January is the month of resolutions. Did you know that over 47% of Americans make New Years resolutions with the majority of those Americans putting fitness in the top 10? With 69% of Americans over age 20 being over weight it's easy to see why fitness goals are in the top 10. 69 percent!! That number astounds me. I would like to believe that our numbers in the horse owning public are little below the national average given our fairly active outdoor lifestyle, but I suspect we, as a demographic, suffer a fairly high statistic as well.
As a veterinarian I am daily faced with the task of assigning body condition scores to my patients. I examine the horse, using my hands as well as a weight tape and give it a score between 1 and 9 to describe it's overall condition. I like to see most of my patients falling somewhere in the range of 4-6 with 5 being the goal for most recreational horses. Because there is such a stigma against "fat shaming" in America right now I find that many of my clients are appalled when I flat out say, "your horse is fat". They may giggle, joke about being an easy keeper or say he "wintered well". They are often quick to say that he's a good horse anyway or that they love him anyway as if my comments about his weight somehow devalue or belittle the horse. This is American anthropomorphism at its worst. As a veterinarian I am concerned only with your horse's overall well being and more importantly longevity. I want you and your horse to have a long, healthy and productive life. He can't do that if he isn't kept healthy throughout his life. There are a multitude of problems that are associated with prolonged obesity in horses including, lipomas, metabolic syndrome, insulin resistance, arthritis, and laminitis. Interestingly enough these conditions mirror the most common conditions associated with obesity in humans: diabetes, osteoarthritis, stroke, heart disease, some cancers and gout. I'm not being "mean" when I tell you your horse is fat. I'm doing my best to help you recognize it, correct it, and make changes so that you can help your horse live a long and healthy life.
Wouldn't it be simpler if it worked this way for us humans? If our doctor would just look at our "owner" and say, "She's fat. Cut the grain completely, switch to grass hay only at 18 pounds/day and exercise for 25 minutes 3 times a week. Muzzle if you need to."
Unfortunately it's not that easy. We, as horse owners are probably guilty of making poor choices for our health due to our busy schedules with our horses. While you are busy rushing to the barn and getting ready to ride or mixing the 5 different supplements that your horse gets every evening you may have forgotten to feed yourself properly. A bag of chips and that extra slice of pizza that somebody left in the fridge will suffice for a lunch on the go. No time to exercise because you have to get to barn to get your horse his turn out time. There are more excuses than there are bales of hay in your barn.
Luckily our life on the go helps to keep things from getting too out of hand for most of us, but is it enough? We expect athletic excellence from our horses. We want our horses to be in top form and able to be at once graceful, athletic, swift, and able to go all day without tiring. Can we expect less from ourselves?
I think in order to get the most out of your partnership with your horse and the best performance it is important for us to be as fit, flexible and healthy as possible. For an equestrian, balance, flexibility and fitness improve our feel and timing in the saddle. By decreasing the weight our horses are forced to carry we can avoid having to ride a 1200# horse. There is a reason draft crosses are currently enjoying a popularity trend.
This year I made many resolutions (I like to think of them as goals) for my horsemanship. I want to advance my horsemanship skills and improve my feel and timing and go on to accomplish goals both with my vaquero horsemanship and cowboy dressage. Among those goals I added working on my own fitness. As I've aged I have lost flexibility and added pounds. I can't continue to ask for excellence from my horse without demanding the same excellence from myself.
There are many many programs out there that are designed to target the muscles and areas that most equestrians need to concentrate on the most. Pilates and yoga are both excellent disciplines for increasing core strength, balance and flexibility which are all important for a balanced rider. Recent research has even linked some equine lameness with back and balance problems in the rider. Improving your own balance and flexibility may help your horse to move more balanced beneath you.
For back country riders, fitness is even more important. While nobody likes to think about the worst case scenario, we have all heard the horror stories of horses becoming injured in an accident in the back country resulting in the rider having to hike out. If you are not fit enough to hike out as far as your horse has carried you in, you have no business being out there in the first place.
So, I challenge you, my fellow horse friends, to take a real look at both you and your horse's body condition score. Determine if your horse is at an ideal body condition and make the necessary changes to assure he is. Your veterinarian can help you with this. Then take a hard look at your own body condition score. If you need to make changes there, have a strong talking to your body's owner and start those changes today. I bet if you take at least half as much interest into the quality of diet and exercise you prescribe for your horse as you do for yourself you will make changes for the better. Do it for your horse. Do it for your horsemanship. Do it for yourself.
Here are some resources especially for horse folks.
http://theequestrianathleteplan.com/
http://www.equifitt.com/equestrian.html
http://www.livestrong.com/article/351282-fitness-exercises-for-a-horse-rider/
Thursday, January 22, 2015
Tuesday, December 9, 2014
Tangled in Tradition
I promised myself when I started this blog that it would only truly be a useful and accurate reflection of my horsemanship journey if I shared both my good and bad experiences, especially as it relates to my growth and education in the Vaquero Tradition of horsemanship. I've been avoiding writing this particular blog entry because I know how it will look to the folks that are the true die hard, 3 B visalia ridin', hand braided rawhide reata twirling, mustache knot tying honest to God Vaquero horseman out there. But, I've put it off long enough and until I get this blog post done and off my chest I won't be able to go on and share my experiences in other areas of this tradition in horsemanship.
Let me start off by saying that I adore the traditions that go along with this style of riding. I have a flair for the eccentric and the thought that this isn't something that just anybody out there is doing appeals to me greatly. I love the tradition of quality hand made gear that would be passed through generations. There is a certain pageantry in the way a Vaquero horseman outfits both himself and his horse. Pride in self and mount are paramount throughout the tradition and I love that about it. It really does do something for your horsemanship when you put pride in your gear and turn out.
Like any long standing tradition there is great wisdom in the way things are done that speaks to well thought out observations in both rider and horse. But, also like many deep seated traditions, there is blind loyalty to a way of doing things that is routed in the thought process "this is how it has always been done there is no reason to change". Many of the older traditions that were once part of the standard tool bag for a Vaquero have fallen out of favor in the light of modern knowledge. One of those is the dia de sangre. One of the ways that some of the old Vaqueros used to instill that "trigger fire neck rein action" where a horse will jump into his turn around when the rein touches the neck was to repeatedly quirt the horse's neck until it was extra sensitive (read painful) so that he would flinch away from that pain when the rein was applied. It was a nasty day for horse and rider and it wasn't something that needed to be repeated, generally, but it did happen.
So, the modern horseman that chooses to learn, study and apply the traditions of the Vaquero will necessarily choose which traditions to follow. Do you start in a snaffle like many of the horseman of the great basin or do you stick to the more traditional jaquima? Do you forego any bit but the traditional spade and skip over some of the smaller transition type bits? Do you ride with parachute cord mecates instead of mane hair? Do you double your horse in the hackamore? Even among staunch traditionalists there is considerable argument. Do you follow Rojas or Connel? Which one was right? From the standpoint of historical argument and research there is an unlimited amount of minutia to debate. It is all fascinating stuff.
I believe the reason that we are seeing a resurgence of this style of riding is because it has been romanticized to a certain degree by the hand of time. We look back on the talented horseman with their prancing bridle horses and want to believe that they were always soft, and kind and looking for a better way of building that ultimate partnership with their horse. The trigger fire horse that responds in an instant to just a jingle of the rein chains is a beautiful thing. They carried themselves with panache and style and grace with a formal flexion in their spade bits that you just don't see anymore. The relatively foreign idea of not starting a horse until it was 4 or sometimes even 6 so that they were mature and grown even has a romantic quality to it. While we like to believe that this was because these older horseman were being careful and respectful of young growing joints, according to Ernie Morris, once those horses were under saddle and put out to work they were asked to put in a full day's work and anything younger would break down too fast. So, there was knowledge that a younger horse couldn't stand up to the work but they were also working their horses harder and longer than most of us do today. There are two sides to every story and looking back on history tends to place a rosy glow.
So, in my drive to really try to learn and study and preserve the traditions of the vaqueros I have embraced the gear, methods, and training programs to the best of my ability. One of the things that I love about my involvement of Cowboy Dressage is that they embrace and encourage folks to ride within this tradition as well. I was very excited to be able to attend and show at the recent Final Gathering. After looking over the entry classes available I decided that in order to show support of the Vaquero classes and hopefully build this division as well as interest in this tradition that I love I would ride only in the Vaquero classes and only bring my traditional gear along with me.
Some of you who have followed my blog posts know that I don't currently have a horse that has been brought along solely through the vaquero tradition. As my journey has been a learning experience I have experimented with all sorts of training modalities and disciplines in an attempt to learn and grow and find out what works best for me and my horses. There is of course, nothing wrong with trying different things but if you truly believe in the tradition of training a horse that responds to signal rather than cue to create the ultimate bridle horse you know that you can reform a horse but not ever make a good solid bridle horse if they aren't started the right way.
