Spirit has groupies!
Aug. 5th, 2010 06:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ar_wahanI went by the barn Tuesday and Wednesday to start "playing" with Spirit on the ground. Colleen showed me how to use the rope halter and very long lead rope to use positioning of a "guide hand" (holding the rope some distance from his halter) and a "driving hand" (holding the rope near the free end) to signal Spirit to back up, stop (she'd already taught me this very early on in his stay there), not come any closer when he tries to approach me, and circle me in one direction and then another. Also to "bump" the rope to get his attention. (Need to learn more about this last one.) This was in the indoor arena, with a group of little girls watching. The girls are "campers" who take riding lessons, learn other things on the ground themselves from Colleen (parts of a horse, different bits, etc.), and have the "pleasure" of helping clean the stable. (Sound a bit like Crimson Acres, Samurai?)
I felt a bit foolish on Tuesday, since it took me a while to "get" some of the positions of my body and hands, and to drop the rope in the drive hand and switch so the drive hand becomes the guide hand to turn him in the other direction. Too much like having to walk and chew gum at the same time! Spirit was sometimes confused, but it was because of me, not him.
Later that day I unloaded the pieces of the futon frame Samurai and I had miraculously managed to cram into my Prius in Boston (a post on the rest of our Cape Cod trip some other time). In carrying the largest pieces around from the driveway to the basement door in the back of the house, I did something to my shoulder. I didn't realize it then, but when I woke up Wednesday morning, YE-OWW! (My Pilates teacher later said I had an "impingement.") What this meant was that I could not raise my right arm (and, thereby, hand) very high without considerable pain, and a hand about eye level with Spirit's eye is where a lot of the guide hand work takes place. So I told Colleen I couldn't really do that on this day.
"You can just watch," she said.
"Good!" I said. "That way, I can take notes -- and photos."
What would really be good would be for me to finally figure out how to use the digital video camera my husband gave me a few years ago!
Anyway . . . she saddled him up and took him to the round pen this time. I learned that Sky High doesn't actually use the Parelli method, but a similar method by Bill Dorrance. I need to learn more about this.
Once in the round pen, the little girls all clustered at the fence, she began to work with him. I was standing outside the gate, and the high top rail of the gate made photos kind of hard to take, as it cut off a bit of my view. But here are some:
Spirit gets a chance to run around off halter for a bit. He didn't seem to mind the heavily flapping western stirrups at all -- because that was one of the first things Colleen had got him accustomed to once she saddled him. (I will not be riding him western, FYI.)
She actually got him to turn around and go the other way with no other controls then the positioning of her hands as she stood in the middle of the round pen.
Then she put the rope halter with its long lead on him, and worked him some more:
After that, she used the milk crate as a mounting block and mounted him. To my absolute shock and delight, he stood PERFECTLY STILL. (My old boy Spooky would simply not do that!) She rode him with just the halter, to continue to teach him to respond to leg aids and the positioning of her body (head up, not looking down, and looking in the direction she wanted him to go). Marvelous! HE HAZ IT! She also showed how she was holding the "leading arm" out to the side with the lead rope (now looped to act kind of like reins) so he would have it as a visual aid (horses can see behind them a bit, remember).
Here she is just asking him to stand still while she "adjusts" his mane. He was practically falling asleep. (FYI, she put reining horse boots on his back legs to protect the tendon injured June 11. It's a LOT better, but why take the chance?)
She then put my bridle on him (I was pleased to have her agree that a noseband in his case is pointless, so there will be none!) and worked with the reins on the ground to get him to respond to them. His response was calm and very "soft."
It was very hot, and he was getting tired from all this "work." So the lesson ended. Because we'd both noticed he was getting a TINY bit sore on his injured leg (he'd been "racing around" earlier in the day when she'd turned him out), she decided to give him today (Thursday) off, and work with him again tomorrow.
Meanwhile, during all of this, the trio of campers was watching very attentively. I would have thought they'd be bored.
But no. They were talking about him among themselves.
"He's such a lovable horse," said one, and the others agreed.
Then they followed him back to the barn.
