Level 1 tasks - reviewed

The weekend was spectacular. Being busy with my brother's 40th B-day party on Saturday, I didn't get out with the horses, but I did on Sunday.

My plan was just to go through as many of the Level 1 tasks as possible with Gypsy and then just go for a ride. I started with grooming like always. This time I decided to pull her mane to try to even it out a bit (gotta look spiffy for the clinic after all!). She's never liked it when I pull her mane and today was no different. But for this, rather than moving away, she tends to block me - and in the most adorable way. Every time I would reach up to grab another section of mane she would turn and put her head against my chest. She wouldn't push or anything, just gently place her head there as if looking for comfort. I can't resist giving her some hugs/rubs when she does this, it's so sweet! I gently rub her head out of the way and continue to rub as I reach for another length of mane. I got most of the unruly bits evened out and then started on the 7 games. She did all the games just great. We didn't do the squeeze game with a jump, but I'm sure she'll be fine with that -- didn't have any problems before. Plus there'll be 2 days to refine anything at the clinic before my official assessment.

She saddled up great - no issues. But was really anxious to get going when I mounted up. I had to mount and dismout about 5 or 6 times on each side before she would stand for me. Then we tried some lateral flexion which also took a few attempts before she would bend without moving her feet. It was windy on Sunday, which may had something to do with her being a bit distracted.

I rode up and down the road doing transitions (walk - trot - walk - trot - canter - trot etc.) and practiced flipping the rope over her head. Definitely need to keep practicing that - especially at anything faster than a walk! The added movement of the trot/canter (both me and her) makes it much more difficult to get the lead line to behave when I flip it over Gypsy's head. She didn't like it much since I kept whacking her in the head. After a while I decided to get my carrot stick and ride using that as a steering guide on the side that the lead line wasn't (I still haven't mastered or even began controlling her direction with my body direction) . The carrot stick helped.

The only thing I didn't do was pushing passenger. Probably could have - even though I wasn't in the corral, but decided against it. I've done pushing passenger a few times before and she did great - it's just easier in the corral to help "contain her enthusiasm." With Gypsy there's never a problem getting her to move and the corral helps keep her from getting away from me. Not that I couldn't stop her if I needed, but today I focussed on other stuff. Some day I just may let her go where she wants and as fast as she wants and just see where that takes us. But I DO need to let her do that where there are no cars (i.e. maybe not in the corral, but also maybe not along the side of the road like today!).

After I was done I spent some more time trying to get her OK with the fly spray again. I can get it on her if I spray it on my hand first, then wipe it on her, or sometimes spray her with my hand wiping immediately behind the spray, but there's no way she will stand if I just spray it directly on her. I tried waving the bottle up and down her side until she stopped moving (then I stopped and rubbed). That worked (essentially playing the friendly game with the spray bottle) - at least until I actually sprayed it. She has no issues with the bottle around her, just the spray.

I didn't spend enough time at this, I know, so will have to try again another day when I have more time (and with a water bottle so I don't waste any more fly spray).

I put Gypsy back and sprayed Jake in the pasture (he stands no problem without any halter while I spray him all over). Then I took Skittles out and brushed and sprayed her. She was better with the spray, but still definitely not relaxed. With her I sprayed and brushed at the same time which helped. Then I did some friendly game with the saddle pad on her. She started out snorting at it like she does with most things, but didn't take much time before she was completley unconcerned - even flipping it over both sides of her back, under he belly, around her legs and over her head. She even stepped on it while it was on the ground. Lots of confidence.

And that was it for the day. Got a busy week ahead of me, but I'm hoping to do some more with Gypsy at least once more before the clinic on Friday.

No camera with me yesterday, so todays pics are just snapshots of Skittles and Jake from the pasture. Skittles is starting to look really nice now that her winter fur is all gone. Nice rich red color.

Nothing much new to report

I've been mostly out of town - work and camping on the long weekend - so not much going on with the horses.

I strung an electric wire across the driveway the other day and let the horses out on the lawn. I've been keeping them off the pasture to allow it to get a head-start, so the horses have only been getting hay and the paddocks they're in are completely bare. They've been looking longingly over the fence at the nice green grass in the pasture....

So since we were away on the weekend and didn't get a chance to mow, I figured why waste it? They were pretty happy to graze the lawn. Once they got their fill though and started chasing each other around the house though... it was time to put them back where it was safe - no swingsets and no picnic tables!