So my 12 year old gelding is a product of many years of muddled training techniques. It's a wonder he doesn't have more baggage than he does. He does really pretty well for me in the bridle (he's currently in a hooded mona lisa) but if things get hot for him I lose him mentally and the bridle horse tradition only really works and looks good if you don't have to touch that bit very much. Ideally Chico would probably stay forever at the two rein stage where I had the ability to two hand him and support him in his times of mental meltdown. Unfortunately this particular set up doesn't fit in such a manner as to allow for an underbridle. So, at the Cowboy Dressage finals my horse decided he was unable to listen to the signal from the bit as well as my aids. When showcasing your horse in a forum that places an emphasis on lightness and softness having a horse refuse to listen to a one handed bridle bit doesn't look very soft. Also when you ride "straight up in the bridle" you rely on the horse bending through his body through the use of your other aids (there is considerable debate within the tradition about whether a bridlehorse SHOULD even bend through his body around your legs, but I believe they should) so when you are unable to back up your legs through communication with your hands to create bend you find yourself in a position from which you are unable to help your horse.
I did put him back into the bosal so that I could work him two handed but since he IS NOT a traditional bridle horse this was of limited help as well. What I really needed in order to help my horse focus and understand even in times of stress was a bit that I could create bend with. Because I was trying so hard to stay true to tradition I didn't have that option for him.
Now, just for my friends that are struggling like I am to properly follow the Vaquero tradition let's outline the things I did wrong for my horse in this situation. First of all this wasn't a horse brought along in the bridle horse tradition from day one so I can't expect him to respond reliably all the time with a muddled foundation. Second I went from the bosal to the bridle without the two rein stage. Shouldn't be a big deal on this particular horse because he's had lots and lots of time in a bit but it's true that we skipped that stage due to constraints with gear.
So here is my "Oh Gee" take home message from this stage in my horsemaship journey. Tradition is wonderful and beautiful and poetic and often seated in wisdom handed down from many generations. I will continue to study and learn and try to do my best working through training my horses in this tradition. What I hope to never do again, though, is compromise my horsemanship and my ability to effectively communicate with my horse for the sake of tradition. I'm not saying I condone using whatever means necessary to get the right behavior out of your horse, I'm saying EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION. It doesn't matter what language you are speaking if your horse is completely unable to listen at all. I hobbled my horsemanship by only bringing traditional gear that limited my ability to effectively communicate with this particular horse. It resulted in poor use of my aids and frustration for a horse that was already upset. I was saying, "Calmete caballo" when what he probably needed was "there there old chap" since that was his original language. My horse needed me to be there for him and support him and help him through his time of need. If I can't do that for him within the constraints of this tradition I will seek whatever tool I can to help him out. I may get some funny looks when I pull out my french link snaffle and pull off the bosal when he's having a bad day, but if it helps me to help him, you can point fingers all you want.
Let me start off by saying that I adore the traditions that go along with this style of riding. I have a flair for the eccentric and the thought that this isn't something that just anybody out there is doing appeals to me greatly. I love the tradition of quality hand made gear that would be passed through generations. There is a certain pageantry in the way a Vaquero horseman outfits both himself and his horse. Pride in self and mount are paramount throughout the tradition and I love that about it. It really does do something for your horsemanship when you put pride in your gear and turn out.
Like any long standing tradition there is great wisdom in the way things are done that speaks to well thought out observations in both rider and horse. But, also like many deep seated traditions, there is blind loyalty to a way of doing things that is routed in the thought process "this is how it has always been done there is no reason to change". Many of the older traditions that were once part of the standard tool bag for a Vaquero have fallen out of favor in the light of modern knowledge. One of those is the dia de sangre. One of the ways that some of the old Vaqueros used to instill that "trigger fire neck rein action" where a horse will jump into his turn around when the rein touches the neck was to repeatedly quirt the horse's neck until it was extra sensitive (read painful) so that he would flinch away from that pain when the rein was applied. It was a nasty day for horse and rider and it wasn't something that needed to be repeated, generally, but it did happen.
So, the modern horseman that chooses to learn, study and apply the traditions of the Vaquero will necessarily choose which traditions to follow. Do you start in a snaffle like many of the horseman of the great basin or do you stick to the more traditional jaquima? Do you forego any bit but the traditional spade and skip over some of the smaller transition type bits? Do you ride with parachute cord mecates instead of mane hair? Do you double your horse in the hackamore? Even among staunch traditionalists there is considerable argument. Do you follow Rojas or Connel? Which one was right? From the standpoint of historical argument and research there is an unlimited amount of minutia to debate. It is all fascinating stuff.
I believe the reason that we are seeing a resurgence of this style of riding is because it has been romanticized to a certain degree by the hand of time. We look back on the talented horseman with their prancing bridle horses and want to believe that they were always soft, and kind and looking for a better way of building that ultimate partnership with their horse. The trigger fire horse that responds in an instant to just a jingle of the rein chains is a beautiful thing. They carried themselves with panache and style and grace with a formal flexion in their spade bits that you just don't see anymore. The relatively foreign idea of not starting a horse until it was 4 or sometimes even 6 so that they were mature and grown even has a romantic quality to it. While we like to believe that this was because these older horseman were being careful and respectful of young growing joints, according to Ernie Morris, once those horses were under saddle and put out to work they were asked to put in a full day's work and anything younger would break down too fast. So, there was knowledge that a younger horse couldn't stand up to the work but they were also working their horses harder and longer than most of us do today. There are two sides to every story and looking back on history tends to place a rosy glow.
So, in my drive to really try to learn and study and preserve the traditions of the vaqueros I have embraced the gear, methods, and training programs to the best of my ability. One of the things that I love about my involvement of Cowboy Dressage is that they embrace and encourage folks to ride within this tradition as well. I was very excited to be able to attend and show at the recent Final Gathering. After looking over the entry classes available I decided that in order to show support of the Vaquero classes and hopefully build this division as well as interest in this tradition that I love I would ride only in the Vaquero classes and only bring my traditional gear along with me.
Some of you who have followed my blog posts know that I don't currently have a horse that has been brought along solely through the vaquero tradition. As my journey has been a learning experience I have experimented with all sorts of training modalities and disciplines in an attempt to learn and grow and find out what works best for me and my horses. There is of course, nothing wrong with trying different things but if you truly believe in the tradition of training a horse that responds to signal rather than cue to create the ultimate bridle horse you know that you can reform a horse but not ever make a good solid bridle horse if they aren't started the right way.
So my 12 year old gelding is a product of many years of muddled training techniques. It's a wonder he doesn't have more baggage than he does. He does really pretty well for me in the bridle (he's currently in a hooded mona lisa) but if things get hot for him I lose him mentally and the bridle horse tradition only really works and looks good if you don't have to touch that bit very much. Ideally Chico would probably stay forever at the two rein stage where I had the ability to two hand him and support him in his times of mental meltdown. Unfortunately this particular set up doesn't fit in such a manner as to allow for an underbridle. So, at the Cowboy Dressage finals my horse decided he was unable to listen to the signal from the bit as well as my aids. When showcasing your horse in a forum that places an emphasis on lightness and softness having a horse refuse to listen to a one handed bridle bit doesn't look very soft. Also when you ride "straight up in the bridle" you rely on the horse bending through his body through the use of your other aids (there is considerable debate within the tradition about whether a bridlehorse SHOULD even bend through his body around your legs, but I believe they should) so when you are unable to back up your legs through communication with your hands to create bend you find yourself in a position from which you are unable to help your horse.
I did put him back into the bosal so that I could work him two handed but since he IS NOT a traditional bridle horse this was of limited help as well. What I really needed in order to help my horse focus and understand even in times of stress was a bit that I could create bend with. Because I was trying so hard to stay true to tradition I didn't have that option for him.
Now, just for my friends that are struggling like I am to properly follow the Vaquero tradition let's outline the things I did wrong for my horse in this situation. First of all this wasn't a horse brought along in the bridle horse tradition from day one so I can't expect him to respond reliably all the time with a muddled foundation. Second I went from the bosal to the bridle without the two rein stage. Shouldn't be a big deal on this particular horse because he's had lots and lots of time in a bit but it's true that we skipped that stage due to constraints with gear.
So here is my "Oh Gee" take home message from this stage in my horsemaship journey. Tradition is wonderful and beautiful and poetic and often seated in wisdom handed down from many generations. I will continue to study and learn and try to do my best working through training my horses in this tradition. What I hope to never do again, though, is compromise my horsemanship and my ability to effectively communicate with my horse for the sake of tradition. I'm not saying I condone using whatever means necessary to get the right behavior out of your horse, I'm saying EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION. It doesn't matter what language you are speaking if your horse is completely unable to listen at all. I hobbled my horsemanship by only bringing traditional gear that limited my ability to effectively communicate with this particular horse. It resulted in poor use of my aids and frustration for a horse that was already upset. I was saying, "Calmete caballo" when what he probably needed was "there there old chap" since that was his original language. My horse needed me to be there for him and support him and help him through his time of need. If I can't do that for him within the constraints of this tradition I will seek whatever tool I can to help him out. I may get some funny looks when I pull out my french link snaffle and pull off the bosal when he's having a bad day, but if it helps me to help him, you can point fingers all you want.
