Put your left hoof in, put your left hoof out....

Put your left hoof in and shake it all about! ;-)

Well, not quite! I should explain.

Last Saturday, my friend Sian Min of Cardinal Points Farm came by for an initial SATs session with Sport. What's SATs, you ask? A more detailed explanation can be found on the Synalia website, but basically it's the idea of naming things (objects, body parts, etc.) and then using a voice command to get the horse to move a body part, touch something etc. (remember the kids hide and seek type game Hot and Cold? "you're getting warmer" or "you're getting colder" Sorta like that...) The horse then gets verbal praise and a treat (treat use decreases after time) when he completes the task/ request. It's proven to be helpful with horses like Sport who are somewhat unconfident, by helping him become more aware of his body and of "scary" objects (tarps, cones, etc.).

So Sian Min started by teaching him "NOSE" and a few other body parts ("face" is used for his forehead, then there's "chin", "left ear", "right ear" etc.) and objects. All in all pretty cool as he started to understand that when she said "TOUCH GLOVES", he'd end up touching the gloves with his nose! Neat!

She taught him the name for another another object and started having him pick between the two objects. "Sport... TOUCH HAT" while holding in front of him a baseball cap in one hand and the gloves in the other (one object on each side of his nose) . If he got it wrong, there was no verbal praise or treat, instead "No that's gloves" with the objects being put behind her back and then re-presented with the same command.

Hmmm... so I touch my nose to your fingers when asked and I get a treat? Score!

I have been using the same SATs techniques this week to reinforce the names of the objects and body parts already learned, as well as started teaching him new body parts. He's doing pretty well, but still alittle fuzzy about "face", "chin" and both ears.

However, he learned his front feet/ legs quite quickly... To illustrate, on Wednesday I taught him "LEFT FOOT" by saying the name and then tapping his left leg (I use "foot" to mean the foot and leg) with a whip, giving verbal encouragement for even the smallest effort (i.e. shifting his weight from his left to get prepared to move his left leg), until he understood to lift or step back with his left leg. That first time asking for "left foot" went something like this:

Me: "Sport... LEFT FOOT." Then tap, tap, tap, tap, tAp, tAp, TAp, TAp, TAP, TAP (tapping to infinity it seemed! He seemed very unfazed by the firm tapping...)


Sport: "Mom, uh, why are you tapping my leg? It's getting annoying. Sigh."...

Me: "LEFT FOOT." Tap, tap, tap...

...until he moved his left leg even slightly. This all took probably less than 30 seconds in total. Then a verbal "eXcellent" with face rubbing and treat.

The second time, there was less tapping (in quantity and pressure) needed before he complied, and the tapping decreased as we progressed (about 6 times total).  That was it for the day.

Yesterday, we reviewed a couple objects and "left foot", then worked on learning "right foot". Huge difference in the speed of learning from the day before! :-) Once he learned the difference between his right and his left foot/leg, getting him to lift his right leg took much less effort on my part than had teaching him left leg the day before.

At first, it was "RIGHT FOOT", a few small taps on his right leg, but he at first lifted his left leg. "No, that's left foot. Show me RIGHT FOOT" with a few small taps, then he shifted his weight and just barely raised his right heel off the ground, so I responded "X", rub, treat! By the end of the session, I was *very* tickled when I asked for "right foot" and he lifted his right leg pretty high (similar to "striking out" but much slower and deliberate, and in no way threatening me) and slowly pawed the air. AWESOME!! It was toooo cute! Big "X", lots of rubbing and lots of treats! Done for the day! Pretty smart horse, huh? :-)

As an aside: It was also interesting to see how on the first day of naming "left foot", he'd take a step backwards versus lifting it. On the second day, it was lifting the foot only (either one) instead of taking a step back... which is fine by me since it keeps the "BACK" command separate from "foot".


And thought I'd include a cute pic of my old man *really* enjoying some soaked alfalfa cubes! Cutie pie!

What do you mean there's alfalfa on my forehead?

Tarps, schmarps!

More work today with tarps (about 20 mins.), on a slightly windy day... he was such a good boy. Though he may not be so amicable when I start to put the tarp over his body, head, etc.! ;-)

He followed me when I walked through the "chute" (note no lead rope)... I've learned that basically his philosophy is "If Mom can do IT and IT didn't kill/ eat/ maime her, then *I* can do it too! Snort!"

My normal view of Sport when I unhook his lead
so that he can roam in the roundpen (if he wants), when I adjust/move obstacles.

I still have to walk "with" him as he goes into the close ended chute (a.k.a. trailer stall),
he won't "self load" yet, but he'll get  there...

He's pretty comfortable with it all. As a matter of fact, in this pic above, there are two traffic cones on the other side of the chest "wall" to give him more of an idea of a wall (a.k.a. "stop"), since the try before this one, it was just the tarp on the temp. corral posts  creating the chest wall, no cones... and he didn't understand fully that he was *supposed* to stop, so he kept walking thorough the wall (see below) pulling out one of the temp. posts and dragging the tarp with his legs and belly. I  was very proud that he didn't freak about having the tarp drag, touch him, make loud noises as he walked through it (and all he did was walk, there was no rushing), yet alittle dismayed he didn't fully stop when I asked him to whoa! I chalk it up as a success however! :-)

The closed end of the chute after the Great Sport Walk-Through...
See below for the after of Sport realizing he's supposed to stop at the chest "wall".

"What?!? No big deal mom, really...!"
(as an aside, the short lens on the point & shoot camera makes his head look huge and body look funky! He's much better looking than this pic!)

"I shall bite the blue plastic 'wall' to let it know I mean business!"

