THAT's better :-)
My devil’s claw solution, as you know, is home made. I had always wondered whether it actually did anything and now I guess we know that it is really effective! Tetley was getting increasingly unsound without it but now that he has been back on it for 3 days he is right back to where he was when he was on it. Trotting sound up and down hill :-) In addition, the feet which he had balanced up completely are now slightly out of balance again, and he has lowered the outside heel. Needless to say he will stay on it for another 3 months until I try again to take him off it.
Caddy and I had another disagreement today. He would not raise his inside shoulder when on the right rein. He was falling in off the wall on the straight lines, and doing a 5 metre circle on the circles. I tried letting him circle 5 metres to see if he would work out how difficult that was and do a bigger circle. No go. I tried circling with him bent to the outside to see if he would realise that it would be easier to do the correct bend. Not interested. I tried lifting the inside hand to lift the shoulder, it worked but he would not hold it by himself and got very fussy in the mouth and began to argue with me. In the end I figured that almost all problems are related to forwardness. I decided to forget flexion, bend and head carriage and sent him forward with a tap on the bum every time he dropped the shoulder. It took him about 4-5 minutes to work out that I was not going to give up, and then his work was perrrrrrrfect, and we stopped. I am really proud of myself how I am working with this horse instead of pushing him into shape, and I hope I can keep it up. Oh and he is STILL growing :-)
Tia’s had the day off today because she still has heat bumps on her back from leaving a rug on her yesterday. They are better, but not gone and I don’t want to risk it. Caddy’s back is so much better that I experimented with just a numnah today and he did not seem any different at all :- )
C.
ps winter has definitely arrived because I have 20 bales of haylage outside. The guy who delivered it insisted that it was my fault that I had five holed ones last year, and lost one whole bale and four part bales. He has only deducted £25 off this year’s bill, when I lost haylage I had paid at least £70 for. Guess who’s not going to get my business next year!
posted by cptrayes @ 5:23 PM
2 comments
2 Comments:
Oh my, the seasons change more quickly over your way. I almost went to the pool today, but kind of crashed instead after hacking about 15 feet of weeds and brush from along my riding ring fencing.
We will have more hot days to come, I am sure, as school will open soon and my classroom has hardly any ventilation.
As to Caddy, again, always consider some muscle soreness as a cause of training irregularity. As he learns to work new muscles they may be a bit sore the next day. Your approach of just going for forward was an excellent one.
I learned a lot from training PJ who, as I said, had chronic muscle issues until he was fit. You need to vary the exercises from day to day. One day, no lateral work at all. One day, just long and low. Another day, how about some cavaletti?
I think Thoroughbreds communicate their physical comfort much more quickly with slight disobediences. While you can often ride through them, trying to circle around them instead often makes the whole training process less traumatic.
I wish I had realized all of this when I first got PJ, but it took training him and then Toby before I began to recognize how important it all was. Now Tucker is reaping the benefits....and I'm off to ride him for a bit before it gets dark. 7 PM here....
Good point Jean, Caddy will get sore just because what he is doing is new, even if it is relatively easy for him.
C.
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