Tuesday, November 11, 2014
Rider Enduced Changes in the Horse
The old adage, form begets function surely applies to our horses. While horses can perform beyond their form or breeding they excel best when used for the purpose for which they were designed. This is why Clydesdales pull the Budweiser hitch and Arabians do the Tevis cup and not vice versa.
What shouldn't surprise us though is function also begets form. Our horses will reflect the use that we put them to. In veterinary medicine we see specific injuries and performance related issues associated with specific disciplines as the horses are used. It's a natural extension of our relationship with our horses. You cannot ride a horse to any extent without changing the way that horse's body in some way. This isn't always bad and it happens in all walks of life. Many of our bodies reflect the work that we do unless we work hard to avoid that. Asymmetrical development in the dominant arm of any person that preferentially uses one arm for the majority of their work is a good example of this. Unless they consciously build muscle in the opposing arm, the arm being used most will be the strongest. Our horses are the same.
What I'd like to talk about today is the way we can affect change in our horses for both good and bad and how we can avoid some of the pitfalls of poor muscle development, braces, and other injuries that can shorten or limit the useful life of our horses. Eventually I will write an entire book on this subject as it is one dear to my heart so paring it down to fit into a blog post has been difficult. There are far reaching implications and a plethora of details and minutia to be debated in this topic. Let's start with just a few.
"Saddleback" is a term that refers to the hollowing of the top line behind the shoulders and eventual sinking and swaying of the back after years of service under saddle. Common thinking in the horse world is often that this is a phenomenon of old age and is unavoidable. To some extent that is true. As a horse ages and is subject to heavy loads it's back will wear and break down. Unless the horse exercises the muscles responsible for rounding and shaping the back, gravity and work will eventually win and you will see a pronounced sway. Conformation of the horse definitely plays a roll in this. Horses with long backs and laid back shoulders will often carry themselves with poor self carriage. Self carriage does not necessarily come natural to the horse and you can see "saddleback" on a horse that never carried a rider. It's common in cart horses that push with their shoulders instead of rounding their backs to push through their entire bodies.
While "saddleback" can be a natural process of aging, poor riding habits can compound this problem. Just like good posture in people, proper self carriage in the horse must be cultivated. A horse that is allowed to carry himself in a sunken and hollowed way will advance into saddle back quicker than one that is in a conditioning program designed to keep those muscles functioning. Just people, some horses will need more time in the "gym" toning and shaping those muscles while others will seem to be toned and shaped without added work.
I have a horse that tends toward saddle back. He has high withers and long sloping shoulder and as he has aged this problem is getting worse. This also happens to be the horse that I do the most back country and trail riding with. He has a long ground covering walk that I enjoy riding but he tends to go hollow when in this gate. If we spend too much time out on the trail and not enough time doing calisthenic exercises encouraging rounding through his top line this problem gets quickly worse to the point of effecting my saddle fit.
"Oh No Muscle". This is a muscle that I am very familiar with in my patients. Anytime I need to do an intravenous injection into the jugular vein and place my left hand on the horse's neck to raise the vein I can tell exactly what kind of hands the person riding the horse has. The "Oh No Muscle" is the over development of the muscles on the bottom of the horse's neck. They run on each side of the neck and form the jugular groove and are responsible in part for flexing the neck and moving bones in the throatlatch area. Over development of these muscles will give a horse a "ewe" neck appearance that may be completely secondary to use and not due to conformation at all. In general, when I put my hand on these horses to raise the jugular vein their first response is to raise the head and neck and flip the nose up. These are your classic head tossers and they tend to ridden with both a tie down and gag type bit to discourage the behavior. These are horses that are long accustomed to bracing against pressure. Better than 50% of the time these horses will also have damage to bars of their mouth from long standing bit pressure.
This habit is tough to break in a horse even with a rider that has good hands. The deep seated bracing and flipping of the head are so ingrained as a defense mechanisms these horses will say "Oh No!" before anything is even asked of them. They generally start flipping their head before I even touch them with a needle and many of these horses will engage in this behavior in the pasture flipping their head at flies, other horses, or any stimuli that they classify as irritating.
The best cure in this case is prevention. This is a case of a horse learning to push against pressure as a defense mechanism. If there is never pressure to push against the horse cannot develop this habit. Pulling relentlessly on young horses or even older horses that are being forced to preform in a way that they are not properly prepared for will develop this habit. There are shelves of tack devices to counter this human produced equine behavior. Tie downs, martingales, cavesons, draw reins, gag bits, correction bits, etc are all developed by folks trying desperately to remedy this behavior pattern as well as establish "proper" headset. There is only one way to be sure that the "Oh No muscle" doesn't raise it's ugly head on your horse. Soft Feel. That's the only sure fire, 100%, always going to work gadget and you can't buy it in any tack store.
Bar damage is the last thing I would like to cover in this blog and this is a tricky one to address. As I mentioned above, I'll often see bar damage in horses with a big "Oh No" muscle but it can be much more insidious than that. Bone spurs on the bars of the horse's mouth will often go unnoticed by the rider and have largely been undiagnosed in horses until more recently. Research has been done recently examining the differences in jaws from horses that were ridden and those that were feral examining the changes that we see in our domestic horses. In jaw bones collected from slaughter houses from horses that presumably spent time with a bit in their mouth we see thickening of the bars, bone spurs similar to shin splints, hair line fractures, roughening of the periostium due to continued stimulation of bit contact. Without doing extensive comparrisons of horses across disciplines and with good information on the type of riding and type of rider they were carrying all we can do is extrapolate about the damage and potential damage that we are doing to our horses with irresponsible bit use.
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The advent of widespread availability of digital x-ray technology is going to allow us to better examine the jaws of horses that are experiencing signs of resistance or bracing to the bit. Physical examination can provide good information as to the health of the horse's mouth and state of the bones of the jaw. I assess the bars on every horse that I float and can usually tell if a horse is having trouble with the bit. I find bone spurs, thickening and roughening of the surface of the bars through palpation of the bars. You can generally tell if the horse is stiff to one side over the other or has a tendency to fight the bit.
Often a horse with bit wear on the teeth has been attempting to alleviate undue pressure on the bars by attempting to hold the bit in his teeth. When I see a horse with rounded premolars they generally will have thickening along the bars as well. In my practice I would say that in general I see the most bar damage associated with snaffle bit use, gag bit use and horses that are asked for "collection" or head set in the show ring. These are the horses that seem to experience the most pressure on their bars. This is in no way a scientific observation but only a personal one based on the hundreds of horses that I evaluate in my practice each year.
Every horse's mouth is a little different. Some big boned horses naturally have very thick and rounded bars and these seem to hold up well to carrying a bit. Other horses have very thin delicate bars and these are generally at greater risk for damage. Young growing horses that have very active periosteums in the jaw and are experiencing the growth of adult teeth are especially susceptible to damage from excessive bit use.
Mitigating this damage relies on protecting the horse's mouth and respecting it. Hard mouthed horses are not born, they are made. While there will be variation between horses depending on bar conformation all horses have to potential to feel and respond to very light stimuli on the bars of the mouth. Building responsiveness in a horse by rewarding try and soft feel will help teach a horse to be responsive and "soft mouthed" without undue damage.
Allowing young horses to mature prior to bitting is also a good practice to minimize damage to the bars. This is one of the things I love most about the vaquero tradition that relies on the bosal saving the sensitive mouth for advanced training. Once the horse is carrying a bit he has advanced far enough in his training to be able to respond with very slight pressure on the mouth.
But, a good horseman can definitely ride a horse in a bit without causing undue damage. I think of a young woman in my practice with a 8 year old horse that she has been riding in the snaffle bit for 5 years. When last I floated that horse his bars were pristine. That is a woman with beautifully soft hands. I don't advocate the widespread use of bitless bridles to irradicate bit damage. I advocate the widespread education of the hands of horseman that use the bits to improve timing and feel and mitigate damage before it happens.
There are many, many more examples of how our riding choices and uses of our horses affect their bodies. I will revisit this topic at a later date to discuss some of the other issues that we see that are affecting our horse's physical and mental well being.
