Trying Hard

 A little over a year ago, my ride on Friday would have been terrible.

Cisco hadn't been ridden for a week. There was some fence construction (de-construction?) happening outside the arena and there was a whole lotta power tool noise. Horses were starting to arrive for a clinic that started the next day. The PA system for said clinic was set up but covered in black garbage bags. The letter B was only held on by a corner and thus was flapping in the breeze halfway down the long side. Two of the clinic horses suddenly showed up at the wrong end of the arena without warning.

Nothing fazed him.

Sure, he looked at the PA system the first time we walked past it. And on about the 20th time we passed that flappy B he dropped his shoulder to the inside. But that was it.

All photos are from the next ride that I had on him, which was a very similar ride.

I thought I might be in trouble as I was warming up. He called out a couple of times and there were a lot of snorts as we walked around the arena - usually the harbinger of a rushed first trot. But not on this ride. 

His new Turtle-Top bit has made a huge difference in how he's been going. He's much rounder at a trot right at the beginning of the ride. I have to keep encouraging him to lengthen his neck - it would be very easy for him to duck behind the vertical and hang out there, and I don't want him to learn that it's an option.

We've struggled a little with the connection at the canter since switching to this bit, but this was the first ride that he tried really hard to carry himself like I was asking. Again, he wants to shorten his neck, so I have to keep trying to get it longer. He got it for a few strides on his weaker lead and felt like he was really close on his good lead. I was really happy with his try. I think the longer neck will take a bit for him to find the strength and his balance.

What Have We Been Up To?

 So, uh, it's been a while. What's been happening?

A bunch, but not much?

Not many new horse pictures, but I have frog pictures.

I've been managing to ride 3 or 4 times a week, mostly Cisco. My thigh is still sore but not nearly as sore as it was since I've started physio, so I'm still trying to keep my rides to about 30 minutes and have a day off in-between. 

Cisco seems to appreciate his new Turtle-Top bit, at least at a trot. He's been much steadier in the contact although it hasn't solved the mouth opening issue. But I don't think it's as bad. Unless he's stressed - then all I hear are teeth clacking together. 

On Wednesday's ride this week, after a week off, he started off by constantly calling out while we walked around (turnout changes in the paddock next to him that day). I thought he might be rather silly once we picked up the trot, but the first 6 or 7 strides of trot felt amazing. Up in front, slow and reaching instead of his normal rushed and wiggly, and pushing into the bridle. Even better, I rode it well. It felt sooo good. 

And dragonfly pictures.

And then of course it quickly fell apart. I managed to get it back a few times for short durations so there's hope that it wasn't a total fluke!

The new bit has not been a miracle at the canter though. I'm pretty sure the fact that I haven't been doing much canter due to a variety of reasons (hurts my leg more, getting to the end of my 30 minute ride limit, fresh horse who doesn't want to steer, current heatwave, sketchy girl lunging her sketchy horse who has been on stall rest and he ran into a jump standard and she let go of the lunge line so I jumped off and didn't feel like getting back on and also didn't want to be in the arena with her. Those kinds of reasons.) is the main reason that it hasn't gotten much better. I feel like it's really close though.

I've decided to finally bite the bullet and take Phantom in for a lameness check. She's been feeling creaky for quite a while and it's not going away. She was ridden on Sunday and was traveling quite a bit on her forehand and took some occasional steps that were definitely uneven. I'm hauling her over to the vet clinic next week. I don't know how much I'm willing to put into figuring it out though. Hopefully, it's something relatively simple and obvious to trained eyes.

Add in an hour or so of physio exercises and stretches everyday and life has been busy. But everyone's well and ticking along!

Rolling, Rolling, Rolling

I've been doing some physiotherapy for my groin pain over the last couple of weeks. I had dry needling done on it (wasn't terrible if you have to have it done) and that really seemed to help the muscle/tendon relax. Since then I've become very familiar with my foam roller (we have a love/hate relationship) and I have some stretches to do a couple of times a day. I also have to work on activating my glutes so that they can fire and take some strain off my adductors.

The good news is that it seems to be helping. Slowly. This isn't something that's just going to go away overnight. It's going to take some diligence on my part to make sure that I keep up with the stretches and rolling and exercises that I'm being given.

I rode for the first time in 10 days on Sunday. My groin was still pretty sore in the saddle so I kept it short, only about 25 minutes. 

What was interesting was how loose my body felt. As soon as I sat in the saddle I felt very around my horse, which was great, but when I picked up the trot I felt very loose through my legs and hips. It's going to be a bit of a challenge to keep this loose feeling but put some tone into my body, without allowing everything to get tight. 

