# for the love of Pi



## Cathartes caballus (Feb 19, 2015)

I'm closing in on the anniversary of my first year of horse ownership (one more week!) I've posted a little here and there, but I've been through so much in my first year that I keep thinking I should have all of my adventures written down somewhere. So I figured I'd try the journaling thing. 

Bear with me, because I'm going to go through my back story and try to catch up on the past year and this could be a long post.

I'm 33, female, married with two kids (boys, 5 and 8 years old). I was born and raised in the Rocky Mountain region (USA) and have been around horses in one way or another my whole life. I was never allowed to take riding lessons as a kid (expensive and dangerous), nor was I raised in a horsey family. But I grew up next to a "horse field" and that is where my siblings and I played in the summer. When I got older I learned to ride by riding other peoples' horses from time to time: trail riding with friends and on rentals. Last year I finally found myself in a situation where I could own my own horse. I knew it would be tough without having any formal horse background, but I am the kind of person who likes to do things well once I commit. I'm also lucky enough to have good friends who have helped me a lot. And a strong background in animal training and husbandry.

So last March I bought Pi. He came with a different name, but I'm a math and science nerd, and Pi is an irrational number and is one of the most important numbers in math. It seemed to fit. He is a 16 (going on 17 this year) year old MFT gelding. I am his third owner and his previous owner held onto him for 7 years. He was almost exclusively used as a trail horse, and trail riding is my primary interest. He was also said to be good with kids. They kept him barefoot and rode him western. I looked at dozens of horses when I was ready to buy, but he was the first one I felt really safe on. 

I don't have my own property to keep horses on. However, I am lucky in that we live in a fairly horsey community with lots of options. Around here we don't have a lot of riding barns with rented stalls. Instead we have several horse "shanty towns": large areas of land that are dedicated to keeping horses. Generally speaking you rent the land and the structures and the animals on it are self-cared and owned. Like a trailer park. It amounts to a hodge-podge collection of corrals and small barns. There are a couple of privately-owned corral facilities... and one city facility.

I rent my land at the city facility, which is right inside town. For $160/year I get a 40' x 40' space to keep my horse, free water, use of the city rodeo arena (across the street), an on-site manure pit for manure disposal, garbage removal from cans placed on one side of the facility, outhouses (summer only), access to two round pens, a mechanical walker, and immediate access to the green belt trail system. It's a good deal. The facility is maintained by the city and run by a committee. There are rules about how your property must look and be maintained, similar to an HOA. My corral is fenced with 6' pipe panels and features a barn big enough for my tack and for a good amount of hay storage and it's attached to a 3-sided run-in horse shelter. It's a good deal. While the city maintains the overall facility, the maintenance of my panels and my barn is my responsibility and expense. 

Since I own the structure, I had to buy it separate from my corral lease. Sometimes people get evicted and they'll tear down all their structure when they leave so the next tenant has to build from scratch. Most of the time, though, if you decide to leave on your own you sell the structure privately and the new tenant has to also get approved for the lease by the city. Again, like a trailer park. I do have electricity in my barn and at my corral, but I have to pay for that myself. And while we do have free access to water, there is just one water station for the whole area. That means everyone has to haul water to their corral. It's not a big deal now that I have it figured out, but it did make for an interesting learning curve for my first winter.

My horse is kept alone, which isn't ideal. But we are surrounded by neighbors and the geldings that are kept next to us are close enough to give Pi someone to stand close to and interact with. I'm hoping to add a second horse some time in the next year, but I think it's important to take my time and make sure that my financial situation is prepared for a second horse and also to make sure I get the right horse. I also want to make sure I've got a good handle on what's going on with Pi before taking on a second horse with a different personality and different management and training needs.

So that's the background. I guess I'll write another post to catch up on the past year.


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## tinyliny (Oct 31, 2009)

I hope you intend to post photos.


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## Cathartes caballus (Feb 19, 2015)

*year 1: the first six months*

I bought Pi in the next state over, so getting him home was quite an adventure. I did a lot of research about the paperwork necessary to cross state lines. The day that I first went to look at him I took him for a trail ride and put a deposit on him. Then we waited for a week, which allowed the seller to get all the paperwork in order. They had been all lined up to sell him to someone else and he'd had his brand transfer and vetting done, but it had all been done to the specification of the other buyer so all the paperwork had to be changed. It also gave me a chance to print up a bill of sale... just in case the seller didn't make one (which, as it turned out, they didn't.)

