Getting Better.....Probably

Monday brought another bareback ride with a little better results than Sunday. He was a bit calmer but we still definitely had sticky moments. Getting him to stretch down into the rein while tracking right was super hard. He was either up in the neck or full stretch down bombing around with his whole front end in the sand. But a better ride is still better so I did the same stuff we've been doing and when he was more consistent I quit.

The saddle fitter had to cancel last night (her poor pup had to have surgery, so a totally legit excuse). So that left Mort and I alone at the barn (plus Emma of course). I threw on the cross country saddle with the goal of riding him in a training/first level frame. Started off on an awesome, swinging, loose-rein walk. I played with neck bend on a super long rein. I started to pick him up and he was OK, but still definitely stuck. So I tried some more easy walk things. Not super successful, so we trotted.

He started off upside-down and behind the leg--as per usual. Instead of trying to fix it with my normal methods (half-halts, transitions, pushing him into my hand, etc.) I just held a very light and following contact. I just rode him on the rail. I let him have as much of the rein as he wanted when he would stretch down. I'd push him forward if he got unbalanced, but with only a following hand. After he had some moments of stretching down, I threw in some large and easy figure eights. Overall we were still pretty upside-down and lazy with maybe a moment or two of him using his topline. Gross.

So I decided to go back to more of my "regular" routine. He got tense a time or two when I made him move off of my legs and into my hands, but after the initial tenseness we were doing OK. I often think about the old saying "Ask, Tell, Demand". I always start off by asking Mort to use his body the way that I want, but that doesn't always work, so we move up the scale. Once I demand him to do something once or twice he gets loose, supple, and a lot more willing to listen to the "ask". I'm certain this means I'm doing something wrong training-wise. I shouldn't have to start out most rides with a reminder that he does actually have to listen to me.

Sometimes he'll listen to the ask or tell but lately I've had to demand. It seems that the demanding is getting less and less over the last several rides, so that's positive I guess? After I got after him yesterday he gave me a pleasant ride where we were able to work in the lower frame that I wanted. We did a lot of changes of direction as well as transitions within and between gaits. He was lovely, relaxed, and supple. He had a nice forward and steady trot. When we walked I played with mini-serpentines and he did really well changing direction and maintaining nice contact and rhythm. He certainly wasn't foot-perfect but I was happy with his honest efforts.

I'm going to try to focus on more and more rides like that until we can (hopefully) get over some of these issues. Maybe in my excitement to be back to work after our time off lead me to push him more than I should have and he's a little sour or sore. We just did walk/trot yesterday and I ended with two laps of the trail in the woods. He'll get some time off in the coming days so if it's muscle soreness that will help. We're also due for a walk-only ride that I'm planning for this Sunday. Maybe in the next few weeks I can fit in a lesson so that she can see all the things that I'm doing wrong.

The one good thing about all of this is that I do seem to be learning how to ride him through his bad moments and hopefully this will transfer into the future and showing.

Weekend Ride

Friday evening and all day Saturday were wet and miserable so Mort got both days off. We were supposed to go camping and fishing this weekend at one of our favorite state parks, so I was a little bummed and didn't feel like dealing with the weather that caused us to cancel our trip.

Yesterday was cool and gorgeous when we woke up though, so I went out to ride. All of the horses were jazzed because a certain red-headed mare escaped her paddock a little bit before I got there. Mort was no exception but I decided to go bareback anyway.

We started off better than we had the last few rides. He was "up" but listening. And he was moving sideways off of my leg really well. He moved into trot decently enough when I asked and listened fairly well for changes of direction and bend. I could tell he was a bit distracted but I also knew he'd worked out of that quickly enough.

Those were all of the good things; the bad was that he was still really sticky for going forward. I could trick him into going forward for a little bit but once I asked for sideways he'd shut down to a little pokey trot in an artificial frame. If I had been in a saddle I might have just kicked him up into canter to work out any kinks but since he was fresh and I was bareback I opted for more trotting first. I focused on square turns for a little bit to see how that would work. They help me make sure I'm not riding him too crookedly, which can occasionally can happen when I ask for bend and counter-bend. It had mediocre results, but at least at this point I felt like I could ask him to canter without too much exuberance.

