October 4, 2010

This is Cinco's third saddling.  You would never know the Cinco of today is the Cinco that first came here.  His confidence is growing by leaps and bounds. 

He doesn't mind the saddle at all.  He accepted it like he had been saddled a lot of times before.  We did the ground skills and drove him a lot and he accepted it all.  He stops, backs, side passes and all the rest, all from the middle of him.  This is pretty good for a horse that was a bundle of jumping beans when he first came.  With horses like Cinco, the best way to train him is to set it up for him to succeed and wait for it to happen.  This gives him time to think about it and to do it without getting shook.  Horses like Cinco learn from patterns. 

Gully has had about 14 rides.  He is really is starting to do well.  He breaks at the poll and has become soft at his face.  He is a very athletic horse .  He is stopping and turning good.  He is showing a lot of confidence when asked to do things.   This type of horse is the one who is easily bored and when you teach him something you have to quickly teach him the next thing.

Sugarfoot has a little bit of a temper.  Most of that is her lack of understanding of what you are trying to teach her.  We worked on ground skills and a lot of speed control and change of directions to engage her mind.  She jumped over jumps, backed through gates and did the figure eight on the cones.  She is a very athletic and smart little mare.  She is going to be a super stopper, because of her natural ability to round her back and bring her hind legs up under her and slide. 

Fred is still unconfident.  He is still fighting demons.  He is very uncomfortable with the friendly game.  We did saddle him today though.  He doesn't seem to care at all about that.  He is still scared of the stick, and we are not sure yet if he is scared of the stick, or is he scared of what happened to him with the stick in his former life.  With a horse like Fred Re-naturalization is a long slow process.  It takes time and more time.  

Prince goes home tomorrow.  When you train a horse like him, you always want the best for him.  You want him to be treated well, so that he gets along good.  You always hope he gets the best deal.  We took Prince on a trail ride today.  We went about 5 miles around our little hill.  He loved it and did very well.  He walked along bobbing his head and didn't have a bit of trouble.  We also took our horse Junior, who is calm and steady.  The only thing we had a little spook with was a donkey.  Both horses put their heads up and looked at the donkeys. 
When we send a horse home like this, we always hope their owners will work the ground skills and ride him with confidence so he will have a good ride.  We also hope they will keep coming to lessons and clinics to continue his and the owners education.

We worked on Gully's lateral flexion, head set, and collection.  Gully is in the place of any three year old colt.  And as with most 3 year olds, you have about 20 minutes of teaching time.  Gully is extremely atheletic, and when you ride him, you can feel every muscle in his body.  He is a very unusual horse. 

We don't write every day on this blog.  Sometimes we skip several days.  It all depends on our work and travel schedule. 

There are a lot of things we do in horse training that are repetitive.  In reading this blog we repeat steps over and over.  This is done to address certain issues that arise when riding a horse.  Sometimes this takes multiple days to fix these issues. 
Prince is at this stage now.  We are working on two things, stopping and backing.  When Prince stops, he tends to go downhill.  He is improving daily on this.  When he has trouble with backing he isn't engaging his hindquarters enough.  So we are working on that.  He will go home soon.

This is Gully's sixth ride.  He is doing well.  We are spending a lot of time working on lateral flexion, by tipping the nose in, disengaging his hind end, and making him push in.   We have started stopping and backing to help him to break at the poll. 

Cinco has made significant improvement in his trust issues.  He still has a tendency to hide from people and he also has a hard time when he starts to learn something new.  We are driving him, working on lateral flexion and turning, stopping, backing and side passing.  His biggest problem is still trust.  Cinco needs a very confident leader who will help him when he gets worried. 

Something we need to remember as horseman is that horses are not like a car or motorcycle.  If you take your horse to a trainer, and then get him back, he is not like a motorcycle or a car.  You can't just park him in the barn and take him out the next time and he will be in the same place.  You still have to keep the horse tuned up.  You have to get out and ride at least 3 times a week (and more if you can) and you have to be consistent. 

