Been Busy

Sweet Teddy Bear

Well, I’ve been quite busy with my new work schedule and all, so I think I’m just going to turn Ted out until late summer and just let him be a horse and gain some more weight and such. I think that he’ll benefit from all the R&R and hopefully come back fresh early this fall so that we can pick back up with his work under saddle. I’d also like to take this time right now to build a little more trust in him … he isn’t untrusting exactly but I can tell I haven’t won his full trust yet, so I think that working slowly will help me work towards that goal instead of jumping ahead of myself and ending up with some gaps. After he shed out his winter coat, I must say that he looks fabulous – truly amazing. I’m so happy that he’s made a complete turnaround and it has been amazing to not only watch him recover but to watch his personality really come out and for him to discover so many things about what it really means to be a horse and part of a herd. He was so weak when he came that I have a hard time even remembering what that was like, but he’s blossommed nicely now into a sweet young horse.

Spring Updates

Well, Ted is gaining more weight again now that the spring grass is here.  I think he really likes being out on all the acreage and not having to worry about when the next meal is going to come. He seems to have become pretty laid back about life here at the farm and he is well settled into the routine and what is expected of him. I think he’ll always be really into food since he was quite deprived (and let’s face it, most horses are pretty food-oriented anyway), but he’s not pushy or anything, he is just excited to see the food come and always eats everything in his bucket. Now that he has more muscle tone, I can tell a lot more about his movement and I really like what I see. He has a nice, loose walk, an even springy trot, and a nice rocking-horse type canter where he uses his hind end some to reach underneath himself. He’s not a superstar or anything, but he’s just a nice horse and turning nicer every day it seems. He also has gotten a lot more energetic, which I actually like. When I’ve ridden him more recently, he’s been more forward than past rides, and I think with a little more work he will have a nice work ethic as well. I am going to try to be careful not to ride him too much in the arena because I’m worried it might start to make him ring sour. We’ll make sure to mix it up a bit and to keep things interesting for him so that what I ask is fair. There will be plenty of years left for him to work, work, work, so I want to make sure that we do it right from the start and not overwork him and turn him sour about it all. I think that easing into things is the fairest thing to do.

Great Scott!

I rode Ted again and this time, I did a bit of dressage work with him … lots of circles and serpentines while working on soft contact with the bit and using his hind end. He has a lovely, springy, easy to sit trot. Way more comfortable that Charlie’s (although Charlie’s trot will always feel ‘right’ to me). He is pretty easy to steer and he seems to be better than our last ride. He also seems to remember some of the work we’ve done on stopping because he is responding a lot faster than he did before. What a good boy and quick learner. I wish I had been doing a better job on keeping track of all the work we’ve done, but oh well. At least I have the little that I do have here to remind myself. We did do a little bit of groundwork and he is a very respectful horse, but I think he could probably use a little more work to get to 100% of where he could be. What I’d like to improve is his willingness to do whatever you want him to since he is a tad resistant in the beginning. Not exactly what I’d call stubborn, but just resistant. The good part is that he really does seem to be a fast learner, so even though he’s hardly been ridden he’s actually coming along nicely.

On a really high note, we actually cantered today and Ted seems to know his leads … we didn’t try any flying changes, but he reliably picked up the right lead when we worked on them in moderate sized circles. On top of that, his canter is absolutely yummy! With a little bit of work, he’ll actually have a wonderful dressage canter and it is super balanced and very comfy to ride. I’m amazed that the decrepit, weak horse I bought just a few short months ago has changed so much and that he’s come such a long way.

Back in the Saddle Again

I rode Ted today again after work on my way home. Erin was already out there riding on the trails, so I decided to tack Teddy up and see what he would do outside the arena. Considering that I’ve only ridden him four or five times since he’s been feeling better, there really is no telling how he will react. I tacked up quickly so I wouldn’t lose a lot of time and decided on my dressage saddle so I’d have the help of a deep seat. I had too much trouble getting Teddy to stand still for mounting outside the barn (because the herd was heading back out towards the creek), that I ended up deciding to lead him out to where the horses were to mount up there. He stood nicely once he wasn’t alone anymore and then we rode off across the creek to find Erin.