What shouldn't surprise us though is function also begets form. Our horses will reflect the use that we put them to. In veterinary medicine we see specific injuries and performance related issues associated with specific disciplines as the horses are used. It's a natural extension of our relationship with our horses. You cannot ride a horse to any extent without changing the way that horse's body in some way. This isn't always bad and it happens in all walks of life. Many of our bodies reflect the work that we do unless we work hard to avoid that. Asymmetrical development in the dominant arm of any person that preferentially uses one arm for the majority of their work is a good example of this. Unless they consciously build muscle in the opposing arm, the arm being used most will be the strongest. Our horses are the same.
What I'd like to talk about today is the way we can affect change in our horses for both good and bad and how we can avoid some of the pitfalls of poor muscle development, braces, and other injuries that can shorten or limit the useful life of our horses. Eventually I will write an entire book on this subject as it is one dear to my heart so paring it down to fit into a blog post has been difficult. There are far reaching implications and a plethora of details and minutia to be debated in this topic. Let's start with just a few.
"Saddleback" is a term that refers to the hollowing of the top line behind the shoulders and eventual sinking and swaying of the back after years of service under saddle. Common thinking in the horse world is often that this is a phenomenon of old age and is unavoidable. To some extent that is true. As a horse ages and is subject to heavy loads it's back will wear and break down. Unless the horse exercises the muscles responsible for rounding and shaping the back, gravity and work will eventually win and you will see a pronounced sway. Conformation of the horse definitely plays a roll in this. Horses with long backs and laid back shoulders will often carry themselves with poor self carriage. Self carriage does not necessarily come natural to the horse and you can see "saddleback" on a horse that never carried a rider. It's common in cart horses that push with their shoulders instead of rounding their backs to push through their entire bodies.
While "saddleback" can be a natural process of aging, poor riding habits can compound this problem. Just like good posture in people, proper self carriage in the horse must be cultivated. A horse that is allowed to carry himself in a sunken and hollowed way will advance into saddle back quicker than one that is in a conditioning program designed to keep those muscles functioning. Just people, some horses will need more time in the "gym" toning and shaping those muscles while others will seem to be toned and shaped without added work.
I have a horse that tends toward saddle back. He has high withers and long sloping shoulder and as he has aged this problem is getting worse. This also happens to be the horse that I do the most back country and trail riding with. He has a long ground covering walk that I enjoy riding but he tends to go hollow when in this gate. If we spend too much time out on the trail and not enough time doing calisthenic exercises encouraging rounding through his top line this problem gets quickly worse to the point of effecting my saddle fit.
So how do you encourage your horse to round and lift and shorten his back to build those top line muscles? Transitions and work on soft feel help the horse to bring his back up. The time that we spend on the Cowboy Dressage court is incredibly valuable to toning and shaping his muscles and top line. Transitions done with soft feel from working walk to free walk and working jog to free jog ask the horse to repeatedly shorten and then stretch those muscles. It's like doing leg bends at the gym. It focuses the energy of the ride up through the top line and encourages self carriage combating the dreaded "saddleback".
"Oh No Muscle". This is a muscle that I am very familiar with in my patients. Anytime I need to do an intravenous injection into the jugular vein and place my left hand on the horse's neck to raise the vein I can tell exactly what kind of hands the person riding the horse has. The "Oh No Muscle" is the over development of the muscles on the bottom of the horse's neck. They run on each side of the neck and form the jugular groove and are responsible in part for flexing the neck and moving bones in the throatlatch area. Over development of these muscles will give a horse a "ewe" neck appearance that may be completely secondary to use and not due to conformation at all. In general, when I put my hand on these horses to raise the jugular vein their first response is to raise the head and neck and flip the nose up. These are your classic head tossers and they tend to ridden with both a tie down and gag type bit to discourage the behavior. These are horses that are long accustomed to bracing against pressure. Better than 50% of the time these horses will also have damage to bars of their mouth from long standing bit pressure.
The best cure in this case is prevention. This is a case of a horse learning to push against pressure as a defense mechanism. If there is never pressure to push against the horse cannot develop this habit. Pulling relentlessly on young horses or even older horses that are being forced to preform in a way that they are not properly prepared for will develop this habit. There are shelves of tack devices to counter this human produced equine behavior. Tie downs, martingales, cavesons, draw reins, gag bits, correction bits, etc are all developed by folks trying desperately to remedy this behavior pattern as well as establish "proper" headset. There is only one way to be sure that the "Oh No muscle" doesn't raise it's ugly head on your horse. Soft Feel. That's the only sure fire, 100%, always going to work gadget and you can't buy it in any tack store.
Bar damage is the last thing I would like to cover in this blog and this is a tricky one to address. As I mentioned above, I'll often see bar damage in horses with a big "Oh No" muscle but it can be much more insidious than that. Bone spurs on the bars of the horse's mouth will often go unnoticed by the rider and have largely been undiagnosed in horses until more recently. Research has been done recently examining the differences in jaws from horses that were ridden and those that were feral examining the changes that we see in our domestic horses. In jaw bones collected from slaughter houses from horses that presumably spent time with a bit in their mouth we see thickening of the bars, bone spurs similar to shin splints, hair line fractures, roughening of the periostium due to continued stimulation of bit contact. Without doing extensive comparrisons of horses across disciplines and with good information on the type of riding and type of rider they were carrying all we can do is extrapolate about the damage and potential damage that we are doing to our horses with irresponsible bit use.
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Often a horse with bit wear on the teeth has been attempting to alleviate undue pressure on the bars by attempting to hold the bit in his teeth. When I see a horse with rounded premolars they generally will have thickening along the bars as well. In my practice I would say that in general I see the most bar damage associated with snaffle bit use, gag bit use and horses that are asked for "collection" or head set in the show ring. These are the horses that seem to experience the most pressure on their bars. This is in no way a scientific observation but only a personal one based on the hundreds of horses that I evaluate in my practice each year.
Every horse's mouth is a little different. Some big boned horses naturally have very thick and rounded bars and these seem to hold up well to carrying a bit. Other horses have very thin delicate bars and these are generally at greater risk for damage. Young growing horses that have very active periosteums in the jaw and are experiencing the growth of adult teeth are especially susceptible to damage from excessive bit use.
Mitigating this damage relies on protecting the horse's mouth and respecting it. Hard mouthed horses are not born, they are made. While there will be variation between horses depending on bar conformation all horses have to potential to feel and respond to very light stimuli on the bars of the mouth. Building responsiveness in a horse by rewarding try and soft feel will help teach a horse to be responsive and "soft mouthed" without undue damage.
Allowing young horses to mature prior to bitting is also a good practice to minimize damage to the bars. This is one of the things I love most about the vaquero tradition that relies on the bosal saving the sensitive mouth for advanced training. Once the horse is carrying a bit he has advanced far enough in his training to be able to respond with very slight pressure on the mouth.
But, a good horseman can definitely ride a horse in a bit without causing undue damage. I think of a young woman in my practice with a 8 year old horse that she has been riding in the snaffle bit for 5 years. When last I floated that horse his bars were pristine. That is a woman with beautifully soft hands. I don't advocate the widespread use of bitless bridles to irradicate bit damage. I advocate the widespread education of the hands of horseman that use the bits to improve timing and feel and mitigate damage before it happens.
There are many, many more examples of how our riding choices and uses of our horses affect their bodies. I will revisit this topic at a later date to discuss some of the other issues that we see that are affecting our horse's physical and mental well being.
Wednesday, October 8, 2014
When to Hold 'Em, When to Fold 'Em
Despite what some folks may infer from my blog posts I do not under any circumstances consider myself a trainer. I am aspiring to be worthy of the title of horseman at some point in the future but am fully aware that that is a title that is earned and not given out willy nilly. In cowhorse circles it's often referred to as being a "hand" or being "punchy". Whatever you call it, I am not it. I am a lifetime student of the horse struggling like so many would be horseman out there to learn how to best communicate with these sensitive and complex animals that are so deeply linked with my soul. These blog posts are a record of my journey and the growth I experience on the way. Sometimes growth is painful and for dense people like me I find the lessons are repeated as often as necessary until it sinks into my cranium.
With the widespread popularity of the Natural Horsemanship movement as well as the rising interest in colt starting competitions like Road to the Horse, many folks consider the ultimate goal to be to start a horse themselves and train it from the ground up. I admit to being one of these. I really want to someday take one of my home grown colts, do all the groundwork myself and then through diligent training take it clear from jaquima a freno sticking as close as possible to the traditions of the viejos. With luck and a lot of hard work, I may still get that accomplished in my lifetime.
The natural horsemanship movement has done a lot of wonderful things for horses and owners in the past 25 years. Unfortunately one of the things that it has done that has not been entirely helpful for horses in general is to perpetuate the notion that anybody and everybody can start their own horse with the help of the right set of DVD's. I don't believe this is true. Just like not every parent is cut out to be a teacher just because they have kids, not every horse owner is cut out to be a colt starter just because they have young horses. Starting horses or kids off on the right foot with the right foundation is a very special skill set.