We worked Prince on forward, stop and circles, and following the focus.  This is same thing we have working on with Prince on most of the time.  We have been consistant with him.  He is really doing well and is getting a lot more trustworthy.  Prince goes home at the end of this month and has progressed well. 

George is just the sweet horse he has been since we have had him.  He is stopping, backing and does everything very well.  He has gotten very soft in his face and will be going home soon.  He will make a very nice horse for his owner. 

Cinco had a really good day.  We drove him for the first time this day.  He took to it like a duck to water.  He remained calm through the whole thing.  This is a really big thing for him. 

Gully had his second ride today.  He is a quick study and is very responsive and light and sensitive.  He is a fast learner.  He is growing mentally a lot.  He doesn't throw his fits like he did and he stays calm longer. 

Sugarfoot had a little snit today.  She is a very dominent pushy mare.  After she tried being dominent, she settled right back to learning.  This is her second time to be saddled.  She did well with the saddeling. 

Fred had a good day today.  We had to work on him catching us, because he forgot how to do it.  We also worked at liberty on desensitization.  He is still a little spooky.  We also worked on draw.  We went in a circle and asked for disengagement and when his head started to face us, we walked off.  This develops draw. 

Junior is a new horse we are helping a friend with.  He had the best day and the biggest change of all the horses we worked today.   First we changed saddles because we noticed that his shoulders were rotating.  That made him much more relaxed and then we put the saddle behind the shoulder extension.  That made him carry his head low and his owner says he never has done this.  His mind is more engaged and he is yawning to get the Adrenalin out.  We know now that we are on the right track with this horse. 

Gully turned a corner today.  He is soft and supple in his face and body.  We warmed up with the ground skills and played the cutting exercise.  We also drove him and he is getting the balance, stop and release.  We worked on correct circles and body arcs and stopped him with one rein. 

Cinco finally stopped hiding today.  He is much calmer and doesn't spook nearly as much.  He finally trusts us and believes what we are doing is OK and now we are going on to some new stuff.  We hope to drive him and see if the trust is still there. 

We finally found the one problem that George had hidden.  We found it after mentally preparing him, getting his feet fixed, and figuring out his personality.   We also found that George is the perfect example that horses forgive, because if he didn't forgive, he would have been a handful.   George is really bracey in the bit and feels that every time someone touches the reins, they are going to rip on his mouth.  If you ask him to back, he immediately begins gaping his mouth, chewing the bit and trying to avoid you.  He becomes nervous, but if you stay SOFT and persistent with him, he finally releases to the feel and finds the soft spot in the bridle.  We found that he likes to drop his head and stretch his back.  This is a good reward for him for getting over being bracey. 

Prince wakes up in a new world every day.  He is still very immature and can't figure out what you want of him, but after you ride him awhile, he comes around.  Today we worked on him going in straight lines.  He has a tendency to wander and can't follow your focus.  Tomorrow, we will be doing more of the driving exercises, like driving him to an object to have him follow your focus. 

We worked on Gully, trying to get him to catch the human.  We warmed up on the ground skills and then went to driving with him.  He is still putting his ears back in a dominance attitude.  He is not near as bad as he was though and he is making progress with learning all the ground skills.  Next week we will probably put a saddle on him. 

Cinco is a changed boy.  At least around here.  If you took him to a horse show, he might still be wild and woolly.  His trust and curiosity are starting to show.  Today he would go around the round pen and smell things, where before he has never shown any interest in them at all.  He is an not a confident learner, needing you to have a short line and keep him pretty close to you.  He still has a lot of brace in his body, which means he has brace in his mind too. 

We worked on George's ground skills today, just as a review to make sure he does them with perfection.  He is still the willing kind horse he always has been for us.  His biggest problem is going inside himself and getting introverted.  We do a lot of scratching, rubbing and just sitting with him.  This will build a bond and he won't be so introverted. 

