That’s “riding” – not “writing”

For the longest time I’ve used my dressage cones to teach letters and to give the riders a marker to either stop at or make a circle.  As the riders progressed, I’d ask them to stop their horse at a letter, then tell me a word that started with that letter.  All part of the fun of therapeutic riding.

Last week, Mrs. Danneker, the teacher who brings her students for therapeutic riding once a week, asked if we could do words instead of letters.  Why not!  So sent me the sight words that the students were learning that week and I printed them out, put them in plastic holders and placed them on the four corner barrels.

The riders thought it was great to circle a word PLUS it reinforced their vocabulary words for the week.  They were so proud when they found their word, too!

Trust is such a big issue when it come to horses and riders. You will hear one person say, “I trust my horse’s judgement better than my own on the trails.” Another may say, “I could never trust my horse in a new situation.”

When there is a strong bond between the horse and rider, it seems all is well; when there isn’t – the picture isn’t pretty.
I just read an article that was published in two different magazines showing how the horse and rider or leader are intertwined. According to the article, there was an experiment with 10 horses and 20 people. The first group of 10 people were to ride the horse. Both the horse and rider were wired to pick up the heartbeat. The riders were told to ride the horse past a group of people four times, but on the fourth pass, several of the bystanders would open an umbrella. Watching the monitors, the persons who were conducting the experiment say BOTH the riders and horses heart rates increase on the fourth pass. Some of the horses were getting fidgety. Why? Only the riders knew about the umbrellas, which, by the way, we never opened! But, the riders anticipated and the horses responded to the feeling they were receiving from the rider.

Next group only led the horse with a halter and lead line. They were told the same thing. Walk by the group of spectators four times, on the fourth time some on the people will open an umbrella. The results were identical! The horse not only feels our energy when we are on their backs but when they are being led as well!

At our arena, we tell the parents and riders that we will dismount if there are severe storms or thunder storms.  The parents always question whether the horses are afraid of thunder.  Our answer has always been, “No, but if the rider gets scared, the horses wil  get scared as well.  No matter how much we try to desensitize the horses, they will still respond to the rider or leader.

We witnessed this just the other day.  We had three adult riders in the arena.  Two were on lead line, one was riding independent.   It was not a particularly windy day, but, in the middle of the class, a tree in the woods behind the arena decided to fall.  One of the riders on lead line head the rustle, tensed up, then decided it was nothing.  Her horse did a little jig for one or two steps and immediately quieted down.  The second rider on lead line was in deep conversation with the leader.  Neither of them were aware of the noise; their horse did nothing.  The third rider saw the tree as it started to fall and began to react to the anticipated noise.  Her horse reacted to her anticipation and trotted out about 30 feet.  The rider was able to regain composure and bring the horse to a walk.  The horse that did nothing is our newest horse and has had the least amount of desensitizing.

Which makes me wonder – how important is it for the rider to trust the horse and the horse to trust the rider?

The Renaissance Festival is in full swing here, so some of the kids are asking if they can joust with their horse. Of course, they are thinking horse-to-horse combat. Not here, but, what about spearing a ring with your lance? Surely that could be fun too!
The first thing I need is some willing but unsuspecting parents. The kids love this part. Each parent is given a ring – the large ones that are used as diving rings in pools. Then each rider is given a lance – none other than a familiar pool noodle! Each rider is then challenged to walk their horse toward their parent and spear the ring without stopping their horse.

The kids have a ball doing this while the parents remind them to aim for the ring not them!

We added a new class to our Giddy-Up Go Horse Show this year – Mom (or Dad) and Me!  A Mom or Dad who had never ridden a horse could take part in the trail class – and be led by their daughter or son, if they chose.  This gave the parents a chance to see and feel what it’s like to be on a horse.

Leading Mom over the bridge.

Our first rider was Carrie led by her daughter, Riley.  This was a big step for Carrie.  Riley has been riding with us for two years, but Carrie had never even been near a horse before her daughter decided to learn how to ride.  Because Riley was under six when she started to ride, Carrie needed to be with her in the arena.  It was a mother/daughter learning experience from how to groom to how to saddle and how to lead.  Riley is now an Intermediate rider and wants to learn how to jump!  Mom is happy that she overcame her fears and was able to walk Stella through the obstacles in the trail class.