Dan and I have now gone through the process of starting several of our own horses with fairly good results. We have had pretty easy horses for the most part that make our jobs easy and make us look good. With the right kind of horse, anybody can experience a degree of success. But what happens when you get that horse that doesn't necessarily play by the rules?
My young black Morgan didn't play by the rules. I've owned Kit since he was a weanling and have known him since he was a day old. I have tried to raise him the same way I had all of my other young horses, hopefully avoiding mistakes I had made with any of them. As a weanling I took him on hikes around the property, exposing him to as many things as I could think of. As a yearling I started some basic groundwork in the round pen and then continued that over the winter before he turned two. I started him under saddle as a long 2 year old and with the exception of the first 10 days of bucking with the saddle every day he did really pretty well. If anything I was afraid he was dull and lazy with a tendency to buck a little when he was bored. I gave him the winter off and expected his 3 year old year to put him back to work and start his journey to my ultimate bridle horse.
Then he bucked me off.
Ray Hunt has always said you need to know what happened before what happened happened in order to understand what happened and I will freely admit to having no friggin' clue. We were trotting along on a nice loose rein when out of the blue (at least as far as I could tell) he came unglued. I'm not talking about jumping sideways a step or two or taking a few good natured leaps. I'm talking about full on grunting, head between the knees Pendleton Round-Up old time bronco busting poster child. I got right back on him, like a good kid, and figured maybe I should go back to more round pen work. He was tight in the round pen and I was afraid of getting pitched as spectacularly as he had pitched me in the arena. After all, I am not a trainer (I believe I've mentioned this) and I need my body functioning in order to do the things I need to do to make enough money to buy these horses hay. He pitched me off in June and it took me until August with a handful of rather tentative rides on him (he didn't buck again, just felt like he might) to realize it was time for me to call for back up.
It was a hard thing for me to do. I'm stubborn, sometimes to my own detriment, and giving up on this horse and admitting that I was afraid to go further with him was a difficult thing. But, I had to admit that after several months of dinking around with him I was going backwards and not forward. I was afraid of getting hurt and it was transmitting to him and he was getting more and more nervous.
Dan and I chose Jon Ensign to help us get past where we were stuck. Dan and a 2 year old mare that he wanted started and he helped convince me that getting Kit to Jon was the best course of action.
Oh my gosh, I am so glad I did! Jon reports that he didn't have any trouble with him which bruised my ego only slightly but otherwise reassured me that I had a good horse that needed expert help. Luckily I hadn't created a monster with my dinking around. Once he had somebody who was confident to let him move forward and trusted him not to come unglued he became a solid citizen. Jon put 30 days of training on him and exposed him to ropes, cows, water, and all the things that we would have done over the next 6 months. I am so much further along in my training with him and now I have complete confidence in him and he in me. We can go forward from here and refine and shape and work on the things that I would like to do with this colt in the future.
No, I didn't start this one all by myself. I had some help. I'll try and start the next one on my own but if I run into a snag or feel at all intimidated I am turning to the folks that do this for a living. I have to tell myself that it is no different than when a competent and well respected horseman asks me to give their horse an IV shot because it makes them nervous. Of course they should have me do it, it's what I do. Having a confident and accomplished colt starter help you with your colt is not selling out (I had to tell myself this over and over) it's making the best decision for your horse to become a solid citizen. Money and time spent on training is never wasted. Like any investment into education, the money is well spent.
So, the moral of this story and my step along my journey is to know and understand your own limitations and weaknesses. It's good to have realistic goals and to work hard at learning and expanding your comfort zone. It's also good to know when you are in too deep and need some help. Calling for back up in the interest of not only saving your own skull but assuring the continued success of your horse is an important part of being your horse's advocate. I now have a much better understanding of that.
With the widespread popularity of the Natural Horsemanship movement as well as the rising interest in colt starting competitions like Road to the Horse, many folks consider the ultimate goal to be to start a horse themselves and train it from the ground up. I admit to being one of these. I really want to someday take one of my home grown colts, do all the groundwork myself and then through diligent training take it clear from jaquima a freno sticking as close as possible to the traditions of the viejos. With luck and a lot of hard work, I may still get that accomplished in my lifetime.
The natural horsemanship movement has done a lot of wonderful things for horses and owners in the past 25 years. Unfortunately one of the things that it has done that has not been entirely helpful for horses in general is to perpetuate the notion that anybody and everybody can start their own horse with the help of the right set of DVD's. I don't believe this is true. Just like not every parent is cut out to be a teacher just because they have kids, not every horse owner is cut out to be a colt starter just because they have young horses. Starting horses or kids off on the right foot with the right foundation is a very special skill set.
Dan and I have now gone through the process of starting several of our own horses with fairly good results. We have had pretty easy horses for the most part that make our jobs easy and make us look good. With the right kind of horse, anybody can experience a degree of success. But what happens when you get that horse that doesn't necessarily play by the rules?
My young black Morgan didn't play by the rules. I've owned Kit since he was a weanling and have known him since he was a day old. I have tried to raise him the same way I had all of my other young horses, hopefully avoiding mistakes I had made with any of them. As a weanling I took him on hikes around the property, exposing him to as many things as I could think of. As a yearling I started some basic groundwork in the round pen and then continued that over the winter before he turned two. I started him under saddle as a long 2 year old and with the exception of the first 10 days of bucking with the saddle every day he did really pretty well. If anything I was afraid he was dull and lazy with a tendency to buck a little when he was bored. I gave him the winter off and expected his 3 year old year to put him back to work and start his journey to my ultimate bridle horse.
Then he bucked me off.
Ray Hunt has always said you need to know what happened before what happened happened in order to understand what happened and I will freely admit to having no friggin' clue. We were trotting along on a nice loose rein when out of the blue (at least as far as I could tell) he came unglued. I'm not talking about jumping sideways a step or two or taking a few good natured leaps. I'm talking about full on grunting, head between the knees Pendleton Round-Up old time bronco busting poster child. I got right back on him, like a good kid, and figured maybe I should go back to more round pen work. He was tight in the round pen and I was afraid of getting pitched as spectacularly as he had pitched me in the arena. After all, I am not a trainer (I believe I've mentioned this) and I need my body functioning in order to do the things I need to do to make enough money to buy these horses hay. He pitched me off in June and it took me until August with a handful of rather tentative rides on him (he didn't buck again, just felt like he might) to realize it was time for me to call for back up.
It was a hard thing for me to do. I'm stubborn, sometimes to my own detriment, and giving up on this horse and admitting that I was afraid to go further with him was a difficult thing. But, I had to admit that after several months of dinking around with him I was going backwards and not forward. I was afraid of getting hurt and it was transmitting to him and he was getting more and more nervous.
Dan and I chose Jon Ensign to help us get past where we were stuck. Dan and a 2 year old mare that he wanted started and he helped convince me that getting Kit to Jon was the best course of action.
Oh my gosh, I am so glad I did! Jon reports that he didn't have any trouble with him which bruised my ego only slightly but otherwise reassured me that I had a good horse that needed expert help. Luckily I hadn't created a monster with my dinking around. Once he had somebody who was confident to let him move forward and trusted him not to come unglued he became a solid citizen. Jon put 30 days of training on him and exposed him to ropes, cows, water, and all the things that we would have done over the next 6 months. I am so much further along in my training with him and now I have complete confidence in him and he in me. We can go forward from here and refine and shape and work on the things that I would like to do with this colt in the future.
No, I didn't start this one all by myself. I had some help. I'll try and start the next one on my own but if I run into a snag or feel at all intimidated I am turning to the folks that do this for a living. I have to tell myself that it is no different than when a competent and well respected horseman asks me to give their horse an IV shot because it makes them nervous. Of course they should have me do it, it's what I do. Having a confident and accomplished colt starter help you with your colt is not selling out (I had to tell myself this over and over) it's making the best decision for your horse to become a solid citizen. Money and time spent on training is never wasted. Like any investment into education, the money is well spent.
So, the moral of this story and my step along my journey is to know and understand your own limitations and weaknesses. It's good to have realistic goals and to work hard at learning and expanding your comfort zone. It's also good to know when you are in too deep and need some help. Calling for back up in the interest of not only saving your own skull but assuring the continued success of your horse is an important part of being your horse's advocate. I now have a much better understanding of that.
Monday, September 22, 2014
Practically Perfect Isn't Perfect At All
Chico is a wonderful, magnificent, gregarious horse with an amazingly engaging mind. We have a true connection like old friends. I've had Chico since he was a very green 3 year old and have put all of the training past his first 60 days myself. I've come quite a long way since I started trying to figure out how to finish a horse. Chico was the first horse I had to finish on my own and honestly, though I have been riding since I was 8, I didn't really know how to go about it. So, I started muddling and trying things and feeling my way along. Every bad habit that Chico has is thoroughly my fault. He has a brace on his left side thanks to my tendency to bend him more to the right. He walks off when mounting often because I trust him and don't make him stand still like I should. I've ridden him in every conceivable bit, bosal and contraption and tried almost every discipline with him trying to decide both where I wanted to go as a rider and where he should go as a horse.
