He began to teach Mag about bending, using a tree to walk a circle around and get a bend, and then leg yields from bending (which he says really helps Mag get the leg yield right).
He also taught Mag to drop his head when he asks from the saddle, and did some bending left and right while standing still. He said giving him those exercises while standing helps him manage to stand with less fidgeting. Though he did still chomp the bit a little, and bite the reins, it did help overall to have a task while standing still.
He went up and down a hill leg yielding back and forth and going downhill is very difficult. Of course, it's hard in an arena and this is Mag's third day learning lateral work.
You can see from the tail what he thinks of hard work.
Even circling the tree in the relatively flat spot - the flattest spot I can find so far - was difficult because it was muddy and uneven.
Organize your legs and do it!
It was really cool to see him stop and get Mag to drop his head - I didn't get a photo of that though.
Mag was doing pretty well for about 15 minutes and then he just said "No more" and started doing every resistance he knows: backing up, sidepassing to the left, pawing the ground, kicking out, tossing his head, and even getting light on his front end. At that point Lukas said Mag can't take any more and had to end on a very bad note.
I was bewildered that he stopped at that point, but he said the horse was offering to escalate into bucking and rearing and he wanted to avoid that. Now that I think about it, I should have put Mag back on the lead line and HELPED Lukas get some good work before quitting, but I was determined to take pictures and a video so I wasn't thinking "help him." Needless to say Mag earned no praise from either of us afterwards. Of course he got praised for every correct step and release he gave while Lukas rode him, from both of us simultaneously. Lukas talks a lot while riding - Yah, Nein, Super! Nein, Gut!, SSSS (not sure what the sss means) Vertrau dich! (Trust yourself).
Although Lukas assured me he helps a lot of riders who have no arena, I noticed that he didn't like working in that spot, he said, "I wish I knew if Mag was resisting because the hills make it more difficult, or if it's something else. In time we'll know, but at this point, there is no way to know. He could be just physically unable to go on, not just mentally overloaded."
I told him we could try working in a parking lot nearby that is small but flat, and no mud at all. If no cars are parked there it might work.
I am perplexed because Mag was never truly calm out there, even though there was no wind, no distractions, Lukas said it's all in his mind. I got the impression it was Mag's first day of hard work in his life and he prefers to be a horse of leisure. I still believe it's important to show Mag as bad as things can get immediately. If he can learn to stand still as lesson #1, and if he can submit to lateral work on a muddy slope, he will be delighted to find out someday it's gonna be easy - just go down the trail. So let's do it - let's blow his mind sooner rather than later!
So now you get to see the awful ending to his first ride on Mag. If you turn up your volume you'll hear him saying "Ja, Gut, Nein, Gut." In the video you can see it disintegrate to where Mag refuses to turn right, period. Hopefully next time will be better, and not worse.
7 comments:
Yeah, ending at the tantrum hopefully won't come back and bite you later. Hopeful it won't. He's still beautiful.
Sometimes you take what you can get, and stopping before "bad" becomes "awful" is a better choice than the alternative.
If the footing was dry and horse and rider had an established and trusting relationship, I think it would have been a better choice to keep pushing. Given what you had, this doesn't suck. Not ideal, of course, but I think Lukas was probably correct to stop when he did. Mag looks like he was trying to comply but it wasn't easy, and like you said, he wants it to be easy.
Next time, you need a dedicated camera person so you can both learn--it's hard to do both! (Sheesh, can I be more demanding? Sorry!)
Camryn, I know, it fruck me out because Mag has so few rides on him, letting the lesson end when he started arguing seems like the worst thing possible that can happen, but I know I'm logically it cannot be The Worst Thing. I console myself by remembering that each time he fussed or struck out with me on his back, I did not end the ride, because I had my husband on the line to support me and two against one seems to work: ) Thank you, I think he's beautiful too. He sure has a lot of scars though. Like he had a terrifically fun childhood *lol*
Aarene, thanks for trying to calm me down about it. You were the one who wanted the photos, and so it's totally your fault what happened. JK: ) It really disturbed me that Mag was stressing out about the exercises, but it was literally the first time in his life he's been asked to bend through his entire body. Soon it will be summer break and perhaps J will come with us and photograph/videotape our sessions.
Oh, dear. This is what I saw. I watched the video many times on full screen. Trainer was riding with some contact, not overly strong not loose reins. I never saw softening actions coming from his wrists. I never saw a horse being "bad" or resistant. I saw a horse that was confused. When Mag would try to escape by going sideways, trainer would pull back the inside rein, opening out the rein, trying to "pull" Mag back the other direction. This is the wrong thing to do. I know! You lift the rein up but not up and out. Meanwhile, he is tightening the outside rein. Sometimes it helps also just to turn the horse's head in the direction he is trying to escape to and then redirect him. Mag is going wt? He pawed because he didn't know what to do. He backed because he had no where else to go! When a horse starts to back, you give the reins forward!