At the canter my butt was glued to the saddle despite Cisco being a little bit giraffe-y. I also thought it felt easier to turn my torso to the right when tracking right, which is usually a problem.

I was more sore after the ride than before the ride, but things have worked out over the last couple of days with the stretching and rolling. I'm still going to limit the amount that I'm riding for a while, ideally riding every other day. Fingers crossed that I can go back to riding more by the end of the summer. 

The ponies are pretty happy with their lack of work at the moment.

I'm thinking of getting some Franklin balls to try to ride with. If I'm going to be spending a bunch of time doing slow stuff in the saddle, might as well try something new!

The Best Laid Plans

Since my province went into stage 3 of reopening at the end of last month, I made sure to make a massage appointment this week during my vacation. I haven't had a massage since around Christmas, and oh boy, did it ever show. She said she could have easily spent 90 minutes on my legs alone. There were a whole bunch of areas that normally aren't a problem but this time they were super tight and sore. She also spent some time on my left thigh and the adductors that have been sore for the last few weeks. Which meant they were pretty pissed off on Tuesday when I went to ride.

My plan for that ride was to work on Cisco coming forward at a canter when I was in 2 point off my legs and not my seat. I had set up a few single poles to ride over. We were going to follow the mantra that I picked up at a clinic years ago of turn, straight, forward, balance into the pole. 

It didn't quite go that way.

Cisco was in the arena by himself, which always means he's a bit more up. My leg was more sore than usual once I was in the saddle so I planned to keep the ride short. I skimped a bit on the warm-up to try to get to the meaty bits of the ride sooner (going over the poles). I should have spent a bit more time riding him down at a trot first.

He wasn't bad, he was just a little sassy. I wanted forward, and he gave it to me. Unfortunately, he didn't come back very well. 

Instead of going towards the poles with turn, straight, forward, balance, it was turn, straight, get wiggly, slow the f down. Only at a trot - we didn't make it to trying it at a canter. 

Our canter - well, he went forward off my leg at a 2 point, going up the long side towards the scary end. He typically backs off heading this direction, so I was happy that he easily went forward. And he hand-galloped forward instead up upward (he often gets high headed and bouncy when he gallops). Again, good. Unfortunately, we didn't really get much of a transition to settle back into a canter, and I kept losing my foot position in my outside stirrup and couldn't get it back on my foot properly and we were heading into the scary corner where he's likely to suddenly drop his shoulder and dive to the inside without warning and I didn't want to die because my position wasn't overly secure. 

Yeah, I gave up on that.

I then tried to just get a decent canter before hopefully attempting the poles. We had prompt transitions, so good. The transitions had a bit of rocket power behind them and then never really slowed down. Bad.

And then he started coughing at the canter. When Cisco coughs, his head just drops and he lets out a huge cough and it feels like he's going to fall on his face. Not fun when you're in 2 point. 

Yeah, I gave up on that too. The whole ride.

In reality, I probably shouldn't have ridden. My leg was really sore the next day. I probably should have given it a couple of days off after the massage, and I think I'm going to give it the next week and half or so off of riding. Next week I have three days where I won't be able to ride because of work, and this weekend there's a clinic at the barn and I can't use the arena until the evenings, so it's a good time to take a bit of a break. I also have a physiotherapy appointment booked for Thursday and figure I'll be pretty sore the next day so that means riding Thursday and Friday are out. 

The ponies will be getting ground work though! I've been starting on the piaffe training from the TRT Method, so I'll see how far we can get in the next 10 days or so!

The Suspension is Killing Me!

In reviewing Pixio footage from Sunday's ride to get a couple of decent screenshots for yesterday's blog post, I came across something that I found kind of interesting.

I never really realized how much a horse's body moves up and down in a trot. 

It was just the perfect set-up to be able to see the suspension in the gait. Cisco was trotting in front of a contrasting coloured half wall, and his butt was pretty well level with the top of that wall when it was at it's highest point. I was slo-mo'ing frame by frame to find a good shot and noticed the difference in the amount of wall that was exposed above the horse.

Here a still of when his butt/back was at it's highest point:

And here is the lowest point halfway through the same trot stride.

You can see quite a bit of the dark wall behind the saddle when compared to the first picture.

Does it mean anything? Nah, I just think it's cool. It was just kind of flukey that he lined up so well against the wall to be able to easily see it.

It's just another way that I'm amazed at how the horse's body works. Think of the amount of pressure that the legs have to absorb to move that barrel of a body up and down with every stride. It's all about that suspensory ligament doing what it was designed to do - act like a thick rubber band that absorbs the shock and releases the energy again.