We started on the right lead and it was fairly nice. He was a hair behind my leg, but he was a lot straighter than he usually starts off with on that lead and he was light in my hands. After playing with that for just a little bit I set us up for a really nice downward transition. It worked and I finally had a nice forward trot with him seeking contact with my hands.

I kept that and played a little bit, but once we were walking and I asked for trot again it was a little sticky again. I could get him out of it better this time, but definitely not wonderful the whole time. The rest of the ride had all the regular trot and canter work that we've been doing lately. His trot would come and go between mediocre and powerful but was definitely better than at the beginning. We did our normal ending with a ton of walk and me picking him up and letting him down several times each direction.

I'm interested to see what today's ride will bring. I'm leaning toward another bareback ride. We get our dressage saddle back from the fitter tomorrow, and I don't really want to mess with the XC saddle in case it was part of our problems last week. If he starts off well I'll probably play a little bit then spend a lot of time walking in the field and on the trails. If he starts off sticky I'll just focus on getting him forward and loose and then lots of walking. Essentially, hopefully today will be an easier and fun day for both of us.

Inconsistency

I'm starting to really notice a theme with Mort.

We start off with a nice swinging walk both directions while he works out any kinks he may have from being in the stall.

I go to pick him up and play with a few things at the walk

Option A: he does them OK but is sorta sticky

This option works out quickly and we generally go on to have a nice ride

Option B: he hates life and gets tight and sticky and crooked

This option means we're on the struggle bus

Trot

Option A: I let him have a lower frame and do some bigger figure eights to continue our warm-up. We do some transitions between walk and trot. I start to play with lateral work and transitions within trot. We do several changes of direction and I start to get some collection.

Option B: I try to get him soft and supple by doing a ton of bend/counter-bend and changes of direction. I also throw in transitions within the gait to help with the forward. I only do a couple transitions between walk and trot since they just lead to more crooked and tense pony moments.

Option 1: He gets better and starts to work out of it

Option 2: We're still tense and crooked and behind my leg

Canter

Option A: We do canter. It usually starts off a bit behind my leg but gets better. Play with figure eights, transitions, counter canter, etc. depending on the day.

Option B: I try canter to see if it will help with the forward.

Option 1: Usually does help with the forward and being looser along his topline. Start to play with transitions, lateral work, changes of direction in both trot and canter. Sometimes it's still a bit of a struggle and I don't push for too much beyond getting him soft and supple.

At this point all of the different scenarios are coming to be the same. If we started off well he's probably nearing the end of his ride. If we started off medium I'll play a bit more with him but be happy to end as it feels right. If we started off terribly I'll most likely play a bit more with trot just to get to where he's fairly soft and supple then end with some big stretchy figure eights. Every single ride ends with me picking him up in the walk and letting him back down when he's soft and supple--I do this until he does it without hesitation a couple times each direction. Sometimes I'll jump off then and sometimes we'll go for a wander in the pasture or on the trails.

I need someone to tell me why we're so inconsistent. I know that I don't show up the exact same every day but I need to know why Mort shows up so tight and tense sometimes. Is it physical? What would be so inconsistently physical and something that he could work out of throughout the ride? Does he need even more walking at the beginning? Do I need to focus more on the walk work and figure out how to get him un-stuck there before moving on? Am I ruining my pony with bad training and that's why he doesn't want to play sometimes? If only horses could talk…

I should be getting my saddle back from the fitter soon. I'm interested to see if that helps. Mort will be going back to day turnout sometime which may help if it's simple stiffness. The vet is coming out at the end of the month for his annual float. I'm hoping to have someone watch us go to see if they notice anything. Sometimes he does a funky thing with his hind end that could be reacting to bad timing on my part or something with a joint back there. If my ground person sees something I'll have the vet look at him. I think the most logical reasoning is just that I'm not consistent enough. We'll see what the next month brings now that I'm not galivanting away on vacation and work trips for a while.

