Filly is having another crisis of confidence. She hates being in the field for long periods so I have had to go all the way back to field training again. Frustrating but I have to do what she needs, not what I would like to be doing.
I chatted to James and he suggested lots of the basic confidence building games, some friendly game and lots of zone 2 / 3 driving games.
I need her to have confidence in me as a leader to start with. She has this in the indoor school, but due to the sodden nature of the field I have not been able to do much outdoors with her recently.
Leadership is important to horses as in the wild it is the leader that keeps them alive. The herd leader knows what to run from, what to ignore, where food and water are. Without a good leader the horse can have confidence in then they are going to try and take that mantle on themselves. But if you are a very young Filly with little outdoor life experience then being leaderless is likely to make you feel very vulnerable and seek the designated place of safety, in her case her box.
The other horse in the field is a very old, but sweet, pony called "Little One". I doubt Filly sees her as a leader. As a result as soon as she feels unsure she looks around for a leader to make her safe, can't find one and runs to the gate where she begs to come in.
I need to get her confident in the field environment again and this is best done by demonstrating that I am a good leader thus giving her left brain time to figure things out.
I used "follow the rail" with zone 2 driving to start this as it is consistent and she is near me for comfort and safety. To start she was very right brain (spooky), but I just held my focus and kept walking the rail. If she got out of position I did whatever it took to get her back again and then walked the rail. Slowly she calmed down, and I got sweaty. I carried on for around 1 hour, with very few rests. By then she was very calm and confident with me in the field.
Chatting with the yard owner we are going to try putting her with other horses in future to give her some horse leadership. Hopefully this will help a lot. As she gains general confidence it is also my hope that her tendency to nip other people will also subside. Since I have upped my leadership it is noticeable that she rapidly stopped trying to bite me.
I had a nice session with Billy last evening. I am still working on the zone 3 porcupine game from the ground to improve the ridden indirect rein and get those hind feet unstuck for forward motion when ridden. This went pretty well, but when I came to mount I found I still had issues with the post mounting standstill and lateral flexion. To cure both, upon mounting, if he moved I immediately went for a lateral flexion to stop the drift (forwards or backwards), whereupon he tried to bite my leg. Placing my foot up alongside his neck makes this impossible for him. As soon as he stopped I got off and stroked him. Over to the mounting block, back on, when stopped off again. Eventually he just stood by the block as I got on and off (on one side, off the other) at least 6 or 7 times.
What was satisfying is that in the early mounts where he had wandered off all I had to do was get on the mounting block for him to walk over, at liberty, and stand in exactly the right position to be mounted. Obviously having me on his back does not bother him at all as he must by now associate standing by the block with me getting on. I find this trust very humbling.
Just got home from another day at James Roberts observing. Again a fabulous day with so much information, even though I had heard the Plan to Plan lecture 3 times now. What was more important was watching James coach this weeks students through the first few checkpoints on the plan. I realise that I have to be much much more particular about the way I do it, and I thought I was being particular. He really impresses the need to do everything with horse in a Savvy way. Quick question. When does a training session start ?
Answer : as soon as the horse notices your presence for the first time. From that point until after you release them again everything matters. A tough standard to adhere to.
This does not mean that you have to be solely focused on the horse all the time, you can chat to your mates for example, but you should be aware of the horse and be on the lookout for little things all the time. If they nudge you or lean on you whilst you are chatting are they being affectionate or seeing if they can gently win the porcupine game and get one step closer to assuming leadership ?
Website is coming on, but as I have work exams on Thursday and Friday there will be fewer blog posts and website improvements for a few days.
I chatted to James and he suggested lots of the basic confidence building games, some friendly game and lots of zone 2 / 3 driving games.
I need her to have confidence in me as a leader to start with. She has this in the indoor school, but due to the sodden nature of the field I have not been able to do much outdoors with her recently.
Leadership is important to horses as in the wild it is the leader that keeps them alive. The herd leader knows what to run from, what to ignore, where food and water are. Without a good leader the horse can have confidence in then they are going to try and take that mantle on themselves. But if you are a very young Filly with little outdoor life experience then being leaderless is likely to make you feel very vulnerable and seek the designated place of safety, in her case her box.
The other horse in the field is a very old, but sweet, pony called "Little One". I doubt Filly sees her as a leader. As a result as soon as she feels unsure she looks around for a leader to make her safe, can't find one and runs to the gate where she begs to come in.
I need to get her confident in the field environment again and this is best done by demonstrating that I am a good leader thus giving her left brain time to figure things out.
I used "follow the rail" with zone 2 driving to start this as it is consistent and she is near me for comfort and safety. To start she was very right brain (spooky), but I just held my focus and kept walking the rail. If she got out of position I did whatever it took to get her back again and then walked the rail. Slowly she calmed down, and I got sweaty. I carried on for around 1 hour, with very few rests. By then she was very calm and confident with me in the field.
Chatting with the yard owner we are going to try putting her with other horses in future to give her some horse leadership. Hopefully this will help a lot. As she gains general confidence it is also my hope that her tendency to nip other people will also subside. Since I have upped my leadership it is noticeable that she rapidly stopped trying to bite me.
I had a nice session with Billy last evening. I am still working on the zone 3 porcupine game from the ground to improve the ridden indirect rein and get those hind feet unstuck for forward motion when ridden. This went pretty well, but when I came to mount I found I still had issues with the post mounting standstill and lateral flexion. To cure both, upon mounting, if he moved I immediately went for a lateral flexion to stop the drift (forwards or backwards), whereupon he tried to bite my leg. Placing my foot up alongside his neck makes this impossible for him. As soon as he stopped I got off and stroked him. Over to the mounting block, back on, when stopped off again. Eventually he just stood by the block as I got on and off (on one side, off the other) at least 6 or 7 times.
What was satisfying is that in the early mounts where he had wandered off all I had to do was get on the mounting block for him to walk over, at liberty, and stand in exactly the right position to be mounted. Obviously having me on his back does not bother him at all as he must by now associate standing by the block with me getting on. I find this trust very humbling.
Just got home from another day at James Roberts observing. Again a fabulous day with so much information, even though I had heard the Plan to Plan lecture 3 times now. What was more important was watching James coach this weeks students through the first few checkpoints on the plan. I realise that I have to be much much more particular about the way I do it, and I thought I was being particular. He really impresses the need to do everything with horse in a Savvy way. Quick question. When does a training session start ?
Answer : as soon as the horse notices your presence for the first time. From that point until after you release them again everything matters. A tough standard to adhere to.
This does not mean that you have to be solely focused on the horse all the time, you can chat to your mates for example, but you should be aware of the horse and be on the lookout for little things all the time. If they nudge you or lean on you whilst you are chatting are they being affectionate or seeing if they can gently win the porcupine game and get one step closer to assuming leadership ?
Website is coming on, but as I have work exams on Thursday and Friday there will be fewer blog posts and website improvements for a few days.
1 comment:
"as soon as the horse notices your presence for the first time. From that point until after you release them again everything matters."
You don't lie when you say that is tough. It's one of the things I struggle with the most as I am trying to learn my way in this program. Sometimes I need to think about me, my focus, my body language, my riding position and then as I'm bumbling around to get it right I realize I have forgot what message I'm sending to my horse.
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