Cisco is by no means an extravagant mover with a bunch of suspension in his trot. Just imagine what we would see if he moved like Valegro!

Continuing On

Sunday brought yet another good ride on Cisco.

I'm going to have to do a year-end spook compilation video.

The other horse in the arena left before we picked up a trot so Cisco started his trot with a bit more enthusiasm than was required. I'm starting to insist that he keep his shit together in these instances. Keeping the pace that I desire is becoming a non-negotiable. I just need to figure out how to control his ability to throw his shoulders around. He's a very wiggly horse.

He was maybe a little bit steadier in the contact at a trot than he has been. Since changing to the Turtle-Top bit every ride has gotten better than the last one, so it seems to have been a good choice. His mouth is still busy, but I think I'm giving up on fixing that. 

I'm working really hard at keeping his neck long and his nose out a bit. He's better at the start of the ride, after we have cantered he wants to get a bit behind the vertical. I'm wondering if it's a bit of a strength issue - he's a bit tired after some canter so he starts to cheat. 

I don't mind his frame, but I wish my hands were higher and more forward.

I'm off this week but the weather is not going to be conducive to do anything fun. We were hoping to head to the mountains for a day trip - Jasper National Park is about 3.5 - 4 hours away. But the highway in washed out last week, and although traffic is getting through, the delays are huge. My brother was already planning to go for the weekend so they drove out on Friday - it took them 7 hours to drive 20 km. We're definitely scrapping the plans for a day trip.

We've had a lot of rain this year, similar to last year. This resulted in poor quality hay in this area. Farmers were not able to get the hay off the field because it kept raining, the grass grew too long and got stressed, and the hay ended up with low nutritional value. 

I've heard from multiple people that this was the first year that they've had to work to keep weight on their easy keepers. This is the first time in my life of horse ownership that I've had to put weight on my horses instead of worry that they're too fat! Both of my horses are currently at a good weight, but I've had to be very vigilant about it. We're all hoping to get better hay this year, but it isn't looking too promising.

That Feeling of a Great Ride

You know that feeling you get when you've had a great ride? The one that no matter how crappy your day was or is you have a perma-grin on your face?

I had that feeling after my ride on Thursday.

I definitely didn't have a good feeling before my ride when I had to deal with mud up to his knees.

Cisco started off pretty relaxed and I hoped it would continue through the ride. I got kind of lucky in that just as the other horse in the arena was leaving and Cisco was starting to worry that he would be abandoned another horse came in. He's always more relaxed when he has an arena buddy.

Mostly better - the mud around the coronet band was still wet though.

It was a ride where he just tried really hard to stay relaxed and do whatever I asked of him. At a trot he tried to keep his neck long and I tried to let him. He moved away from my inside leg to keep the circles round, and when I remembered to ride the outside of the horse at the same time as the inside he got really steady and felt solid on the circle. His canter transitions were prompt from a light aid. And when I asked him to drop his head from the giraffe carriage at a canter that I've been getting since I changed his bit, he finally gave me an honest attempt.

Post-ride stare at the new spotted horse along the driveway.

There were a few spooks - a dog suddenly barked, something in the scary corner moved, and one dead person sighting. But every time he came right back to me and settled back into his work. A couple of years ago he wouldn't have been able to let these things go and the rest of my ride would have been super tense.

I was really happy with this ride. It wasn't perfect. But I really felt that Cisco was with me for the whole ride. His attention is so often focused on something somewhere else in the arena, but for this ride he was focused on me.

There's always a derp photo though!

Too bad that I rode in the evening and most of my day was over. I would have liked to enjoy my horse created elation a little bit longer!

I Got To Break In My Unused Tools

As I was driving down the highway to the barn on Monday evening, I saw a car ahead of me going the opposite direction that was driving really fast down a service road. "What an idiot" I thought. My next thought was "I didn't know there was a service road there". Then I saw the fence boards go flying through the air. 

Yep, he went through the ditch and the fence at a pretty high speed. As I drove past the little car had a whole bunch of smoke coming from somewhere on it, but it was white smoke so I figured nothing was on fire. This is the same highway that two people were killed on less than three weeks ago. People are idiots.

This ditch is at the barn - full of water. Maybe the ditch he drove through had a similar amount of water and that was why his car was smoking. 

My plan for the night was to ride Phantom. It was going to be an easy ride as I was expecting to be pretty sore. 

