A hot day, and some new exercises

Last night I did some DVD watching, since we are ready for some new exercises. I also had a look at the overview I started making for Series 2 of Gaining respect and control on the ground, and realised that we've already done some of the things on it, like helicopter exercise, and desensitising to a plastic bag, and the pat pat patting I was doing is something that CA calls Slap and Tap. Although of course it's all very thorough when he discusses it, which is useful. He speaks from experience. "Some horses do this", and "A few horses do that, not many, but sometimes you get one that will", so you have an idea of what might happen and what to do.

It was interesting today, when we were doing one of the exercises, Darcie was doing just what the mare on the DVD did, which was think that all my body movements meant to move, so I did the same sort of desensitising to my body movements as CA had done on the DVD. Actually I sort of started doing it, and instantly recognised that I was doing the same sort of thing, and so more consciously did the same sort of thing.

We went up a bit earlier today and it was quite hot and humid. I had to get to the Uni library near the paddock before it shut, otherwise we would have gone up when it cooled off a bit. Banjo was being led out of the paddock when we arrived, but this time Wart had not followed him up to the gate. We found Wart at the dam with a big group of other horses. He was upside down beside the dam when we came into sight, rolling in some dust. Other horses were in the dam, pawing at the water, and one was even lying down rolling in the water. When Wart saw us he came up for his food and happily ate it. When I say came up, I mean trotted and cantered up. He does love food and attention time.

After visiting Wart, we went to the paddock that Darcie and Orion are in. They were right down in the far corner and were not all that motivated to come up, probably because it was sooo hot and sooo humid and do I really HAVE to move? They did come up in the end, and I was glad that Orion was there, because Darcie mostly came up due to him coming up. But you could see they were thinking about whether the prospect of food was worth the walk up in the heat and humidity.

Darcie was initially quite flinchy to touch today so the desensitising exercises I'd chosen to do today, which were "run up and rub" as well as more "slap and tap", were definitely suitable ones! I also consciously did much more rubbing of the face, and would only stop when she held her head still. Again, watching the CA DVD helped make that a more conscious choice.

I groomed her and picked out her feet. She's still a bit waggly with the back ones, so I need to make a concerted lesson (or series of lessons) with those.

We started our training session today with "changing sides", where you teach the horse to step across with the forehand when you want to work with the other side of it, instead of the person walking to the other side. It builds on the yield the forehand exercise. It went very smoothly, both kinds. First the hand under the chin to move the head across, then push (with visual pressure, not touching the horse) the forehand over. That was all very low key and went well.

Second was the point with the lead hand and then push the shoulders over (same kind of push as before). With this one, at first she wanted to spring off into LFR when she saw the pointing hand, so it took a couple of goes for her to understand the difference, that I didn't want her to spring out into movement around me. Although I do love her responsiveness. Also when pushing her across I had to go a bit further at first until she gave the desired front leg movement, of pivoting around the hindquarters and stepping across and in front with the front legs. She was tending with the second method to go backwards, or to move the whole body. But it didn't take long.

Then we started with the desensitising exercise of "run up and rub", where I go to the length of the leadrope out in front, then run up to her and rub her head. You kind of pull the leadrope with one hand through the other as you go, so you can stop the horse from turning away, but you let them run backwards if they want. And when you get up to them you straight away start rubbing the head and keep it up until they stand there quiet.

The first time I ran up to her she was pretty horrified and tried to decamp! But I kept her facing me and as soon as I got up to her I started rubbing her. The next time she was about the same, the time after that she moved much less, and after about four or five goes she didn't move backwards at all. So when she was good at that, I started skipping up to her. She was good with that, too, until I got right up to her, and the first couple of times she moved back a little, but then learned to just stand there. She still puts her head up a little when I skip up to her but she'll stop that soon enough. The running up, she just stands there, she is really great. (It took her less time to get used to it than it was taking the mare on the DVD, LOL!)

After that we started with Changing eyes, which is an exercise where the horse learns to walk around you quite close with a good bend, then you change hands with the rope and stick, sliding the hand up the lead a bit when you take it into the new hand, and move towards the hindquarter and the horse yields the quarter, then you plant your feet and the horse moves the forehand across and walks around you the other way, while you let the lead out a little bit to the length it was before. So that is a combination of LFR, yield the hindquarter, yield the forehand, and changing sides. There is a bit of coordination involved for both handler and horse! I just reviewed the DVD and I saw that I didn't remember to consciously slide my hand up the lead when changing hands. The first time I did it, I could see the lead was too long, so I guess I did work it out, but I forgot that it was an actual part of it.

