I'm Not Dead!

Promise! I'm alive and well and not infected anymore...oh wait, I haven't shared that story, have I?

I just recently got over a very badly infected leg, due to a serious friction burn I incurred when playing indoor soccer on Astroturf. If anyone has ever fallen on asphalt, imagine that but with slide, i.e. you don't just stop and rough up the skin, you slide and remove it completely. You then have Astroturf. The stuff is horribly unforgiving...anyway, four days later after caring for it myself and suffering through what appeared to be increasing pain and sensitivity, I barely made it through my Thursday afternoon classes without crying. I could hardly walk, my leg looked like a deformed sausage, and the wound was incredibly painful and sensitive to the touch. At the urging of my classmates, I drove to the ER and was diagnosed with borderline septicemia. Luckily we caught it before that point, so I was scrubbed (OW) and given a goodiebag of Bacitracin topical gel, non-stick pads and rolls and rolls of sterile gauze as well as a prescription for some heavy duty antibiotics (which were almost guaranteed to give me a yeast infection, so I spent a week eating yogurt and taking probiotics). Three days on the couch and two weeks later and it's almost entirely healed, but it meant no Stella time for a while. It was only as of this past Thursday that I really felt good on my feet.

Stella is happily shed, shed, shedding away, and I have had the opportunity to work her in the arena a couple times. I have talked a bit about Birdie Theory here before (I think), but if not, let me review: Birdie is a metaphor for the leading edge of the horse's attention. I think most good horsepeople recognize that you cannot get anything done with a horse unless he is paying attention to you. We use the horse's "Birdie" to describe where his mind, AKA his focus, is when you are with him. Stella and I have been working with Birdie for a while now, because it is the biggest barrier to our relationship. Stella is not fully confident in me, and her Birdie has a tendency to fly off readily if something new appears (that is to say, her attention is easily drawn elsewhere if something interesting or potentially threatening pops up) and so I have been in the process of teaching her to stay in her own body and pay attention to me and only me. I must get her to the point where she would rather be with me than anywhere else, and so naturally her Birdie stays with her no matter where we go or what we do.

This has been progressing slowly, but it has been progressing. I fully expect her to get distracted, and it's an opportunity to see how quickly I observe her "leaving" and how quickly I can get her Birdie back. The first sign that a horse is focused somewhere other than you, the rider/trainer/owner, is when you can hear, even very quietly, the horse breathing. It's the first sign of what will likely lead to a blow-up or a dangerous behavior or an all-out refusal to do something, if it's allowed to escalate that far. When I hear that from Stella, which I often do at the beginning of our sessions, I ask her to do something, then another something, and another something. I ask her to take two steps back, one step forward, track under left, track under right, two steps back, etc. I poke her shoulder, touch her neck, touch her leg, anything to bring sensation back into her body so that she must focus on it. Then, I bring out the lunge whip. We've been practicing not being afraid of the snapping and it touching her, and now she's so OK with it that it's become a focus tool. I gently wave the whip back and forth over her neck, back, haunches so that it drapes/taps her. It brings a physical sensation to her body that she cannot ignore and also gives her a very specific point to focus on. Within a minute she cocks a hind leg and settles. That's exactly what I want, and I usually let her hang out there for a few minutes while I pet her.

Stella's Birdie still strays when we leave the arena, unfortunately. I think her attention flies way back to the barn by the time we get to the gate, and so it takes a few minutes longer to get back than it would otherwise. But this is OK, I'm not really in any rush. I'd love to get on her come summer, but if I don't, it will hardly be the end of the world. I'm just so freaking happy to have my girl back, and to be feeling good about where we're going.

I know I've promised conformation shots and a discussion to follow, and that is still in the works, but spring grass is tempting and Stella finds it hard to stand still long enough for me to get a decent shot before she drops her head to graze...I wonder where her attention is there!

Brain Fizzle

OK, so after I said I was going to take pictures of the fantastically dirty Stella mare, I had an even better idea...if I was going to go through all the trouble of trying to get decent photos, why not make them ones of her CLEAN and SHINY and do a conformation assessment? I've never done a post on her conformation specifically, and most of the photos that have been up of her aren't conformation critique-able.

So I set out on said mission. Then life happened, boyfriend had a bad day at work (and said boyfriend was supposed to be my horse holder) and Stella just wasn't in the mood to stand still (it was feeding time, probably my bad...) I got a few shots but they are so horrendous, so horrible, so unflattering that I could never in a million years post them here. I don't care to make my lovely, feminine mare (almost-mare, she'll be 6 this April!) look like a jug headed, imbalanced baby yak. Seriously, they were awful. I can deal with the winter fuzz and some residual mud, but nothing about the photos were flattering in the least.

We'll go for round two when we get a decent sunny, dry day, although based on weather.com that won't be happening in my neck of the woods until after the weekend.

But, in other news, we have a great couple of sessions this week. Monday was fabulous. We're working on the concept of "come": it occurred to me after listening to one of Dr. Deb's audio horsemanship lessons that my mare doesn't understand the concept of "come". She understands "go away" because that's all I've ever asked, but it makes much more sense to teach "come" before to send a horse out and then expect them to want to join up with you.

