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Posted on 02/24/2006 9:12:25 AM PST by HairOfTheDog
Great pics of The Bay Man. I'm glad you're finally getting geared up to to ride. If I couldn't ride all winter, I'd be crazy by springtime. I'm real impressed that Bay was so calm under that scary tarp too.
Half my fern has 6 or 8 fronds up that are 6 or 8 inches high, but the other half hasn't done much. The little brown curls that it did have have turned browner and died, but I have hope that it'll put them back on later. I'm thinking that the pieces that you root pruned are the ones that are having the trouble. They may not have had enough root to support the growth that they already had, but as soon as the roots get more developed I'll bet they start putting out again. That's the hope anyways.
Wow, sounds like you and Waylon had a scare! But it's great the he handled it so well. I'd love to have a place like you've got where I could just ride out from the cabin every day. It sounds like y'all should have a really great Memorial Day weekend.
I was more aggressive with the first one I did than with later ones. Maybe cut off the dead curls, that might encourage them to start new.
Wow! Seymour is doing great! Be careful when you first put him outside though, he may go into shock. When it warms up, you might want to set him out just a few hours a day for a while until he adjusts.
Will you come move in next door to me? ;o)
seriously though, that's very nice. I'm sure she appreciates it way more than you know
Now that she's got her fence in I could put the horses over there... ;~D
but they'd probably just stomp the flowers she has planted, and they never do a real tidy job of mowing.
I have a mare who is definitely not a mudder. She hates to get her feet dirty. I make her march on through.
I sometimes ride a young mare who belongs to my trainer -- she is prissy and often a bit balky about going forward alone or through a narrow place, or over mud. She will balk, put her weight back, and try to dodge left or right to avoid the mud or turn around. I find it works pretty well if I sit back in the saddle and urge her forward, while holding the reins relatively loose and in a very open position. When she dodges left, I give a strong brief opening rein to the right, and vice versa, all while urging forward with the legs and voice. She hasn't gotten to go around or turn around yet with this technique . . .
I'm more timid than SHE is about deep mud, heavy brush, and fences I can't see the other side of . . .
And on the other hand... if you have a horse that doesn't like mud, like our Cyn, you want to be careful that when you ~do~ force it, it's safe... It'd be worse to validate her fear by going someplace she gets really mired down in.
I did that once on a friends horse. We were riding together, and when we got to the back of my property her horse started trying to turn around and go back. This horse was very very spoiled. I kept telling her to at least keep the horse facing in the direction we were wanting to go and she couldn't do it. She was a very timid rider.
I could tell the horse wasn't going to do anything all that awful, so I asked her if she would let me get on. So we switched horses, I was on Rusty. It was actually a lot of fun. This poor horse tried everything, but she never got turned around. Then she tried just going sidewise off the trail. One side was trees and brush the other side there was piles of rocks that we had dumped back there when we cleared some land. She got in those piles and was jumping around, over, and on them. I could hear Suzanne going Oh, Oh, OH, I don't know if it was for me or the horse:)
She finally decided the trail was better, and we had to go thru another battle wtih her trying to turn. I finally just nailed her with the spurs, and finally up the trial she went. The funny thing is, about 10 more minutes into the ride, Suzanne started having trouble with Rusty....He wasn't trying to turn on her but he'd just stop, and stand there. I told her just kick the crap out of him, and she'd flap her feet....I tried to tactfully point out to her where the problem was, but I don't think she got it.
She finally sold that horse and got an older mare. She's moved away now so I don't know how she is doing. But it was fun making that horse go down the trail.
Becky
Exactly. That's what I meant when I said you need to know the lay of the land. Having a horse sink to far, can break a leg. If I don't KNOW what's going to happen IN the mud hole, I don't go in.
The rider needs to be smart.
Becky
We have a bridge on the road to my house. Every horse I've ever taken down there balks at the thing. The road is a mix of asphalt and gravel, and the bridge is cement. I think they see the change as the scary thing rather then the bridge itself. I usually have to back them 1/2 way across. It's kind of funny. Of course the hollow thud sound doesn't help much either.
