Orion Goals, Part 1

With the upcoming move (2 days! Squeeee!!), I've been thinking a lot about what I want to accomplish with Orion. I think I mentioned before that a lot of the things I have always wanted to do with him require consistency, and until now, we haven't had that, so it's been pointless to try. Now that I know I will have the option of going to him pretty much anytime I want, the possibilities are spinning through my mind like mad. I know that I need to take things one step at a time though, so I'm prioritizing and selecting two that seem to me to be some of the most pressing at the moment. One is a long-term goal, and one is a short-term goal.

1. Healthier feet
2. Taking the damn BIT!

Orion's feet have never been stellar since I bought him. They have improved dramatically, but I would still like to see them get even better.  His frogs are still kind of puny, and his heels could stand to be a bit lower, which could beef his frogs up by giving them more contact with the ground and fix the problem entirely. I'm realistic, and I know that a lot of his problem is that it's been hard to keep him on a regular trim schedule. That will improve with him being closer. We're lucky that his normal farrier, who does some of the best work I've seen with Orion, is still going to be working with him. I'm SO thankful for that! He's offered to show me a thing or two as well the next time he's out, so that I can better help Orion with his feet between trims in the way of maintenance trimming.

I've been studying hoof anatomy, what a healthy hoof should look like, and some trimming techniques, and I'm planning on starting to teach myself to trim so that I can eventually take over Orion's trimming entirely on my own. I started to teach myself last summer, but I was also living and working in Philippi at that time, so again, without consistency, I gave up on it. Now I can really get the practice and experience that I need.

So that's a long-term goal. Getting his feet to where I want them and learning to totally care for them on my own is going to take a while.

Our short-term goal is going to once again be encouraging him to willingly take his bit. On Sunday, we went on our first ride in 6 months (and our last ride at Orion's home of the past 3 years), and he's once again decided that the bit is an unwelcome visitor to his mouth. It took 45 minutes to get him to take it. 45 minutes!!

This horse has never had a bad experience with his bit in the entire time that I have owned him. To my knowledge, he didn't have any bad experiences with them before I owned him either. He's had this problem before, and with a little time and help from Liz over at In Omnia Paratus, he got over it last summer. He went for months with almost no issue, and when he would start to backtrack, it didn't take much to fix it.

As I mentioned, it had been 6 months since we last rode. Now he's acting up with the bit again. I know that has a lot to do with it. He's used to lounging and playing around the pasture all day, and he knew that if he was bratty about his bit, he could delay the ride. He can be a brat, but he's smart. He knew exactly what he was doing. He persevered over every method that has ever worked in the past. Eventually the BO came down and helped out. She mixed a handful of grain with some sunflower oil, put the bit with it, and quickly slid the bit into his mouth while he was trying to lip the grain from her hand. He was too busy enjoying the grain to worry about it anymore.

Once he's settled in to the new place for a couple days, I'm going to spend a day or two just working on that bit problem. Usually once he's over it, he's good, and with the ability to ride more often, I don't think this problem will reoccur too much. I just need to take the time to get rid of it now so that we can explore his new home more in the coming weeks. Miles and miles of new trails. I can't wait. :)

Riding Bitless?

So, back to the story from last night.  After Orion had his mini-heart attack over a bush, Chelsea and I headed out.  What I didn't mention last night is that I was attempting to use Chelsea's bitless bridle on Orion.  He still was giving me crap about the bit.  I had managed to get him to take it in under ten minutes one night, which all things considered, was quite a feat.  However, it was apparently a fluke because that never happened again.  So, I knew I still needed to get him over that problem, but in the meantime, I really wanted a real ride and didn't have enough time to work with him that night, so I tried a bitless bridle.

He goes fine in the paddock with a halter and lead rope or halter and reins, and the bitless has a little more control than that, so all should be fine, right?

Wrong.

He did pretty well until we got further out the road.  It took some getting used to on my part to change to short repetitive tugs rather than continuous pressure when I wanted him to turn a certain direction.  A little more leg was required as well, but all in all, he did better than I'd expected.