Immunization Day

Not tons of Parelli exercises of late, but I can already tell that even while I'm not actually focussing on Parelli games with my horses, my "Parelli savvy" is starting to become second nature. I know I'm just starting with all of this, but am really starting to get hooked on learning it all and being a better human for my horses. They are truly amazingly responsive when you're "speaking their language" and amazingly forgiving when you're not! Makes me want to try harder.

Today was immunization day. All 6 horses (my 4 plus the two boarders) got their west nile and Eastern/Western tetanus shots. Gypsy also got her Flu/Rhino shot as she will be off the property at least once this year (hopefully more). Gypsy and Jake are "old hands" at this, but Gypsy has always had issues with the needles (below). She doesn't take off or anything, but she does tense up and start tossing her head. Today I started tapping her neck (to her this means "here it comes!") and she tensed her neck and raised her head. I kept it up for as long as her head was up. She tossed her head up and then down and I stopped tapping her neck as soon as her head was lowered, then rubbed. We repeated this over and over until she stopped tensing and then a few more times for good measure. She did great - for the first time ever.

Jake (below) stood like a rock and didn't even flinch.

Indy flinched, but took it like a star, happily took her treat, then kept pestering me for more.

Yarrow was really curious - as usual - about what the heck was going on, so he finally found out. He stood as well as he does (standing is not one of his strong suits).

Rein barely blinked.

And then it was Skittles' turn (left). She didn't get immunized last year because she was still untouchable. So as her first exposure to the vaccines, she gets today's shot and another booster in 3 weeks. I was a bit nervous... I still have that residual "what's she gonna do" feeling whenever I try something new with her. I hope it goes away eventually, because she continues to impress me. She snorted a bit at the plastic bag holding all the needles, then stepped up to sniff at it. So confident. She barely noticed the needle when I poked her. Such as star. Hugs and smooches for my Skittles!

Later in the day, the mosquitos just got insane. The horses were covered, so there was no more putting it off: I got out the fly spray and started first by spraying it in the air away from the horses (they were all crowded by me at the gate... probably thinking I would let them out). They all jumped and took off. What is it about spray bottles that are so scary?? I started with Jake (he jumped the shortest distance). He was still pretty uncertain, so all I did was wipe the mosquitos off with my hand, and got him relaxed by scratching some itchy spots too, then started spraying my hand and rubbing him with my hand, getting the spray closer to him as I sprayed my hand. Eventually I got the spray directly on him and he stood there very calmly. I think he started to realize the mosquitos were bugging him less and less the more I sprayed him.

I repeated the process for all the rest of the horses and it worked beautifully! Even Gypsy. And none of them were haltered. They chose to stay. They all seemed to almost sigh a great big "SIGH" when I was done. A break from the mosquitos.

Yay! Gypsy learned to bend!

Another beautiful day, but there are thunder showers in the forecast, so I figured I should get out with Gypsy early and work late instead of the other way around.

It turns out that getting your horse to bend (with feet still), with no opposition reflex is one of the tasks for the Level 1 assessment. So back to trying to get Gypsy to bend.

Once she was caught, groomed and saddled, I started asking for the bend from the ground first. We didn't get much more of a bend than last week (see blog titled lateral flexion), and again, as soon as I released, she would straighten, so I never seemed to be able to get any MORE of a bend. A few times she drifted in circles and I drifted with her, holding the pressure on the line until she turned her head. After many attempts with making no further progress, I started wondering if maybe she's not comfortable bending (maybe that's why she straightens right away once I release)? Maybe she's got some pain or something?

Then I thought I'd try a suggestion a friend made and offer her a treat when she tries to bend. Not as a bribe, but as a reward for trying. Well as soon as I put the treats in my pocket (she knew what was going on), she practically folded herself in half to reach them! So she CAN bend after all! But I didn't give any to her at first ... I rubbed/blocked her head until she straightened, then started asking for the bend again: "trombone" stroke on the line, then add pressure. She started to bend, I released, then added a bit of pressure again before she straightened and she gave me a bit more bend, I released, and then rubbed and gave her a treat. I repeated this whole thing until I was getting a nice bend on both sides both with and without the treats! Yay!! And she didn't move her feet!!

So then I mounted up (3x on each side and she didn't move once! Double-Yay!), and started asking for the bend from the saddle. It worked!! She did it!! both sides!! (see pictures). Lots of love, rubbing and treats. She's such a star. Never once did she move her feet while I was in the saddle until I asked her to.

So then I just took her down the road for a short ride and practiced swinging the rope back and forth over her head and steering her without the help of a fence! What I learned was when I leave her alone she goes straight (for the most part), and only turns when I pick up the lead. And she does this with very little pressure at all.