We have been having a lot of rain yesterday and today, so can't really do anything in the mud.  But we did get Cinco's feet trimmed.  And he did a great job!!  Our farrier did the front feet without a bit of trouble.  Then he only had a little trouble with the back feet.  Cinco didn't kick or anything, he just kind of pulled.  Cinco is learning that he doesn't have to fight with everyone, and he is getting more trust in the people who are handling him.  This is a major step forward for him.  He is gaining a little trust. 
We get quite a few horses of this type.  They think someone is going to kill them and they are the goosey, jump in the air, and land on you, and their first instinct is to fight.  This is one of the most dangerous types of horses for the "new to horses" person.  If you have a horse like this, you need to get some professional help from a REAL Natural Horseman.  Don't go to just anyone, because this horse can't be forced.  He will get worse with force and someone will get hurt. 

Gully had a very good day today.  He is getting the ground exercises down well and we have driven him quite a bit.  He has the driving pretty well figured out.  The only thing he does, that isn't right yet, is he goes behind Jere's back in the circle and snakes his head at him.  This is probably stallion behavior, but will soon disappear.  He still has a tendency to be a little aggressive, and Jere still has to prove his leadership and will probably have to do it over and over for a while.  Jere played the catching game with him today and he got it.  Tomorrow we are going to take him onto the playground to see how he does with a longer rope. 

Cinco's eyes are getting larger and more liquid.  This is a sure sign that he is getting calmer and starting to trust.  The Cinco you see today is a far cry from the scared, nervous, jumpy horse that came to us.  When he came, you couldn't touch his ears, the shoer wanted to drug him to get him trimmed, and he was a jumpy bundle of nerves.  Today we trimmed his front feet with absolutely no problems at all.  We didn't even have anyone hold the lead rope.  What a difference in a horse.  This Natural Horsemanship will really work, if you give it the time.  It is so much fun to see a horse like Cinco change.  Of course we still have a long way to go, but now the owner knows there is hope for him. 

George is just a nice, sweet, horse, that tries really hard for us.  He does not need any severe measures with his training, or with his equipment.  He is willing and docile.  His main problem is that he is a left brained introvert and he goes inside himself to protect himself, until he has had all he can stand, and then he reacts. 
Today was an easy day for him.  He put his head down, his ears up and just enjoyed himself with all the things Jere asked of him.  Just a super horse.  Wish he was ours!!!

Prince's journey has been a long and trying one, both for him and for us.  We are making some progress with him though.  His main problems are that he stops with his feet all strung out, he lacks impulsion, and he doesn't know how to stop balanced.   He is just an immature colt, that grew physically faster than mentally. 

This pictures is an example of the unbalanced stop Prince makes.  See how far apart his feet are?  He can't engage his body from this position.  We are making progress with Prince.  He is doing a lot more balanced stops now. 
Lots of colts, that are big physically, have this sort of issue.  They just grow faster than their mind does.  Remember this when you want to buy a 4 year old and he is big.  A good place to go for information on this phenomenon is Dr. Deb Bennett's page on the Internet. 

Riding Clinic, Sept 4, 2010

Our son Cully, rode Prince in the horsemanship clinic we had on Saturday.  Our goals were mainly to get Prince out with other horses and to get him used to paying attention to his rider instead of all the exciting stuff that is going on around him.  He did very well.  Cully has been riding him for awhile now, and he is used to his methods.  They worked on the basics in this clinic and Prince needs help with stopping, backing, and hindquarter engagement. 

Sugarfoot was her usual self.  She is very loving and dominant!!  What a combination.  We worked on her ground skills.  She is doing real well on them.  We saddled her and she will be started driving next week.  She doesn't object to the saddle at all.  Her owner is coming to ride her soon.  He is our grandson, Clay. 

Fred went to the gym today.  He was soaking wet when he was done.  He had a pretty hard day and he didn't trust as much as he has other days.  You can see the trust developing, but he has times when he looses it.  Then he goes to the cones and puts his feet on it.  That is his safety place.  He knows he was successful at that so he goes there.  He is just going to take a lot of time to become trusting of people. 