Until we got to a point where he decided he'd had enough.  We had been trotting for a minute or two, and right when I asked him to go back to a walk, he instead turned very abruptly and sprung into a quicker trot headed back home.

-_-

The trot became quicker and quicker and quicker to the point that I thought he was going to pop up into a canter if he increased his speed anymore.

The whole time this was going on, I was pulling back on the reins as much as I could, to no avail.  Bitless bridle be damned, he wasn't listening to it AT ALL.  I tried turning him instead, didn't listen to that either.  My form went to crap as I was doing this because I was concentrating more on what I was doing with him than how I was sitting.  I was still managing to stay on, until I leaned forward slightly to collect my reins more, and at the same time, he dropped his head down.  I had my hands firmly closed on the reins so as not to lose them, but because of that, when he dropped his head, I was pulled forward even more.  That, in addition to his extremely bouncy fast trot and my crappy form sent me onto his neck and from there to the ground.

Well I was pissed.  He stopped as soon as my butt left the saddle and waited for me to jump back up, but then he wouldn't stay where I put him long enough for me to mount back up.  I was mad at myself and him, I was sore (but not seriously injured - only had a couple scrapes), I wasn't tall enough to reach my damn stirrups, and my horse wouldn't stay next to the friggin' bank I was trying to mount from.  Chels ended up getting off Kit and giving me a leg up.

We made the horses go a bit further so Orion wouldn't think he was allowed to get his way after that, and then turned and went back to the barn.  The return trip was uneventful.

Soon afterward I was talking to Liz about going out to see Q and Griffin and asked for her help in fixing Orion's bit problem.  She came out the next day and had him taking it in under 20 minutes.  See the story on that here.

The night after I fell, Orion went from a horse who would play giraffe and avoid taking his bit at all costs, to one who snatches it right out of my hand when he sees it.  Talk about a welcome change!

Equestrian Discussions: Training Methods

"What training technique(s) do you believe in? What led you to it/them? What methods work best for your horse, and why?"

I'm no real trainer.  I mean, I work with Orion on things that I feel, and other peer horse people feel, he needs work on.  I read about things.  I get advice from said peer horse people.  The stuff I believe in goes hand in hand with what most of the people I talk to do.

The methods I've learned about most are Monty Roberts, Buck Brannaman, and Linda Tellington-Jones - mostly the first two, but I'm reading more about T-Touch when I have time.  I want to start using it more with my horse.

I know training methods have come a lonnnnng way, and most people these days seem to realize that it's best to listen to the horse.  I guess that's my main criteria. Listen to the horse.  Use his language.  Don't use fear - leadership and authority, but not fear.  Every horse is different. Different personality, different history, different preferences.  

In my experience, my horse is willing to please, but also has an extreme stubborn, dominant streak.  He's only dominant with people - I think it's because he gets beat up on in the field and doesn't have authority there, so he tries to exert his authority on people, who are obviously smaller and easier to push around.  

Because of this, he needs a firmer hand.  It's easy to want to baby him and love on him all the time, but when he's being a brat and trying to be pushy, that's not an option.  The funny thing is, once he stops trying to do the opposite of what you want and understands you're in charge, he shows what his real personality is - a loving, willing to please, laid back horse who will try try try to do absolutely anything and everything you ask him to do.  

I like to experiment and try different things I read or hear about, as well as do things that I just think from experience with him might work. Sometimes they do, and sometimes they're extreme failures.  Each time something doesn't work though...I know one more thing not to try.  When they do, I can add it to my list of Orion-tested methods that work for him. 

So mainly, from a person struggling along to learn as she goes, my advice would be to listen to your horse and figure out what works for him or her.

For Thursday, January 31st: Your choice!  Post some questions and I'll choose a couple of them to answer next week. :)

Back to School, Join Up, and a Solo Ride!

I'm officially back on campus!

My new roommate and I are getting along well and having fun. :)  Our room is coming together nicely.  I won't post pictures yet because it's not quite done.  I just got the last of my stuff from my uncle's house last night.  It's not quite unpacked yet.  I'll hopefully be finishing that tomorrow after I pick up some Command strips to hang my posters and hooks. Yay! lol

Seriously though, I'm loving being back on campus.  I've already had a couple of unsatisfactory experiences with the financial aid office, but it's being taken care of.  I swear, every year, it's always something!  But...*deep breaths*...it will be ok.  