One of Those Days

My plan yesterday was to get some fun work in the field in. It started out well--Mort had a lovely swinging walk that was a pleasure to ride. We then moved on to some trot and he ate that up well-really wanting to stretch out and cover the ground. It's so much fun to get that big trot out in the open. I played some with asking for a certain bend and tested moving off my leg occasionally. He was listening fairly well for being a lot more forward than in the arena. Then we moved on to the canter.

It started off well enough; though he was still a bit too up-and-down on the right lead. I asked him to stride out some and he did willingly enough. But in doing that, I think we dropped a bit of his brain someplace. He was still listening to the basics of which gait I wanted but he no longer knew what yielding to leg pressure was. Dammit. I'd pick up his reins to ask for trot or canter and he just got bouncy and short and tight and crooked. So I'd ask him to fix the crooked and he'd just get worse and push into my leg. Double dammit.

So instead of ignoring that and just having fun in the field I decided to go back to the arena and get him to move off leg some and then call it quits. But instead of being able to move off leg he got bouncy and short and tight and crooked and then stopped forward movement. All the arena did was make things worse. So now Mort and I are frustrated which is never a recipe for success, but I don't want to end the ride with him refusing to go forward. (Looking back I probably could have just gone back out to the field to fix this but hindsight is 20/20)

I hop off. First, it let me take a few deep breaths and focus back on not getting frustrated. Second, it let me go grab my dressage whip. By the time we got back to the arena I had a better frame of mind and a tool to help me with a sticky TB. I hopped back on and Mort was immediately stuck, so I gave him a quick tap and he begrudgingly walked forward. Good start, but we were far from fixed. I wanted him to move forward off my leg without flinging his head in the air and getting tight on his topline. It was a tough process. Eventually, with a ton of quick changes of direction and several loud whip smacks to my boot, Mort was thinking again. We ended the trot work with some lovely, quiet transitions and relaxing stretchy trot where he would willingly move off my leg and change bend. Then we ended the walk work with me picking him up and moving off my leg or bending then letting him down to repeat the process. He was pretty good.

Sometimes I don't understand my horse. He's so smart that he thinks he knows what I want before I ask and he gets worked up anticipating. He also gets worked up about it if he thinks that he knows but then I ask for something different. But he's also kinda lazy and doesn't always listen to the half-halt before I change directions then we find ourselves off-balance, and he gets worked up about that. It takes so many quick changes of direction to convince him that I need him between my legs and on the aids. I have to knock him off balance occasionally to get him to realize that I'm trying to help balance him and make life easier.

Once he's actually listening he's really good and he's really fun and soft and pretty. But it's sometimes such a struggle to get there. Maybe this means that I need to be introducing more things to him to keep him guessing. But on the flip side all of the tension that comes with rides like this makes me wonder if I'm not over-facing him. Is there something physical that he has to work out of before he's ready to be soft and supple? Is it just that the years of racing still have a hold on him sometimes and he just reverts back to tight and bouncy and only having to marginally listen?

I really want to find a few rides where he starts off a little more relaxed and soft so that I can show him how awesome those are. When he comes out soft and ready to play that usually means a shorter and easier ride. I want him to realize that soft and supple feels good and should be easier than the alternative. I've been really trying to remember to ride softly when things are going well. It's all a process and hopefully my horse doesn't hate me by the end of it all.

Canter for Days

Guys, I'm not ready to say that I'm learning to ride Mort through the bad days but yesterday marked ride number two where things started off poorly and I was able to turn it into a good ride! Maybe Mort is finally training me to be a better rider--I know that's his goal in life.

He started off behind my leg and not wanting to move off of my left leg. This has definitely been a theme lately--I'm sure it's my fault. I know that I can be imprecise with my leg aids when it comes to asking for bend versus sideways, so that's something I'm trying to pay attention to. Yesterday started off with a somewhat grumpy and lazy pony. I had to really shut him down a time or two and give him a clear path forward when he didn't move off leg, but after doing that a few times he got better. Then after working on some transitions and canter he got more forward. I'm not sure what changed his attitude, but I'll always take it.

