horsegirlonajourney

Rocky goes quadpolar for our lesson

Posted on June 11, 2009 by horsegirlonajourney

I understand that exuberance can be a little scary at first. — Erin Murphy, Equine Partners, Inc.

Rocky started out at liberty by racing around the arena, bucking and snaking his neck, totally disrespectful of anything mere humans might want. Obviously he’s no longer too footsore to play, and it was great to see him buck and leap and twist and kick out and really arch his neck and show off his huge trot.

Then when he rolled he got all the way up on his spine, although he didn’t roll all the way over. Given how much better his health has been since we moved here, I’m hopefully he’ll be able to make it all the way over someday. He didn’t used to be able to get up onto his spine.

I tried some “extreme” catching game to get him to tune in, and when he came to me, I waited for him to put his nose into his halter rather than just put it on him. See? I can be taught. Of course, I had to tell him aloud “please consent to your bondage,” because that’s the kind of partner I am, but I did wait politely for him to do so. Then Erin and I watched as my LBE transmogrified into an LBI. Later, when she worked with him to teach him S-turns to improve his draw, he went RBE until Erin’s consistency brought him back to himself and he started solving the puzzle. And briefly, he had a moment of planting all four feet, head way up, eyes wide, but now I can’t remember why.

The S-turns were scary to watch at first. What you do is put your carrot stick in the hand you’re most facile with (my right) and hold the line in the other hand. You set the horse up to face you and then you run backward, keeping tension on the line. Any time the horse is not facing you straight on, you change direction so you are going in the opposite direction as the horse — heading back past their hind end. At the same time, you block their turn with the stick and string. It’s an energetic swing that whistles through the air and slaps the ground in zone 2/3/4, and it’s possible that a horse will run into it, although Rocky did his best to reverse direction fast. Erin described it as flicking the string out like it’s your hand and you are scooping the horse into you by reaching out to zone 3/4 and drawing toward you. If they go to the right, you flick on the right. “Don’t go that way!” If they go to the left, you flick on the left. “Don’t go that way!” All the while keeping tension on the line … until the horse puts slack in it.

The lesson is twofold. The horse has to figure out that if he trots right at you, nicely straight and centered and with slack in the line, you stop changing direction and flicking the stick and indeed you slow to a stop and give him time to rest. If he’s LBI, you give him a cookie. The horse also has to figure out that it is his responsibility — not yours — to keep slack in the line. When he keeps the slack, the pressure goes away. No stick, no string, no sudden changes of direction.

The 180-degree turns are the same thing you do when teaching a Labrador not to pull on the leash– when the dog hits the end of the leash you turn and walk briskly the other way, until he learns to keep slack — but doing that while also getting a good string swing while also running backwards while also seeing the full 1100 pounds of horse wheeling side to side to try to figure out this new game … it’s a workout for sure.

Erin did it with Rocky for a while to teach him the game, after I struggled with figuring it out. He kept thinking the swing of stick and string meant circle, so he’d try to scoot off but would get blocked. That’s when he started rearing up a little and that was scary to watch. But then I realized he wasn’t rearing or striking, he was just changing direction so fast that he was sitting back on his hindquarters to pivot his front end around. My nervousness changed to pride: what an athletic boy I have! I also saw how careful he was not to run over or step on Erin when he figured out to trot in to her. She played with him long enough that he had several successes in a row and then handed him back to me — having given both Rocky and I time to work through the “whu? huh?” stage and get some confidence.

I had a hard time coordinating my turns with bringing my stick under the line and flicking it out to the left, and my backward run was more of a jog, but since Rocky had figured out the puzzle by then, we were able to get some practice in.

Our homework is to play all seven games online with the belly of the rope on the ground to prepare us for liberty, and to practice these S-turns for at least two more sessions to improve our draw and earn his respect.

Categories: Leadership, Lessons | Tags: S-turns | 2 Comments

My plan for ‘solving’ Rocky’s opposition reflex to stepping on his rope

Posted on June 5, 2009 by horsegirlonajourney

I’ve been struggling with this one for a while. On one hand, Rock doesn’t always panic when he steps on his rope while grazing, and when he does panic, it’s not as big as it used to be. On the other, he still does sometimes panic, and I have not been able to tell what makes those times different. It might be that he’s stepping closer to the snap and therefore has less play in the line when his head comes up.

Rock can't wait to learn the new way to lead by the leg

I called the Parelli Savvy Club Gold hotline today for the first time to ask what I should do about this. I spoke with a woman named Julia and told her what I have been doing: lots of porcupine to bring the head down, lots of head down, variety in putting the halter on while squatting, etc. (And as I talked I got a warm thrill as I remembered how hard this was for Rock when I started, and how these days I barely have time to close my hand on the line now before he lowers his head.) I explained that this mostly happens when we’re out grazing, as I try not to trip him him when we’re playing, although that has happened to.

We talked about a lot of things but here are my action items:

I can handle the rope better (or take it off for grazing) so he doesn’t get into this situation. I thought that I wasn’t supposed to manage it during down time, that he was supposed to learn to deal with it. Turns out nope, once I put the rope on, it’s my responsibility to manage it. I can do that!
She asked if he pulled back when tied, which made me realize I hardly ever tie him. He’s on the high line for at least an hour, sometimes two, every morning to eat his beet pulp and supplements and pellets out of a bucket, so he gets practice at tying, but that’s a rather yielding setup as well. She suggested that when I tie or practice tying to a rail, I wrap the line rather than tie him hard. (There’s a Savvy Club DVD segment about how Pat teaches horses to tie and not pull back, which I will review.)
Instead of holding both sections of the rope when leading by the leg, just hold the one side. I’ve been holding both to keep slack on the halter and just apply pressure to the leg. Now it’s time to play porcupine in both places at once, the leg and the head, so Rocky can solve that puzzle: lower my head and step forward. Now that I think about it, well, duh. When riding a person often uses multiple cues, many of which are porcupine. And you don’t see David Lichman‘s horses doing the Spanish Walk with their noses in the air. Julia said to practice this in a safe environment where Rocky feels comfortable so he can tune in and solve the puzzle without additional stress, and to go as slowly as he needs.

One thing that resonated strongly was the idea that when a human puts a humany thing on a horse, the human needs to stick around to give release. We were talking specifically about the rope but I think it applies beyond the line and will ponder it further. I said that I was always nervous about just turning a horse out with a lead danging from its halter, because it seemed to me like a good way to break a neck or take a bad fall. She agreed, and noted that when it comes to lead ropes, the horse can’t give himself release the way a human can.

I can simulate a downward pull by stepping on the rope, letting it slide under my boots and holding it in my hand so I can give Rocky drift if he needs it. I saw Pat do that with the rescue horse at the Reno Celebration (“want to learn how to do a backflip?” he joked). But if the horse is standing on his rope he can lower his head but he’s still trapped until he figures out how to move his feet. By then the release isn’t connected with the lowering of the head.

Heading out to the Back 40 now, either to lead them to the Back 80 (now that Sterling is living down the road a piece at the trail-riding ranch, the herd doesn’t have a fearless leader through the pass) or to practice leading by the leg in this new way, or both.