The entire herd ended up following me across and I was concerned that they might take off in agallop once we got to the big, open field, so I dismounted Teddy and started walking towards Erin in the field. Once I got to her, I did get back on (and Ted stood nicely), and then we rode back together. Teddy wasn’t a big fan of leaving the herd, but in the company of another horse, he was manageable and I think that over time, his green horse attitude will wear off and he’ll figure out that there is no point putting up a fight about that kind of stuff. Overall, I felt pretty good about the ride considering that he’s not been ridden in a month and that he’s gained quite a bit of weight again and is acting more energetic than ever before. I fully expect him to continue gaining energy under saddle until his weight levels off where it should be and he settles into a fitness routine. In many ways, he reminds me of Charlie when I first bought him and was getting him ready to foxhunt. Lots of energy, a little bit of nerves, and a little resistant to going places. Luckily, he learns quickly and I think that in no time, we’ll be hitting the trails like old pros.

Getting Behind

This month has been busy and we lost quite a bit of ground (both in riding and weight) due to the ice storm. I decided to pull Ted out of training until he puts a few pounds back on that he lost when we were out of power and couldn’t get feed from the store. The horses had plenty of hay, but when they are used to high-calorie meals, hay alone isn’t going to hold a lot of weight on them. Several other horses have gotten thin as well, so it isn’t just Teddy, but I am hopeful that he will bounce right back and be ready to ride again my March. It’s been too cold and yucky to ride anyway, so it’s probably just as well. I pulled blankets off the horses this week and, to my surprise when I was petting on Ted, I realized he’s put on a lot more weight than I thought in this last month or two. When he appeared to have plateaued in his gain, but it turns out it was just not visible gain. What used to be hard, bony backbones and ribs is now padded with fat and muscle; I can’t feel a single bone in his back anymore and it is amazing. It hadn’t occurred to me that he would put on weight in certain spots first, almost prioritizing where it was most important, but nature does know what it’s doing after all, so I guess that the backbone and ribs was goal number two. I think now that he’s filled that back out, we will probably start to see more visible gain over his topline and hips as well as his neck and overall muscling. It may be wishful thinking, but I think he is actually going to fill out nicely and look more like an appendix than a full-blooded TB. Now that he’s gained more weight, particularly in a spot that will pad his back from the saddle, I’m going to start riding again. I took on a contract position that means getting up at 4:45 every morning to get ready for work, drive 30 minutes out to feed horses, and then drive 45 minutes to the Bentonville and work all day. It’s a really new schedule for me, compared with my commute down the hall to the living room, but I am adjusting well and next week, Daylight savings hits, meaning more evening light. I haven’t decided if I am going to get up thirty or forty minutes early to ride after feeding in the mornings, or if I will stop by the barn on my way home a couple evenings a week to ride, but I do plan on getting on a schedule that means riding two or three times every week. I also set up a jump and am working on getting a chute set up to run Teddy over a jump a few times to see how he does. I hope to soon start popping him over cavaletti and small cross-rail jumps to get him balancing and figuring out take-off points and so forth. I’m really excited to see how that goes since we’ve seen him jump things in the pastures several times and he has lots of talent for it. He pops his knees up, keeps his eyes straight ahead, keeps a steady pace and a smooth arc, and (maybe most importantly) rounds his back over the jump.