What I've created is a pretty brave, quiet, fairly broke horse with some well ingrained quirks that I just put up with in him that I would have NEVER allowed in my hackamore horse. While I can ride Chico in the bosal and have attempted to "restart" him that way he will NEVER be a true bridle horse in the traditional vaquero way. He's never quite figured out responding to signal but is pretty light just off pressure most of the time.
This past weekend I had the opportunity to ride in a Cowboy Dressage clinic with Dale Partee. It was a great weekend to spend with Chico and I looked forward to the opportunity to spend time both with my best bud and all my good girl friends as well. Cowboy Dressage is wonderful for many reasons, but the true Jack Palance "one thing" (A City Slickers reference, I'm sure many of you will get it) that I took away from this past weekend was to hold myself and my horse accountable. Cowboy Dressage is an exacting discipline. Because you are riding straight lines and circles on a fairly small court accuracy and timing is a must. We've been riding on the cowboy dressage court for two summers, playing in the dirt as it were. But this weekend "sorta" round and "sorta" straight and "almost right" wasn't good enough. Dale was so good about making sure we did it again and again until we got it right.
And you know what? Chico can do it. Even if he's wiggly sometimes and opinionated and not always perfectly bent around my leg, if I don't accept that as the answer and continue until he has it right, viola!, there it is! I'm so in the habit of close is good enough with Chico because of all of the mediocre training we've done that I've created a mediocre horse. But, he doesn't have to be that way. I can raise the expectations for both Chico and myself and he will rise to the occasion.
I don't really have a good reason for why Chico has always been allowed such leniency in our training while I was so strict with Moony. Perhaps it's because I was too close to him or felt unsure with what I was asking. The good news is that that can change. I don't have to "retrain" him, all I have to do is ask for precision. He knows dang good and well what I am asking. He knows how he is to respond. What he doesn't know is that "meh" isn't enough. Dale reminded us of a quote she picked up from Buck Brannaman that I will have to paraphrase here because I didn't have a pen. Don't ride your horse the way he was or the way he is. Ride him the way you want him to be.
The vaquero journey and Cowboy Dressage are natural partners. Even though the traditional vaquero never had a need to ride patterns in an arena, the tradition of horsemanship, soft feel, and taking your time to make things perfect are all the essence of both the vaquero tradition and Cowboy Dressage. The vaqueros didn't just strive for pretty dog gone good, they wanted perfection and precision in their cues creating a trigger fire like response in their bridle horses. A good vaquero will communicate with his horse so subtly that you will never see what he is asking. You don't get that level of precision with "sorta" right answers. You get that with striving for perfection every single time you ask your horse to do something. The vaqueros used cattle to train their horses in percision. I'm using the Cowboy Dressage court.
You know, when you really think about it, it's a good motto for life as well. Don't live your life the way it was, or the way it is, but live your life they way you want it to be. Strive for perfection in all things and with grace and a good heaping of try perfection can begin to happen.
A moment of perfection from this past weekend.
Thursday, July 17, 2014
Mountains and Leads: Ramblings and Musings.
Author's note: This blog post could be titled, "How I Spent My Summer Vacation". This post more than any other I've posted recently is the ramblings of my brain attempting to understand some nuance of horsemanship. I hope it encourages you to explore with your own horse. I think I'm on the right track here in my thinking and reasoning, but it's entirely possible I'm completely off base too! Read at your own risk! -jlg
There is nothing like spending 10 hours on your horse to really get your mind and body in tune with the natural rhythms and balance of your horse's movement. Every summer we take a week long trip to the Montana high country and spend a glorious week at 9,000+ feet elevation taking in the splendor that is God's country. We typically put in 12-24 miles/day depending on the terrain and the day. It's not terribly difficult riding, some rocky ledges, some switch backs, some water crossings. Mostly it's just a horseback tour through some amazing mountains looking at wildlife and taking in the grandeur.
This year we had a horse along on the ride that was being ponied each day without a saddle. I ended up directly behind this horse on the trail on numerous occasions and it offered me a unique opportunity to really study the way the horse's back moves as it carries itself without interference of tack or rider on some of the rugged terrain. Watching the arc through the neck, rib cage, back and hips as that horse navigated a switch back made me better able to visualize what was happening under the leather of my saddle and how my weight in the saddle might affect my horse's natural movement. Horses are such amazingly athletic and graceful animals. They flow naturally like a ballerina, carrying themselves in perfect balance for a rounded back, stepping up and underneath themselves in the turn, carrying the head at the most natural and comfortable and efficient place for balanced movement. Naturally, movement down a mountain trail does not require feats of advanced horsemanship and extreme collection, but with changes in the terrain, the horse must adjust how he carries his body.
As I was watching this riderless horse ahead of me and trying to better feel what my horse was doing below me, I, for the very first time, felt my horse's leads at the walk. It's been quite a few years since I first heard Buck Brannaman talk about the leads in the horse at the walk at one of his clinics. I thought the man was spouting mystical out of reach horsemanship principles that yahoos like me could never appreciate. Heck, 4 years ago I still couldn't even consistently get my canter leads on my gelding, now I had to worry about leads in the walk and trot? No thank you!
But, watching that horse and appreciating the feel of my own horse I was able to finally feel and influence the leads on my horse at the walk on those high mountain trails. Buster McLaury introduced us to encouraging a walk with purpose in our horses. Having a forward moving horse, like our Morgans, makes that a simple task. We don't have to work very hard to get that good forward movement. I think until you have a very forward walk there is no lead at that gait. Movement with purpose on a free walk appears to create a walking gait that causes the horse's hips to travel just a fraction inside or outside of the movement of the horse, much like the hips will shift slightly in a the lead in the canter. While I wasn't able to scientifically measure my horse's gait as we were traveling along, I could feel my hips shifting either left or right with his lead. To begin with, I noticed this the most while ascending a series of switchbacks.
My gelding is very right lead dominate. It took me almost until he was 7 before I could consistently get a left lead at the canter and it required extreme acrobatics. If he has his choice, even today, irrespective of direction of travel, he will choose his right lead. So, I wasn't too surprised to appreciate that same preference at the walk. What was interesting was to feel him shift his weight and change leads as we entered into the switch back for a left hand turn. He would travel along on the left lead on the next straight stretch for a little while before preferentially switching back to his right lead.
Dan was traveling behind me during this phase of our trip and I mentioned to him what I was feeling and he could watch from behind as I could feel him switch his leads and surprisingly it was fairly easy for him to see in just watching my gelding's hips. And, as I watched the horse in front of me who I would have expected to be a fairly straight traveler I could appreciate by watching his back and hips that he would switch leads from time to time at the walk as well.
Then I started to experiment with influencing that lead in the walk by my body position and seat. Much like cuing for a lead change in the canter I shifted my feet and hips to change leads at the walk. If I stayed in rhythm with my horse and didn't interfere with his rhythm he switched leads fairly easily, though I couldn't get him to "counter walk" in the wrong lead around a switch back. He's too seasoned a mountain horse for that! Interestingly enough when I got out of rhythm and just tried to "force" the lead change by actually cuing, rather than just pushing my body weight over he ignored me. A narrow mountain trail isn't exactly the best place for experiments in lateral movements but it is a great place for developing feel.
So, as cool as leads at the walk may or may not be to the casual observer, what does this have to do with developing advanced horsemanship? Everything!
The leads at the walk are the horse's natural ability to orientate his body for the execution of lateral movements such as shoulder in/out, haunches in/out, and leg yields. When a horse is walking in a lead the hind end is tracking on just a slightly different track than the front end. Have you watched a dog trot down the road? As the dog is trotting down the road he will move his hind end over just a bit so that he doesn't step on himself. They reach so far underneath themselves in their trot that they have to have a leading side. The horse in "natural" extension will do this as well and we can use it to help teach ourselves and our horse's the beginning of lateral movement. If you can learn to move with your horse so that the horse feels your body and reads it just as you are feeling his body and reading him he will pick up the nuances of changing body position. If you over cue, exaggerate your body position or force your body position your horse will learn to ignore that making it that much more difficult to teach leads on the horse at any gait. I mastered the forcing and exaggeration for poor lead departure about 4 years ago while attempting to teach my gelding his left lead. Forcing a maneuver on your horse through exaggerated cue or body position doesn't work. When you find yourself doing this (we all do from time to time) you should hear Buck's voice in your head saying, "Do less, not more".