On the way back I closed my eyes and just let my body move in sync with hers. What an amazing feeling. I could easily feel what feet were moving where - way better than with my eyes open! She wandered a little bit, got curious about one of the driveways we passed and stopped to check it out. I let her check it out (I was in no hurry) and then I let her graze a bit in the ditch before asking for a trot the rest of the way home. An awesome day!

Brushing the babies

Today I ran out of day before I could get out with any of the horses. So I just brought Skittles and Indy out for a bucket of oats and some grooming before the sun set. They've each been going through a bit of a growth spurt (haunches higher than withers right now) and neither has been able to keep weight on. They're always the last to be allowed to eat, so every once in a while I make sure they get some grain.

While they were eating I groomed them. Skittles LOVES to be groomed. She almost forgot to eat while I was grooming her she was enjoying it so much. She was just covered in tufts of shedding fur and cakes of mud.... a really sorry sight. Poor girl. By the end she looked almost pretty! (above).

The mosquitos are already starting to come out... I'm going to have to start getting them used to fly spray. This year is going to be brutal for mosquitos with all this moisture.

Indy (left) has been more successful at rubbing off all her winter fur than Skittles, so there wasn't nearly as much fur coming off of her, mostly dried mud! I also spent tons of time combing out her tail and mane. Both are incredibly thick. Her tail is absolutely gorgeous. I wish I had a head of hair like that! Her legs are starting to get those Clyde "feathers" on them as well. Neither looked exactly clean or shiny when I was done, but MUCH better than when I started (probably should have taken a "before" picture of each!).

After I was done, I decided to try to measure how tall they're getting. The measurement wasn't completely accurate because I didn't have them on perfectly level ground and neither stood still for me (they weren't too sure about that measuring tape!), but I think Skittles is about 14.3hh and Indy is about 15 or 15.1hh

Pushing Passenger/Emergency dismounts

It was a stunning day yesterday, so I was dying to get outside and work with Gypsy. I worked more on lateral flexion, turning to a stop, pushing passenger, mounting/dismounting and flipping the lead line back and forth in front of Gypsy's head while on her back.

We started, again, with Gypsy leaving when I came out to catch her. Everyone else, of course comes up to me! But she always eventually lets me approach. When I took her out, I let her graze the lawn for a while. Saddling is getting to be less and less of an issue. Today when I approached her with the saddle, she got concerned and shifted her weight back, but didn't actually take a step back. She stayed, I waited, and she eventually leaned forward and put her nose on the saddle, then shook her head and started grazing again. And she was unconcerned when I put it on her back and did up the girth.

Out in the corral we did some circling game, squeeze game and squeeze over a jump. It was pretty windy out, so she was always looking for a predator to come running out of the adjacent trees. So I just kept asking for a change of direction, backing up, more circling etc. until she settled. Then I started mounting and dismounting. She still doesn't stand for me when I put my foot in the stirrup. I can hold her there, but she won't stand unless I do. Strangely though, she will always stand still once I hop up off the ground and stand in the stirrup. So I just would mount from one side and then the other, back and forth until she stood for me on both sides when I put my foot in the stirrup. Hopefully, eventually, if we do enough of this, she'll start out standing for me right from the start.

Once I settled into the saddle, I got into my pushing passenger position and she moved off at a nice trot and kept it up for a good 15 minutes before I asked her to walk. I tried asking her to slow just by slowing my body or "stopping riding". But all she did was speed up. Obviously I'm doing something wrong! She didn't slow until I picked up the line and put pressure on the halter.

Next I started working on getting her to bend to a stop. This took a lot of time because, while I got a nice bend this time, her feet never stopped moving. After about 5 minutes of circling and circling and circling with her neck bent (and me getting dizzier and dizzier), it occured to me that I probably didn't need her to stop with the bend in her neck, I just needed her to stop. The bending is intended to disengage the hindquarters, but did she have to stay bent to stop? I just wanted her to stop, right? So I tried releasing the pressure as soon as she felt like she wanted to stop. And voila! She stopped! She stopped straight, but she stopped. So I let her stand there and think about it for several minutes while I rubbed her neck. Then we moved off into pushing passenger again. Again she started trotting and I let her. Gypsy is the type of horse that I rarely have to ask to move - it's the slowing down that's a problem! So I let her move and stayed out of her way.

Then I tried tossing the rope over her head so I could try bending her to the other side. WHOA! She didn't like that. She jerked her head sideways and sped up. Huh, well I guess we better start practicing tossing the rope from side to side! I did bend her to a stop and repeated the release when she gave the slightest try at stopping. It took a couple of attempts, but she did stop. We started with the bend and circling, but the stop was straight again.

