For all those who do not know the term Liberty means playing with a horse without a rope attached. Not that she had just been released from prison, though to her it must feel a little bit like that.
We started just going for a walk around the farm, with rope attached. People on a yard are not used to seeing a loose horse wandering around so it's best to use one outside the school. This is a walk we have been doing every day for about 2 weeks now. It involves going past fields with horses in, which given Filly's past was a challenge to start with, then getting to a huge field surrounded by hedges, trees, a large pond, passages through hedges for footpaths etc. A spooky horses nightmare, but a magical Parelli playground. We don't do anything too pushy there, maybe some circles, figure 8s, etc. What I have found works really well is to let her have some say in matters. I walk casually, but purposely around the edge of the field letting Filly have the full 22 feet of rope to play with. Rather like taking a dog for a walk on a retractable lead. If she wants to graze she knows she has until the rope runs out as I walk to grab a mouthful. Then just as the end of the rope comes to my hand she trots up alongside munching away. I rarely have to tug on the rope, she can measure 22 feet very accurately. If we find a particualry good bit of clover then a longer picnic ensues. This lack of pressure has made her much braver (Left Brain in Parelli speak) and any slightly scarey spots she now tends to stop and consider carefully, with a mouth full of course. She then approaches at her own pace with me just providing moral support. She even tried to go down the aformentioned tunnel in the hedge today, but as this contains a narrow wooden bridge over a stream I'm afraid I had to stop her (she's not mine after all).
After all this fun we went back to the indoor school. I let her off the rope while I set up some of the toys and watched as she had a good roll. I had intended to put the rope back on, but she gave me a look that said lets play. So we started with some Stick to Me, a bit like having a dog at heel. Very good with no tendency to leave at all like in the past. Moved on to some circling game, again very good. Better than with a rope in fact. Change of direction on the circle which I had never done at liberty before, again excellent. Over a tarp on the ground. Well this caused a little bit of trouble. Not what I expect most of you are expecting. I could not get her off it. She wrapped it round her legs, picked it up with her teeth and generally scrunched it all up. Finally got her off it with some sideways game.
Now to the whole point of the day. A big squeeze game. To get her used to going in starting stalls ( she is going to be a race horse afterall) I have devised a fun squeeze. Take 2 plastic jump wings, about 2 foot 6 inch. Put alongside a wall of the school. Place poles on wings so that they are parallel to the wall and hey presto you have created a passage that you can vary the width on. We had done this exercise once before with the rope on and had little trouble. Would it work without the rope. You bet it did, and the turn and face at the ends was better than with the rope ! So feeling brave I moved on to the next phase of my cunning plan and draped the tarp over the poles so that it now looked like a solid wall. Again no problems at all and we spent ages playing with it. Squeeze, yoyo, just standing still all done with no right brain (spooky) moments at all. In fact she started playing with the tarp again.
That was enough for one day, but what a day. They don't happen like that every time, but the wait is definitely worth it
No comments:
Post a Comment