Sunday ride

I had a nice time with Walli Sunday.


Lunging went even better,
and I introduced her to a crupper, due to her low withers and the steep hills around here. She was fine until cantering and then she bucked a lot, which was honest, I had it pretty tight. I loosened it and later rode with it, no problem. I do not ride horses with saddles pressing onto their necks - cruppers are a necessitiy for some horses and some terrain, otherwise I jump off.

Then we went into the arena to work on mounting, which is her real issue. She is hardwired to swing away from anyone attempting to mount. So now she knows my cue to bring her hip toward me, but even before I could cue her, she was swinging away. I swatted her for that and hope it made an impression. I'd rather cue her for good behavior than punish her for bad, but this is really ingrained.

I took her out on the trail, my goal is to ride to the castle, and I could see it in the distance, before I decided I needed to get home and get to my chores.

I'd never actually seen Schloss Burg (castle) from horseback, and it was kind of romantic.

I made the mistake of trying to mount her from the opposite side, and she swung away from me so fast! Ugh, right, OK, we need to work on that too, I guess. And not on the trail - but back at home.

I've contacted her owner and said she should not allow this behavior, and that I'd demonstrate my solution as soon as we can both get out there again.

I know a lot of people use lunging as a technique for mounting avoidance, but my problem is, I don't use a moveable mounting block - her problem exhibits when mounting from a built-in thing at the corner of the arena, and when someone tries to mount using the higher arena edges. So I cannot just send her off to work when she's bad. And she sure is - she gets herself completely perpendicular to the block.

Out riding she was quite spooky, really looking at everything and stopping suddenly. Stopping of course is better than bolting, but it's annoying. At one time she stopped dead in fear of a recently fallen branch in the slanting sunlight, and I leapt off her, tapped her forward with me, and together we walked over that branch, so she realized how silly it was. Then I took her back down the trail where she first saw it, and started again. I don't let her hide behind me as I go on foot down the trail. She needs bravery so I put her a little bit in front, so I'm walking at her shoulder. She always perks her ears and acts on alert. I don't know why she's so tense, but I hope to get her over that. She is very responsive to my cues at positioning during leading down the trail. She's a sensitive, good minded horse, and I could have a lot of fun on her I think.

I feel safe on her, but I'm not able to enjoy her yet on trails, because she doesn't trust me yet. In time..

She's a good girl with very little leadership in her life, so we'll see what happens.