My husband and I had never trailered a horse alone before. I had a little experience trailering horses with friends, and he had a lot of experience pulling trailers... though nothing alive. We borrowed a two-horse, straight-load BP from a friend. Driving it empty was no problem, and Pi loaded into it very easily despite the fact that the previous owners usually hauled him in a huge stock trailer. We hadn't thought to bring a hay net, though, and Pi pawed anxiously in the trailer most of the way home. It was a three hour journey, not counting stopping over at a friend's ranch so he could be appraised and so we could pick up some loaner tack. By the time we got home it was dark. So my first solo trailering experience ended with unloaded in the dark... although I do have flood lights in my corral and that did help a bit.

Those first couple of weeks were fun, but they were also big learning cuves for me. An experienced friend came out and helped me fit my loaned tack and take my first few rides at home. I really owe him a lot. One day he got on my horse and rode him hard down into the river bottoms to see if he was likely to give me problems anywhere. When he came back, he said, "you're going to have to ride him assertively, but he'll be fine." On another visit we walked over to the arena where he got on and ran Pi through all his gaits and then got off and made me do the same... including cantering, which I had done before but not much and which I had a bit of a fear issue with. But I had a strong desire to learn to ride better, so pushing through fear was a big part of my life over the past year. 

During those first few weeks and months I used to lead my kids around on him a lot. We'd go through long walks through the corrals. I got to know Pi better and practice with the tack without committing to riding alone. He is really gentle with the kids, and even my trainer has commented that he is a different horse when they are on him or around him. 

One day, at the end of our first week together, we came back from one of our walks and I went to tie him up to untack him without closing the gate behind me. In my mind I thought I would go back and close the gate after I tied him, but I never did. When I was finished untacking him I let him go and went into the barn to get something. When I came back out, he was gone.

I was alone with my two kids. I put them into the truck and told them to stay put, grabbed a lead rope and halter, and went looking for Pi. He hadn't gone very far: he was out rubbing noses with every horse he could find. But I was inexperienced and he didn't know me and catching him ended up being quite the event. I was worried that he would leave the facility and end up on the road or the green belt, but he never did. Whenever he got to the edge of the corrals he turned and headed back in. Eventually my husband showed up. He had the presence of mind to get a few flakes of hay and throw them on the ground. He caught Pi pretty easily when he came over to eat... right about the time when animal control showed up. The whole fiasco was pretty embarrassing, but I've since learned that it's not super uncommon for horses to get out and nobody really judged me. 

Not too long after that I realized that Pi had a pretty nasty lice infestation. He was in winter coat when I bought him, which might be part of the reason why nobody noticed. So that was a learning experience, too. The only lice treatment that the tack shop had was Permethrin, which ended up working perfectly. Unfortunately I quickly discovered that I couldn't spray it on him: he was afraid of the spray bottle. That first treatment took my husband and I HOURS because we couldn't figure out how to deal with Pi's skittishness with getting sprayed. Eventually I gave up on spraying him and used rags soaked with the insecticide to wash his entire body and then clear water rags to rinse him off afterwards.

I talked to my friend about it later, and he said that his horses were always squirrely about spray bottles first thing in the spring. His advice was to just go for it and make Pi deal with it. So two weeks later when it was time for the follow-up treatment, that's exactly what we did. I got smart and bought a pressurized weed-sprayer. Then we tied Pi up to a secure place and I hosed him off with the Permethrin solution. Sure enough, he danced pretty good at first but then quickly settled down so that I was able to finish the treatment and then rinse with no issues.

The treatments worked: the lice went away and we haven't seen them since.

Grooming in general is something I've had to work with Pi on a lot over the past year. He has always stood tied nicely in that he knows not to pull back... but he gets antsy and moves around a lot, particularly when grooming. But I don't think he'd had much, if any, regular grooming at his last place. They had him out on pasture in a herd and just brought the horses in to go trail riding. The inside of his tail was a huge matted knot that took me a few weeks to work through. At any rate, this is something I've worked with him on a lot over the past year. He's not perfect, but he's improved a lot. Yesterday I lightly groomed him untied in the middle of the corral and he stayed put very nicely for me.

Trail riding was challenging for me at first, too. While I have horse friends, most of them live far enough away that riding together is hard to do. I knew that if I was going to ride much I would have to suck it up and go out alone a lot. I decided that I would teach myself as much as I could and then get a trainer when I hit my limit. So those first few months I got comfortable riding at all gaits on the trail - including the gallop - which really increased my confidence and changed the way I handle my horse.

