Breathing Learned

Aleythia's going to write today! I would, but she has a better story.


          Lately Lydia and I have been riding with HM. She is a dressage and jumper rider. And since Lydia and I know next to nothing about dressage & jumping we asked her to teach us. It also gave us a chance to ride different horses.
          A couple weeks ago we went over our first jump. The first time I jumped it didn't go over well; I cantered along the outside of the arena, turned to face the jump that was halfway down the arena, and ended up being to close to the outside of the jump. T barely even tried to jump it. It was like she was saying "your stinkin' cues are what messed this up, not me". Of course, she was right. HM explained three things. 1) don't change anything as you jump. You shouldn't be letting your reins droop when you're on the straight line to the jump. 2) Look straight ahead. If you're not sure where you're going the horse won't either. Especially with T who is a really sensitive horse. Lastly 3) Breathe. T needs to know you're relaxed. If you're relaxed she will be too.
         So, I tried again. As we were on the straight line to the jump I made sure not to let my reins droop. I looked straight ahead to the wooden beam across the arena. I took deep, calming  breaths. I was relaxed and T was relaxed. T went over that jump perfectly. I did not. I can claim some leeway because it was only my second jump, but my form was not a pretty sight. I probably wasn't even doing two-point position. I ended up smashing my stomach into the saddle horn; effectively losing my balance and making T lose her forward momentum. But we made it over.
        I learned that breathing does affect your horse. Especially if they're really sensitive like T. With T she will do a sliding stop if you breathe out and relax in the saddle. So, I tried it out on my over hyper horse at home.
       My horse was really being a pain that day. She reared on me! Ana NEVER rears. It wasn't just once or twice either. So, I got the whip out and made her feet move. I lunged her, made her back up really fast,etc. Basically told her that I would not stand for any disrespectfulness. Once she calmed down something amazing happened; I had her trotting on a lose line; her head was low she had an ear cocked toward me most of the time. I sped up my breathing and did a little soldier march. She sped up her trot, but didn't break into a canter. I was amazed! I'd tried to make her slow and speed up her gait before, but it never worked. Then I tried to see if I could get her to slow down. I slowed my breathing and in effect relaxed my body language a bit. She slowed her trot and even broke down into a walk. Which I let her do because it is very rare that Ana walks on a lunge line. She was very relaxed. I was very pleased with her so I put her away.
       That is how I learned how important breathing is. Now I want to see if she will calm down if I do the same thing on her back. I'm going to have a very interesting ride.
       Well, hope, my experience helped all you horse lovers out there! Have fun! If you have any questions please comment.
      

Laying Down a Horse and Why Desensitizing Works

Is it just me or has anyone else lumped, laying a horse down and teaching a horse to lay down, together? There is a difference. When you lay down a horse you want them to go from being afraid to trusting you in one session. With teaching a horse to lay down, you take your time and you do it over a period of sessions. You don't force the issue. It's like teaching your horse to sidepass. It's just something you want them to know how to do.
I have had no experience laying a horse down. So don't ask me how to do it. I wish I did know how to do it, but I would rather not ruin one of my horses by doing it wrong. I think sometimes it is necessary to lay a horse down. As far as the humanitarian aspect of laying a horse down, I don't know. I've never done it.

So on a slightly related topic I'm going to talk about why desensitizing works. It's actually very interesting. Scientists have figured out something that horsemen have been doing for years. I came across this in a Western Horseman magazine. In the May 2012 issue, page 62. I just thought I'd share it.
There's a structure in the horse's brain called the amygdala which is involved in a horse's fear responses. It's connected to the hypothalamus, which acts like a thermostat to reset the nervous system after the amygdala responds. When one part of the horse's brain reacts with fear another part releases chemicals to bring the brain back to a balanced state.
When we work with horses we gradually apply more pressure so that it gives the hypothalamus time to reset the horse's brain. After the brain is reset it will take more to scare the horse. This is a process called "down regulation." ... or desensitizing.

This article talking about the chemicals in a horse's brain is all about laying a horse down, so I'll just add this little bit from the article as to why laying a horse down works.
When a horse is layed down it is an extremely vulnerable position for a horse to be in. He's in the position he would be in if a predator were eating him. So the horse thinks he's going to die, the amygdala kicks in, nothing happens, and the hypothalamus resets the horse's nervous system. Vwallah you now have a horse that believes nothing will happen when he's faced with anything less than a near death situation.