At first Darcie was doing what the mare on the DVD was doing, which was wanting to trot, and she even put in a little bit of canter, despite being so close to me (it's only a stick length of lead rope). So I was just letting her go, while making sure her head was tipped in, and tapping away her shoulders or barrel if they got too close, but letting her relax, relax, relax. Also I was doing the desensitising to my movement so she didn't think every little movement meant to go faster. One thing she did at first was, when she saw me swap hands with stick and lead rope, she would think I wanted her to go faster. So we did some desensitising to those movements too.

Another thing she was doing was guessing that maybe I wanted her to stop and yield her quarters, like in LFR stage 1. So if she did that I just pushed her front end across and asked her to keep going. It didn't take too long before she figured out I wanted her to make small circles around me.

Being a hot and humid afternoon probably helped because she decided in not too long a time that walking was a better option than trotting. It was maybe ten minutes or so before she was walking fairly consistently.

Then we started with the yielding the quarters. To do that, you swap lead and stick, so if you are going to the left, you put the lead into the right hand and the stick in the left. The right hand points at the quarter as you move in that direction. I found I needed to put my non lead arm up in each direction to keep her from walking past or into me, and to get the hindquarter moving over and the front end pivoting more. At first she was wanting to walk forwards more than pivot. So we just kept it up, I had to bump her back a little at first, and then when I got a couple of good steps, where she pivots on the front and steps across behind, with the close foot going in front of the far foot, then I would plant my feet and do the "changing sides" where she moves her front end across past me, and then starts to walk around me in the other direction.

At first she would start off in a trot in the new direction but she started getting that I wanted her to walk.

I should say that during all of this, Xia was desensitising her to a dog running around her and getting fairly underfoot. Darcie was a bit cranky with Xia for a bit but then just started to ignore her.

After a while we were getting it pretty reasonable. Still the hindquarter yield was not as good as it should be, she was not stepping across immediately in the way she should, but it was very improved, and she was nice and relaxed.

I just realised that this exercise is actually a shoulders in at the walk on a small circle. He asks for the hind foot to step under the body. I remember while watching the DVD last night, hearing him say it should step in the line of the outside foot. And he wants a bend in the body and through the neck. So that is a shoulder-in on a small circle. This exercise helps with whole-body flexion and with hindquarter engagement. There is an article about it on the Sustainable Dressage site, here, where she is calling it "shoulder-in volte". It's fascinating, the convergences in good training. I will check, but I'm pretty sure it was in a book by Nuno Oliveira that I read not long ago, where a shoulder-in on a small circle was mentioned as a suppling and calming exercise, and one to be done very often.

Next time I do it with her, I will more consciously be looking for a shoulder-in bend.

She was quite sweaty after all that. I got her to yield her hindquarters (as per LFR 1) and halt, and gave her a good head rub.

Then we did flexing of the head and neck to each side. She was AWESOME. So light and responsive.

Then we finished up with "tap and slap". The pat pat patting one. I started just behind and below the withers and she tensed up at first but then relaxed - and THEN showed me that it was actually feeling quite nice, since she started to stick her head and neck out a bit and wibble her top lip! I moved along her back and she started to move a bit when I did the top of her quarters but soon stood still. Also she moved her head a bit when I was doing the top of her neck but she learned to stand still with that one too. She's getting pretty good for it.

Ellie was hosing down Orion, who'd also been a bit sweaty. Darcie has not been hosed since I got her (our old agistment had no taps), and maybe not ever. I introduced the hose to her. It was turned down pretty low, but I could put my finger over the end to make it go in a bit more of a spray when I wanted. She was pretty good about it, moved a little at first. The most annoying bit was when she'd move around and the hose would get hooked up on a leg. The grass was quite tall right there and it held the hose up so that made it get hooked more easily, instead of being simply stepped over.

She was really quite unhappy about having the water up between the hind legs, up near her udder area, but learned to stand still after a bit. And when I moved to the other side, and got to that bit from the second side, she didn't move at all. I even had Ellie hold her while I hosed a bit under her tail. The only bit I didn't do was her head, which I will do another time, when she's more used to the water. I did let the hose trickle past her lips, which she was sort of worried about and sort of interested in. She moved her lips and tongue to kind of roll the water around her mouth. I think she might learn to drink from a hose, in time.

So after that, we let them graze while holding their leads for a bit. Darcie was not sure about grazing on the lead - she was waiting for me to ask her for something, so I took a bit of grass in my hand and led her nose down with it. Then we took them back in their paddock and let them go. And went and got a bucket with a bit more feed and fed them through the gate as usual, so that they don't rush off immediately. Orion had been about to roll when he saw the gate, and he postponed the roll for some food. Darcie was actually in a roll when I brought the bucket up, so she got up and walked over FAST so as not to miss out.

Today I took the camera up and got a few more photos. I'll post some when I load them onto the computer and edit the ones I want.