Cinco is really working out.  Everything jelled for him today.  Of course he still is very claustrophobic on the right side.  He is getting good at all the ground skills and didn't loose his cool on any of them.  All four of his feet were picked up without any trouble and that is a major deal.  He is starting to trust us a little better and a couple of people have been working him, so that is also a major deal. 

Gully had another rough day.  He certainly has his ups and downs.  He is like a big spoiled kid.  He still has a tendency to want to run his own program and gets a little aggressive sometimes.  We worked again on ground skills.  We drove him and he was very receptive to that.  Gully is a high energy horse, with lots of drive and movement.  If he had a job every day, it would be better for him.  But time will make him better.

George is becoming very supple, very light in the bridle.  His whoa and go is very balanced.  He is starting to turn around very fast.  He has no problems to speak of and is just a very nice horse.  If the owner will ride him a couple of times a week, he is going to make a very nice trail horse. 

Prince is still having his impulsion problem.  He also is heavy on the front end, leans on the bit, and is used to people pulling on him without giving him any release when he gives to them.  This is all related to impulsion.

To fix this we are teaching him to engage his hindquarters, with the inside hind foot taking the first step.  We did a lot of walk, trot, stop and back transitions on him, and asked him forward again.  When he breaks at the poll and gives we release pressure on his face. 
 

Sugarfoot's first saddling was today.  She accepted it like she had been doing it all her life.  She is not claustrophobic and didn't jump or do anything out of the ordinary.  Her main problems still are pushing into you and wanting to walk all over you.  We are still working ground skills and she seems to be getting over that some.  Today she spent some time on the "Patience Tree" to get her used to standing and waiting for her human.  She did very well with that. 

Fred is the Great Licker now.  He licks everybody.  And not just a little bit.  He slobbers all over you.  He is a very smart horse and figured out how to untie the Blocker Ring today.  We worked on the ground skills and did figure eights around the cones on line.  He also has a real problem with spooking at anything different and with the rope.  We worked a lot on that by throwing the rope over his head and doing the "drunken cowboy" act.  Fred is a very likable horse and has a real personality.

Cinco is still working on his ground skills.  When you combine the skills and ask for more preciseness, he becomes more unconfident.  This is where working him through it and showing him that everything is going to come out all right on the other end is very important.  He has tendencies to go right brained and this is mostly on the right side.  We have been directing his feet and giving them something to do and having him do it precisely.  That breaks his pattern of going right brained. 

 We are still working on the ground skills with Gully, and he is playing a lot.  He has a lot of curiosity and is extremely athletic.  He has settled down and is following his nose and there is still a little brace in his body.  This may be due to the fact that this is the first time we have driven him. 

Prince was ridden today.  Today was probably the best day he has had so far, here.  We worked circles to supple him and soften his mouth.  We also did  straight lines to teach him to follow the focus.  It also helps his impulsion, which is still his hardest thing to do.  His stops were ok today, but he still wants to push into the bridle.  That is still part of his impulsion thing where he goes downhill and gradually coasts to a stop.  This problem has improved a lot since we have been riding, but is still a problem.  His owner came and rode him and got along very well.   

George was first again.  George is doing beautifully.  He is becoming very supple and losing the brace in his mind and body.  He is becoming reactive to his leg aids.  The lady who rides him is going to do some work to be able to ride him and he will turn out to be a great horse. 

Prince was first this morning.  We warmed up on the ground and drove him.  We then started riding him.  We worked a lot more on impulsion as this is really his Achilles heel.  We did circles, transitions, stop and back.  Circles soften his body and make him more flexible.  Transitions help with impulsion and improve his gait.  The stop was worked on because he has a tendency to dribble out and he is still heavy in his front end.  Backing is to engage the hindquarters.

George was warmed up on the ground too and then ridden.  We worked on circles and stopping.  He is very stiff on the right side and circles will help him with that.  Today the owners came to ride some of these horses and we gave them a mini lesson. 

Cinco is so much better.  He is asking questions much more and settling down.  He is gaining trust in humans now because his owner worked him and he wasn't near as scared as he was at first.  Today we pushed him through some things he didn't want to go through to let him know he was going to come out alright on the other end. 