Anyway...let's go back in time for a minute.  I promised you I would be writing about my adventures of the past week or so. :)

Last Thursday:

*If you click on the pictures, you can see the larger versions.* 

:)

I got done with work early because my brother had an orthodontist appointment, and both boys went with their dad to that.  They wouldn't be back until my mom was home from work, so I got a hold of a friend for a ride (you know who you are...thank you!!!) and headed out to the barn on my own around two.  She dropped me off and went on to her weekend destination - horseback riding at Spruce Knob.  Jealous!!!

But I got to spend the rest of the day with my horse by myself.  It. Was. Amazing. 

I spent the first 45 minutes or so just grooming him to perfection and spoiling the heck out of him.  Seriously.  He was shiny and bright and clean by the time I was done.  He got his mane and forelock braided.  The burrs are starting to get bad, and he seems determined to shove his entire head into every patch of them that he can find.  When I was out there the week before, I spent what seemed like forever separating them all out of his mane, and he'd looked like a unicorn with his forelock all burred up and sticking straight out from his forehead.  

Unicorn!

He wasn't quite that bad this time, but I braided him anyway as a precaution because I know it's only going to get worse.  The B.O. usually doesn't have time to get them out herself, and I'm not there enough in the fall to get them out every day.  It usually results in him getting the really bad tangles just cut off, and I'd rather that not happen this year.

After the grooming session, I lunged him for a bit without tack.  He was very good, and other than a little bit of head tossing in the very beginning, he listened really well.  Usually it's really difficult to get him to trot on command, but he started doing it today.  In the past, he's sped up for a few strides and dropped back to a walk soon after.  I always have to stay after him, and he gets ticked off about it.  Today though, he trotted when asked, and kept doing it until I asked him to stop.  *squeal!*

  And......drum roll please...

HE JOINED UP WITH ME!!!!

After lunging him for about ten minutes, he suddenly dropped his head low.  He'd been paying attention and had that inner ear fixed on me the whole time and had been licking and chewing for a while as well.  So when he dropped his head, it took me a second to register what that meant.  I wasn't trying to join up, just to get a good lunge session in.  But that was what he was telling me he wanted to do, so when he kept his head down for another circle, I turned sideways to him.  He stopped and immediately walked to me.  

For those who don't remember or know what join up is...refer back to this post from last year.

I was so excited and happy, that I just ended the lunging session there. Haha.  For the rest of the day, when he wasn't on his lead, he followed me around like a puppy.  When I led him back over to where he'd been tied, he followed me back with his chin on my shoulder.  It's so different for him, that I was on Cloud 9.  :D

I had planned on trying a solo ride since I had so much time that day.  But before I tried that, I wanted to lunge him with his tack to get out any issues he had with it.  I used Chelsea's western saddle instead of my bareback pad because it's a lot safer, and I was taking all precautions.  I packed a lead rope and water and a granola bar (in case of blood sugar emergency...it sometimes drops for seemingly no reason) in my saddle bag.  With all of this finally on him, I took him out and lunged him again.

Surprise!  When I asked him to go into a trot that was a little more brisk than he was currently at, he cantered!  He NEVER canters on the lunge for me.  I wasn't even going to ask him to until he had done the trot a few different days for me and made sure it wasn't just a fluke.  But he did it anyway.  And he didn't seem to mind it until I stopped him and sent him out again and asked for it.  Then he got kind of irritated and bucked a few times.  I reprimanded him, and he trotted away and to the other side of the paddock. -_-

I made myself stay calm and went to get him, collected the line as I went.  I brought him back over and asked him to trot again.  He was fine and eager to please again, but I didn't ask him to canter this time.  I wanted to end the session on a good note and didn't want him worked up before we rode, so I only asked for the trot.  He was fine, and after a few circles, I allowed him to stop.  