Here's what I learned: round penning in the sense that everyone knows it today (where you immediately send the horse away, make them run, and then ask them to step towards you and follow you) is completely backwards. In order to set the horse up to really succeed and understand A) what is being asked of them, and B) that the person in the pen isn't a monster giving them an ultimatum (i.e., "either run 'till you drop or give in and follow me around"), but a teacher they should want to be with, the horse needs to be taught how to "come" before they are asked to "go away". Before you even teach a horse to come, they need to understand the principle of untracking the hindquarters. Some call this disengaging the hind end, but they aren't the same thing. Disengaging the hind end is a term/method invented by self-advertised horse trainers who saw what greats like Tom and Bill Dorrance, Ray Hunt and Harry Whitney had done and tried to replicate it without understanding it. Disengaging the hind end is these trainer's way of getting the horse to move away the most dangerous part of his body, therefore giving the trainer the horse's head. It's a psychological tool that doesn't serve a higher purpose after it's taught. Untracking, on the other hand, is teaching the horse that, under pressure (which starts out as just a tap from a rope or whip and ends up as nothing more than a position taken up by the handler on the ground), he should pick up the appropriate hind leg and bring it up and under his body, crossing it under his navel. By doing this, he is not only psychologically yielding to the trainer, but he is also learning the first lesson of how to use his body to carry a rider. Bringing the hind leg under the body effectively sets the horse up to lift the abdomen and raise his back by tucking his pelvis, which he has to do to protract the hind leg.

This lesson of untracking then goes on to be used in the round pen. Instead of asking the horse to go away or chasing him and pressuring him to force him to make the choice to follow the handler, the horse is asked, while moving freely, to untrack the hind end. By asking for the untracking and then "inviting" the horse to come to you by bending slightly at the waist and opening the angle of the arms, you set the horse up to A) round in the turn towards you, and B) continue moving in your direction. You reward the horse for his efforts (no matter how small), and immediately he understands that you control where his hind end goes, and he is MORE than happy to follow because the message is so clear. There's no running, no flying dirt, no sweaty horse at the end. I'm happy to report that as of Monday Stella understands "come" and will oblige at both the walk and trot. I haven't allowed her off the line yet but the lunge is absolutely slack when I ask and she comes without hesitation. The next step is to do it in true free movement, so I am not attached to her in any way. We're getting there; what we've accomplished so far is so wonderful I can't wait.

Be on the lookout for picture overload, Stella's got some interesting conformation to discuss...

We'll Be Back After This Quick Break

The Amazing K (AKA my awesome trainer) has been away in Texas for the past couple weeks, and the ground has been too ouchy for Miss S. So we've taken yet another winter-imposed break. But, she's fat, fuzzy and quite at peace with getting lots of grooming and pets.

So we'll be back soon with more updates, pictures and videos of the lovely lady. But I have to share this because A) I cannot stop laughing, and B) this is where Stella will eventually be when it comes to trailering. She loads slowly but surely but tends to be explosive when coming out. This, however, is both awesome horse training and fantastic entertainment.

I had tears coming down my face from laughter...the mini moving at warp speed finally did me in.

A Bit About Bits

K and I have tossed around some ideas about bits for Miss Stella. She started her career in a God-awful single jointed rubber snaffle...ugh, that thing was horrendous. It looked as though a dog had chewed on it (and I think that may have actually happened...) so I still haven't figured out how she tolerated it for so long.

Bitting a horse is actually very simple, but most horse people haven't a clue how to properly fit a bit. I got some knowledge dropped on me a couple years ago by someone who I have the highest respect for and it's proven true thus far, so here we go:

1. NEVER choose a bit because your trainer/barn owner/stable hand/tack store owner/hubby/tax guy said so...they don't know your horse. And their opinions are often biased in some way.
2. Know how each bit functions: what's the difference in action between a pelham, a simple 1-joint loose ring snaffle, a waterford? Is there even a difference? How does a mullen mouthpiece compare to a single or double jointed mouthpiece? What's the difference between straight and bowed cannons (the mouthpiece components) in how they act in the mouth? Start making your flash cards, folks...
3. Bigger is NEVER better. Sorry folks, that whole thing about a thicker mouthpiece being kinder/softer? It's a bunch of horse shit...here's why:

Above is some simple geometry. If you arrange a perfect circle so it touches a straight line at only one point, it will, surprise, only intersect that line at ONE point, and the size of that one contact point does not change based on the size of the circle. Notice in the above illustration that the two circles are significantly different in size, and only touch their respective lines at one point. This is the basis for the argument that a thicker cannon/mouthpiece is softer: riders perceive that if the cannon is thicker, it must have more contact space (i.e. touch the horse's mouth at more than one point) and therefore not seem as "sharp" to the horse, whereas a thinner cannon would contact less of the bar space in the horse's mouth and therefore be harsher. Not only is this a bunch of bollocks by itself, but it also does not take into account each individual horse's palate: if you peer into the mouths of every horse in your barn and do some simple measuring, you'll see each horse's palate is shaped slightly different. Many horses simply don't have the room in their mouths to comfortably fit a big honkin' mouthpiece, and will thus fuss with the bit because it isn't comfortable! So much for being "softer", eh?