Gully had an extremely good day.  His ground skills have gotten a lot better.  He has lost his bullying attitude and is very interested in what we are trying to get him to do.  He is the kind of horse that has to have his mind challenged all the time.  His owner also worked him and she played the ground skills.  He worked well with her, with no sign of the teenager coming out. 

 

Gully is progressing nicely and his ground skills have greatly improved.  He is showing a lot of initiative and curiosity.  He really wants to please now.  He has pretty much quit being a teenager and just needs a job to do. 

George did ground exercises for just a few minutes this morning.  Then we rode him.  We did circles on him to soften his mouth.  He was ridden in the arena this morning instead of the round pen.  This allows him to free up and move out a little better.  We worked on stopping and backing and he showed a lot of improvement in all areas.  Being in the arena helped him a lot with his forward motion. 

We rode Prince too.  His ground skills are very good so we don't have to do much of that with him.  We drove him and he is still heavy in the front.  After that we rode him and worked on circles, engaging his hindquarters, and going forward.  He still wants to get his head down and coast to a stop.  After we get him to where he will stop and turn, we will take him to the arena and maybe that will help with his impulsion.  This horse is like a colt.  He has no foundation training on him.  He doesn't turn or stop or back up.  All of this has to be taught before you can ride him in a big arena.  No wonder he has a history of getting scared and running and bucking.   

Cinco turned a little corner today.  He wasn't near as scared as he has been in previous sessions.  He is asking questions, and can learn new tasks if given time to assimilate them.  This is a big step for Cinco.  If you can ever get him to think instead of reacting from fear, he can learn something.  His owners know that this horse may take a little more time than the average horse, because of the fear and trust factor. 

Fred had a really good day today.  His ground games have really improved and he is one of the smartest horses we have seen.  His trust factor is way up.  But it is still somewhat of an issue with Fred.  Over time though, he will get to trust humans more and more.  Usually he is a pain to catch, but he let himself be caught easily today. 

Sugarfoot is always easy to catch, because she catches you in hopes of having a treat.  She is very food orientated.  She still doesn't lead too well, but she has only been broke to lead for about two weeks.  She did relatively well in the ground skills.  We taught her to find a cone and touch it and she learned it very fast.  Sugarfoot's owner is a 14 year old boy, who has done a lot of work on her, since we got her.  He is going to try to show her in open shows.  She has a really nice personality and they should do well. 

Hopefully, I can get some pictures posted tomorrow so you can see what each horse looks like. 

Gully, the new horse is the first one we did this morning.  His owner was here from Bandera to see how he was getting along.  The first thing we did this morning was to review his ground skills.  He is starting to get all of them.  However, when you try to circle Gully, he tosses his head, jumps in the air and paws at you while coming towards you.  He is pretty much of a teenager.  He also has some stallion behaviour.   When we worked on finding the cone with his feet,  his mind became a lot more engaged and he quit being so much of a teenager and settles down.  This is all part of his left brained extrovert personality.  He has to be challenged all the time. 

George was the next horse we worked.  We spent only about ten minutes working on the ground skills.  He does very well at all those skills.  Then he was ridden and this is only the third time he has been ridden here.  We worked on circles to soften his face and get him over the fear of being pulled on.  He will sidepass, and will two-track.  He must have had some training on him to do such intricate  manuevers.  Tomorrow,  we will ride in the arena. 

Prince was next and we rode him for the first time, here.  We discovered he is just like a colt, with no basic foundation on him at all.  He doesn't turn, he doesn't go with the feel, and he braces at everything.  He travels downhill, pushing all his weight onto the front legs, so therefore can't get his front feet out of the way to go forward.  Consequently, he slows to a stop a lot and has no forward momentum.  Today we worked on stopping him and giving to the bit.  Prince braces to everything and this has become an automatic reaction by now, to protect himself.  We worked on circles and leading off with the correct foot on the turn.  The horse must lead off with the correct foot so that he has momentum for his body to leave. 