Trainer is a tall dude. Trainer has a high center of gravity, giving Mag more to deal with.
Walter Zettl has the most wonderful, simple warm up exercise. You start out on a loose rein, not floppy but loose. You do lots of walk trot transitions, and as you do, you gradually take up contact. That way, the horse relaxes into contact. Soften when you slow down or stop.
This was hard for me to watch. My muscles were twitching, wanting so desperately to get on that horse. Mag is so beautiful! I could just imagine him being a lovely, subtle horse. I hope I am not being too blunt here.
I'm with Kitty Bo. I see the same thing: a confused, not defiant, horse who has no idea what the right answer is because he is not being given release.
Lytha, I understand why you want to teach him to stand still first, but in my experience training youngsters of different breeds I found that, across the board: repeatedly asking a young, intelligent, high energy horse with a sense of humor to stand still is incredibly frustrating for the horse. They have the attention span of a gnat and you lose their brain by continuously requesting the same thing over and over. This is when you also lose their respect because they are bored. I honestly do the opposite: if the horse wants to move so badly, I *make* him move until he ASKS to stop...and then I ask him to continue moving some more until he's moving forward calmly and willingly. THEN *I* ask to stop again: it is then his reward for obeying my request to move. He usually will respond and stand. I'll ask him to stand for no more than a minute initially. And then we end the session there: no repeated drilling with smart horses! With a smart horse you only have to do this for a couple of sessions (as in, on different days) before it becomes ingrained. You can then build up to teaching other things like standing and staying (ground tying), etc.
I love Mag. He reminds me so much of Karen Burch's Ashke and also of a fellow barnmate's Arab: both are HIGHLY intelligent horses that bonded tightly to their owners and their communication with their people is so clear, they don't really need words to speak.
This type of horse requires short, engaging training sessions where you end on some sort of positive note. If he isn't understanding what is wanted, don't keep trying by requesting in the same manner. Request in a different manner or try something else entirely and re-visit the subject on a different day. If he gets the answer right once, leave it there for the day. This type of horse blossoms with positive reinforcement but is easily frustrated with drilling and excessive repetition. It can be a challenge to stay one step ahead of them sometimes but they are the absolutely most rewarding horses to work with because once you and him reach an understanding, this horse will do anything for you. It just takes time and patience.
I agree with Saiph & Kitty Bo, it looked like Lucas was restricting Mags' movement and confusing him. Can't believe he ended there, even a good forward walk would have been a better ending. Not impressed with Lucas at all, especially after reading the next post & his comments with S.
I just re-watched this and hope you don't mind my adding my two cents here. What struck me especially is that Lukas seemed very tense and rigid, and didn't really understand the horse he was riding, which scared him... which made him more rigid and tense. Meanwhile Mag just seemed to lose his patience with the communication, the constant chatter, and with Lucas's physical presence, his seat and his weird rigid hands.
Way back a thousand years ago when I worked with young Arabian horses, we were VERY firm in the beginning but with just a very limited set of rules, within a really broad scope of constant communication. In other words, we would take a week or two weeks to teach them exactly where to walk in relation to us. With a lead, then without a lead. That was all we did. If we needed 2 months just for that, ok. (Eventually the lessons picked up pace :) And we were very clear, so that there could be no confusion. (Usually, they got the lesson immediately, the time repeating the lesson was just to let them try to test it 5 million times. And they did!) Then, the next lesson. And if we had to go back a step, so be it. But between all that very consequent work, we had fun. We just hung out, walked around, saw weird things, basically had horse kindergarten. We gave them the tools to trust us and to have fun and seek mental stimulation from us. They were hilarious, too, and often played little jokes on us.
The head trainer, a salty old dude who used to ride the (usually quite green!) pastured mares for fun without saddle or bridle, used to tell us the story of how these horses used to sleep in the desert in their owner's tents (no idea whether that is actually true), and remind us of how special this breed is. And it is special. These were basically giant, gloriously beautiful show dogs. Ha ha. They are very high strung, very strong-willed, but also incredibly affectionate, playful and intelligent if you know how to show them what you want while still giving them the space to be how they want to be.
Growing up, there was always that one weird kid in class, who showed up wearing just weird colourful clothes and talking to trees and painting or whatever. Well, training these horses was like having an entire classroom filled with those special kids. So, so weird, so hilariously funny, so very challenging, but 100000000% worth it.
...I don't think Lucas "gets" your horse. You do, though!
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