There’s an Appy at the pack station in Colorado who is for sale and the wrangler texted me today asking if I was interested. I declined, of course, but I agreed with the cowboy: their Appy would look great next to mine. I wonder if they are related?
Rocky
I had some time between meetings today so I went out and gave Rocky his injection, then took him out to graze. He was more interested in wandering though so I went with him, holding the line but letting him lead. He chose to go to the edge of my parking area and stare at the pot-bellied pigs. I draped the line over his back and stepped away to watch.
He watched intently, but he was blinking and swishing at flies, neither completely tense nor comatose. I’d have stayed with him until he decided to wander away (or toward!), except I had another phone meeting and had to put him away. I led up him up the drive past the pigs’ pen and he did not spook, although he did keep watching. So, progress there.
I love watching him explore. He climbed up a small mound of sharp gravel, sniffed all around a tree, sniffed all around the muck cart, nibbled on the one weed amidst a lawn full of otherwise acceptable grass, at least according to how the other equids here chow down.
We did another ride around the ranch today, this time with his boots on so we could expand our route to include more driveway and perhaps go in the ditch, both of which have sharpish drainage rocks. He stopped a lot, this time out of “gotcha” and not “eek,” and I kept laughing.
That was one of the awesome things about the Gold Summit at Parelli, that everyone just laughed when the horse would make a face or pull a gotcha, and then the person playing with the horse would respond per Linda or Pat or their own knowledge. It is so much more fun for horse and human to laugh and deal rather than get frustrated, angry, or annoyed.
I once saw a trainer beat a horse around the poll with the riding crop, wham wham wham on a constant rhythm for a long time, at least 15 minutes. The mare refused to go through a squeeze and consistently resisted going through that part of the driveway, day after day. The trainer’s intent was to make the horse more afraid (“respectful”) of the rider than of the squeeze. The trainer was not angry, was in fact pretending to be dispassionate but I think she enjoyed herself, believing she looked like the expert trainer dealing with this difficult horse without getting thrown or “letting the horse get away with it.”
I was very new to horse ownership and Parelli at that time, but even then I thought a) that mare barely feels it, she has so much adrenaline coursing through her, and b) not only is the area scary in itself but now she gets beaten about the head at the same spot. How on earth could anyone think that an effective system? And the owner was paying money to this trainer, for this, with the best of intentions — wanting a safe, reliable, and go-through-the-squeeze horse! How much more fun to laugh, to take the time it takes, to put the relationship first, to base everything on the rapport > respect > flexion > impulsion model!
Anyway. I made a figure 8 pattern out of the huge oak tree and the yard waste pile, and kept my focus on where we were going — and where we eventually would get, after some stopping, some wiggling, and one “but I absolutely have to sniff this bench right now!” I backed him a couple of times at these stops, but other times I just sat there, relaxing, wondering what he would do if I didn’t fight his idea.
Those times, he eventually lifted his head and took a step, at which point I encouraged his idea of walking, and steered us back on course. I don’t know if this inconsistency is a bad thing or not but as I am still working on building my confidence, I am okay with just sitting there sometimes. We both could use practice at just hanging out. I need to ride at a time when activity is going on, so I can stop him near some activity and chat with the humans.
Salsa
I am playing Friendly Game with Salsa to get him used to having humans on his right side. Rocky is sly about putting you on his left, but Salsa just jams around until he’s got you where he wants you. I can’t halter from the right but I can unhalter from the right, so I’m doing that and sometimes following with a treat. I touched his legs and he picked up his feet, and I just admired them and put them back down as I had forgotten to take a hoof pick with me. I think I did pretty good on my timing this morning too, with my approach and retreat, my rhythm and relaxation, and my keeping the session short — about 12 minutes, not half an hour.
Later in the day I did another session, this time taking him into the barn to sniff around. I switched on some clippers and got very absorbed in “clipping” the wall, until he came up and noodged and stretched out his nose to touch the clippers. I left them on and sat with him and occasionally held them out for him to sniff. By the end, I clipped a little bit of the split ends off one little piece of mane, just to see how he would be about it. He was as fine with that as he is about getting brushed, which is to say, not scared but not exactly climbing in your lap begging for more either.
I had a realization today about thresholds and need to remember to write about it next time.
On Monday he had a few foot-planting spooks (way better than his “teleport 15 feet to the side” spooks!). But he also had a foot-plant that felt different. I can’t even explain now why — his head was up, ears perked, feet still, just like his real spooks, but something was different. I think it was the look in his eye. He turned his head just a little and looked at me and I swear his expression was of the “gotcha!” variety rather than the “mom is it okay?” variety. This is when I used Linda’s gold summit tactic of creating some driving game commotion with my reins. Not a phase 4 whack but more of a phase 3 annoy. (“Be like a fly. A fly can get a lot from a horse.” )
Horsegirl on a Journey 