Cinco was the last one.  He is still fairly scared, but is getting better with trusting us.  We only did on line work with him today.  We did a lot of getting him to drop his head and relax.  Because he is a right brained introvert, it is a slow process to get him to trust us.  We have to teach him two or three things and then quit.  Today we worked on giving to steady pressure, circling, and back up.  He got the steady pressure quickly.  Circling to the left, he was fairly well connected to us, but circling to the right he would leave pretty fast.  He would have his head turned away with his ribs poked right at you.  Backing was also pretty easy for him today. 

Tomorrow we will try for some pictures.  Stay tuned!

We got a new horse yesterday to train. His name is Gully and he is a bay three year old Quarter Horse Gelding. He is a left brained extrovert. He has been handled quite a lot. We started teaching him the ground skills on line and how to be respectful of our space. He is a high energy horse, so if he gets pushy he is rather dangerous.

Prince was our first horse today. We have had him about a month and have gotten him over some of his worst dominance problems. His ground skills are improving and he is being driven. He still trips all over the obstacles, due to not paying any attention to where he puts his feet. This also follows through to not paying any attention to his handler. But, he is turning, backing and sidepassing in the driving reins. We are driving this horse to soften him up, and give him the confidence to follow his nose. This will lead to riding him.

We played the catching game with Fred today. Fred has a lot of fear about people. We worked with him with steady pressure to move his body around. We did desensitization at liberty so he could make his own decision to stay or leave. When he gets over his fear of humans, this will be a very nice gelding.

Cinco is the scared one. Even more scared than Fred. We played the catching game at liberty. His draw and join up was much faster today. We also worked on getting him to turn his feet loose, so he can travel with more cadence in his gaits. We also desensitized him at liberty. He could make the choice to stay or go. When the pressure is too much he can leave at liberty. This is vital with a scared horse like this one is. They have to be able to get their feet moving, because a horse only has one good weapon, and that is being able to run. When you trap them in any way, they think they are going to be eaten.

George is a real nice horse, who just needs a leader that will set perameters for him. His ground skills have really improved. He asks a lot of questions and is very curious about what is going on. Today we worked on teaching him all the ground skills. He is very willing and curious.

Sugarfoot found out that she has to follow a leader today. And she didn't want to! She showed her dominant side. This mare looks like a sweet little mare and she is, but she is also trying to be the alpha of her herd of two. Her herd of two consists of horseman and horse. We played the catching game at liberty and she wouldn't join on. Then, she finally decided to. We think tomorrow she will be better at this game, but you just never know.

Today, we are going to introduce you to the 2 free horses we have.

The first is Fred, a bay Quarter Horse gelding. Fred is 11 years old, and the lady we got him from said someone roped on him. According to his registration papers, he has some very nice bloodlines. He is a right brained extrovert, with a lot of fear and confidence issues.

The second free horse is an unregistered Quarter Horse, named Sugarfoot. She is a sorrel filly, three years old. She has only been handled by the lady who gave her to us and has had only kind handling. She is a left brained introvert, who thinks her only job is to be loved on. She is very dominant.

In the next blog we will tell you what we are doing with these horses.

The Natural Journey

We have received several horses in for Natural Training and thought we might share what they are learning with you. When each horse arrives at our facility, we explain to the owners that this is not just the horse's journey; it is also the horseman's journey. Their horse changes and so do they.

Prince is a big 16 hand Paint Gelding. He is a left brained extrovert. He is pushy and believes that people don't rank very high on his scale. We have had him for a month now and he is making real progress.

George is a nice little horse with a sweet nature. He is a sorrel Quarter Horse, about 15 hands tall. He is a gelding. He is a left brained extrovert and asks lots of questions, which indicates curiosity.

Cinco is a palomino Quarter Horse gelding. He floats between right brained extrovert and a right brained introvert. He lives in a very dark place and is afraid for his life.

We will talk about each of these horses and how they are coming along in the coming weeks. Also, I will be posting some pictures.