Dressage Training Begins

Ted continues to gain weight very slowly, but I think he’s getting the right amount of food for now so I think I’ll just wait it out and hope that he’s just slowed down but is still gaining weight slowly. Well, I rode Ted several times this week to get him going well enough that I can start working on his dressage training pyramid. He’s already going very forward under saddle and he actually seems to have the same “cruise control” that I am used to with Charlie. I love riding horses that just keep moving forward without a lot of effort from the rider. It makes cueing them for moving sideways or fine-tuning their forward motion, and just overall control a lot easier when you have nice speed to work with. He never has broken into a canter (and I haven’t cued him for that either), but he has given me a really nice, forward trot that is going to make the dressage and fence work both easier. Right now, I’m mostly working still on steering, stopping, and getting him to move with a steady rhythm.  The rhythm is the hardest for us so far, but I know that with time it will come. I am working him in my new “cyprium” bit which is supposed to be a good knockoff of the copper blend that Sprenger uses in their dressage bits, but I didn’t pay anywhere near the regular $150 Sprenger price tag. I thought this was a good opportunity to try it out and see if it makes a difference over my old stainless steel bit. The copper blends are supposed to taste better to horses and help them to hold the bit softly in their mouths. It also causes salivation which keeps their mouth from being dry, which can cause the bit to stick and pull on their mouth, causing discomfort. It is a double-jointed loose ring bit with a lozenge in the middle. Teddy seems to really like it and he moves much better with that in his mouth than with the western bit I used at his old farm. He definitely steers better in it but possibly just because the sides can move more independently than the western shank bit. I have been mostly using a very loose contact, but now that he’s trotting some I am starting to pick up just a little more contact with his mouth to get him used to that and so that I have better communication lines for steering him and fine tuning his movement. I went to a dressage lesson with Laurie Hedlund last Saturday and worked a lot on my training plan for both Teddy and Charlie and got a much better idea of building and training a dressage horse from the ground up. Laurie is a lovely rider and a fantastic instructor and she has a great ability to explain things in a way that I truly understand what she wants me to do, so I feel a burst of enthusiasm and energy towards getting to be a better rider and I hope to get Teddy going in Training Level by the end of the year, which I think is possible. The hardest part will be getting him to pick up his canter leads correctly, but since I haven’t even tried it and he may already know how that, I may advance even faster than I am expecting. I have seen him use both leads in the field and I have seen him do many flying changes, so that also makes me hopeful that he will be easy to train changes for jump work (and maybe I can be hopeful enough that it will come in handy for dressage as well, but I know it will come in useful for jumping courses). Right now, we are doing lots and lots of trot circles, changing directions and moving all about the arena. I am making sure to keep my inside leg supporting him in a nice bend and my outside leg positioned to keep him going forward and his outside hip from swinging out. He seems to go well in both directions (unlike Charlie, who is very, very stiff to the left), and he gives nice flexion to the inside with his face as well, indicating he is quite supple already. I suppose being young is in his favor so he hasn’t had a chance to be ridden really poorly for years and years to do damage and cause stiffness that you might see in older horses like Charlie. I hope soon to start doing spirals with Ted, working more muscles and flexibility as well as getting him used to yielding to my leg aides and moving in and out of the circle for me. Once we are doing that well, I can safely say that we will start canter work to see what we have to work with there.

More About Trimming

In the last post, I never really did discuss what I am doing when I trim a hoof. So, I thought I’d give a short synopsis of the goals I have in trimming hooves. First, we will start with a before and after shot of a hind hoof.

Before

After

Before/After

So, my trimming tools include a long (probably 16-inch, by two inches wide) rasp, a hoof knife – to cut away the bars and quarters and frog (the frog is the triangular, squishy part in the middle of the hoof), and a cordless dremel to help smooth the bars and quarters when I’m done with the knife or if the hoof is too dried out and hard to cut.

First, I clean out the hoof with a hoof pick and a wire brush. Then, I start out by using the hoof knife and scraping away any dead sole all the way around the tip of the frog to the heels. I also cut off any of the frog that has flaps in it or areas that are taller than the edge of the hoof. The frog needs to bear some, but not all of the weight, so it should be level with the edges of the hoof wall.

