Better by leaps and bounds

She is definitely improving! We have totally cracked open ditches and she has no hesitation in popping across them. We even did a fence followed by an open ditch and an open ditch followed by a fence. We have also cracked "up" and its counterpart "down" and she has been happily hopping off steps up to 18 inches high.

I started with a totally different strategy today, letting her get well used to being in the open first. She is clearly agoraphobic, and now we have worked that out it is so obvious! She goes into the middle of the 80 acres and you can feel her scanning for the track, just looking for rails, or a path she can follow. I think it will take her another couple of sessions before she's happy. As an aside, doesn't it also explain why she was so happy to stay inside the dressage boards at her first competition??? And why when she ran away last week instead of running to the gate for home she ran to the far end where there is, you guessed it, a track!

I had a problem at one tiny fence, a log on stands about 2 feet high, probably less. There was a ditch behind it two strides away that she was already happily jumping. She had already jumped a similar log coming the other way. But she would not go near it. She refused and refused. I decided that she would have to jump it if it took all day. We are at a stage of her training where she needs to understand that she can say no if she wants, but that eventually she will do it, so she may as well do it sooner. She has given up rearing and bucking, so I felt the time was right to insist on this one, and the fence was tiny.

I presented her at it again and again. She started refusing to go near it and had worked herself up into a complete tizzy. So I used her numnah as an excuse to get off and break the deadlock. I put it straight, and got back on calmly. The break allowed me to think of my next option. I decided that she was getting away with not working by refusing to jump it, so that every time she refused I would simply take her past it and make her jump the ditch and pole on the other side of it (It was a coffin, but with plenty of room to swing away and do only two of the three elements at a time.) The second time I did this, I thought "she's given in, she'll go next time". And she did. So I took her away and gave her a break and chatted to Superhubby.

I went off and jumped a few of the bigger fences on the course. She is very reliant on me and not really taking them on for herself, but because I am telling her to. But that will do for now, she will start attacking them soon and then I won't be able to stop her! What I did get for the last two fences I jumped made me really thrilled with her progress - I felt her scan the field and question which fence I was going to point her at next*. Tetley does this, and it's fantastic. She is beginning to, and it will make her a superstar if we can encourage it.

So all in all, a really great session. Still not ready for Rodbaston, because she needs to do 2ft 9 - 3ft without a warm-up over 18 inches first, but she is really getting there now.

I have been spit and polishing my new (second hand) saddle this afternoon. The girl who owned it was a showing person and she was obviously more concerned with whether it shone than whether the leather was fed. I have been sandpapering it (yes, really!) to get the old "coating" of polish off. It was allowing mould marks and flaws in the leather to make it look much much older than it can possibly be (they have only been made for three years, so it can't be older than that. Also she bought it from an agent and they had no agents in place until two years ago, prior to that the owner of the company came to fit them. So I believe that it is two years old or even less. It didn't look it!) Anyway, after sanding it all down, it then drank half a tin of saddle oil like a man lost in the desert - that's an AWFUL lot of oil, at least 6 or 8 coats, and only on the seat - the flaps are new :-0 It could still drink some more too. And it looks HUGELY better and I'm MUCH happier with my purchase.

I forgot to update you on the Trakhener with ringbone. The girl got back to me asking lots of questions. Amongst the questions she said he had been sound since she placed the ad, hacking and schooling well. Since the ad said she needed to get rid of him because of the rehabilitation he would need, and it seemed that his rehabilitation was complete, this made me a bit suspicious. Then she asked what weight I am, and said that he had never carried more than 9 stone without bucking them off. This is a strapping great well built 16.2 Trakhener wer're talking about here! 9 Stone??????? Basically, there just has to be something wrong with that horse's back. And my guess would be kissing spines, that kiss if he carries 10 stone but not if he carries 9 stone. And also that it's the spine that has cause him to have ringbone. Just my guesses, but not a horse that I would touch with a bargepole, sorry!

I have realised that I need to know when Tetley is sound and when not from my diary but that it is getting lost in all the other rubbish I'm writing. So from now on I'm going to put it at the end so I know where to find it without reading all the rest :-)

C

* I have just realised that you need to understand the field. It is 80 acres. 20 acres is grassland for dressage and lorry parking. The other 60 acres is littered with every conceivable type of fence in every possible height up to Intermediate. There are fences absolutely everywhere you turn over the entire 60 acres. It's a fantastic facility to be able to use, £15 per hour per horse.

Tetley - triangle and back. Totally sound. Overtracking in walk by an enormous distance.