January 27, 2011 Taking obstacles in stride



Pictures lifted from the video of the longe lesson



I brought Rory in today, groomed him and saddled up.  Despite having done nothing for a week, Rory remembered all his lessons and stood quietly in the barn.  He didn't even move when I put the saddle on.  We went out to the arena and I set up the camera to video the lesson.  After reviewing the basics I let him have a bit longer line and he was just as good.  I set up a cavaletti and longed him over it.  The first couple of times Rory trotted up to it he jumped over the obstacle.  He half hopped over it for a while, then figured out how to accomodate his trot to take it in stride.  Before we finished I asked Rory to trot more forward, and then come back to his working trot, and then go forward again.  It was a good session.

January 26, 2011 - A quiet week

I haven't done much with Rory in the last week. We had a very cold snap over the weekend.  Sunday night went down to -34C with very little wind.  The lack of wind meant the horses spent the night in the clouds of their own breath, much of which frosted the tips of their hair all around their heads and necks.  I tried to take a photo of Rory, but he wouldn't stand still far enough away from me to get all the frost in nicely.  Once the sun came up the frost melted away quite quickly.

Rory was quite warm enough in his blanket, and was a bit annoyed that I had to check before he could have his breakfast.  I'm not thrilled with these blankets.  The lining seems to be a very poor quality nylon.  Rory wore through one side of the shoulder lining in his rainsheet in less than two weeks.  Another horse at the barn has the same winter blanket and the lining has several very long rips in it.  I looked at it closely and could see that the material was pulling apart along the stitch lines too.  Rory's lost one of the chest buckles on his winter blanket - it must have broken badly as there was no sign of it.  These blankets have two cross bars - one for the tongue, the other for the nylon strap attaching it to the blanket - and the strap bar breaks leaving the buckle still on the billet.  The nylon loop for the buckle was still intact so I just attached the snap to the loop with a quick link for chains.  I'll be glad when he's finished growing and I can get him the same type of blanket that my other horse wears.

January 20, 2011 Full of energy

 Rory was full of energy today.  I went to see him after riding and he followed me across his paddock and hung over the gate when I left.  I encouraged him to chase Totyo around and after a bit they did start playing.  I took a lot of pictures.

Rory kept coming back to me at the gate and I eventually gave in and brought him into the barn.  I just gave him a grooming today.  He stood very well on the cross ties and didn't fuss about the blanket coming off or going back on.  The little bit of attention seemed to be enough to keep him happy.

January 19, 2011 A bigger circle

Rory was very happy to see me at the gate today.  When I called him he came marching over with a little more energy than he usually does. I took him into the barn, groomed and then we went out to the arena for a little longe lesson.  I didn't bother with the saddle today.

In the arena I let him go to see if he wanted to run, but he just nosed around the stuff in the corner (chair, wheelbarrow, pitchfork) while I retrieved the longe whip.  I went and stood in the middle of the arena and after a minute Rory came over and got a bit of carrot.  I snapped the longeline on and when Rory went to walk away he was surprised that we were attached again.  Today's lesson was walk, trot, halt, and out on the slightly longer line - maybe fifteen feet.  For the most part Rory was very good  if a little slow to come down to walk or to halt at times.  His halts when they came were very good as he stayed out on the circle and didn't turn in to me.  I didn't need to use the "out" command very much today.  I kept the session short with several changes of direction.  Once I pushed a little harder than necessary when he was ignoring my trot command and Rory jumped into a canter.

After we finished with the longe I let Rory loose again and he followed me around as I went and scooped up his poops.  On the way back to the barn I was thinking that I'm going to have to be careful not to bore Rory, and to be sure to keep pushing forward in small steps.  It might be time to introduce the side reins to our longeing lessons.

January 14, 2011 - A demanding day

Totyo and Rory having a snooze

I brought Rory in today and rasped his feet before grooming and tacking up.  He didn't need much more than rolling the edges of his hooves but he was less than cooperative at first.  A couple of times he threatened to lie down, but gave up on the idea when I didn't let go of the foot I was holding.  Once Rory realized I wasn't going to put up with his wiggles and objections he stopped trying to take his feet away from me.

I gave him a quick grooming and saddled up.  We went out to the arena for another longe lesson.  Rory was a little full of energy today.  I made the mistake of giving him a few more feet of longe line and he wasn't as attentive.  Halt was not working, and with the extra distance from me Rory paid more attention to Totyo's whinnies.  The snow on the arena roof was periodically sliding off and the noise startled Rory.  Several times he tried to bolt, but I managed to bring him back to a walk without too much trouble.  Once I realized I'd given him more line I brought him back to about eleven feet again and ran through the walk, out, trot, halt commands again with very good response from Rory.  At the end another load of snow slid off the roof as I was switching the longe line to a different ring on his halter.  Rory saw the shadow slide that time and stood still as he watched it go.

On the way out of the arena I looked at the clock and realized that with all the activities today I'd had Rory paying attention for almost two hours.  None of it was difficult or very new for Rory, but it was a long stretch of time for him to be behaving himself and he had been very good.  He was happy to get back outside.