Sometimes No Plan is a Good Plan

First off, the Midwest Horse Fair!! Well, had a good time. I went on Saturday with a few friends. I caught the end of the Mustang Challenge. I hope to see more of that next year! It was very interesting to see all the different methods used, and how the horses reacted. But for bigger news, I got a saddle! :) It fit the cut-out of Moose's withers that I brought and was within our price range, so it's here. The only thing is that I'm not sure if it's going to fit him. We put it on with no pad underneath, and it really fell forward and pinched his shoulders. But I tried it with a Theraflex I'm borrowing, and it fit a lot nicer once shimmed. So, I think it might work. . . we'll see.

Anyways, I also attended a few clinics. I saw one about trick riding, and that was interesting to see. I also saw Ray Ainsworth, and he was working with a filly that my neighbor's cousin brought up. I was a little disappointed that Parelli wasn't there, because I saw them last year and their demonstration completely blew me away! But it was still a good time.

I played with the horses today at liberty and had a really nice time. I had no plan when I went out there, which is the basis for the title, but ended up doing lots of friendly. I had a noodle, flag, and whip. I was trying to get Bella more desensitized, and to get Moose to allow me to touch him. Having my focus on both horses proved helpful, because then if Moose started going introverted, I just walked away and started desensitizing Bella! But I found out 2 interesting things today. 1) I think Moose's problem with being touched actually is a RB problem, at least with new objects. Because when I touched him with the noodle beyond his face, he jumped forward like the RBI Pat played with in Horsenality segment of the January DVD. Also, I noticed that whenever I actually touched him with the noodle, his eyes got wide. But the moment I took it away, they would relax. 2) Moose taught me a nice lesson today about timing, too. I realized that I was putting more pressure on Moose when he was already unconfident. For example, say I have the flag. I'd let Moose sniff it, and then I slowly move it up -not touching him- by his cheek. He'd lift his head and flick his ears when I reached the threshold, then I'd immediately remove the flag. So, that's not the problem. The thing is once and while, he moves his head to the side to look at something else. For whatever reason, I always thought that then I should make him look at the scary object, so I'd bring it back up by his cheek until he acknowledged it, then remove it again. But in his mind, I was just putting more pressure on him when he got unconfident! So, that was as very nice thing to find out today!

And due to our good day, Moosey actually had draw!! :) I couldn't believe it, because we were at liberty, too. So, there might be hope for our audition after all! Yep, if we can pull it off, I think Moosey and I can pass Level 1. I'm very excited! But hey, I guess the key is just to not have a plan, right?

The Day After Yesterday

After rewriting this like 3 times, I finally figured it'd be easier on anyone who reads this if I just started out with some background things going on in the past few days.

For starters,  I've had a horrible time with Moose's draw recently - he'll just stand there and lean on the pressure. Sometimes he'll be great, but other days he'll be awful. It doesn't seem like unconfidence, so I wasn't really sure what to do about it. Then, I thought about make vs. want, and realized he should LOVE to come to me. Well, it's not exactly fixed yet, because it's a new invention of his, so to speak, but in the past 3 days he's came to me 3 times at liberty, so a GREAT start!!

Also, I've been thinking about Bella and Moose's confidence levels a LOT lately. Bella is an attention hound and is very curious about things, so I think she loves to learn and has no issues with people. And I had a sort of light bulb moment when I thought about Moose. I don't think he likes to learn. I am still developing this theory, but I think to him learning is stressful (kind of like how Allure used to be a very unconfident learner, just that Moose is not nearly as extreme). For example, the other day I had plans to play with a saddle we've got laying around here. I brought it up to Moose and let him sniff it. He sniffed it, but immediately after walked away quickly. On the other hand, Bella comes up and just says "OMG!! You have an English saddle! What's that taste like?" So then, I put it on the ground near Moose and walked away. He was really curious about it then. Situations like this one lead me to conclude (Ha, I sound like I'm writing a science paper) that Moose has confidence issues with humans. I will definitely have to lick and chew on that for a while!

Now onto my ACTUAL post. Starting off with yesterday: the day didn't go so well. I was trying to stop Moose  from throwing his head away from me every time I go to halter him. Basically, he had other ideas. And I started getting frustrated and emotional, and eventually just quit. I knew if I kept going things were just going to go even further downhill. Although, Dancer did roll near me, so I can't call the day a complete failure.

