A lovely if slightly cold day today. Ritchie and I decided we had to get Bonitao and Filly off the yard for a short hack along the local lanes.
All the usual prepare to ride was done, which showed Filly to be in a very mellow today. We prepared as we had played the last few days with more work on maintaining responsibilities on the circle and sideways over a pole and cones using porcupine pressure. Both showed considerable improvement.
Of course once on board the prepare to ride was put to good use. We played corner game at walk which she really understands now and I hardly had to direct her at all.
At trot I am still being very uncritical other than she must maintain gait. The order of the responsibilities of the horse is important so getting her to maintain gait first is the correct thing to do. As for direction I play "tit for tat" letting her choose where to go for a while, and then taking her idea and modifying it with my idea as to where to go next. Doing this, and with lots of stroking and reassurance, we trotted for a fair time with no head tossing at all. A great leap forward. No I have to gently increase my ideas as to direction compared to hers. Slowly, with her hardly noticing, I will be directing her more and more. No fight, just persuasion.
After about 15 minutes in the school we left and went for a walk. She happily helped me open the gate to the school, thus giving the earlier practised sideways a purpose.
The hack was fun, but she was again pretty tense. With lots for reassurance and stroking she held it together very well. The few spooks she had were all of one step, or less.
She was very forward in the walk leaving poor Bonitao far behind. He regularly had to trot to keep up, and he is a horse who prefers to be in front. We figured he thinks it is too much effort to stay in front of Filly so plods along behind.
All the usual prepare to ride was done, which showed Filly to be in a very mellow today. We prepared as we had played the last few days with more work on maintaining responsibilities on the circle and sideways over a pole and cones using porcupine pressure. Both showed considerable improvement.
Of course once on board the prepare to ride was put to good use. We played corner game at walk which she really understands now and I hardly had to direct her at all.
At trot I am still being very uncritical other than she must maintain gait. The order of the responsibilities of the horse is important so getting her to maintain gait first is the correct thing to do. As for direction I play "tit for tat" letting her choose where to go for a while, and then taking her idea and modifying it with my idea as to where to go next. Doing this, and with lots of stroking and reassurance, we trotted for a fair time with no head tossing at all. A great leap forward. No I have to gently increase my ideas as to direction compared to hers. Slowly, with her hardly noticing, I will be directing her more and more. No fight, just persuasion.
After about 15 minutes in the school we left and went for a walk. She happily helped me open the gate to the school, thus giving the earlier practised sideways a purpose.
The hack was fun, but she was again pretty tense. With lots for reassurance and stroking she held it together very well. The few spooks she had were all of one step, or less.
She was very forward in the walk leaving poor Bonitao far behind. He regularly had to trot to keep up, and he is a horse who prefers to be in front. We figured he thinks it is too much effort to stay in front of Filly so plods along behind.
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