We toodled around at a walk for 10 minutes before I picked up a trot. Phantom has been starting pretty shuffly at the trot but she started to move a bit more forward maybe a half lap around. Then she coughed, so I said whoa so that she could come back to walk in case there was going to be more coughs. She did a weird little stumble behind but kept walking.I thought to myself, "she didn't grab a shoe with that stumble, did she? Nah, it was a nothing stumble." So we changed direction and picked up a trot again.

About 5 steps in she started head bobbing. I hopped off and picked up her left front. 

Yeah. She had grabbed her shoe. And it was hanging on by one nail.

I twisted it back into position so that she wouldn't stand on a clip and enlisted someone to hold her so I could run to my trailer and grab my tools.

I bought an inexpensive set of shoe pulls and a rasp about five years ago after having to pull Phantom's very twisted shoe off with a claw hammer and fencing pliers on Canada Day (while wearing shorts). I rushed out the very next day to grab tools in case it ever happened again. I've never had to use them so far.

After pulling that shoe off with the wrong tools, I watched a Youtube video to see how you are actually supposed to do it. 

I remembered that I had to rasp off the clinch before trying to pull the shoe off. I don't know how good a job I did of it because the last nail was above the clip and I kept rasping the clip instead of the clinch. But the shoe came off without too much work and thankfully Phantom put up with my awkward efforts.

 So Phantom got herself out of work yet again.

Farrier day is next Wednesday so she'll have to wait until then to get it put back on. I have hoof boots that I can slap on that foot but I don't think that they fit her as well as they used to so we'll probably be stuck with just walking. It's going to be pretty wet for the next week (woke up to pouring rain this morning, wasn't supposed to start raining until tonight) so hopefully her foot doesn't break apart too much.

Then, to top off my night, when I was throwing out some extra hay I stepped in a hidden puddle of muck water and got a soaker in my running shoe.

I should've stayed home.

Weekend Update

I had a couple of good rides this weekend.

Phantom had her first ride on Friday evening since her abscess popped up a couple of weeks earlier. She felt surprisingly even at the trot and was pretty bendy through her body. I wasn't happy with how the first left lead canter felt - I don't know if she's ever felt like that before. Kind of pulling her body forward instead of getting the rear motor activated. It got better, so I'll try not to dwell on it. 

My leg feels a bit sorer when riding her versus Cisco (Phantom's saddle has a wider twist I think) so I kept the ride short and sweet. Like most of her rides these days.

Cisco decided to hang out with me after I turned him back out. Thus there were a bunch of snoot pics.

 

Cisco was my victim for my ride on Sunday. It took me a bit of time to set the Pixio up in a different location than I normally do - too bad I didn't check to see how much space there was on the memory card. It ran out about 5 minutes into the ride before I picked up a trot. Oh well, another lesson learned.

This was the fourth ride in his new Turtle Top bit. When we picked up the trot he was immediately round and bendy. It usually takes a few minutes (or a bunch of minutes) to get to this point. I've got to make sure to keep him going forward so that he doesn't curl a bit too much behind the vertical though. I can't quite figure out if he's wanting to curl or he's just figuring out his balance and strength.

The canter is a different story though. He kind of turns into a bit of a llama. He's bent around the circle and turning off my outside aids. But his head is up in the air.

I mean, I'd rather his head be up in the air than curled up and his nose towards his chest. I can work with that. Fixing the curling is way harder. 

After riding Cisco has been offering to just stand and chill in the barn without being tied up. I think this is something I'm going to actively try to develop with him.

We did some work on getting the canter transitions with some simple changes on tear drops along a long side. They were much more prompt than they have been - I still need to drop the amount that I ask by like 50%. I've had some nice ones by just swiping my leg back, but more often than not I forget and dig in my heel. I've also realized that I do a chicken arm with my right elbow as he picks up the left lead canter that I need to sort out.

I'm not convinced that this is going to be his bit. I'm not giving up on it yet, and maybe I'll alternate between both bauchers. He doesn't hate this one - yet.

Move Along, Nothing To See Here

I haven't been blogging much about my rides as of late. Partly because I've been so busy/tired, that I haven't had the energy to spend an hour typing up something interesting. But mostly because not much interesting has been happening. 

Well, cool skies are interesting.

I've been riding - well, Cisco at least. Phantom has seemingly recovered from her hoof abscess and I'm planning to hop on her tomorrow to see how she feels. She looked a little bit uncomfortable still at the canter on Sunday, but looked pretty good last night. 

My rides on Cisco haven't really been overly exciting. We've popped over some tiny little crosspoles a couple of times, and he's gone over them all on the first approach. He's still a bit wiggly to them and sucks back when we're jumping towards the scary end, but we're getting from one side to the other.