I haven't taken Harley down there yet. I hate riding on the road, and I hate battles on cement and asphalt. And now there is a new house I'd have to pass that has 2 big German Shepherds that run loose and I've heard are aggressive:(. I've thought about going because it's a good experience for the horse, but there's just too many possible catastrophes to deal with.
Becky
I keep seeing and thinking of things to respond to in your post.
About Bay and the hidden fence in the tall grass. When I'm on a horse and he suddenly stops like that, I don't immediately start cueing him to go if it's new places and especially when you can't see the trail. Tall grass is like mud. If you don't know what's there, be careful. BUT if you determine nothing is unsafe then you have to make the horse keep going. And I know you know that:), just talking. I'm actually not sure what I would have done in the case you found yourself. Even holding the fence down like that would have made me nervous.
Becky
Horses seem to be very good at drama and they can figure out who they can get away with what very quickly. There's 2 kinds of horse people...people who have horses, and horsemen(in the generic sense), and there's a BIG difference. It sounds like your friend fits into the former category and you in the latter.
Well, this girl made the mistake of thinking she could raise a weanling and they could learn together. The horse got it's bluff in on her real early. You know you try to help people, but when they are intent on doing something their own way...there just isn't much you can do, except stand back and watch the rodeo:)
I let her ride Rocky for a while to help her confidence, and she did pretty good on him, so it surprised me that she had trouble with Rusty. She was doing pretty good with the new horse, but before she moved away I could see little things she was already starting to do that had to potential of messing the mare up. But there was also the possibility that the mare was solid enough that she'd stay good.
Becky
You and me both. There's nothing much that makes my butt draw up more than riding a spooky horse on pavement. I'll do it, because if I want to ride at the barn I don't have any choice, but I don't like it.
As for dogs, I have been known to pack a BB pistol in years past. But I've wondered if a Supersoaker pistol full of ammonia might not do the trick too. I got attacked by a pit bull on day on my sister's horse and it was NOT fun. If the owner hadn't been there to call him off I don't know what would have happened. He didn't really hurt the horse, but she was spinning so much that for what seemed like an eternity, I felt like I was riding a horse in a blender. I never saw the dog coming. He never barked a time. He was just on us all of a sudden, like a brown blur. It's been my experience that dogs that bark aren't as serious as the ones who don't. Most of the time you can back down the barkers by just stopping and facing them and hollering "NO!" real loud.
Bay threw a balky fit once last year early on, one of the first rides with Cyn. He didn't want to go in the little creek he's crossed a million times, the one we've got all the pictures in. At first I chuckled at him and kicked him forward, not letting him turn around, and danged if he didn't keep it up and danced and jittered and wanted to spin and refuse. He started making me mad, and I take a little different approach I've used before, going back to my stallion, who had the potential to rear up in those kinds of situations.
When a horse is balking and you force it is when there is a risk, when faced with the point of 'go/no go' that the horse will rear up or otherwise blow. While I didn't think that would happen with Bay, not over this creek expecially, I did this:
Walk them up to the point where they balk and encourage, if they refuse and spin, let them turn around, but when they are facing away from the 'challenge' smack them. I didn't have a crop, only the leftover ends of my reins, which I slapped back and forth several times on his shoulders. This was punishment, not encouragement, for him turning around. Then turn him back and encourage.... but don't punish. If he turns again, and Bay did, he got smacked several more times. When I turned him back to face the challenge again, he went.
It's the same idea as letting the horse go sideways but not turn, give them limited choices where the trail starts seeming like the easiest choice because the other choices are increasingly unpleasant. But turning and only punishing him when he was turned the wrong way takes the heat out of the moment for the horse... and decreased the chance that they'll panic and blow up.
Just another approach... A little safer for either a fractious horse or an inexperienced (or timid) rider.
ROFLOL.
Becky
The whole area between the trail and the main creek has been churned up into the Mother of All Mudholes. It is deep and sucky, but so far we haven't lost anybody (not even one of the little ponies). So long as I keep my mare collected and her weight on her haunches, she's o.k. And once she gets IN the mud, she's all right . . . I guess she figures (1) her feet are already dirty now (2) once she gets to the creek she can rinse them off.
Hey, that sounds like a good idea. Thanks for the tip.
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