I mounted and asked him to go through the gate that he had problems with at the beginning of the summer.  He walked through without a problem.  I took him out to the road and headed to a trail in the woods that was shown to me at the beginning of the summer.  It's the third time I've been on it, but I love it.  It's my favorite trail so far.  There are a lot of low-hanging branches, so there's never a dull moment.  You have to constantly be prepared to shove them out of the way.  

And Orion likes to try to clothesline me on all of said branches.  He only really tried it once that day.  I ended up spitting out leaves because he suddenly broke into a trot right before we reached it.  I ducked, but still ended up with the branch in my mouth and a mouthful of leaves when we emerged on the other side - where he promptly dropped back to a walk. 

Brat.

Once he got over being jumpy about the dogs the came with us ranging through the woods on either side, he relaxed and really seemed to enjoy himself.  I was kind of surprised that he seemed more confident and willing to move out than he ever has when there are other horses around.  He willingly trotted on our ride, just like he had while lunging.  He actually wanted to speed up on his own a couple of times, just for the heck of it.

Once we got back, I untacked him and went to get a bucket of water.  It was really hot, and he's out of shape.  He was pretty sweaty. Haha.  As soon as he couldn't see me anymore when I went for the water, he began whinnying.  After I had the bucket filling, I stepped out around the tree that was blocking him from me and looked across the yard at him.  He was on high alert watching me, but as soon as he could see me again, he calmed down and was quiet.  I stepped back over to turn the water off and collect the bucket, and he immediately began whinnying again.  Once more, as soon as I began crossing the yard with the bucket and he could see me, he was fine.  I felt special.

The farrier came out to trim him again.  Orion was perfect for him.  I'm definitely keeping this guy as his normal farrier.  He's the only one Orion has liked and behaved for consistently so far.  So three farriers later, I've finally found one!  And O's feet are slowly returning to a normal look.  At least on the bottom.  They still don't "pancake" out like most others I've seen, but I'm confident that in a few more months with regular trims, they will.  

So that sums up my day alone with Orion.  A lot happened, and it was so much fun and so rewarding!  I can't wait to do it again.

More stories next time!

:)

A Little Snippet

Hello all!

I've been pretty busy the past few days!  A day spent by myself with Orion, camping and horseback riding with two really good friends, and finally getting a real saddle (treeless!)!  Tomorrow I'm spending a day with my two best friends and moving back to school, and classes start on Wednesday.

I'm going to write it all up and post it little by little over the course of this week, but for now, here's a little snippet of what I've been working on.

There are a few rough spots, but I think overall you'll agree that Orion has made a lot of progress with lunging!  He's finally started trotting for me on command without putting up a stubborn fight.  This video was from today, but he was consistent Thursday and today with his behavior.  I'm soooo excited and proud of him!

More on this subject and everything else later! :)

(Oh, and P.S. - what do you think of the new header that Carly over at Live On made for me?  She also has a recent post that will tell you a little more about what I did yesterday!)

A few pictures until I have more time to write...

These were taken about a month ago.  :)  Thanks to Brandon and Shelby for being my photographers for this!  It was a fun day.  As you can see, Orion acted up a bit, partially from his ever-present stubbornness and partially from my inexperience.  We're working on it...I have confidence that lunging, as well as a lot of other things, will get better this summer when I'll be less than ten minutes from the barn and will be able to be there more often!  

Join Up

So where was I?

Oh yes.  Joining up with Orion. :)

Sunday morning, I went out to the barn around 8am.  It was 30 degrees, there was frost everywhere, and Orion and Jake didn't look like they'd started moving for the day yet.

Needless to say, Orion was kind of cranky.  It was just like waking someone up and making them get out of bed before they were ready.  He did what I wanted him to, but he was a butt about it every step of the way.


I was by myself and didn't have a time to leave by, so I was able to do things my own pace, and it was nice.  I gave him his food (which is always the first thing he gets since he's still gaining back weight - plus, he expects it now by this point), and tried to get him to lift his feet for me.  It didn't happen.  I leaned on him, he leaned back twice as hard.  I pinched and pulled and talked to him - nada.  He wasn't having it.  So I brushed him down and started working on his mane and forelock, since he looked like a unicorn and the top half of his mane was a solid chunk of burrs.  He wasn't having that either - every five minutes I got a sideways head-butt to the side.  He was trying to be sneaky about it - you could tell - he'd lift his head from where he'd been looking for grass, slowly move it sideways closer to me, little by little, and then WHAM.  I either got the air knocked out of me or almost knocked over, and usually stumbled back a few steps.  Brat.


