Piaffe, pirouettes and perfect changes.

Today we have been working on walk pirouettes, which I have never done before. They aren't the most exciting exercise in the world, but it's interesting to do something where you have to feel every step of all four legs to place the horse properly.

Much more exciting was flying changes, and he got some absolute corkers today. Unfortunately most of them were exactly one stride BEFORE I asked for them, which in the end we will have to tell him off for. But Sonia says at this point, when he is new to doing them and does them so beautifully, that we should just let him enjoy doing them.

Then we worked on canter pirouettes. These are incredibly hard work for the horse, who has to sit right down in order to get the turn of the forehand. We put him on a very small canter circle and take it smaller still, and then do a half halt and ask for a turn directly on the hocks without breaking stride. He is trying very, very hard for me, and he's definitely getting about a quarter turn before it's too much and I let him out onto a 10m circle again.

And on to piaffe, which he is definitely getting. I bring him down in speed from collected trot, and he will bounce on the spot for one or two "strides", which will gradually become two, three, four .... until he is able to keep it up until we move it out into passage or collected or medium trot. Now that's fun to teach!

Now how does he do all that with these hocks:

This is the one that came up a few days ago. You can see the lump outlined against the white of the other leg, which is back behind it. There are two lumps on this hock, one low and one a couple of inches higher up, just where the white ends on the other leg.



And this is the original lump. Good grief, just look at the size of it! It's a jolly good job I'm not into showing. But I think you can see why this is so worrying, lack of lameness notwithstanding, can't you?




C

ps no, I won't be calling a vet. 1) He isn't lame. Not even on flexion tests. No reasonable vet would suggest treating a horse who isn't lame 2) xrays would be nice to see if the joints are fused, but that would cost £150 and we would be no better off except for a little peace of mind. 3) if the xrays showed no fusion that would be £150 to pay for a HUGE increase in worry, and still no treatment for a horse who is not unsound. 4) don't fix what ain't broke, as my dear Dad would tell me.