Now on to TODAY!!  Objective of the day was to help Moose gain confidence with the tarp. So, I grabbed one and went to work. We ended up playing at liberty, because I never haltered him. It seemed unnecessary, because he was responding alright without it. So, I started out with him sniffing the tarp. Once he sniffed it, I'd walk away. Eventually, he'd lick his lips, so I'd let him think for a little while once he did that. Once he was alright sniffing it, I tried to pet him with it, but there was a threshold about touching him anywhere else but his nose. A saying popped into mind here: "If he's scared of blackbirds, get him used to eagles." So, I wagged the tarp around and retreated until he looked at me. The first time he looked at me was about 20 feet away, at a guess. Well, I continued approaching and retreating, until I was about 6 feet away. Then, he came to me and sniffed the tarp, and blew a few times! Now THAT is a sign for session over!

In comparison of the 2 days, it's interesting how things work out: I can play with the horses for a whole 3 hours some days and have everything go wrong that will. But other days, like today,  I can have 30 minutes, have a GREAT time, and get more done than in that 3 hours. "How interesting!"

And I almost forgot. . . (as if I could forget). . . I got my braces off today!! YAY!! So, after 2.5 years of scrubbing and yanking and grinding and pushing and pulling and all those other things us teens go through to have nice teeth, I finally have them. Can't say they're perfect as of yet, though, because they hurt like the devil at the moment. But in a day or two, I should be pain-free and acting in Orbit gum commercials.

There Is Hope For Us Yet

I haven't updated on the ponies for a while, so I thought I'd let everyone know about their progress recently. Today in particular went pretty well.

As background knowledge, Moose can't/won't (I'm not sure which one) stand near me at liberty while I pet him. And Dancer has become hard to catch again. But of course, I'm sure that's not anything new.

Sooo. . . .

Moose let himself be petted with no line on!! And while someone could totally ruin this moment by saying that I had treats, he still did it!! So, that made me really happy. And with that, he would've let me put the halter on him, too, had I decided to progress further.

Okay, but now this one is a shocker. Dancer actually greeted me at the gate today. I know, amazing right!? But here, let me just describe the magnitude of this for you. We have 3ish acres of pasture at our house. And she came all the way over from the other side of the pasture!!

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Needless to say, that made my day. But wait, it gets better. She even walked inside the stall! (background knowledge: Dancer has not been inside the stalls ever since Bella came here, because she she got trapped inside a few times). And when I went into the pasture, she didn't leave! She actually stood there and let me pet her!

"How interesting!"

Now for a little lecture, oh the horror. Okay, so I just saw the 6th DVD of L&HB yesterday. The 6th DVD wasn't real long, but I learned an interesting tidbit of information. Linda phrased it better, but basically there are 2 kinds of fear in horses: fear of death, and fear of a loss of dignity or spirit. Horses who have a fear of death are usually the RB kind, and are looking to be safe. Horses who are afraid of a loss of dignity/spirit are usually LB and are dominant.

Reflecting on that, Dancer is not afraid of dying. She is definitely a a more LB type. So, that means Dancer would most likely have the fear of a loss of dignity or spirit. So, maybe that's why Dancer doesn't (I'd say didn't, but I'm being realistic here) like me. Somehow, I am bringing up this fear in her. Hmm. . .

This made me decide to really try to get her rapport. Before, I had an oookay rapport and focused on respect to such a degree that I lost all of the rapport. So, this time I'm trying to do things different. But it's still interesting that even when I'm being nice, she's still dominant. For instance, I'll give her a treat and then she will perk up and barge right into my personal space. So, I wave my arms, like "Sorry, honey you're too close!" Then, her ears go back immediately and she just gets angry. I'm realizing that I have to be a better leader, but how can I do that without losing her rapport or causing her to be fearful?

Ah, well. "Be not afraid of growing slowly, be afraid only of standing still." There's my motto for today, lol!

You can't catch me!!

Oh, Dancer. I thought we were done with catching problems!!! Why does she have to be so smart? Lol, no wonder I like RB horses better, they're actually LOOKING for a leader!! I think I'm really going to have to think of something or analyze myself, because I must be doing something extremely wrong!! Maybe I'm reading her wrong or something, or acting differently. I think I act different when on line, because I realize that she can't escape from me. But I'm pretty sure there's more problems than just that!! Well, I'll have to fix that! She used to run to me, after all!!

But anyways on a better note, since I couldn't catch Dancer I decided to run around the pasture a little bit to ger her used to humans moving at fast speeds. I remember reading somewhere that you should run up to your horse and skp around and stuff, so I decided to try it. I took the carrot stick, and flailed it around (no where near Dancer, she was quite a ways towards one of the fences) and started skipping. Well, as soon as I reached her first threshold, she flipped out and ran WAY over to the other side of the pasture. So, I tried it again, keeping the same phase of intensity, but increasing the distance away from her. That was alright for a little while, but then she took off again. This time, I decided to try skipping and moving the CS only, not the Savvy string. Again, she totally freaked. But MAN, is she funny when she's scared, though!! It just made me laugh, I was barely skipping and it's just like ha, Dancer's afraid of people skipping!!