Incidentally, my MFT naturally performs a variety of gaits. His go-to medium gait, though, is not the fox trot but the rack. I'm fairly sure he also has a flat walk and I've seen him do a hard trot on more than one occasion. But that go-to gait is a rack and he has a few versions of it depending on what condition he is in and how he is using his body.

The basic trail loop here is about 6.5 miles. The expanded loop that I sometimes do can get us up to nearly 9 miles. But in the beginning I had a hard time getting him out very far. I had a few good rides on him and then he started balking on me. Back then it wasn't anything nasty: he would just stop walking and nothing I did could persuade him to move forward.

My friends all told me that he had my number and that I needed to make him go by really kicking him. I tried that: not only did it not get him forward, I started seeing head tossing, tail wringing, and just enough prancing to make me uncomfortable.

One day it occurred to me that he might be foot sore. He had come to me as barefoot, but I had been warned that the terrain and climate was different enough that he could potentially have problems going barefoot. So I had my farrier out to tell me what she thought. She showed me how to look for stone bruises and recognize soreness: he was a little bruised and sore. She offered to put shoes on him, but I had a hard time putting shoes on him when he's been barefoot for most of his life. Instead I went out and bought him some Easyboot Epics for his front feet. 

The boots made a huge difference, but by now Pi was in the habit of balking in certain places. I had to learn how to push him forward. I finally figured out that he was most responsive to getting slapped with the end of the reins or a lead rope. We had one or two "discussions" out on the trail and then he gave up balking.

I also started the practice of getting off at some point along the trail and letting Pi graze. It was my way of making trail rides more enjoyable for him, especially since we were basically doing the same trail over and over again with small variations. 

I made a friend at the corrals and we started riding together a few times per month. Where riding alone used to be a necessity I discovered that it was a preference: there is something nice about exploring and trying new things at my own pace in partnership with my horse. Still, riding with my friend opened up new routes that I hadn't tried before, including ones that took us through town. I did things with her that I wouldn't have done on my own, including exploring narrow canyons and getting stuck on a shale shelf and having to find a safe way back down.

Once we got stuck out in a flash thunderstorm. We were headed back in about two miles from home when we heard the first thunder and saw the first dark clouds on the horizon. Half a mile later the storm was upon us with intense wind and sideways rain. We were near a park with a shelter, so we decided to make for it. My friend got nervous and got off her horse, but I decided I was safer on my horse and stayed on.

We headed down the trail with the wind at our backs until we got to a place where we had to turn against the wind to get to the shelter. Pi wouldn't turn at first, and I couldn't blame him. So we stood with our backs to the wind for a few minutes until the gusts died down just enough that I decided to try it again. He turned when I asked him to, saw my friend and her horse ahead of us and almost to the shelter, and decided that he was going to canter there. It was just a slow canter, and I knew he was following the other horse. The weather was miserable and once we'd turned I couldn't see out of one eye. I decided to trust Pi that he would stay sensible and get us to the shelter and I just hung on. 

The shelter was a narrow hallway with a roof between two bathrooms. The roof extended just past the hallway into a place where the horses could stand exposed on three sides but covered on top. My friend's horse wouldn't even enter the better area and she stood miserably huddled as close to the building as he would let her go. My horse, on the other hand, followed me all the way into the beginning of the hallway and stood quietly in the entryway. There was someone else taking shelter there with her two dogs. She brought them too close and they jumped at Pi and tried to bite him in the face. He just looked at them like they were crazy and the woman shoved them in the bathroom where they couldn't cause problems.

The storm blew over quickly, as those midsummer storms are prone to do, and soon we were back on the trail... soaked head to toe, but happy enough. It was the first time that I realized I could really count on my horse to be sensible when I needed him to be.

Shortly after that I started noticing that it was harder for Pi to canter. He would avoid the canter by going into a fast, broken washing machine trot. I took him to the arena to see if it was really an issue of losing the canter or if it was related to my inexperience: maybe I was asking him to canter in bad places or something. I worked him hard in the arena, but I could not get him to transition into a canter. I knew something was physically wrong with him, so I took him to the vet.