Next, I address the bar areas by cutting off any of the ridges that have grown in. I make it smooth with the rest of the sole surrounding it. I also take the knife and cut away a little scoop in the quarters area – on the outer hoof wall sort of next to the bars. This scoop allows for expansion and contraction in the hoof as it bears weight. Without this scoop, the horse’s hoof is kind of in a locked position and cannot dissipate the weight as the hoof structure is intended to do. I often also use the rasp here to get even more of a scoop as well as the dremel to smooth it out. In the side view before and after, you can see that the hairline at the top of the hoof relaxed from a curved line to a more straight line, which is from the quarter scoop allowing the expansion rather than driving the force back up through the hoof wall.

Now, I pick up the rasp and begin by backing the heels. There is a partial triangle at the back of the hoof, and we want the point of this triangle to be as far back (towards the heel bulbs) as possible. This, along with the heel bulbs, is the hoof’s primary landing zone. If the heel/bar triangle is too far forward, the horse’s weight lands too far forward away from the cushy heel bulbs, which can lead to all sorts of hoof pathologies and lameness problems. We also want the heels to be as wide as possible to give a large landing zone for the weight. You can see in the side view picture above that the weight bearing point of the hoof at the heel is further back in the after shot due to the heel being trimmed back. It is also important to keep the heels level by making sure the depth of the collateral grooves on each side of the frog are the same. Finally, I trim back the toe from the outer hoof wall (rather than from the bottom) so that the horse’s hoof breaks over quickly. This also keeps the outer wall from ending up having leverage forces on it, which will separate the wall from the hoof structure, causing pain and lameness.

Finally, I look everything over, make sure the heels are level, the quarters are scooped enough, and that the toe is backed enough and I’m pretty much done. So, that is the trim in a nutshell and it is more involved that described here, but this gives a pretty good idea of what I am trying to accomplish with my trim sessions.

Trimming Time

I never did post a whole lot about Ted’s last hoof trim, so I figured it would be good to document the before and after shots of his hooves to track the progress. There wasn’t a lot of work to do, and I was completely done with all four hooves in half an hour, which is a record for me with any horse so far. I am still new at this so I hope that once the horses’ hooves get in good shape again and I get better at trimming, that the process goes faster and easier for me. I trimmed his bars up first and the dead, overgrown bar material literally popped out when I trimmed them. It was ridiculously easy. Backing his heels was also a lot easier than it looked like it was going to be.

That front left is pretty weird, but I’m measuring the collateral grooves to make sure I am trimming true to “level” as indicated by the coffin bone inside the hoof. You can see the coffin bone in the xray – it is a dome shaped bone inside the hoof capsule. (With all

these terms in here, I feel a need to add a diagram about what I’m talking about – plus it’s a good

opportunity to show before/after shots to show the kind of changes I’m making when I trim his hooves.)

The really crazy part is that after I was done, I was amazed at how much change there was as to where his heel support was when I’d done so little actual trimming. I also backed his toes quite a bit, but probably not enough since he is still forging some at the walk. Until I get those hooves back into good condition, it’s going to be a little trial and error to get the trim right. He’s as sound as ever, though, so I know I can’t be that far off on the trim. I also got some feedback from my trimming mentors and it sounds like I can rasp the outer sides of his back hooves where he has some flares and cracks to keep them from having any leverage to cause further damage. Apparently, these little flares and cracks are often the beginning of quarter cracks, which can cause significant lameness and pain. Obviously, I don’t want to let that happen, so we will keep those flares under control until the new hoof wall has grown in stronger. In another few months, I should start to see a significant line in his hoof wall, indicating the change of when I bought him, revamped his diet, gave him good nutrition compete with vitamins and minerals, and started giving him a more natural, appropriate trim. I wish it was as easy as giving them a good trim once and fixing past problems, but many hoof problems have to be grown out and it takes up to a year or more for a horse’s hoof to grow completely out, so many times, damage done in poor past trims can take quite a while to totally resolve. The good thing is that the horse’s hoof wants to heal, so as long as you provide it with the right environment and regular, quality trims, the performance of the hoof itself can turn around within a few months. Teddy’s old, dead soles that I remember are already long gone. The creek did its job scraping and exfoliating all the dead sole out of Teddy’s feet, without me having to guess how far and deep to cut to remove dead tissue. Now, what used to be blackish and crumbly and rotting is all smooth as a river stone and it has a lovely, healthy, live color and texture to it. We’ve come a long way already and I look forward to the progress in the future.