Eventually I got tired of being beat up, so I decided to try lungeing him to get rid of some of his pent up energy - he was being a huge handful.  That went badly.  I don't think I ever did get him around in a full circle.  Every time we started out, he'd run for the gate like he did Saturday evening.  Grrr.


After three times, I got frustrated, but then something from Monty Roberts popped into my head - "Don't make him go away a little, make him go away a lot." Ha!  I hadn't even thought about trying join up that day yet.  I wasn't even sure if I wanted to right then, until that saying came to me.  So, I decided to try join up.  He didn't want to listen, he didn't want to do anything for me, he was showing no respect or willingness - not just with the lungeing, but with everything that morning.  It seemed like the best option at the time - and is something I've wanted to do with a horse for years now.


I walked over to where he was grazing by his gate, collecting the slack lunge rope as I went, and unclipped it from his halter.  I started pitching it toward his hindquarters and got no reaction, so I went back and got Chelsea's lunge whip and started snapping it on the ground about 8 feet away from him.  That got his attention.  He jerked his head up and watched me for a second and then started pacing the fenceline next to him, looking for a way back into the field and to the other horses, who were all the way on the far side of the pasture.


The point was to chase him away so that he would be singled out and by himself, without a herd.  It sounds mean, but the basis is that a horse's instincts tell him that he needs a herd.  To a wild horse, it's dangerous to be completely alone - it leaves them vulnerable.  To domestic horses it usually isn't such a big deal, but the instincts are still there.  So me chasing him away from me, but not hurting him, should have shown him that I wasn't an enemy but that I wanted his respect.  When a horse decides on his own that he'd rather work with you than against you, which is what put him on his own in the first place, that is when a strong partnership can be formed.  That is what I tried to do on Sunday, and it almost worked.


Back to the present(ish), Orion was pacing the fence, and every time he started to stop, I snapped the whip on the ground again.  After a minute or two, he spun and ran to the other end of the paddock.  I walked around the barn to where he was on the other side, and found him trotting the fence line there too.  He began to slow down, and I snapped the whip again.  He ran back to where he was to start out with, next to the gate, then turned and ran around a pile of logs that lies next to the gate, back around the logs again, back to the other end of the paddock, back to his starting point again, and then he stopped.


This time, I let him, because he had had one ear fixed on me for the last five minutes or so, the first sign of a horse paying attention and engaging in the process.  This time when he stopped, instead of dropping his head to graze as he had every other time, he just stood and watched me.  Since he was doing something different, I wanted to see what he would do next.  So I just stood and watched him from about fifteen feet away.  We both stood like that for a couple minutes, and then all at once, he dropped his head lower and started making chewing motions with his mouth - the last two signs of join-up.  It's the horse's way of saying, "I want to work with you."


I dropped the whip to the ground and turned away from him to wait for him to decide to join me.  Everything was silent.  I could hear birds chirping in the trees and the occasional car pass on the road.  But for five minutes, everything else was quiet.  I couldn't hear the pull or ripping of grass, so he wasn't grazing.  I couldn't hear the crush of dry leaves, so he wasn't moving.  I snuck a glance back at him a couple of times, and he was still just watching me, head high now.  After five minutes, I heard him take a couple of steps in my direction.....and then Ed drove his van into the paddock to pick something up from the barn, and that was it.  The magic was shattered, because now Orion was too distracted by the big white metal monster on wheels that was moving in his direction.


