew thi
Read more

Preparing Patagonia

-
Image
I may come to regret this, but Im not as prepared for this trip as I was for Alberta’s epic trek last spring. In part because I havent ridden in 3 weeks. 😃 The days will probably be shorter (4-6 hours of riding) and its pretty slow riding because its over glacier rocks …. so maybe Ill be fine? Also looks like its just gonna be me and the gauchos as the other riders had flights cancelled last minute. So this trip will be Spanish (actually Castellano) immersion too. The last few weeks in BA has been momentous, from the run to the final of the World Cup, to the dozens of people who ran in the streets in defense of a small dog in a hit and run, to the amazing fresh fruit and vegetables, to the delicious food and mountains of gelato. BA is big, at times wild, messy and very passionate. I havent found much indifference here. But now, I have to figure out how to get my backpack to weigh less than 8 kg to fit all the clothes I need for weather ranging from polar sun to blizzard. Yes, I have l
Read more