Once stopped, I started with the rope swinging. I started with swinging the rope along side of her head, which made her move. We stopped again, I swung the rope some more, a bit slower, she kept tossing her head away from the rope. So then I leaned forward over her neck and started rubbing her head with the rope and with my hand on her head, more or less between her ears, I moved the rope back and forth in front of her face, virtually dragging it over her nose until she stopped flinching away from it and stood quietly. Then I moved my hand off her head, but just above it, and kept tossing the rope back and forth. She continued to stand quietly. So I just systematically and slowly kept tossing the rope back and forth over her head from further and further down her neck until I was back in my original position sitting up in the saddle. Lots of rubbing and reassurance. It worked! So then we tried it at a walk. She still had a tendency to speed up when I toss the rope, but this time she didn't bolt away; just walked faster. A couple flinches, but WAY better than when we started. I'll keep this up more next time.

On to emergency dismounts. I didn't have any problems with this one. I didn't attempt it at anything faster than a walk, so it went well. From both sides. Gypsy didn't seem to mind my jumping off!

After that, I called it a day. I took the saddle and lead off her while in the corral and walked away. She followed, so I started doing some turns away and toward her, stopped and backed up and she continued to mirror me! Cool! No lead on her at all! I took the saddle, saddle pad and carrot stick back to the shed and left her in the corral to graze for a while as a treat.

I didn't have my camera yesterday, nor was anyone around to take any photos. I wish I had though - especially the rope tossing, because that was a big change. Today's picture is just one of me haltering Gypsy from a while ago (not much to do with today's activities, sorry!)

Lateral Flexion

Because I had such a hard time getting Gypsy to bend on Monday, I decided just to work on that today - before it rains for the next several days.

She didn't come up to me in the field today. She let me approach, but when I started adjusting the rope and halter to put on her, she trotted away. She did this several more times, and every time she stopped to look back at me I stopped approaching her. At one point she started walking back toward me, but then decided to keep on going past me! At last she let me come up and scratch her back. I scratched her all over until I found the sweet spot on the base of her neck. After some more of that she quietly let me put on the halter and followed me out.

After some brushing and friendly game, I started on getting her to give to pressure in zone 1 again. She did well, although a couple times she would bend nicely, then throw her nose up and away - against the halter again. Having got the bend, I let her... not sure if I should have done anything different. Then we just kept doing it over and over and releasing the second she gave even a little bit (note the photos: 1st one straight, 2nd one a slight bend. Again, no one but me to take the photos, so the perpective isn't that good!) I used the "trombone" technique described in the pocket guides: stroking the lead a few times before picking it up and applying pressure. This seemed to get her attention before increasing the pressure on the line.

A few times she moved her feet to try to relieve the pressure, rather than turn her head. I tried to maintain the pressure while she moved around, but just her movement might have lightened the pressure on the line, so I hope I didn't "reward" her for moving her feet. I did my best to stay with her until she stopped and bent her neck. She never really bent her neck very much. I just kept releasing as soon as she turned her head and then she'd put it straight again. Each time I continued to hold the pressure when she started to bend (in the hopes of getting a deeper bend), she would start moving her feet again. I kept at it, probably for about 20 minutes, but went back to releasing at the slightest bend while her feet were still. Hopefully when I return to this next time she'll bend just a bit more and just a bit quicker too.

I also spent some time throwing the rope up, over and around her head. She really doesn't like that. Lots of backing, snorting, blowing and trying to leave. So I tried various different approaches - swinging the end back and forth like a pendulum until she lowered her head and relaxed, then just throwing that end up and over her head (this is with me facing her). She was OK with that. But if I tried to hold the end and throw the loop over her head, she would always throw her head away to avoid the rope, then try to back up or leave. Also, I'm not very good at getting the rope to go where I want it, so that doesn't exactly help either. I kept smacking her in the side of the face with it! I'd probably leave too!

Next I tried standing behind her withers and tried throwing it from side to side in front and over her head. This also wasn't too popular, but she tolerated it better than when I was standing in front of her. Eventually she stopped jerking her head sideways and just stood there while I practiced going back and forth.

Then I went back to trying lateral flexion again. She bent her head at about 90 degrees at one point, but again tossed her head straight again as soon as I released the pressure. We did it a few more times, always getting the bend, but just not getting her to hold the bend for any length of time before moving her feet. Maybe that's OK. Will have to check back in the pocket books.

It was raining by this time, so decided to call it a day. She did pretty good. I hope to build on that in future sessions.