Yesterday, Lilly and I received a visit from my very generous friend Alex, of
Alex and Apple Show fame. She took pity on me after reading about my last horse show experience and was kind enough to come give me some pointers and guidance to help me have a better relationship with my horse. I first met her back in June of '08 when I attended one of her
clinics to help Lilly with, who would have guessed it, being herd bound! This was more of a trail issue as we weren't doing a whole lot of showing at that time, but I had experienced a pretty awful weekend trail riding with my friends. I got some great pointers from her during the weekend of the clinic but I didn't do a whole lot of trail riding after that, so the herd bound issues kind of faded away.
After the clinic, we stayed in touch and she recently moved a bit closer to my neck of the woods, although she's still not quite close enough. In a perfect world I would have a lesson with her every week because her ability to train animals is truly inspiring.
Our philospies are quite different, but I have much respect for her and it seems fairly obvious that her philosiphies and techniques work better than mine. Over the course of about 5 hours, I had a lot of "ah hah" moments and I'm going to have to learn to change my ways. I think it'll be a lot harder for me than it will be for Lilly, but for some reason that mare of mine has a hold on me in ways that aren't good for either of us!
Alex prefers to have an employer/employee type relationship with her horses. As an employee, you can still laugh and joke with your employer, perhaps even have a good time on the weekend at a BBQ, but the bottom line is that person is still your boss. There are lines you don't cross and things you don't say because you know your job could be at stake. There is always a certain level of respect maintained, even if you consider your boss your friend.
I don't know what Lilly and I have, but it certainly isn't that. Even though I consider myself the boss, and for most things I demand she be respectful, there are a lot of things I let her get away with. For example, when we're standing in the arena, she creeps. It's only one baby step at a time, but she's on the move. Not a big deal in my book because I just constantly tell her to quit moving and back her into place. She'll stand for a few moments, and then she creeps again.
I gotta tell you, if I wasn't sitting on Lilly, that would never fly. A gelding from my past would have been quickly reprimanded and told to stand still. Even little things like that weren't tolerated, but for some reason I let Lilly get away with it.
Why? I have no idea, honestly.
Alex offered a suggestion that turned into one of those ah-hah moments. Lilly has always been a good horse. She's not a biter, she's not a kicker, she doesn't buck, rear, or misbehave when she's being ridden. She's just a good darn horse. So I end up letting little things like that slide. Why? Because she's just so good. It serves no purpose to make a big deal out of something so small and seemingly irrelevant. She stands still in the lineup at shows, and that's all that really matters. Or is it? All these little things multiply into bigger issues, and Lilly learns that
she's really the one in charge.
Alex started Lilly in the round pen and I stood outside to observe. First she did some work with the halter and lead, and then Alex took the halter off and started working her in the pen. Lilly started out as she always does, running around, doing her own thing, but in a matter of minutes she went from typical Lilly to Lilly like I've never seen. She was paying attention, jogging around instead of going as fast as she could, and you could see the weight of the world being lifted off her shoulders. It was pretty obvious that Alex was boss mare and Lilly was looking to her for direction. Lilly was no longer making all the decisions herself and she was clearly enjoying herself.
When I'm in the round pen with her, Lilly is boss mare. She chooses her direction, she chooses her speed, and while it feels like we do accomplish something, I can now see that I'm merely waiting for her to finally do something I've asked her. When she does, I reward her for the try and the session really stops there. She does try really hard to understand what I'm asking of her, which is something I love about her, but when she gets it I immediately back off, reward her, and move on to something else. Alex prefers to reward her for the try, but then continue to ask for more and more, going past so-so and on into excellent. Lilly and I have been hanging out in the so-so world for a long time, and Alex helped me see that Lilly has the potential to go well into the excellent.
After watching the transformation, it was my turn to get in there with Lilly and try to accomplish the same amazing things Alex did. I have a lot of work to do, especially in regards to staying back by her hip instead of directing my energy at her head, but I feel much better about our round pen work and what I can accomplish in there. I need to remember to use my body more too, and exhibit the same amount of energy with my body that I want to see from Lilly. Alex was able to get her to canter simply by skipping around in the round pen...
So here I am trying to work with Lilly:
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Trying to be the boss and give her orders for a change. |
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A picture of Lilly after giving her a release by turning and walking away... Lilly would turn in as I turned and follow me around the round pen. |
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A respectful horse standing next to her alpha mare mom (that's me!). |
After the round pen work, we saddled her up and took her into the arena. I told Alex about a few of our issues, namely being my mare's desire to anticipate
everything. There's no setting her up for anything because as soon as I start to get her ready, she knows what's coming. Take the canter for example. She already knows what I do to prepare myself (and her) to canter. She knows it's coming and is so focused on nothing but cantering, that I end up having to spend most of that time holding her back. There's not really an opportunity to properly ask for the left lead, because I'm holding her back and she's not listening to me anyway. The longer I take to try and set her up, the more the anticipation builds and by the time I finally ask, she shoots into it like she's been fired from a rocket. I have to hope she's chosen the correct lead or we have to do it all over again. After we're done cantering, she starts over again, anticipating when we'll be cantering again.