So, Sport has not had any work for the last few days due to the cold, wet weather... but today I decided to work on getting him to go in between a tarp "wall" and the roundpen (a "chute" of sorts).  As expected, he snorted at the tarp when we walked into the roundpen, but didn't think much of it, except giving it the "hairy-eyeball" a few times when he walked near it. He was not really paying attention to me, was more concerned about where the other horses were and whinnied for them once, so we did a few easier exercises to get him focusing. We serpentined through some cones, one of which he snuffled, then bit, then knocked over with his nose... he then of course, did a soft snort then an "in-place" little spook because he made it fall over... I put the cone back up and he snuffled it again and sighed...

We then did several passes between the tarp and fence line in both directions, with the tarp about 3 - 4 ft. from the fence. (As an aside, I got the tarp to "stand up" like a wall, by using three of those plastic temporary fence rods/posts, laying the tarp over the rods and holding it in place with some bungee cords.) And then I had him back through both directions and stop while beside the tarp. It was amusing  when I'd unhook his lead so that I could readjust the tarp "wall" closer to the fence (so that it was about 2 1/2 ft from the fenceline). He's standing right there snuffling the tarp and me, nibbling grass... I had him walk in between the smaller "chute" a few times both directions, then back-up, then stop quietly.

You can see his concern in this pic... concern for grass!!

Hmmm, this sounds crinkly like a feed bag, but doesn't taste good!

I wish Sport was as quiet about other things (like going to horse shows! ahem!), but he'll get there, I hope! Next time, I'll put the tarp closer to the fenceline, wash, rinse, repeat... Then block one end of the "chute" so that he can go in, but has to back out... and then we'll work on having the tarp over parts of his body etc. I figured getting him used to the tarp first before putting it on him will help... we'll see!

You can see the utter excitement on his face in this photo. :-)

Sport's first show as a spectator

He went to his first show this past Saturday as a "spectator", and though he generally overall did well, it was a mixed bag. We parked a good distance away from the arena and warm-up areas, but he could still see all the goings-on. But, when I tried to walk him in a field near the trailer where a handful of folks were warming up,  he'd get nervous, snort, dance and leap around on the lead line as I was walking him (I used 15' lead to make sure I had safe distance as he was doing all this, but also I was able to keep a hold on him and not have him get loose!). But after a minute or two of that, he then calmly walk and then stand quietly, relax, eat grass for a few minutes, and then it was the same over and over (wash rinse repeat as they say). One upside, he didn't constantly scream... 

At one point I tied him for just a few seconds to get something out of the trailer tack area, I hear him start dancing around, and then I hear a "pop!" Uh-oh. I look around to the other side of the trailer and he's broken the bailing twine he was tied to, and he's standing there about 4 four behind the trailer just looking at me and Kidd (my friend's horse). While I'm glad he didn't run off like a banshee with it's hair on fire, I'm bummed that he was being so silly/nervous that he broke the twine because he's normally very good about his limits (i.e. when he tries to go backwards but feels the halter/lead pressure from being tide up, he stops rather than pulling harder). 

By the end of the day we put him in the trailer to wait with a haybag for the last hour or so where he could still see the arena, lights and other horses and hear the announcer, etc. He was very good while waiting, only one whinny, no pawing nor kicking, and he was munching hay after awhile (staying in the trailer was oddly a good thing for him, he seemed to feel pretty safe in the trailer) - his little brain had had *enough* of standing tied to the trailer after ~1 1/2 hours earlier in the day, so tying him there wasn't an option, especially when the only horse he knew would leave to go warm-up or whatever. *sigh* 

I feel bad because it was *way* too long of a day for his first show visit, but we had no idea it would take so long (I went with a friend who barrel races and they don't have a set time to compete, just a number, so it takes as long as it takes others to do a run, plus dragging the arena after every 50 riders... and she was # 162!!!) - we had thought we'd be gone maybe 4 hours or so, we ended up being there 6 hours... ugh. 

Chillin' at the trailer until he reached his limit...

I hope I didn't set Sport back in his training by taking him that day... I felt really disheartened on the drive home, and still feel pretty discouraged by how he'd go back and forth between nervous and relaxed. I was really hoping for more relaxation after he was there for awhile... :-(  Especially since we have been working at home to on groundwork exercises to make her more confident.  I hope he gets better as we progress, I fear he won't... I soooo wish he had some of General's confidence. *sigh*

Why you should wear your helmet and not push your horse too fast!

So, on December 16,2010, on a lovely weather day, I thought... "Sport's got such a good brain from what I've seen, I bet I could get on him just to tool around the pasture today. It's such a beautiful day."  Well, I thought to myself maybe it was abit too soon to get on him, but unfortunately pushed those thoughts to the back of my brain, and got on him anyway. Long story short, it was alittle windy, he was somewhat nervous, and after one slightly tense lap walking around the pasture, Sport had reached his comfort zone threshold and "BAM!" literally out of nowhere (besides him being alittle tense, I really had no indication of the reaction that was coming), a lightning quick rear up, followed by a solid rodeo buck! So, off I came, whacking the back of my head (with my helmet ON thankfully) and somehow tearing muscles in my ribcage underneath my left armpit. Admittedly, I deserved it as I should as listened to my inner thoughts... He ran back to the barn, and I followed slowly. I did do some groundwork with him in the roundpen before calling it quits that day, but haven't ridden him since, realizing he needs alot more groundwork, confidence-building and lunging work before I get back on. Which will be in the roundpen this time, with my new helmet on my head. *sigh*

And as embarrassed as I am to retell this story of my stupidity, I felt it was necessary to 1. Remind myself why I wear a helmet and 2. To show anyone reading this blog why it is SO important to wear your helmet since I got bucked off at the WALK. And, yes, I have a new  helmet!

Inside of the back of the helmet (about where my head hit the ground)

Outside back of the helmet