Telegraph

-

Had a successful ride today and Q was great … he only tried to bolt once! 😂

I shut it down within the second stride, mostly because he telegraphed his intentions 5 seconds before. Neck up, ears back, back tight, accelerating speed … and then tail tucked in, and boom. I looked behind and nothing. Silly boy.

I love my horses sensitive and forward. Q definitely delivers on that front. It requires no effort to get speed … slowing down can be a bit more challenging but he also hates being managed so I telegraph to him my request to slow down. I rarely need to escalate to bit contact.

The “mistakes” of bolting have increased this winter but are also driven by my releasing contact and having loopy western length reins. I like it, and Im starting to increase the length of the reins. What I like most of all is that I can read his intentions telegraphically.

An expressive horse is a beautiful thing,



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

oh! really? Thank You ❤️

-
Image
Life lessons from my horse: Hold on señorita, Ill protect you! Its been a rough few weeks work wise. More work than I can handle, conflict and temper tantrums from graduate students, and an emergency bathroom renovation, along with preparations for the revival (after a 3 year pandemic hiatus) of the biggest St Patricks Day house party … well Im teetering somewhere between high anxiety and anger with a heavy dose of insomnia. Not good. Ive been trying to ride a few times a week but certainly not as often as usual, and my trips are short and abrupt. 45 mins, WTC, mostly solo. Grooming, thats for sissies. 😉 Yesterday, my horse was a tool. He tried to attack my friends horse as she passed me (albeit a bit too close), he tried to bolt when a cross country skier was crossing behind, he reared when the sleigh crossed our path with the double team, and he was just crabby and ears pinned whenever anything came nearby. Today before I left for the barn my husband warned me to stay safe, and lung...
Read more

Waterworks with my old trail buddy

-
Image
What a great ride yesterday! Q and I accompanied our past trail buddy who switched barns last spring and really struggled this summer with what appears to be seasonal headshaking. Bummer. I also tried something that seemed to work, but not sure if it's just coincidence. When his horse started violently headshaking (clearly in pain), I stopped and turned around to face him. The horse looked at me, stopped headshaking and I gave him a peppermint. In all, I gave him three peppermints during the ride (not when he was actually shaking), and it seemed to distract him? We also worked hard on keeping the pace low-key and the horses on the buckle. I did have to remind my friend to drop the reins several times, but I think his horse appreciated the lack of pressure. The headshaking seems to be light sensitivity, and perhaps some allergies as well. The horse wore a dark flymask to protect his eyes from the sun, and it seems to help. The symptoms disappear at night, and will likely disappe...
Read more

Just enough spice

-
Image
Its been a rough go these last few weeks between a significant increase in work, brutal cold snaps, icy trails and skating rink parking lots. Ive only ridden a handful of times on those rare occasions where the universe converged. This has made for a spicy pony and while it makes me more prudent on how I engage in speed when the brakes are fairly absent, it also makes me super appreciative that this spicy horse does keep his excitement under wraps most of the time. Clearly Q is fit and feeling good, and his daily turnout with bestie Chester is absolutely insufficient in expending energy. Especially since these two lazybouts just stand in a corner watching the world go by.  We went out today after a little snow fell to cover our thick ice. Footing was good, and it was our first outing in over 10 days. The strategy is always the same: long steady trots for 5-10 mins until Q starts relaxing and blowing through his nose in loud bursts. During the first stretch we kept on trotting throu...
Read more

A filthy confession

-
Image
I have never cleaned a sheath. And I have owned four geldings for a cumulative 27 years. I wanted to tackle this project with Q 2 years ago mostly as a training objective but also to keep my watch on any potential cancerous growths (the second plague of the grey horse). My barn owner is an old pro at this, and she tackles the dirty deed for most of the geldings in the barn. So I asked her advice. “Make sure you can touch him between his back legs as non chalantly as his shoulder” So that project took a year. Every grooming session I would carefully brush between his back legs. He is still ticklish but I spent every bath session last summer with a hose on his sheath. But today, the fearless leader introduced me to the sponge, soap, and (get your jewelry off your hands) manual extraction of all the gross smelly gumminess that is lodged in there. My objective was not cleanliness, but acceptance. Both figuring out what I was supposed to be doing, and how much to pull out the c...
Read more

So long, farewell … 🎵

-
Image
Last day before our departure and I just had to spend it at the barn! 😃 Didnt have time for much but lost myself in Qs deep brown eyes while doing his stretches and then entered into the fairytale forest of the first winter snow with a horse that was feeling bright, forward and attentive to have just the most magnificent ride amidst the slowly falling snowflakes.  Gave him his last brushing, last carrots, last kisses. Magical. Q will be busy while Im gone. He has 3 massages booked. and will be groomed/lunged twice a week, plus his daily turnout with his bestie Chester. The barn family will be sending me picture postcards throughout. When I travel for long periods, I leave a type of “power of attorney” with the barn owner so she may take all decisions on my behalf and I will cover all costs, including, if necessary, euthanasia. I do not want my horse to suffer a trauma while staff are trying to reach me, and there is no hope for repair. But I also don’t want them to hesitate to sen...
Read more