Ghost has been learning to tell her colors. Just like the horses do. Apparently they both see blue and yellow which is handy, since I have things in those colors.
From her first lesson with one color, to her third? lesson, adding blue in, she’s come a long ways. I can’t wait to see what else she can do.
This was a fun quick little video we made. Just messing around really. Simple and easy.
I put it on the facebook page and it has over a thousand shares two days later.
I can never believe the ones that go crazy and the ones I work so hard at and no one cares. I wasn’t going to do it because it was cloudy out. Then the gopro quit because the sd card was full so I switched to the phone.
We were actually working on sitting and just took a quick break.
Why bother teaching a bunch of ‘silly tricks’?
Isn’t it more important to teach the important thing? Shouldn’t our horses know how to lead, to ride, things that matter before or instead of pointless things like tricks?
I think that is completely the wrong way of looking at things.
Tricks are the foundation of all those other things. Tricks teach a horse to learn. Tricks teach a horse to be fearless, curious, to seek out new things. Trick training teaches all those other things almost by accident. The serious learning is accomplished in a way that is fun for all involved as goals are reached that we think are frivolous.
This little trick has taught both horse and rider to over come insecurities, to work together, balance and trust. Soon it will be flawless and smooth. Together they will learn to be a team. Steering is nothing compared to that.
Rusty has progressed to pulling the kids wagon. It works alright. Sufficiently noisy to get him used to almost anything back there. Heavy enough that he can learn to pull a bit of weight.
It was a gift when our daughter was born more than eight years ago though. Beautiful at first it has aged with hard use. And that one time I ran it over with the car. Oops.
Besides, it would be nice to have something I could eventually ride in. I’m considerably bigger than the wagon.
So I mentioned to my husband that I would like a little cart if he knew of anything around that might work. We farm so nothing ever get thrown away. People seem to think that the current generation has invented recycling. They have never looked at the fence rows on farms. Nothing is thrown out, anything that might possibly be reused is carefully saved and used for parts, repairs, new and interesting inventions.
There was one axle and wheels he thought might be good. And they would have been, If I had a team and or heavier harness.
With nothing showing up immediately he decided instead to repair the wagon so it would drive better. The puncture vine around here is nasty stuff and had long since destroyed the inflatable wheels. We were running on flats and one completely blown apart tire.
My husband took the wagon to the shop, pulled off the old wheels and gathered some old wheels off a planter to replace them with. Much wider, heavier, and not going to go flat.
I haven’t had a chance to try it out yet but the kids have taken it and are having a blast ‘driving’ each other around pulling it.
I can’t wait to hitch it up and fully appreciate my awesome husband who does his best to make sure I have everything I could ever need or want and goes about it without my even asking.
We seem to have a new preferred riding style around here right now.
Not sure why. It’s apparently more fun this way. For the Goblin Child. 8 always wants to do anything she does.
It had rained a little and the horses had a good roll so they were filthy. They both reached everything they could from the ground and were sick of getting the dirt blowing in there faces. So they wanted on to reach the top parts.
Then they turned back around and we went for a nice little ride. In the howling wind. What great horses not to kill anyone through all this.
Apparently I’ve been figuring this horse thing wrong. I’ve been trying to find horses for everyone. Lady is a perfect match for a delicate little girl. The delicate little girl has been wanting to ride my big sturdy gelding though. He brother usually ends up with delicate high strung Harvey who he’s very happy with but will not be able to ride for many many years on his own.
So we put the tiny girl on the big horse. The sturdy boy on the delicate mare.
Not saying it will stay this way, I’m done trying to assign horse to child. They can switch and share and play musical horses.
He is over energetic though and fears nothing, zipping along on speedy little Lady is right up his alley. Hesitant and more timid my bigger, fast walking but slower moving gelding calms and reassures her. He brings out her bravery and I trust him not to be bothered by what that bravery brings on. Watching him scramble on and off of a mare just his size is as fun as the scrambling must be. She waits patiently while he takes a break from riding to run across the hay bales.
Hopefully the weather holds and we can do this again soon.
It is spooktober and horses are known for spooking.
They can train us to live in fear of provoking their fear. They train people not to try to ride if it’s windy. They train us to need to be warned if someone is passing by the indoor arena door. They train us to fear plastic bags, loud vehicles, flapping things. We begin to hunt them out and stay away. To hurry a horse the other direction if we suspect a trigger may be coming.
Is it the horses that are afraid or the humans?
Are we teaching our horses to be afraid of these things?
If we run away, or quit and turn for home as soon as we ‘think’ they will be scared then we are never giving them the chance to see for themselves. Horses can get used to the most amazing things. Without the use of over stimulating, without crossing over threshold, without them inducing learned helplessness.
We can not reinforce fear by rewarding it, with treats, scratches, or love.
We can by running away and hiding from it, but not by offering support and understanding.
What if instead when faced with a daunting obstacle we stopped, took a deep breath, and found something else to occupy our minds. We can work on something familiar and comforting, we can offer scratches.
If the spook has already happened we can reassure them with a treat. If you are mounted, make sure you are back in a secure position than laugh, pat their neck, and click them for still being there with you. Because we work so much at liberty I can let my horses leave. Wait for them to come back, they usually come running from the few feet away they went, I give a click and reward for them daring to return and we continue on with lots of reassurance that I will protect them and reward them for their bravery.
Instead of spooking from things in expectation we can help prevent or calm the spook by displaying the behavior we want from our horses. By showing bravery and offering support we can help our horses to over come fear. By allowing them to have the experiences we can let them get use to them. We can end up with horses who accept the challenges we offer and who will brave the biggest of semis with us.