The amazing thing was, even though the process wasn't completed, he still worked so much better for me after that.  He didn't fight me at all.  I let him graze while I talked to Ed, and then Linda came down, so I talked to her for a while too.  She suggested I try to get the rest of his burrs out while he was eating and distracted, so that's what I did.  His mane was smooth and neat once again (as if it would stay that way once he was back out in the field, ha.  I liked it though.) and he no longer had a unicorn horn.  I let him graze a bit more, and then I tacked him up, and rode for about thirty minutes or so.  I only rode him around the paddock since I was by myself, and I didn't want to push it as far as exercising him went.  He'll have to be eased back into riding for longer periods of time.  He didn't give me any problems for the rest of the day, and I was one happy girl.  


Next time I go out, I'm probably going to try again.  I can't wait to see how much better things get after he actually does a full join up.  I'm trying to get Chelsea to do it with Kit too.  I think it would help their relationship a lot - Kit can be an extreme pain in the ass, and it's fully intentional. sigh  She'd be a good little pony though, if only she would keep her act together and not try to be difficult about everything.

Kit

You can definitely expect there to be more join up stories and more riding stories later on! :)


I'll also be doing more research on different things I can do to help Orion's balance and things to do just for fun to improve my riding, so watch for that too.


:) 

Some Plans for Orion...

So, Ethan is coming up to see Orion today (hopefully) with his sister and maybe their mom.  I'm not sure who all is on the roster for the visit. lol  But I'm excited.  I can't wait for all my friends to meet Orion.  I think he could win over anyone.  He's so sweet and gentle and gorgeous.  I mean seriously, all he has to do is look at me with his big eyes and his ears pricked and I freakin' melt.  He's that cute.  And so far he's responding well to me, which is great.  No real bond there yet, but it's a good start so far.

I'm going to read about some stretching exercises to do for his legs and some massage stuff while I wait for some definite plans to be made for later today.  Everyone is busy right now, so I don't want to bother them about it at the moment.

I think one thing I'm definitely going to do today, because I think it's so damn cool, is lunge him. I've tried explaining how it's done to Ethan, but I think it's something that you can't understand the allure of until you actually see it in action.  It's all about body language, as Liz told me.  She had to teach me the other day because I had never done it before.  I've read about how to do it, but not actually done it.  And really, it's not that hard; it just took me a few minutes to get the hang of it.  Every time I stopped driving Orion around the circle, he didn't just stop.  He actually came to me.  It was so sweet.  I couldn't believe it.  He may have just been trained to do that; I'm not sure.  But one thing I did notice was that on that day, when I put him back out in the field, he immediately came into the barn and waited for me to come in.  I'd only been out there twice before, but when I put him in the field, he just went on doing his thing, eating and walking around.  Sunday though, he came and waited for me.  Whether for treats or because he wanted to be around me, I don't know.  He got both though.  I started teaching him to "kiss" while he was there. lol

I think that lunging might be another way I can start to build a bond with him.  Simply put, when you lunge, if you do it right, you're speaking the horse's language.  Facing them head on is aggressive.  It's what a head mare will do when one of the herd is in trouble or needs put in their place.  When you turn sideways to them, it's passive.  It's like saying "Okay, you can stop now."  So they do.  They stop.  

One of the things I'm interested in doing with Orion is join-up.  It follows the same kind of rules as lunging does.  You act aggressive and send them out to the outside of the circle, except in this case, you don't have a lunge line attached.  They are free.  They move around you in that circle, and eventually, they will want to stop.  In the herd, it's like asking permission to come back in after they've been chased away.  The signs that they want to come back to you are fixing their inner ear on you to show you they are paying attention, dropping their head lower, and licking and chewing.  Once they've done all of this, they'll usually come into the middle with you if you let them stop.  And remember, nothing is attached to them, so no one is making them do it.  You resume a passive position, and they decide to come to you.  

It helps build the bond stronger, because you've proven to them that you can speak their language and they got to make their own choice about you.  It builds trust.  I want to do that with Orion someday.  For now though, I'll just stick to gentle lunging, because I don't want him to work too hard with his legs being the way they are.  Sometimes join-up can take a while.  I don't think it would with him, but I don't want to risk overworking him.  So that will be saved for another day.

For right now, I'm sticking to reading my new book on essential oils so that I can learn more about aromatherapy and how it can be used.  I want to learn all I can before I start it with him so that I can make the most out of what I do. :)

And that's what I'm going to go work on right now! :D