Gia - sessions 139 and 140 - another outing and more jumping
Yesterday was a bit busy, so I didn't have a chance to write about Gia's adventures.
I took her to CDP stables again. Her trailering was perfect, she even pulled me towards it when I went to load her in the morning. One more good one, and then we get to try shipping boots! You'll definitely want to check out that post!
I put her on the walker while I rode Butch.
While I was getting her ready, I tied her to the trailer, almost properly. She could have cared less. The only thing she wanted was to be able to reach the yummy grass underfoot.
Lunging went pretty well. Since her cut is just above her hocks, (she was still sound yesterday, by the way), I did not want to use the Pessoa, which rests just above her hocks. So, I just passed the lunge line through the bit and attached it to the girth to allow for a little leverage to encourage her to stretch while she moved forward. She was a bit grumpy about being asked to move forward, even at the trot, so I did a lot of transitions with her until she had a better attitude.
Under saddle, she was about the same as last time at first. She was a little nervous, but not too bad, and we started with a lot of stretching circles, all over the arena and around the jumps. When that felt better, I asked for trot, and we did the same thing. That also went fairly well, until I started to move her out towards the rail for some shoulder-in and diagonal work. She was quite nervous at one end about the shadows, cars, farrier truck and hammering, gazebo, and the farrier's large black lab. At the other end, she was even more terrified of a very small Jack Russel, who was probably 20 feet outside the arena. Despite a ton of circles, I couldn't ever get her very close to either end. In fact, she got so upset by the littlest dog, that she felt like she wanted to bolt across the arena. I had to work on getting her to lower her head and neck and relax. When I finally got her to focus on me again, I praised her big time! I went for a few more moments where I was able to get her to lower her head and neck, praising her each time, and then I ended our session there. We didn't accomplish as much as I had hoped, but I need to remember that it was only her second time ever being ridden in that arena, and she is only 4. In time, this will all definitely get better.
Before I took her back to the trailer to untack her, I walked her to the least scary of the two scary ends of the arena, and we just hung out together. She felt a lot more relaxed after that. I plan to start with that next time!
As for today, I warmed her up with all of the same things I have been doing.
She was a bit fussy about her up transitions to the trot. I had to use a lot of circles to encourage her to lower her head and neck before each transition.
Once that was better, I put her over the trot poles to the X. She was fairly good with that today. She did try to duck out of it a couple of times, but we were able to get several nice passes, with the correct speed and straightness.
I took her to CDP stables again. Her trailering was perfect, she even pulled me towards it when I went to load her in the morning. One more good one, and then we get to try shipping boots! You'll definitely want to check out that post!
I put her on the walker while I rode Butch.
While I was getting her ready, I tied her to the trailer, almost properly. She could have cared less. The only thing she wanted was to be able to reach the yummy grass underfoot.
Lunging went pretty well. Since her cut is just above her hocks, (she was still sound yesterday, by the way), I did not want to use the Pessoa, which rests just above her hocks. So, I just passed the lunge line through the bit and attached it to the girth to allow for a little leverage to encourage her to stretch while she moved forward. She was a bit grumpy about being asked to move forward, even at the trot, so I did a lot of transitions with her until she had a better attitude.
Under saddle, she was about the same as last time at first. She was a little nervous, but not too bad, and we started with a lot of stretching circles, all over the arena and around the jumps. When that felt better, I asked for trot, and we did the same thing. That also went fairly well, until I started to move her out towards the rail for some shoulder-in and diagonal work. She was quite nervous at one end about the shadows, cars, farrier truck and hammering, gazebo, and the farrier's large black lab. At the other end, she was even more terrified of a very small Jack Russel, who was probably 20 feet outside the arena. Despite a ton of circles, I couldn't ever get her very close to either end. In fact, she got so upset by the littlest dog, that she felt like she wanted to bolt across the arena. I had to work on getting her to lower her head and neck and relax. When I finally got her to focus on me again, I praised her big time! I went for a few more moments where I was able to get her to lower her head and neck, praising her each time, and then I ended our session there. We didn't accomplish as much as I had hoped, but I need to remember that it was only her second time ever being ridden in that arena, and she is only 4. In time, this will all definitely get better.
Before I took her back to the trailer to untack her, I walked her to the least scary of the two scary ends of the arena, and we just hung out together. She felt a lot more relaxed after that. I plan to start with that next time!
As for today, I warmed her up with all of the same things I have been doing.
She was a bit fussy about her up transitions to the trot. I had to use a lot of circles to encourage her to lower her head and neck before each transition.
Once that was better, I put her over the trot poles to the X. She was fairly good with that today. She did try to duck out of it a couple of times, but we were able to get several nice passes, with the correct speed and straightness.
Comments
Post a Comment