Now, there is such thing as too thin...thinner is generally more comfortable, but if the cannons are too thin they will creating a cutting action (and in most cases, this is exactly what is intended by these super-thin bits). Same thing with "textured" mouthpieces: they create uneven, lumpy pressure and can cut/cause sore spots.

Finally, and this is the hardest part for a lot of people (including myself, at one point) to grasp: if your horse truly UNDERSTANDS the bit, no matter what you put in his mouth, he will react to it very much in the same way. You will often see, in old videos of some of the great horseman, the riders swapping out all kinds of head gear and bits on their horses in one session. The way the horses respond doesn't change because they understand how the bit works and respect and react to it accordingly. These guys do this to prove that horses don't have a "bit preference"...this thinking can be dangerous because it takes the responsibility of teaching the horse about the bit out of the rider's hands and assumes the horse will magically "respond" to a particular bit. 

The better thing to do is to take the guesswork out of bitting: know what your horse's mouth looks like. Does he have a low palate? Does he have narrow or wide bar space, and how much space is there between the jaws when his mouth is closed comfortably? What is the shape/size of his jaw? What condition are his teeth in? How thick/big is his tongue, his lips? How wide is his mouth from lip corner to lip corner? Know this information and you can go pick up any bit and know if it will fit your horse.

Stella has a fairly small mouth in general: her palate is low, her tongue is not that big (otherwise it probably wouldn't fit in her mouth...), she has good bar space and nicely conformed jaws but there isn't a substantial amount of room in there when her mouth is closed. Her teeth are well taken care of. Her mouth is a hair narrower than 5 inches, maybe 4 7/8 inches. 

At the moment all the bits I've considered are snaffles: I think she'd like a Baucher (above) to start with, since it tends to sit a little more securely in the mouth of a horse who isn't totally confident about the bit yet. I'm also thinking of a variety of single joint snaffles, specifically eggbutt snaffles with slightly curved cannons. Simple yet stable and not a lot of "wiggle" to them, which can be nerve-wracking to a young horse who hasn't learned to carry the bit themselves.

Let the experimentation begin!

Progress

It's a pretty awesome thing when you find a trainer who truly gets you and what you are trying to accomplish with your horse AND has the knowledge to help get you there. I have found such a trainer, and no, you can't have her.

We are starting on the ground with Stella. Our first session about two weeks ago was roundpenning, but no type of roundpenning I'd ever done. Instead of pressuring the horse to move out and away, I invited Stella to be with me immediately. K and I discussed her reaction to pressure and decided it was not disobedience or defiance as so many would probably assume (and as I assumed), it was frustration. "Big" pressure isn't needed with this horse: it stresses her and pushes her further away from being interested in joining me. It would explain why I never got her to join up in the traditional round penning methods: she'd just run around bucking like a bronc until she was sweaty and exhausted and I was at the end of my patience.

There is still the traditional idea of pressure and release to ask the horse to move its feet, but the pressure came from my body language, not from a rope or whip. I asked with my body first for her to walk out, trot up, etc., and then asked a little "bigger" if she didn't respond. The idea was to ask as little as possible, and for eventually her to raise or lower the energy in her body (which would then manifest as picking up the trot, canter, etc, or coming down to the trot, walk) by just the position of my body and my breathing.

The first couple days were successful, and ended with a very calm and fairly focused mare. The next few, however, were not so much. K and I decided in our session yesterday, in order to help Stella succeed, that we would keep her on a lunge. It enabled me to have direct control over where her head was, and it would "help" her in understanding where her focus needed to be as well as minimize the amount of bronc bucking she did.

What a great session! K is so encouraging. I'm learning the importance of rewarding what I perceive to be even the smallest try from Stella. She needs that more than anything, because often she does not get the big picture all at once. I have to reward those few steps of quiet, relaxed trot, the nice down transition to the walk, that attempt to pick up the canter when asked (even though we could both tell she was saying "Mom, I'm so unbalanced!!") every single time. This is what builds her confidence. This seems like such an easy, obvious concept, and it is, the problem is noticing the small tries and interpreting the signals she gives me. Is that flinging of the head and fast trot her honest try at raising the energy in her body and picking up the canter? Is it defiance? Is it nothing? The answer is that everything the horse does is a communication to us. If the trot gets bigger and faster it is supposed to tell us something, or is a response to something we did. The problem often occurs when we try and interpret the message, and we transcribe into English what the horse said in Equine. Doesn't always work. It's like trying to interpret in Greek what a Russian said to you. Things get lost in translation.

Stella is doing better each session, and all the facets of her personality are coming out. Is she high energy? Absolutely. Is she disobedient? Absolutely not. What I'm seeing is that she is so utterly willing to do what I ask, but what I ask isn't always clear, and in her attempt to guess what I want often explodes a little. She doesn't know how to manage her energy in a productive yet expressive way, and that's what I need to teach her.

Also, as a total aside, Stella got a new toy :) Pictures and video to come.