A Recued Horse's Tale: Roscoe Day 15 - 17

DAY: 15: A day off for everyone. The usual three feedings for Roscoe, along with a nice grooming session for both horses. Roscoe hair can really hold onto the dirt from his favorite rolling place. The horses have a spot in the lower pasture that they have pawed and stopped at so much that the course dirt is now a fine powdery dust that sticks to everything! In their minds this is the best roll spot ever! Sadly it takes double the effort to get them half as clean. Sigh. Why do we do this again? Tomorrow we are going to a fellow Nor-Cal Downunder Brumbies member’s ranch for a “spur of the moment” training session. Yes, we named them. It will be interesting to see how everyone does.

DAY 16: This evening we are headed to Folsom, California for an afternoon of equestrian fun with the Nor Cal Downunder Brumbies. The plan, which is carved in semi-frozen Jell-O, is to work on the exercises introduced in Day 14 and if time and focus allows introduce Yielding the Forequarters. For Roscoe this is more about exposure and seeing how he reacts to various situations while keeping the physical stresses low. He is walking and moving so much better and seems more playful, especially when he sees us heading to the feed storage area. His coat is looking better too. Let’s hope his mane grows back well.

            Rain, thunder and lightning! Holy cow, Batman! Crazy! Okay, so today was rained out but the weather reports look decent for tomorrow so we’ll head up to Pioneer Park in Somerset for a training session.

DAY 17: The "challenge" we are running into with Roscoe is keeping his mind and spirit "active" while working with the hoof and leg issues (which seem to be improving almost daily). So either we do nothing or we adapt. Sadly because he is rehabbing his feet/legs the amount of energy that we can ask for safely is low (walk) with short burst of medium (trot) and high energy (lope). Still, if what we are seeing translates then this fellow is going to be a really nice horse. For now it is all about baby steps and patience. We loaded up Roscoe and Argent and headed over the hill to the arena in Somerset. The goal was to review and refine the exercise introduced on Day 14. He licked his lips and lowered his head when he rope was used to flog him with kindness. Spanking the ground with the rope made his ears perk up and he took a couple of lateral steps away from it but he calmed down quickly. We refined Yield the Hindquarters Stage 1 and got some nice leg crossovers each side with fairly low pressure. We have not introduced Yield the Hindquarters Stage 2 fully yet because it is a more “high energy” exercise. Stage 2 will be introduced over the next couple of sessions. While working on some basic leading skills we sort of did a C-Pattern and he did get his hind end out of the way quickly. This is a positive thing. While working on Lunging for Respect Stage 1, Roscoe broke into a nice little trot with me being conscious of asking for it. My pointing was energetic and he read that. A happy mistake to be sure. He trotting about a half circle and I stopped him followed by a rest/reward. We did this a couple of times both directions. He seemed to enjoy it. Asked for the lope a couple of times and he tried it. It seemed uncomfortable still so the simple act of trying was rewarded. The four Backing methods are improving, each one at their own pace. The recognition of the cue is getting better. Real improvement in Marching and Tap The Air methods. Having the Arena Mates in my pocket also helped! Flexing is really getting good and is probably at a B grade already. Between each exercise we flex 4 to 5 times each side and then desensitize. They add up! I overheard another horse owner (who was getting a lesson from her trainer in the public arena) say “Wow, that horse is light off of the halter!” I just grinned and kept working.

We introduced the Plastic Bag On A Stick today at the end of the lesson. It went fairly well. Roscoe seemed more annoyed that scared at the silly bag but soon relaxed and let me rib his body and face with it. Tomorrow we’ll do it again and then it’s a day off.

Laurie (who weighs less than I do) was able to take Roscoe for a couple of easy laps at the walk around the arena (maybe ten minutes under saddle) after the ground work was done. He walked on with light cues and seemed easy with the bit. It was really nice to see him look happy to be doing something. We hope to increase his time under saddle by five minute increments at each session. We’ll also alternate between saddle/no saddle as his progress dictates. He is putting on some weight and his coat looks better. It is a process of baby steps. Here is an image of Day 1 and Day 17. Looks like we are doing something right!