Leading Dad over the pole.

Our next entry was Matt led by his daughter, Riley.  (No confusion or relationship here.  We have two Riley’s in our classes, both of whom had a parent riding.)  Matt claims that he didn’t even know he was entered until the day of the show.  He has always been very supportive of his two daughters taking riding lessons, but never knew what it took to actually ride a horse.  After completing the class, Matt remarked that riding was a lot harder than it looks and has to give his daughters a lot of credit for what they have accomplished.  Both Riley and her sister Callie are Intermediate riders in our riding program.

Both parents received participation ribbons for taking part in the class.  Perhaps next year a few more parents will want to try to ride!

Our second annual horse show was scheduled for Saturday, August 8, 2009, but apparently mother nature had different ideas on when we should hold our show.  As the riders and guest gathered, so did the thunderstorms with torrential downpours!  The horses started acting a little jittery, and since we don’t ride during thunderstorms, we decided to postpone the show until Sunday.

Sunday was a bright and hotter day.  We actually tied the record high of 92 degrees!  None-the-less, 20-some riders and their families reconvened at our facility.  The show started promptly at 11:00 am and continued, despited the heat, until 7:00 pm.  Not bad.  No heat exhaution, we kept the arena fans going and water flowing, everyone, including the horses survived.

The show was divided into three three sections – showmanship, equitations, games.

Only five riders participated in the showmanship class.  Each followed the pattern with the horse rather nicely.

The equitation classes consisted of two parts – an equitation pattern and a trail class.  In the equitation pattern class, the rider was judged on his or her form.  Heels down, eyes forward, ability to keep the horse on the rail, whether the reins were too loose or too tight, etc.  The trail classes judges the riders ability to maneuver the horse through obstacles.  This year our riders had to cross a bridge, walk over a star-burst AND keep the horse in the center of the poles, walk through a gate, through an L set up with poles, trot the long wall or at least walk it AND either do a two-point or stand in the stirrups when crossing the pole that was about half-way down the long wall, make a tight turn, grab a ring from a cone, then set the ring on a spindle.  We did practice in class before the show so no one got butterflies from not being sure of either pattern!

The games were pole-bending and pony express.  Our pole-bending was more like cone bending.  Yes, if the cone got knocked over, you would have time added to the score and there were only four cones instead of the traditional six.  Pony Express was a modified barrel racing game but instead of three barrels there were four barrels and a cone (start/end designation) and instead of a cloverleaf the rider made a star with all right turns in the pattern.

At the end of the show, ribbons were awarded to the show Grand Champion and five Reserve Grand Champions.  This year we had a tie for First Reserve Champion!

This our show winners were:

Alex, Eva, Linda, Callie, Riley (not pictured Morgan, Bowen and Shelby)

Grand Champion – Shelby Krohn – riding Stella
First Reserve GC – Eva Aguilar – riding Lu-Rain
First Reserve GC – Morgan Nimmo – riding Slick Chick
Second Reserve GC – Alex Aguilar – riding Lu-Rain
Third Reserve GC – Callie Keller – riding Slick Chick/Leslie
Fourth Reserve GC – Bowen Waltz – riding Slick Chick
Fifth Reserve GC – Riley Redmond – riding Leslie

All of the riders did an excellent job of showing off their riding skills.  We hope they all come back next year for the third annual Giddy-Up Go Horsey Show!

Congratulations to all of our riders!

It’s time to start practicing for our annual horse show.  The show typically consists for four classes: Showmanship, Equitation, Trail, and Games.  We try to practice the trail class a couple of times before the show so that the riders are comfortable with the pattern and the obstacles.  Some years they have to get mail out of the mail box; others they are moving something from one barrel to another.  This year, I introduced “the gate” to the class.

First time through I let them try to figure out how they should remove the rope to open the gate.  Some have a very hard time figuring it out; others are quicker.  Lu-Rain decided that since her rider wasn’t sure how to maneuver her up the the rope, she would take matters into her own hands, er, mouth.