Extrapolating even further, I think this is why teaching straightness should be one of the first places that you start with a horse. I think the horse's tendency toward's having leads and his natural ability to create arc and bend through his body is well established in his natural movement. Straightness, however is not natural. Teaching the horse to hold himself equal and level with straight and even movement through both sides of his body is harder, I believe, for the horse than creating a bend on a curve. It's like us learning how to walk with good posture. It's not natural and takes some work to get good at it and most of us will go right back to slouching first chance we get.
I have always started my young colts with lots and lots of bending, circles, flexing and yielding of the hindquarters and have ignored teaching straightness until I felt I had them very "bendy". Then I have fought the bendyness trying to create straightness. This leads to trying to "lift" a diving shoulder or make the rib cage bend appropriately around your leg. If the horse can already carry himself straight, those body parts shouldn't fall out of alignment. I think both are incredibly important, but I'm wondering now if I have over emphasized the bendyness and ignored the straightness to my horse's detriment.
The old vaqueros didn't worry about all of this bend in their horses. They rode a straighter more classical horse. They didn't do flexing, arcing or breaking down of the body parts individually like we tend to see in today's training programs. Perhaps we have gotten away from helping the horse be straight in our western performance training. Anybody who watches the contortion act a reining horse will go through before a lead departure knows that "bend is in!"
I think in the next colt I will concentrate more on straightness earlier in his training. It should create a whole host of new problems for me to tackle! This is why there are no young master horseman. It takes a full life time to get this stuff figured out!
There is nothing like spending 10 hours on your horse to really get your mind and body in tune with the natural rhythms and balance of your horse's movement. Every summer we take a week long trip to the Montana high country and spend a glorious week at 9,000+ feet elevation taking in the splendor that is God's country. We typically put in 12-24 miles/day depending on the terrain and the day. It's not terribly difficult riding, some rocky ledges, some switch backs, some water crossings. Mostly it's just a horseback tour through some amazing mountains looking at wildlife and taking in the grandeur.
This year we had a horse along on the ride that was being ponied each day without a saddle. I ended up directly behind this horse on the trail on numerous occasions and it offered me a unique opportunity to really study the way the horse's back moves as it carries itself without interference of tack or rider on some of the rugged terrain. Watching the arc through the neck, rib cage, back and hips as that horse navigated a switch back made me better able to visualize what was happening under the leather of my saddle and how my weight in the saddle might affect my horse's natural movement. Horses are such amazingly athletic and graceful animals. They flow naturally like a ballerina, carrying themselves in perfect balance for a rounded back, stepping up and underneath themselves in the turn, carrying the head at the most natural and comfortable and efficient place for balanced movement. Naturally, movement down a mountain trail does not require feats of advanced horsemanship and extreme collection, but with changes in the terrain, the horse must adjust how he carries his body.
As I was watching this riderless horse ahead of me and trying to better feel what my horse was doing below me, I, for the very first time, felt my horse's leads at the walk. It's been quite a few years since I first heard Buck Brannaman talk about the leads in the horse at the walk at one of his clinics. I thought the man was spouting mystical out of reach horsemanship principles that yahoos like me could never appreciate. Heck, 4 years ago I still couldn't even consistently get my canter leads on my gelding, now I had to worry about leads in the walk and trot? No thank you!
But, watching that horse and appreciating the feel of my own horse I was able to finally feel and influence the leads on my horse at the walk on those high mountain trails. Buster McLaury introduced us to encouraging a walk with purpose in our horses. Having a forward moving horse, like our Morgans, makes that a simple task. We don't have to work very hard to get that good forward movement. I think until you have a very forward walk there is no lead at that gait. Movement with purpose on a free walk appears to create a walking gait that causes the horse's hips to travel just a fraction inside or outside of the movement of the horse, much like the hips will shift slightly in a the lead in the canter. While I wasn't able to scientifically measure my horse's gait as we were traveling along, I could feel my hips shifting either left or right with his lead. To begin with, I noticed this the most while ascending a series of switchbacks.
My gelding is very right lead dominate. It took me almost until he was 7 before I could consistently get a left lead at the canter and it required extreme acrobatics. If he has his choice, even today, irrespective of direction of travel, he will choose his right lead. So, I wasn't too surprised to appreciate that same preference at the walk. What was interesting was to feel him shift his weight and change leads as we entered into the switch back for a left hand turn. He would travel along on the left lead on the next straight stretch for a little while before preferentially switching back to his right lead.
Dan was traveling behind me during this phase of our trip and I mentioned to him what I was feeling and he could watch from behind as I could feel him switch his leads and surprisingly it was fairly easy for him to see in just watching my gelding's hips. And, as I watched the horse in front of me who I would have expected to be a fairly straight traveler I could appreciate by watching his back and hips that he would switch leads from time to time at the walk as well.
Then I started to experiment with influencing that lead in the walk by my body position and seat. Much like cuing for a lead change in the canter I shifted my feet and hips to change leads at the walk. If I stayed in rhythm with my horse and didn't interfere with his rhythm he switched leads fairly easily, though I couldn't get him to "counter walk" in the wrong lead around a switch back. He's too seasoned a mountain horse for that! Interestingly enough when I got out of rhythm and just tried to "force" the lead change by actually cuing, rather than just pushing my body weight over he ignored me. A narrow mountain trail isn't exactly the best place for experiments in lateral movements but it is a great place for developing feel.
So, as cool as leads at the walk may or may not be to the casual observer, what does this have to do with developing advanced horsemanship? Everything!
The leads at the walk are the horse's natural ability to orientate his body for the execution of lateral movements such as shoulder in/out, haunches in/out, and leg yields. When a horse is walking in a lead the hind end is tracking on just a slightly different track than the front end. Have you watched a dog trot down the road? As the dog is trotting down the road he will move his hind end over just a bit so that he doesn't step on himself. They reach so far underneath themselves in their trot that they have to have a leading side. The horse in "natural" extension will do this as well and we can use it to help teach ourselves and our horse's the beginning of lateral movement. If you can learn to move with your horse so that the horse feels your body and reads it just as you are feeling his body and reading him he will pick up the nuances of changing body position. If you over cue, exaggerate your body position or force your body position your horse will learn to ignore that making it that much more difficult to teach leads on the horse at any gait. I mastered the forcing and exaggeration for poor lead departure about 4 years ago while attempting to teach my gelding his left lead. Forcing a maneuver on your horse through exaggerated cue or body position doesn't work. When you find yourself doing this (we all do from time to time) you should hear Buck's voice in your head saying, "Do less, not more".
Extrapolating even further, I think this is why teaching straightness should be one of the first places that you start with a horse. I think the horse's tendency toward's having leads and his natural ability to create arc and bend through his body is well established in his natural movement. Straightness, however is not natural. Teaching the horse to hold himself equal and level with straight and even movement through both sides of his body is harder, I believe, for the horse than creating a bend on a curve. It's like us learning how to walk with good posture. It's not natural and takes some work to get good at it and most of us will go right back to slouching first chance we get.
I have always started my young colts with lots and lots of bending, circles, flexing and yielding of the hindquarters and have ignored teaching straightness until I felt I had them very "bendy". Then I have fought the bendyness trying to create straightness. This leads to trying to "lift" a diving shoulder or make the rib cage bend appropriately around your leg. If the horse can already carry himself straight, those body parts shouldn't fall out of alignment. I think both are incredibly important, but I'm wondering now if I have over emphasized the bendyness and ignored the straightness to my horse's detriment.
The old vaqueros didn't worry about all of this bend in their horses. They rode a straighter more classical horse. They didn't do flexing, arcing or breaking down of the body parts individually like we tend to see in today's training programs. Perhaps we have gotten away from helping the horse be straight in our western performance training. Anybody who watches the contortion act a reining horse will go through before a lead departure knows that "bend is in!"
I think in the next colt I will concentrate more on straightness earlier in his training. It should create a whole host of new problems for me to tackle! This is why there are no young master horseman. It takes a full life time to get this stuff figured out!
Wednesday, June 11, 2014
In the Moment
On our recent trip I had the opportunity while on the plane to read Tom Dorrance's True Unity. I'm almost embarrassed to say this was my first read through this excellent book. I've read plenty of excerpts and quotes and am familiar with Tom's teachings, but until recently had not had a copy to hand to peruse at my leisure. If you consider yourself a student of horsemanship and haven't had the pleasure of reading this book, I encourage you to get yourself a copy. You'll need a pen or highlighter while you read because the pearls of wisdom are many and like any inspirational piece of work there will be snippets that speak to where you are with your horse today. For me, the reoccurring theme that I kept hearing over and over again in the book from both Tom and the stories included from his students was "be in the moment".
Tom was unique in his ability to be in the moment. He was an astute observer and intuitive reader of both equine and human natures. There are many, many stories of Tom noticing just a small change in either horse or rider that translated to big changes or happenings when put into the big picture. A dropped ear, tightened eye, lifted tail, or tense mouth spoke volumes to Tom. With these slight reads on the horse he was able to "read the horse's mind".