Interesting, right?,
Lyida Johnson

Don't Blame the Horse!

So, as often the case I was reading in a blog and I came across a post that was talking about blaming the horse. I got some inspiration to write, so this is my opinion on the topic. Which more than likely you have all heard before. But, who doesn't like a good reminder.


The best question to ask when your horse is doing something bad or incorrect is.. da da daa!
"Why?"
So simple.

Now story time.
In the years that I have been riding, few as they may be, I have learned something. Usually it's my fault.
I fell off my barrel horse cause he went one way and I went the other. I didn't choose the direction so he did... then I choose the direction.
One of the fillies starts bucking when I hit her rump with the end of my rein while riding. The first time I did it I went from really soft to hard way too quickly.
Flicka is lazy and bossy. Through my inexperience I let her become that way.
A friend's horse I rode cuts in over the jump. I wasn't giving him the direction and the stability he needed.
Santana bucks me off when I urged him into a canter. I hadn't ridden in a while, I was flapping all over, and we were in the big field.

Now that you have a bunch of examples of when it's been my fault here are examples of when it isn't.
Santana bucks when I won't let him go back into the paddock. He's telling me to bug off.
Misstack is so distracted with everything going on around her she doesn't know I'm there and keeps invading my space.
Ana is hyper, and has ceaseless energy. She's a Saddlebred/Arabian cross.

Though if I thought about these problems I could probably trace them back to something I did or something someone else did... or didn't do.
Santana doesn't respect my authority.
Misstack doesn't either.
With Ana I really don't know. I can guess. Nobody ever worked on stopping with her. It was all about the all important GO. Or it really could be her breeding. It can still be fixed though.

Horses work off of instinct. All animals do. That is why we are the leaders and why we must take responsibility for their actions.

Sincerely our fault :)
Lydia Johnson

Equine Nutrition and Anatomy

Anybody up for learning about equine nutrition and anatomy? There is a site that is offering a course on it. I am 99.9% sure it's free.
https://www.coursera.org/#course/equinenutrition
There's your site and I would encourage you to look over the terms of use and honor code. I think it's going to be a lot of fun and very educational. They'll send you an email when the course starts. When you're done you will receive a certificate that is signed saying you took the course. So some personal information will probably be required. Note* it said something about that if you are under 18 you will need parent/guardian approval. If you are under 13 they ask that you do not use their website.

Don't Worry Bout It

Some problems, if ignored, will go away by themselves.
This is something that I have discovered over the years. It's not so much that I ignored the problem is that I didn't worry about it.
The most major one was with my barrel horse, Santana, and bridling.
He didn't want the bridle going over his right eye. Like it was terrible. He had to be put in a stall or the trailer so that they could just get it on. He would rear and try to run away.
When I started riding him I never forced the issue. I just did it. I took my sweet ole time and got it done. In fact I took my sweet old time with everything I did with him. I took half an hour just to groom and tack him up. Not because he was a pain about it, just because I didn't have any need to go fast. That was what probably helped the most. I wasn't aggressive about anything I did with him.
When I put the bridle on I did is as stress less and painless as possible. I rode him almost every single day and did it once every single day. It went on, I rode, it came off.  I can't remember exactly how long it took him to get over his bridling issue, but I wanna say three to four months.
The other thing I can think of is Flicka. She would walk off when we tried to get on. All we did was tie her up to the trailer and get on while she was tied to the trailer. The halter was around her neck and we just leaned forward and undid it when we were on. We did that every single time we rode.
Three or four months later Aleythia walked her outside and got on. She didn't move.
Another is Ana's cribbing. We tried getting a cribbing halter, yelling her name, throwing dirt clods at her... nothing worked. Eventually Terry just put wire mesh all along the inside of her stall. She doesn't do it anymore. Or at least not nearly as often. She does it when you're handing out apples and she didn't get all of them.
Pawing works that way too. Pawing comes from a lack of patience. The horse wants to get moving. If he stood tied all day and you ignored everything he did he would eventually figure out that he's not going anywhere, the post will hold him, and he'll stand there like an old nag.
If you've ever read Mugwump Chronicles you'll see she uses a similar technique.
Let's put it this way. Your horse doesn't want to cross a bridge. You have to cross that bridge once every single time you ride. You try to get him as far as you can urging him across that bridge but most of the time you end up leading him across. Every single day you can urge him across a little further before leading him. Don't you think that eventually he'll be able to walk across that bridge without a problem?