First she stopped short of the rope.  She’s no fool.  She wasn’t going to touch the hot wire!  Then she crept closer to determine if it really was a hot wire.  It wasn’t, so she promptly grabbed the rope in her mouth, then dropped it so her rider could cross through the gate.  She did have tht look about her that seemed to say – I did good.  I opened the gate for you!

This isn’t about horses but it is about one of our riders – Samantha Carlson.

Samantha 2008 Tour de Cure for Diabetes

It wasn’t until Sam had been riding a horse for a few years did she learn how to ride a bike.  Last year she made the commitment to ride in the Tour de Cure for Diabetes.  It was a 15 mile bike ride – and she did it!  If you ride, you now how difficult 15 miles could be.

This year Sam has made the commitment again.  This time she’ll be going 25 miles!  If you want to support this young girl – did I tell you she’ll only 11 years old – click on this link – http://tinyurl.com/nyqkqc - and pledge whatever you can.

Oh, did I mention that Sam has Cerebral Palsy?  Here’s her story in her own words.  http://www.prettyponypastures.org/images/ppp.pps

If you thought “horse”, you are wrong.  Thanks to one of our volunteers, we got the ramp we have been waiting over four years for!

Matt, who has his own business, K & D Homes, volunteers in the evenings.  When he learned that we needed a ramp, he jumped at the opportunity and within a week, completed the work necessary.  We even had enough lumber from last year’s barn building to build it!  We now have a very sturdy, quality ramp for our riders.

Thanks Matt!

Besides ramps, Matt tells me he can take care of any remodeling needs.  Check out his Website – K & D Homes - to find out more.

ramp in our arena

We took Leslie to her first schooling dressage show today.  What a wonderful way to start Mother’s Day.

Never mind that the show was an hour and a half drive away, that we were showing from the trailer, and we were the first ride at 9:00 am, so we had to leave by 6:00 am to have some warm-up time.

After an hour of trying to best braid Leslie’s mane, we loaded her in the trailer.  This is the first time in two years that we have taken Leslie off the farm and her first dressage show with only six months of training, once a week at best.  Amy, her trainer, and I decided to enter her in the Introductory Level Tests A and B.  We feel that she has been making good progress, but we wanted a judge’s opinion.

Leslie was a bit nervous when we brough her into the arena area to tack her up, so we walked her around a few times.  Mirrors!  Our arena doesn’t have any; this one does!  I remembered someone saying that some of the horses in the Olympics spooked when they saw themselves on the big screens that were hung in the arena.  What would Leslie do when she saw herself in a mirror?  She was curious, but not afraid.  Good!  This was actually a good thing when we bridled her.  She decided that she wanted no part of the bridle.  Not her style, but in a strange place, understandable.  She ran.  Where?  To her reflection in the mirror.  She stood so close to the mirror that it got steamy!  As she commiserated with herself about her predicament, we were able to bridle her.  Amy mounted and the tests began.

Happy to say the tean took ribbons in both classes – fourth in Intro A and second in Intro B.

So proud!

I went to a demo clinic last night about riding with feel.  Interesting thought – feel.  In our human world we often see a situation and say it doesn’t “feel” right; we meet someone and later declare that we didn’t have a good “feel” about that person.  But, how does this fit in with horses?  Is it the same kind of “feel”?

Being prey animals, I know my horses are on the watch and aware of their surroundings.  But what about the people they interact with on a regular basis?  Through my studies, I know that horses mirror the rider or handler.  How many times do we go to the barn after a bad day at work only to find that our horses does not listen or obey our commands.  Still in a bad mood, we place the blame of the bad ride on the horse – it has an attitude today, not even considering that the horse was playing off our “feelings” that evening.

When performing therapeutic riding, our horses are interfacing with both a rider and a leader.  I know that they will often tune into the rider and adjust their gate accordingly.  But what about the leader?  I have seen horses that were very edgy in one class and calm in the next.  Was it the leader, the rider, or a combinaiton of the two that cuased the horse to react?  Did the leader in the second class have a different aura or feel and the horse, “feeling” the calmness became calm as well?

I am considering purchasing the book and maybe the CDs on this topic to see what insight they might give me when working with our horses.  I’ll post the results when I see them.

True Horsemanship Through Feel, Second Edition

Horse Handling & Riding Through Feel