#starting colts

[westboundblues]

wild roan

[thirtymilesout]

“wild one”

[whichchick]

Denny Emerson (I am a huge fan) posted the other day on facebook, talking about doing vs. watching.  Quote:  Given the choice between riding a green horse on an insignificant trail ride, or watching good riders do hard things, my preference has always been to do it myself.

Watching good riders do hard things is important for learning.  I get a lot out of watching good riders ride and I try to make time to do it.  

However, I don't knock "insignificant" trail rides on green horses. Quiet hacks on beginner horses are the foundation of their lifetime riding careers.  The early outings -- quiet, calm, “you can do it” outings in a natural environment on a mostly-loose rein -- are foundational work and someone's got to do it. 

Lots of people don't LIKE doing it or don't feel comfortable doing it.  Starting colts under saddle is not for everyone.  Beginner horses are wobbly and clueless. They’re not comfortable to ride until they get their sea legs and figure out where the feet go.

Many people can't differentiate between "I have no balance" and "I'm gonna buck/bolt"... or possibly they aren’t comfortable mustering the appropriate response for either option, as needed.  Maybe they have difficulty keeping their own bodies loose and relaxed in face of wobbly and uncertain horse motion. 

Some find the drunkard's walk and small sillies of those first outings mentally exhausting.  Some don’t read a horse’s intentions and feelings as well as they might -- those folks typically get caught flat-footed or unawares when a horse is overfaced or pressured too much and reacts suddenly or violently. 

Colt starting and the first thirty rides or so are not for everyone.  I can't teach a horse piaffe or passage. I don't have the seat to jump a 3' course of fences. I'm lacking in many areas, but I can back and ride green baby horses in a way that is relatively low stress for them and me... and that's not nothing.

It is Horse Kindergarten, no getting around that.  The lessons are things like “This is a saddle” and “This is a bridle” and “Here is how you get on and off a horse trailer”.  Pick up your feet like this.  Stand for mounting.  Stop, go, left, right, back.  Go.  Carry.  Easy, smooth, relaxed.  Here, let us go up hill.  Now, downhill.  Balance, rock your weight back, smoothly.  Whoa and stand.  I will mount/dismount on the trail and that’s OK.  Go through the water, go over the log.  Trot, walk, trot, walk.  Leapfrog in a group.  This is a canter departure cue. Here are leads.  Leg yield, sidepass, turn on HQ and FH.  Like with people kindergarten, there are some important overall lessons that go along with the curriculum.

Overall “horse kindergarten” lessons for the horse:  Relax.  Work through what you don’t understand.  I will give you time to think through a task and reward you, clearly, when you get it right.  You can do this work, and do it well. You will not be overfaced or rushed through things before you understand what to do.  It is OK to try different things to see if you can find the answer.  I will not be mad if you are wrong but you have to try.  You are a Good Boy.

[whichchick]

Bird had the day off yesterday but Zipper (welcome to Riding Horse Land, Zip!) did not.  Early in a horse’s working life... that time when you can throw a leg over with a better-than-75% chance of not being kilt but the horse still hasn’t got enough skills to be anywhere near fun to ride, when wobbly and confused are the orders of the day... the “rides” are like five minutes long.  And this is OK.  Zipper doesn’t need an hour of under saddle work.  He needs short, easy rides where he learns the very basic skills and gets a chance to practice carrying weight in a familiar, safe environment.

There are not very many tools in the box at this stage, they don’t work real well, and the horse doesn’t have the balance or strength to be comfortable at a canter.  So, we walk.  After walk is good, we trot.  Walk and trot stay the working gaits for rather a while, until the horse is stable in trot.  I get Haven’t you cantered him yet? frequently when I am starting babies.  Look, people.  He will not “forget” how to canter.  He’s been cantering since Day 1 of his life.  He KNOWS how to canter.  He’s wobbly and unsteady and not real confident at walk and trot.  There’s a lot more motion in canter and he’s not got his sea legs yet.  We DO NOT need to be out there flailing around in an unbalanced canter while he’s still trying to figure out how to carry a rider.  

My personal rule of thumb is that until the horse can more-or-less trot the length of the driveway (about 250 feet) in a decent, steady rhythm, there is no point in leaving the security of the driveway area.  Once we’ve left the driveway area, we go down t’ holler and work on hill climbs (for balance and strength) and trot circuits (for balance and strength) and creeks (for go-forward-bravely) and so forth.  Along the way, we trot the uneven track down along the creek (has rolling hills).  Once a horse is confident and steady over the uneven track with its small rolling hills, can trot up a rise, rebalance, trot down, rebalance, trot up, rebalance... this is a horse that is 100% ready to canter.  It takes a couple of weeks for a young horse to get there with my fat, floppy adult ammie ass in the saddle.  

Look, a lot of the time, horses buck when they become scared, unbalanced, worried... don’t you think an unbalanced baby who hasn’t figured out the “carry a rider” gig might be PRONE to bucking if asked to canter before he’s got his legs under him?  I don’t want bucking and I’m not in a hurry.  Zipper has plenty of time to get his legs sorted and his balance figured out while we walk and trot around the place.  Once he is steady and confident trotting the rolling hills, I’ll pick a warm day (for less shenanigans) and give him fifteen minutes of marching walk to the buckwheat field, trot the quarter mile around it, march back down, and then head up the long steep track (first half is very steep, second half is a grassy, gentle incline with good footing) at a marching walk.  (This gives him enough warmup to put the young-horse sillies to bed.  It will also be familiar territory for him -- we’ll have done a lot of work in this area prior to cantering.  Also, the gentle incline helps him with balance for beginner cantering.  I don’t have a ring but I damn sure use the tools I have.  I’m not an idiot over here.)  When we hit the nice grassy section, we’ll pick up a trot and I’ll sit-n-rock and he’ll float right into a canter, zero bullshit and very little chance of bucking.  This is not my first rodeo.

So anyway.  I had Trys lead him (with me aboard) out the driveway and back on Saturday.  Yesterday (Monday), I got him out and saddled him up and then got on him myself (nobody holding him down, he held himself still) and we rode (at the aforementioned walk) out the driveway and back twice.  We practiced all of the Beginner Skills:  walk on, turn left, turn right, whoa, one-rein-stop (to left and to right), back up, stand still.  We did each skill a couple of times (successfully) and that was that.  I hopped off, petted him, and gave him a small bite of Good Boy grain.  (Riding horses, especially early in their careers, get fed while being tacked up and stuff, but they also get a small bite, not much more than a handful, of sweet feet when they’re done.  It’s in a bucket.  I don’t hand feed horses.) 

This would be in a ring but we don’t have a ring, so it’s in the driveway.  Zipper did most of his riding readiness work in the driveway, so he’s good there. People act like you have to have a round pen or a ring or an indoor or whatever to start horses but honestly, all you need is a horse and a certain amount of clue.