Later that day, I went online and ordered a Double Diamond rope halter and 10' lead from a tack store in New Hampshire (this had been the brand Colleen recommended). IT ARRIVED THIS AFTERNOON! (Along with a little something for Chris, who trailered him and spent hours getting him to walk inside!)
I am tempted to put this rope halter on Laddie with the lead rope and see if he knows any of this stuff. I strongly suspect he does.
I'll go back for another session with Spirit tomorrow.
(FYI, my shoulder is almost back to normal today, as I suspected it would be.)
I felt a bit foolish on Tuesday, since it took me a while to "get" some of the positions of my body and hands, and to drop the rope in the drive hand and switch so the drive hand becomes the guide hand to turn him in the other direction. Too much like having to walk and chew gum at the same time! Spirit was sometimes confused, but it was because of me, not him.
Later that day I unloaded the pieces of the futon frame Samurai and I had miraculously managed to cram into my Prius in Boston (a post on the rest of our Cape Cod trip some other time). In carrying the largest pieces around from the driveway to the basement door in the back of the house, I did something to my shoulder. I didn't realize it then, but when I woke up Wednesday morning, YE-OWW! (My Pilates teacher later said I had an "impingement.") What this meant was that I could not raise my right arm (and, thereby, hand) very high without considerable pain, and a hand about eye level with Spirit's eye is where a lot of the guide hand work takes place. So I told Colleen I couldn't really do that on this day.
"You can just watch," she said.
"Good!" I said. "That way, I can take notes -- and photos."
What would really be good would be for me to finally figure out how to use the digital video camera my husband gave me a few years ago!
Anyway . . . she saddled him up and took him to the round pen this time. I learned that Sky High doesn't actually use the Parelli method, but a similar method by Bill Dorrance. I need to learn more about this.
Once in the round pen, the little girls all clustered at the fence, she began to work with him. I was standing outside the gate, and the high top rail of the gate made photos kind of hard to take, as it cut off a bit of my view. But here are some:
Spirit gets a chance to run around off halter for a bit. He didn't seem to mind the heavily flapping western stirrups at all -- because that was one of the first things Colleen had got him accustomed to once she saddled him. (I will not be riding him western, FYI.)
She actually got him to turn around and go the other way with no other controls then the positioning of her hands as she stood in the middle of the round pen.
Then she put the rope halter with its long lead on him, and worked him some more:
After that, she used the milk crate as a mounting block and mounted him. To my absolute shock and delight, he stood PERFECTLY STILL. (My old boy Spooky would simply not do that!) She rode him with just the halter, to continue to teach him to respond to leg aids and the positioning of her body (head up, not looking down, and looking in the direction she wanted him to go). Marvelous! HE HAZ IT! She also showed how she was holding the "leading arm" out to the side with the lead rope (now looped to act kind of like reins) so he would have it as a visual aid (horses can see behind them a bit, remember).
Here she is just asking him to stand still while she "adjusts" his mane. He was practically falling asleep. (FYI, she put reining horse boots on his back legs to protect the tendon injured June 11. It's a LOT better, but why take the chance?)
She then put my bridle on him (I was pleased to have her agree that a noseband in his case is pointless, so there will be none!) and worked with the reins on the ground to get him to respond to them. His response was calm and very "soft."
It was very hot, and he was getting tired from all this "work." So the lesson ended. Because we'd both noticed he was getting a TINY bit sore on his injured leg (he'd been "racing around" earlier in the day when she'd turned him out), she decided to give him today (Thursday) off, and work with him again tomorrow.
Meanwhile, during all of this, the trio of campers was watching very attentively. I would have thought they'd be bored.
But no. They were talking about him among themselves.
"He's such a lovable horse," said one, and the others agreed.
Then they followed him back to the barn.
Later that day, I went online and ordered a Double Diamond rope halter and 10' lead from a tack store in New Hampshire (this had been the brand Colleen recommended). IT ARRIVED THIS AFTERNOON! (Along with a little something for Chris, who trailered him and spent hours getting him to walk inside!)
I am tempted to put this rope halter on Laddie with the lead rope and see if he knows any of this stuff. I strongly suspect he does.
I'll go back for another session with Spirit tomorrow.
(FYI, my shoulder is almost back to normal today, as I suspected it would be.)