See Teddy’s hoof update pictures at the album here:

Teddy’s January Trim

The New Year

I rode Teddy again just at the walk, working a lot on steering issues and getting him to go past the ‘arena gate’. It seems he’s much easier to control while he has company, and that when he is ridden by himself, he is going to be much more of a challenge. Once again, though, his fight didn’t last long so I started to gain ground on him fighting less and less as we passed the gate and I tried my best to make sure and reward him by releasing pressure as fast as I could when he did what I wanted. I also worked quite a bit on getting him to stop well for me, and on this he seemed to catch on quite easily what I wanted. As soon as he came to a stop, I reached down and pet his neck and let him decide if he wanted to stand still or get back to walking. Every time, he took off walking again, and that is fine with me. I can always work on getting him to stand still later and right now, all I want is for him to know that when I pull, he should stop. I’ve always thought that is the most important thing for a horse to know well and I remember spending many hours schooling Charlie to stop at all speeds so I wouldn’t worry foxhunting him. Luckily, this is something I am very familiar with teaching a horse, so I feel very comfortable (especially with Ted’s apparent ability to quickly discern what I want) that soon Ted will stop with ease for even a beginner rider. After passing the gate without him trying to go towards it at all, I pulled him to a stop and immediately dismounted. I hope that helps him learn that what I want is for him to do what I ask and that he will be rewarded for that. Obviously, the ride won’t always end when I get what I want but I think in the beginning it can be a quick way to communicate what you are wanting with a young horse. His attention span is not bound to be really long in any case, so a 20ish minute ride is probably about right.

December Updates

I rode Teddy last week for the first time since he arrived at the farm. We had family in for the holidays, so me, my sister, and my cousin all went out for a ride. We finally have three horses so that my sister and I can take guests out for rides, which is nice. However, we don’t have three saddles. Obviously, the inexperienced rider needs a saddle, and my little sister’s horse can be a bit of a challenge, so I knew she really needed a saddle as well. Teddy has always been so sweet and calm and controllable that I decided I’d be the one to go bareback, and that we would be needing to take it easy anyway, so that would reduce the risk of me slipping off his back. I did borrow a friend’s bareback pad to give Ted a bit of a buffer between his bony back and my bony rear-end and it turned out to be a lot easier to grip with my legs than slick horse hair which was nice.
We kept things slow and easy and just walked about for a bit, enjoying the nice weather out-of-doors. Teddy behaved himself like an absolute gentleman and I am glad to report that it seems like even after recovering him to his intended state, I think he will be a very level-headed mount. He’s still quite green and doesn’t turn all that well, but he is willing and I think he wants to please me so he appears to be a horse that will be really easy to train to do just about anything I want to try. He did get a tad worried about the jumps laying down on their sides alongside the arena, but his version of a ‘spook’ was to take two slow steps sideways away from it and to keep going forward. What a good boy. That’s always nice to see in a Thoroughbred since they often are so nervous about everything. I’m glad to have that first ride out of the way and hope to start putting more and more rides on him as he continues to gain weight. Now that he’s reached a plateau in his weight gain again, I think it’s time to up his feed amounts to keep him putting on as much weight as possible, especially while we have very little grass for foraging and the hay we are feeding is from two years ago and probably isn’t the best of quality anymore. I hope after the start of the New Year to see quite a bit more weight gain and muscle development and from what I’ve seen so far, he’s going to be a looker this summer with his rose-grey dapples!