Just do it and don't worry bout it,
Lydia Johnson

Desensitizing and Sensitizing

Is it possible to have a horse that is extremely responsive to its rider, but unresponsive to everything else?
I think it is.
You may here people say that desensitizing makes your horse unresponsive to your cues, and they would be correct... if that was all you did.
I'll give an example.
Aleythia and I started training a young filly, Flicka, when we were about ten. We didn't know what we were doing. We had a little help, but mostly it was what we felt like doing, whenever we felt like doing it, and no thought as to the mental readiness of Flicka. We did a lot of one thing and not enough of others, or not at all.
The best thing about Flicka is that she is pretty much child-proof. That was because of all the things we did with her. We got on her bareback and bridle less in the pasture and just sat there, we swung up Indian style, and moved all over her back sideways, backwards, and standing up. That's about all we taught her.
Flick is the laziest most unresponsive horse you could probably come across. Ok maybe not quite that bad. There's always something that's worse.
Flicka won't canter. We never made it a requirement for her to canter.
She can't do ground work worth didlysquat. I worked with her once this last summer and I wanted her to back up. Basically I ended up hitting her chest with my whip for five minutes until she figured out that going forward wasn't the answer. Then she stood still for a minute. After that she took one tiny step backwards.
Her steering is faulty. If she doesn't want to go somewhere you won't get her to go there.
My point is we didn't do any sensitizing. She is five years old and she hasn't cantered with a rider.
The other extreme is a horse who is off the scale sensitized. Those horses are really nice in a calm, familiar area, but the moment you take them away from their comfort zone they become terrors. They spook at every little thing and are very unenjoyable to ride. They haven't had enough desensitizing.
We all have some form of those two extremes. Maybe not quite as extreme but they're still there.
What we want is a horse that listens to our request, but zones out almost everything else.
The trick is to have an even balance of sensitizing and desensitizing.
The best way to do this is before or after every ride with your horse you desensitize. Just make a habit out of it. It doesn't have to be major. It can take 30 seconds.
The first time you desensitize say like to a rope, your horse will more than likely freak out and you might have to make a whole session out of that one thing, but after that it will not take very long.

May your horses be responsive and safe,
Lydia Johnson

Catching Horses

This post is as much about horse behavior as it is on how to catch that horse of yours.

Here are a few ways you can catch your horse

You can chase him around. This does work. What happens is your horse realizes that it's less work to let you catch them. This is the make the wrong thing hard and the right thing easy. Basically just make them run around until you think that he will let you come up to him to be haltered. The moment he moves away you chase him around again. A tip for this is that when you finally do catch your horse, put his halter on and just stand there petting him and letting him relax. This will make being with you a positive experience. This does take a lot running to accomplish though. Especially if you are in a pasture.

Food. Food is a powerful motivator. Your horse will more than likely come to you if he knows you have his favorite treat. Through try to get him haltered and then give him his treat. This will be a problem if you have more than one horse.

Retreat. Horses aren't afraid of something that's retreating. Instead they become curious. So you walk out to the pasture to catch your horse and he starts walking away from you. Right when he takes that first step you retreat. Watch his reaction. What most horses will do is instead of walking away they will step towards you. I keep experimenting with this one because it has so many aspects. But I did it with catching a horse. I walked up to one of the fillies and tossed my rope over her neck. She started walking away. I turned around and walked away with the body language of are you sure you want to leave? She took a step towards me. After that it was a piece of cake to get her haltered.
Another aspect of the retreat is to work your way towards your horse in arks. So that most of the time you're not facing him head on. When you do reach him you'll let him smell your hand and then retreat. And repeat. In stages you'll go from letting him smell your hand to petting his head, then neck, and eventually haltering.

You'll have to decide which way works best for your horse. Cause chasing your horse around would not be good for a horse that's been abused. What would work for that type of horse is retreat or possibly food. I wouldn't suggest using food on a pushy, dominate horse. Chasing him around would work.
Sometimes a horse will see your halter and hightail it out of there. To fix that bring your halter to the pasture and go around and say hello, but don't catch your horse. Also what will help is if you don't always work with your horse after you catch him. Catch him and let him go. That way he won't associate haltering with working.


Say hello to your equine for me,
Lydia Johnson