So typically if she finally gives me a decent canter transition, I stop and reward her for the try. Then we move along to something else. Again, we're staying in the so-so instead of trying for excellent. From now on, if we have a good one, we'll try for another, and another, and another.
Being the absolute genius that she is, Alex decided to take Lilly's obsession and turn it into something that works for us instead of against us. She spent quite a bit of time getting Lilly soft in the bridle, and then went to work on the anticipation. She walked her around the ring, asked her to "hurry up" at the walk, and then immediately stopped her. When she got soft, she backed her up. Once she was soft again, they moved forward at that walk. Hurry up, stop, back, walk... and eventually they moved into trot, hurry up, stop, back, trot.
Instead of being focused 10 steps ahead of her rider, Lilly started anticipating the stop. She knew it was coming and you could tell she was hunting for it. She was constantly focused on Alex and I could see Lilly's legs starting to get heavy. She went from "trot really fast" to "now dang it, I know she's going to ask me to stop any minute, so maybe she doesn't really want me to trot... ok, she does want me to trot, but I'm just going to go really slow so when she finally asks, it'll be easier for me to stop."
Alex worked her at the canter as well, and was able to get some beautiful transitions out of her. She was moving so slowly at the canter that she was actually four-beating! I've never been so happy to see a four-beat canter in my life! Alex explained that the reason she was four-beating was because her body couldn't physically canter as slowly as she was trying to go, so the only way for her to maintain that speed was to four-beat. Once I'm able to build up her muscles, she'll be able to hold herself together in a proper canter, moving at that same slow speed.
I was amazed... and I wanted to get on and try it for myself! So after some pointers about the stops and a few tips about getting her softer in the bridle, I tried out my new pony. For the first time in her life, I had to WORK to get her to trot. My super sensitive, super responsive horse wasn't so sure she wanted to trot... what?! Now for some of you, this method might not seem like such a good idea, and you certainly wouldn't want to do it with a horse who is already hunting the stop, but for a horse with lots of GO like Lilly, it's absolutely wonderful. I would much rather have to ask for a little more than to constantly ask her for a lot less.
Without further ado, some pictures of us practicing. Please try your best to ignore my hair. It was WINDY again! (... and also 85 degrees!) :)
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Working on the extended trot and exaggerating our bends into the corner. |
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Check out this pitter patter jog! And I just sold my western show saddle! |
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Here's my girl using her hind end to SIT down and back with energy! |
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A pretty hunt seat trot! |
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And finally a canter with the most "upright" feeling I've ever had on her back. No rooting and no dragging herself along. If I can remember to sit up, we might have something! |
I noticed a big change in Lilly. She was no longer creeping, she wasn't in her own world thinking about her own thing. When we were on the move, she was hunting the stop, and when we were standing still, she was trying to be invisible. She stood stock still with all 4 feet underneath herself for a change instead of being all strung out. She was waiting for the next command.
Amazing. I don't know how else to describe it.
We gave Lilly a break and I went to the pasture to get Baby. We wanted to take them out on the trails so Lilly could act a fool and I could get some tips on how to handle her. M was kind enough to let me use Baby for our experiment. When I brought Baby in, Lilly didn't move an inch... she didn't creep forward, she didn't nicker or whinny, she stood in the cross ties and tried to make herself invisible. I saddled Baby and we headed out to the trails.
Once we were out a good distance from the barn, Alex said, "okay, take her back." So I turned Baby around and we started making our way back to the barn. I turned my head around to look at Lilly and she just kept walking. I wasn't sure she saw Baby leave! So we repeated the exercise a couple times and Lilly could care less...
I was happy in a way, but at the same time, I wanted her to act up so I could see how Alex would handle her. Perhaps just that little bit of training we did in the arena made a huge impact? Take away from her the idea that she's the boss and she'll look to her rider for direction instead of making her own decisions? Could it be that easy?
So we switched horses and right away Lilly started to chomp on her bit. It was pretty clear that Lilly knows Alex is the boss, but she's still on the fence with me. In the past, she's made the decisions but times have changed! I had to get right after her and she settled in. We played a bit of leap frog and I had to work through a few issues, but it wasn't anything serious and certainly nothing like we saw at the show. I was really surprised by Lilly's behavior.
She still needs some work with being attached to Baby. After Alex left, I had both mares in the cross ties and I took Baby out first. When I left Lilly behind I heard those shoes of her racking across the concrete and I I heard her whinny a couple times. So I know we're not out of the woods yet, but I'll keep working with Lilly on the trails and see if I can convince M to go on a number of trail rides with me. Playing leap frog with the horses is a great way to desensitize her to having Baby out of her sight.
I'm hopeful that I'll be able to apply the tools Alex has given me and become a better leader without falling back into my old habits of constantly rewarding her for so-so behavior. I loved the horse I had yesterday, and I don't want to go back to where we were. It'll be a lot of work, but I'm going to work really hard. It's wonderful to know that Alex is only an email away and is so willing to help me work through these issues so I can have a better horse.
Thank you doesn't seem like enough, Alex, but I really appreciate you taking the time to come down and spend the day with us. You made a huge difference, and in such a short amount of time. I'm excited to see the changes in Lilly when I'm able to apply the techniques over weeks and months. Thank you!!