Gia - session 107 - back to lunging on a line
My round pen is temporarily unavailable, due to a new horse occupying it while he remains quarantined. (I quarantine all new horses that come into my farm for 2 weeks, just to be safe). So, I worked with Gia on the same things she did last Friday, but on the lunge line in the arena, rather than free in the round pen.
We did the same routine - 2 minutes of walk and stretch, 5 minutes of walk/trot transitions with incrementally increasing moments of stretch, 2 minutes of trot/canter transitions with one moment of stretch per canter, then a 2 minute walk break and repeat it all on the other side.
She did super with everything, except for the canter transitions. She definitely gave me more attitude when I asked her to canter today than she did on Friday. Her "attitude" today only consisted of pinning her ears, but that is still unacceptable behavior. Every time she behaved inappropriately, I charged at her, stomping my feet and waving the whip - going back to the idea that when a horse behaves inappropriately, you should make them go away from you. It's a little tough to do when they are on a lunge line, but we made it work. As I chased her away, I would let the rope get longer so that she could escape away from me. As soon as she escaped humbly, I would let up and go back to normal. It usually only took a few seconds, and it only took a couple of reminders in each direction for her to behave correctly.
I will include a video of one of her trot sets when I post this blog. The video gives you an example of what I am doing with her at the trot. It includes the up transition to the trot, then each time I say "good" is what I am counting as a "stretch moment", then a down transition to the walk, and I repeat it one more time so that you can see that I am adding one more "stretch moment" in the next trot set. Feel free to let me know if you have any questions about our routine!
Other than that, Gia's session was pretty uneventful. I briefly thought about riding, but it was a bit windy, and she could use more time on the lunge to get back in shape, so I will hold off on that for another day.
We did the same routine - 2 minutes of walk and stretch, 5 minutes of walk/trot transitions with incrementally increasing moments of stretch, 2 minutes of trot/canter transitions with one moment of stretch per canter, then a 2 minute walk break and repeat it all on the other side.
She did super with everything, except for the canter transitions. She definitely gave me more attitude when I asked her to canter today than she did on Friday. Her "attitude" today only consisted of pinning her ears, but that is still unacceptable behavior. Every time she behaved inappropriately, I charged at her, stomping my feet and waving the whip - going back to the idea that when a horse behaves inappropriately, you should make them go away from you. It's a little tough to do when they are on a lunge line, but we made it work. As I chased her away, I would let the rope get longer so that she could escape away from me. As soon as she escaped humbly, I would let up and go back to normal. It usually only took a few seconds, and it only took a couple of reminders in each direction for her to behave correctly.
I will include a video of one of her trot sets when I post this blog. The video gives you an example of what I am doing with her at the trot. It includes the up transition to the trot, then each time I say "good" is what I am counting as a "stretch moment", then a down transition to the walk, and I repeat it one more time so that you can see that I am adding one more "stretch moment" in the next trot set. Feel free to let me know if you have any questions about our routine!
Other than that, Gia's session was pretty uneventful. I briefly thought about riding, but it was a bit windy, and she could use more time on the lunge to get back in shape, so I will hold off on that for another day.
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