We worked more on canter yesterday than we have been. I did some counter canter to work on his straightness. He overbends to the right and wants to counterbend or pop his shoulder to the left. Counter canter fixes both of those things because he actually has to listen to me instead of just going into autopilot. He also has the tendency to be a bit "deep" in the bridle while we're on the right lead so I threw in some quick transitions to rock him back more. The more that I gave him to do at the canter the better the quality got. He was definitely working hard for me at this point. I was feeling so confident that I decided to play with the walk-canter transitions.

He does OK on the left lead but really sucks at it on the right. He's a tough horse because of his smarts sometimes; he really anticipates. Anticipating a walk to canter means he gets tight and crooked. I haven't found a great way to combat this yet; the more that I try to correct him the more sticky he gets at the walk. So yesterday I didn't try to correct him at all. I put us on a circle and I'd ask for canter. We'd canter about 3/4 of the circle then I'd go back to walk. Then I'd ask for canter again. I tried to only minimally touch his mouth. The transitions weren't pretty but they were prompt and he got better over the handful that we did. I did the same tracking left with even faster results--but he's better at them that direction anyway.

After letting the quality of canter fall apart with these transitions I went back to each lead and got some good quality of canter again. I almost have to surprise him with transitions and half-halts. If I prep too much he anticipates me or ignores me. Of course, if I have zero prep he gets surprised and out of balance. Horses are fun. We finished up with some more trot including me making him do transitions while maintaining a leg yield or shoulder-in. I'm super mean for that but we did end the ride walking the trail loop through the woods as a cool-down.

Trailer Woes

Mort got Friday off due to more rain. The barn had one of its h/j schooling shows this weekend so I just brushed Mort Saturday morning and called that good enough. Sunday I came out in the evening after the show as over and just tossed him on the lunge. I've learned that if I lunge him tracking right first we have a lot less explosions after a couple days off. The plan for Monday was to hop on for a fairly easy school and then work on loading.

For those of you who don't know--since I haven't updated the blog almost all year--Mort has developed an issue with loading. It's really frustrating and heartbreaking because he was SO GOOD the first 2.5 years that I had him. The day that the new barn owner went to pick him up it took 40 minutes to load him. I was shocked. He seriously had never been unreasonable before. If you let him sniff it he is usually happy to hop right up. Her trailer has a back tack and a ramp so I thought one of those was probably the issue. The next time she was hooked up I grabbed a handful of carrots and he walked cautiously on after about 10 minutes. OK, so he probably was a little nervous from new person and new trailer--easy.

I scheduled a vet appointment. Took me a good 45 minutes to load him and it required a team effort to give him some encouragement from behind (snaking the lunge whip on the ground about 10 feet behind him). He had to be drugged at the vet's for some eye stuff, so on our way out he loaded right up into the trailer with zero issues.

Fast forward a month or two and he had to go to the vet for his hoof issues. I gave myself an hour to load him and after about 45 minutes of the gentle, grain-based method I resorted to some encouragement again. He had to be drugged for x-rays at the vet's so I was hoping that he would get on the trailer as well as he did the last time that he was drugged. That didn't work. He was immovable. He was either frozen with his front feet inches from the ramp or if we tried to pressure him he would explode into a 1200 pound monster.

Mort doesn't like being told what to do. He's a good boy most of the time but if he feels threatened or bullied he changes completely. He doesn't want to hurt you but he also doesn't care if he has to mow you over to get out of the situation. I will point out that I never resorted to painful methods. I didn't lunge him until he dropped. I offered him many treats if he moved forward. We did try a stud chain (something I've used with him before for vaccinations) and tapped his butt with a lunge whip (not hit but just an annoying tap). We tried a rope around his haunches. We tried a rope halter. We tried drugging him again. It just got worse and worse. He was either frozen or angry and fearful.