Dr. Robert Miller spoke at length on the perceptiveness of the horse at Light Hands Horsemanship recently. These animals are so good at reading body language of herd mates as well as other species both predator and prey that they seem to have a heightened sense of their surroundings. A horse is sensitive enough to feel the elevated heart rate of it's rider through the leather of the saddle. And we as, highly evolved, intelligent beings believe we can fool a horse by hiding the halter behind our backs when we go to catch them.
I think Tom had some of this highly evolved perceptiveness and I think it's one of the things that made him such a great horseman. He was incredibly adept at reading the horse and being in the moment with the horse so that he could feel the horse's intentions before the action occurred. He and Ray would often ask their students of horsemanship, "what happened before what happened happened?" While incredibly frustrating for the budding horseman, this is the crux of being in the moment with your horse.
How often does your horse do something, "out of the blue"? Your answer is probably, "All the time!" but, I'm willing to bet that in reality it is quite infrequently. While the horse's highly developed sense of flight of fight does lead to sudden bursts of activity preempted by seemingly insignificant occurrences, many times the horse will be quite explicit in it's intended reaction before it happens.
A perfect example of this happened to me the other day during a routine visit with one of my patients. Of course I've had Tom on my mind and have been in mulling mode since reading through True Unity but being a fallible human, I need lessons drilled into my head repeatedly. I don't learn nearly as quickly as does the horse. On this day I was preparing to sedate a horse for a float. This is a relatively quiet older mare that I have floated at least once before though it has been awhile. She was quietly led up to me for the procedure. As I approached the mare I was busy chatting with the client and watching out of the corner of my eye as their Labrador sniffed the tires of the vet truck exchanging pleasantries with our dogs in the truck. I patted the mare on the neck, noticing as I did that she was a little tense, but proceeded to prepare to give her an IV injection. As the needle touched the horse's skin she exploded "out of the blue". She snorted, reared, flew backwards and looked at me like I was every bit the lion for which I had acted.
After the horse reacted I felt like the worlds biggest fool. Suddenly all the other things going on faded away and I looked at my patient standing there with stiff neck, high head, white eyes and tight lips. She had been standing just that way when I approached he with the needle as well. She told me in no uncertain terms that she WAS NOT READY for her injection. If I had taken a moment to calm her down and talk to her until her heart rate dropped and head and jaw relaxed I may not have had the same reaction to the injection. It probably would have taken me 2 or 3 minutes to reassure her. Instead I spent 10 minutes talking calmly while she danced around in no mood for second chances. If I had been in the moment with my patient at the time I could have avoided the whole incident.
It is hard for me to be in the moment at any time in my life. I am a very accomplished and proud multi-tasker. I have an active mind, always going and churning through any 5-10 things at one time. I used to think this was an attribute, but I think this trait is actually why sometimes things slip through the cracks. Instead of completely doing one task at a time I have 10 irons in the fire and none of them are heating evenly. I'm guessing that Tom Dorrance was not a multi-tasker. I am imagining that when we was doing something, whether it was braiding, riding, teaching, or listening to a student, that was ALL that he was doing. I believe that is why he was able to observe so much about the person, horse or situation. How many times am I in a situation where I am not totally there? I'd have to say it's more often than not, actually. I may be talking to you and I might appear to be listening, but I bet in my brain I'm thinking about the next appointment, my list of diagnosis and possible treatment plan already.
Part of this problem is my personality. Part of this problem is my job. But, the solution lies only within me. I used to spend an awful lot of my time in the saddle with my phone in my ear. It wasn't by choice, it was necessity, but how can I effectively communicate with my horse while talking about a sick animal in the next county? How can I effectively give veterinary advice while I'm trying to give muddled cues to my horse? I can't do either, I'm willing to admit.
So, along with all the other goals in my horsemanship journey, I have made being in the moment one of my top priorities. I'm hoping to carry it over to my job and other aspects of my life to the best of my ability. The few times that I believe I have managed to be thoroughly in the moment in the past week have been very rewarding, making interactions richer and memories brighter.
Giving up multi-tasking may prove to be more difficult than giving up chocolate or caffeine, but I think it's just as good for me. I'm going to do my best to be in the moment in each and every thing that I do in my business, personal life, and horsemanship life. Simplify to edify. The journey continues.
Tom was unique in his ability to be in the moment. He was an astute observer and intuitive reader of both equine and human natures. There are many, many stories of Tom noticing just a small change in either horse or rider that translated to big changes or happenings when put into the big picture. A dropped ear, tightened eye, lifted tail, or tense mouth spoke volumes to Tom. With these slight reads on the horse he was able to "read the horse's mind".
Dr. Robert Miller spoke at length on the perceptiveness of the horse at Light Hands Horsemanship recently. These animals are so good at reading body language of herd mates as well as other species both predator and prey that they seem to have a heightened sense of their surroundings. A horse is sensitive enough to feel the elevated heart rate of it's rider through the leather of the saddle. And we as, highly evolved, intelligent beings believe we can fool a horse by hiding the halter behind our backs when we go to catch them.
I think Tom had some of this highly evolved perceptiveness and I think it's one of the things that made him such a great horseman. He was incredibly adept at reading the horse and being in the moment with the horse so that he could feel the horse's intentions before the action occurred. He and Ray would often ask their students of horsemanship, "what happened before what happened happened?" While incredibly frustrating for the budding horseman, this is the crux of being in the moment with your horse.
How often does your horse do something, "out of the blue"? Your answer is probably, "All the time!" but, I'm willing to bet that in reality it is quite infrequently. While the horse's highly developed sense of flight of fight does lead to sudden bursts of activity preempted by seemingly insignificant occurrences, many times the horse will be quite explicit in it's intended reaction before it happens.
A perfect example of this happened to me the other day during a routine visit with one of my patients. Of course I've had Tom on my mind and have been in mulling mode since reading through True Unity but being a fallible human, I need lessons drilled into my head repeatedly. I don't learn nearly as quickly as does the horse. On this day I was preparing to sedate a horse for a float. This is a relatively quiet older mare that I have floated at least once before though it has been awhile. She was quietly led up to me for the procedure. As I approached the mare I was busy chatting with the client and watching out of the corner of my eye as their Labrador sniffed the tires of the vet truck exchanging pleasantries with our dogs in the truck. I patted the mare on the neck, noticing as I did that she was a little tense, but proceeded to prepare to give her an IV injection. As the needle touched the horse's skin she exploded "out of the blue". She snorted, reared, flew backwards and looked at me like I was every bit the lion for which I had acted.
After the horse reacted I felt like the worlds biggest fool. Suddenly all the other things going on faded away and I looked at my patient standing there with stiff neck, high head, white eyes and tight lips. She had been standing just that way when I approached he with the needle as well. She told me in no uncertain terms that she WAS NOT READY for her injection. If I had taken a moment to calm her down and talk to her until her heart rate dropped and head and jaw relaxed I may not have had the same reaction to the injection. It probably would have taken me 2 or 3 minutes to reassure her. Instead I spent 10 minutes talking calmly while she danced around in no mood for second chances. If I had been in the moment with my patient at the time I could have avoided the whole incident.
It is hard for me to be in the moment at any time in my life. I am a very accomplished and proud multi-tasker. I have an active mind, always going and churning through any 5-10 things at one time. I used to think this was an attribute, but I think this trait is actually why sometimes things slip through the cracks. Instead of completely doing one task at a time I have 10 irons in the fire and none of them are heating evenly. I'm guessing that Tom Dorrance was not a multi-tasker. I am imagining that when we was doing something, whether it was braiding, riding, teaching, or listening to a student, that was ALL that he was doing. I believe that is why he was able to observe so much about the person, horse or situation. How many times am I in a situation where I am not totally there? I'd have to say it's more often than not, actually. I may be talking to you and I might appear to be listening, but I bet in my brain I'm thinking about the next appointment, my list of diagnosis and possible treatment plan already.
Part of this problem is my personality. Part of this problem is my job. But, the solution lies only within me. I used to spend an awful lot of my time in the saddle with my phone in my ear. It wasn't by choice, it was necessity, but how can I effectively communicate with my horse while talking about a sick animal in the next county? How can I effectively give veterinary advice while I'm trying to give muddled cues to my horse? I can't do either, I'm willing to admit.
So, along with all the other goals in my horsemanship journey, I have made being in the moment one of my top priorities. I'm hoping to carry it over to my job and other aspects of my life to the best of my ability. The few times that I believe I have managed to be thoroughly in the moment in the past week have been very rewarding, making interactions richer and memories brighter.
Giving up multi-tasking may prove to be more difficult than giving up chocolate or caffeine, but I think it's just as good for me. I'm going to do my best to be in the moment in each and every thing that I do in my business, personal life, and horsemanship life. Simplify to edify. The journey continues.
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