First Beach Ride for 2008

My friend and neighbor, Sharon, and I loaded up our horsies and went to the beach at Lake Lahonton State Park! We were greeted at the gate to the park by a ranger, which meant the time had come where there is enough traffic for a ranger to man the gate. Oh well, time for Whisper to get used to seeing campers, boats, jet skis, and running children on the beach. There were campers at the parking spot we usually go to, so we went down a few more parking areas until we found one without campers that also had a pottie (I have a small bladder!).

When we pull up to our parking spot, there was a kid heading to the pottie with an AK-47 - I'm assuming it was a toy! But this IS Nevada! Whisper jumped out of Sharon's 3 horse slant load like it was a huge jump. She is used to a 2 horse straight load and backs out of that. She was so high headed I commented to Sharon that no way was I planning on riding a horse with a head that high. Last fall when we came, the lake had been deserted, now it was not. After saddling up and a bit of lunging to tighten up the girth, I mounted up and Sharon and I went down the beach and towards the water. We got to a ledge in the beach just before getting to the water, and both horses thought we were asking them to jump off the Grand Canyon. The ledge was 4" high. After a bit of convincing and clicking and carroting, I got past the ledge as did Sharon, and then we had to convince our horses to go into the water. Even tho they were practically swimming in it last fall, this was different with the activity around us. I didn't get any pics today as I had my hand-held camera and I wanted to keep both hands on the wheel. Here is a video I took at the same place last fall:




We walked up and down the beach, and went in and out of the water. Whisper did fine and was out front quite a bit, and went in the water in the opposite direction of her buddy when Sharon and Phinn decided to canter over a huge log. We actually spent quite a bit of time going in the opposite direction of Sharon and Phinn with never a balk or backwards step. She even went in the water on her own far away from Phinn. Once Whisper gets over her initial fear of going in the water, she actually enjoys it and likes to trot in and get in pretty deep. It is still a bit too cold for me to get wet, but my shoes did get sopping wet. Sharon and I played around for almost 2 hours before we decided the horsies were tired and we headed back to the trailer for the ride back home.

Whisper is certainly becoming my brave girl, and I am proud of her!

Test Ride in Specialized Saddle

I took a test ride today on Whisper in the Specialized Saddle. It gets two thumbs up from me and as long as it works for Andi next weekend, I will be placing my order!! We did a 6 mile ride mostly at trot, canter, and her gait, which is a saddle rack. We threw a boot, so I had to get off and put it back on (thank goodness for the gaiter, it did not get lost, and I knew immediately when it popped off). So there I was, in the desert with no mounting block, no rocks, forget stumps - there are no trees, and a horse I have not been able to mount from the ground in the treeless saddle. This was to be a test, but the saddle passed with flying colors. I will admit, I do not have a spring to my mount anymore and I have to "drag" myself into the saddle. It did not budge! Whisper was comfortable in the saddle, and trotted with her head down and rounding her back up into the saddle. We were both happy campers. Here are a couple of pictures of the sweat pattern the saddle made:

I palpated her entire back, and she had no soreness anywhere. So here's praying it will work for Andi as well. I can't say enough good things about this saddle and the ability to tweak saddle fit is at the top of the list of good things about this saddle.

Saddle Fit and the Specialized Saddle

I received my demo saddle, the International Saddle by Specialized Saddles. I managed to get it on both Whisper and Andi and try and tweak the fit. The nicest thing about this saddle is that you can change the width, angles, flair, rock, and everything to fit the horse exactly. Then 6 months down the road, when the horse's shape has changed due to fitness, you can change it again and always "tweak" the fit. This is also a saddle that you can fit exactly to different horses for the cost of another set of pads: $26! Do that with any other saddle! Here are some pics of the fitting process with Whisper:

Here is the saddle upside down to show how the main pad attaches to the bars of the saddle with velcro. This is the 3/4" pad, they come thicker or thinner to make the saddle either narrower or wider, depending on your horse. Then there are various thickness shims that you can add anywere beween the pad and the bars to fill in for rock, flair, at the loins, to make sure there is even contact with the bars completely on the horse. You can match the angle of the horse to the saddle, and change it anytime! The stirrup has 3 positions to accomidate the rider. I am riding with it in the middle position for now.

Here are two pictures showing how shimming can make the saddle fit exactly. In the first pic, there is excessive flair, and the second pic shows how a shim cut and placed in the correct position will fix this. Since Whisper is a prima donna who will let me know in a New York minute if something is bothering her, I will be able to tweak this saddle til she is happy. Here are a couple of pics of the same saddle on Andi, with the shims adjusted to him:

My biggest concern on Andi was if the saddle was going to be too long for his short back. Here is a pic with him all girthed up in the saddle, and a video of him moving in it:

Now, the real test will be riding both horses in this saddle. So, stay tuned to Saddle Fit, Part 2.

EVIDENCE OF OUR SUCCESS!!

I used my helmet cam to video my ride on Whisper yesterday. It was a great ride, and when I went to edit it, I saw something very amazing. Whisper's ears were almost always on me! This may not seem exciting to a lot of people, but that is evidence that Whisper is looking to me as her leader, and waiting for me to direct her, and is LISTENING to me and for me! I attribute this turnaround in her to clicker training and TTouch methods by Linda Tellington Jones. I will have to be honest and tell you I used to poo-poo the TTouch methods when I first heard about them. It honestly was out of sheer desperation that I bought her book, "The Ultimate Horse Behavior and Training Book" read it cover to cover, and started applying her methods. It is amazing how certain touches can bond a horse to you and strengthen your relationship. Instead of butting heads and fighting with a 1000 lb. animal, we are on the same page and working as partners, both of us enjoying the other. Here is our video:



You probably noticed Whisper slinging her head near the end of the video. This is her expressing her frustration at having to be behind Fireman. Keep in mind, this was a mare who would not go forward unless she was on another horse's butt! And previous to this ride, when she got frustrated at being behind another horse, she would buck! So, since this ride was to be for Fireman's problem, I knew I was going to be behind at times, so I put the Promise Wrap around Whisper before we headed out on the trail. You can see the Promise Wrap on her at the end of the ride at the end of the video. It did stretch out a bit on the ride, and I will not ride with it that loose again, but the Promise Wrap kept her from bucking out of frustration. A little head slinging was her only expression of her frustration.

As to Fireman's problem, he has been having ants in his pants lately. I attribute a lot of his antsyness (as well as that of my horses) to being on an all alfalfa diet. And as much as I would love to cut down on the alfalfa hay and feed more grass hay such as Timothy, we live in alfalfa country and that is all I can get. Since alfalfa is not nutritionally balanced, Mom's horse, Fireman, as well as my own, have been receiving a mineral supplement that includes magnesium. It is a fact that a lack of magnesium in the diet can make a horse antsy, spooky, and "hot and racey". Fireman had been on his daily supplement for 2 weeks, and we wanted a positive experience, so we let him stay in the front. That is where he is happiest. He did fantastic and did not have as much ants in his pants as he did prior to his supplement, so I can only expect him to get better.

Moral of the story:
Don't blame the horse! If you are having problems with your horse's behavior, first look at tack, saddle fit, teeth, type of training, and nutrition. A horse just wants to get along, so if he is being bad, there is usually a reason other than it being the horse. You are supposed to be the intelligent one, so it is up to you to figure out the problem and fix it.