After some time we decided to give him a break. No one was getting through to him in this frame of mind--he had just shut down. We spend a half hour hanging out and relaxing. We then spend another half hour or more eating our lunch on the trailer ramp while he milled around near it. He'd get a treat or some hay if he'd put a foot on the ramp. I moved this to slowly getting him further and further on the ramp. Several times he was halfway in the trailer with his hind legs on the ramp; zero times did he get on the trailer.

It had been just shy of five hours at this point. It was going to get dark. It was supposed to snow the next day, so we didn't want to leave him at the vet's but it was getting to that point. I decided to try one more thing--a rope twitch. Usually a horse won't move forward with a twitch, but I was desperate. We put a twitch on and I had someone tapping his butt with the lunge whip. He eventually launched onto the trailer. He hasn't gotten on one since.

I fully take responsibility for some of his issues. I shouldn't have scheduled the vet appointments without working with him a lot more. I have 100% made matters worse because now he not only has fear of trailer ramps (I guess?) but also has issues with the whole process. I have a lot of regret and guilt about it. I swear he was never hurt or put in an unsafe situation but it doesn't matter because according to his perspective; he was.

Now that you've heard the terrible back story, you're up-to-date. Steven and I bought a trailer this past winter. My wonderful husband spent many days working on updating it and making it extra safe for Mort. It does have a ramp but no back tack. I'm not sure what it was that Mort was scared of with his first trailer issues but I don't know that it would matter at this point anyway.

I've spent a handful of days working with him in my new trailer. I've made a promise to myself that I won't resort to anything negative--perceived or otherwise. He's only getting treats and affirmations when things go well. I'm trying not to ask for too much. So far I've stuck to this. Our first session he just put his front feet low on the ramp a few times. The second session he did the same but would walk another step further up. By the third session I had his front feet in the trailer and his back feet on the ramp.

Yesterday we went back to the second session's success instead of improving like we had been doing. It had been a month since our last practice so it's not that surprising, but it was still disappointing. The barn owner said that we could find a place for me to park out there so that I can work on it more regularly. I'm really hoping that it helps. I want to just play with it a little every day until it's not a big deal. We'll see. Maybe we'll both just live at the current barn forever with me standing in the trailer and him standing with his front feet on the ramp.

Definitely reason number a million that Mort and I haven't done anything off-farm this year. I honestly wasn't sure whether I was going to post this or not since I'm so ashamed about it, but this blog is to keep track of what I'm doing with Mort and this is certainly what I'm doing right now--good, bad, and ugly.

Ride Recap

It was hot and humid--and it's also horse fly season. Gross times a million.

My dressage saddle is away with the saddle fitter so that leaves me the options of riding bareback or in my cross country saddle. Since it was so hot I opted for the cross country saddle. After checking a few points of fit that I learned about on Sunday I felt like it fits him well enough to ride in (as I've done before).

I'm not sure if it was the hot, the day off on Sunday, or the saddle, or whatever, but Mort and I didn't start off very well yesterday. I was all buckled in for it to be one of our bad frustrating regretful rides and it really started out that way. I couldn't get him to move off of my right leg. Then I couldn't get him to bend left. So I did a ton of bend, counter-bend at the walk. I did leg yield with his head facing the rail. We had a small meltdown when we passed the open gate with that one. I did some straight leg yields across the arena. For the first time ever (probably not but if feels that way sometimes) we actually worked out of our bad mood/miscommunication/whatever.

I did much of the same work in the trot that we did in the walk and he just got better and better. There were of course a few bobbles here and there when I had to half-halt hard and refocus, but shit got better. We did some changes of direction. I added some shoulder-in. He just got softer. I thought about quitting and didn't and it somehow didn't bite me in the ass. I wondered whether or not I should canter and then I did canter and it didn't bite me in the ass either. After a bit more trot and walk after our canter I decided that I should actually quit before my luck ran out.

There are seriously few of these "bad" rides that I can turn around like that. And this was certainly the worst one that I have been able to. It wasn't on par with some of our best rides at the end, but holy crap was I happy about it anyway. I better put all that leg yield work at the walk in my toolbox for next time to see if it helps.