I decided that I would try one more bit for Mr. Fussy Mouth and ordered a Neue Schule Turtle Top Baucher. These bits are a ridiculous price in Canada (around $400!!!) so I ordered it from the UK. After I paid customs it was closer to $240. Still, a stupid price for a bit that I don't know will be liked.

So shiny!

Does he like it? I still haven't decided. Last night's ride was the third ride with this bit, and the best so far. He was trying really hard to keep his neck long at a trot instead of wanting to get a bit behind the bit. The connection at the canter hasn't been as good as it was in the other baucher, but the left lead canter has been stronger, so I don't know. 

He doesn't hate the bit, so we're going to keep using it for now. I thought his mouth was being a bit quieter, but once we popped over a couple of jumps last night he started clacking his teeth together. His mouth is definitely his stress indicator. 

I also finally broke down and put spurs on. Cisco knows how to move off my leg, he just thinks that it's a suggestion rather than a command. The spurs have definitely helped so they will continue to be used. I've just been using my very small nubby baby spurs and might need to go up to slightly bigger ones for a couple of rides on occasion but so far the baby ones have been enough to get my point across.

I've only been riding every second day because my groin is still quite sore after riding. I applied some kinesiology tape and I think it's helped a wee bit. I will need to see my doctor in a couple of weeks so maybe I'll mention it and see what she says - I'm sure it will be go to physio and stop riding, neither of which I want to hear!

Since we had so much rain over the last few weeks, the mosquitos have now come out in force. We tried a short ride down the road last night, thinking that the road would be safer than the grass to not get eaten. They didn't care. The poor horses were covered in mosquitos. Thus our outdoor evening rides will be no more for a while!

So, yeah. Nothing exciting. Just plugging away at the same things with some slight improvement. But riding is happening!

(Mostly) Wordless Wednesday - Pony Squeals

I finally caught Cisco's adorable little whinny on video. This is the whinny he uses when he's calling to someone outside of the arena. It can be even more adorable when he does the same little squeal but under his breath and I'm the only one that can hear him. Makes me giggle every time. 

Make sure the volume is turned up!

There's a Hole in Her Heel

On Thursday, Phantom, my drama queen of a horse, was pretty sure her leg was going to fall off.

I fed her when I brought her in before an intended ride. She's a right foot forward when eating horse, so her left hind needs to stay underneath her to keep her balance. She wouldn't keep that foot weighted on the floor. I found a strongish digital pulse but nothing else so I suspected an abscess might be brewing.

It's been really muddy for most of the last week. We keep getting pelted with bursts of rain. On that day it had poured rain for about an hour just before I arrived. 

A farmer's field a mile or so from the barn. Supposed to be a crop field.

The barn would be visible behind the trees. I hope bees can swim!

The roads to the barn have been atrocious this year. This is on the good road.

Yep - it washed out. I had to go through in my rental car (mine was in for repairs).

I had forgotten to put my boots on when I went out for Phantom. Thankfully, she likes me, so she came to me and I didn't have to walk through the mud (though it took some convincing). Also, note that she is fully standing on her left hind and might even be resting her right hind yet would not put weight on that left foot 5 minutes later in the barn.

I buted her and threw her back out. Despite not wanting to stand in the barn with weight on her left hind, she was walking perfectly fine on it. 

The next morning I went out early so that I could have a look at her and if I needed to call the vet hopefully avoid a weekend fee. 

As I walked towards her paddock, she was picking at the grass, walking and standing on all four legs. When I got to the gate, she saw me, lifted her left hind to leave it resting kind of awkwardly, and gave me a nicker. As I said earlier - she's a total drama queen.

Otherwise, she was about the same. Walking without issue, resting it in the barn. Still a strong digital pulse.

Saturday I found a hole in her heel.

I'm still thinking that's it's an abscess. The cleft in the center of her heel has been pushed to the side and the hole is close to the center. I'm thinking that the pressure of the abscess pushed that cleft over.

It was already wet from being outside in the mud. Ugh. Thus I didn't soak it. I flushed it with some betadine as best I could and wrapped it with some Animalintex. Not my best wrapping job as Phantom refused to unflex her fetlock. I tried to wrap up a bit higher than I might normally wrap to keep the mud out, but I'm not sure how well that will work.

I have no recollection of buying fluorescent orange vetrap.

Hopefully, it was indeed an abscess and she should be more comfortable in a few days. I'm also hoping that it stops raining. But that isn't looking so good.