Pi was eventually diagnosed with West Nile Virus Encephalitis. He had severe hind end weakness due to swelling in his brain and/or spinal cord. He improved rapidly after he was diagnosed without any treatment, which leads us to believe that we managed to get him to the vet during the worst part of his illness. I'd been good about having him seen by the vet in the spring: he'd had all of his vaccinations, his worming, and his teeth had been floated. It was so unusual that he got WNV even after a vet-administered vaccination that the vaccine company asked for a sample to be sent to their lab for analysis. That sample also came back positive for WNV and the vaccine company ended up paying for all of my vet fees related to the illness. WNV can be very bad and Pi never really got all that sick... which, I'm sure, is a function of the fact that he had gotten the vaccination.

Pi was out of work for a month or so while he recovered.


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## Cathartes caballus (Feb 19, 2015)

tinyliny said:


> I hope you intend to post photos.


I will! My computer is just so slow with photos and I wanted to work on story first before I get buried in fighting with the computer over the photos. But they are coming!


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## Cathartes caballus (Feb 19, 2015)

*side notes on tack*

This seems like a good time to mention that part of my growing pains over the past year have been in figuring out tack. To start with, a friend loaned me a really nice older Tex Tan saddle, a one-ear head stall (no throat latch), a "western snaffle" type bit (a sort of Tom Thumb except with curved shanks), a breast collar, a pad, and a set of barrel reins.

The saddle was really comfortable for me, but I quickly figured out that it just didn't fit Pi. The gullet and bars were too wide, so that when I sat it in it touched his withers and it dug into his sides in the wrong places. I think saddle fit was a big part of the reason why he reared on me the first time I took him into the arena alone. Oh, right... I forgot to mention that. Yeah... he reared on me... and it wasn't a little pop up, either: it was a big one. I rode it out and then stayed on him for several laps around the arena until he was relaxed enough for me to feel like I could get off without sending the wrong message.









_Forgive the super defensive riding and the heavy contact on that bit. This was a very early picture from last spring, and might have even been the day that he reared on me. But it's a good picture of the first tack set I used on him._

After that I went on a hunt for my own saddle. I found a western saddle with SQH bars that seems to fit Pi pretty good except the skirt was just a little too big for his short back. Ugh... he's a tough horse to fit. He's narrow, has huge shark fin withers, and a short back. I rode that saddle for a couple of months but while it fit Pi reasonably well it was uncomfortable for me on longer rides.









_Out on the trail back when I first figured out to take a break and let him graze as reinforcement. Not the greatest photo of the saddle, but you can see how huge the skirt was._

I eventually decided to buy an Aussie-style saddle from Downunder Saddle Co. I bought a Wizard Poley, and while I could have done without the horn I wanted to buy used and with a horn was all they had in my size. I sent them a wither tracing to ensure fit and I've been pretty happy with the way the saddle fits him. Naturally he also got a new breast collar and saddle pad with this set up.









_Not a great photo for saddle fit, but you get the idea. This is a very early photo of this saddle and I was still trying to find the sweet spot where the saddle fits nice. But here you can also see his boots._

I started using a trainer at the end of the summer. At first it was just for my oldest son to get him into riding. I wasn't very confident letting him ride Pi on his own in the big arena because... well, in the back of my mind I could see Pi just running off with him. 

At first he was mostly taking lessons on her horses, but it wasn't long before I wanted him to be able to ride Pi so he could practice during the week. 

Now, my trainer strongly prefers snaffles over curbs, so my son was learning to ride by direct reining. But I didn't want him to ride like Pi that way in the bit that he had. I also knew that Pi's neck reining wasn't the greatest. So I decided to buy a snaffle. And, because I was trying really hard to put training first, I bought a really mild one: an egg-butt with a french link mouth piece.

Naturally I test drove the bit in the arena. It worked well, so I tried it on the trail. I have two snaffles now and they both work really well for me.

Since I bought a new bit I figured it was time to buy my own head stall. I had chewed on it all summer and finally decided to try a halter bridle. I bought a leather one with the bit piece that clips onto the sides. I thought it would be nice for trail riding since I'm in the habit of getting off and letting him graze. And it was. It is. But I never really liked how bulky it was on his head, nor having to balance the bit in his teeth while I snap it into place.









_Grazing on the trail with the halter bridle with the bit removed._

My husband gave me a new western headstall for Christmas. I haven't used the halter bridle since.









_Here he is wearing the new head stall with a black halter on underneath. Not the greatest photo but you get the idea. Also here he has the vaquero single reins with the scissor clips._

Finally: reins. I hated those barrel reins that my friend had loaned to me. They felt too light in my hands and twisted badly on the trail. I bought a set of split reins and a single, synthetic, vaquero-style rein at about the same time. Both attach with a scissor clips, which I like for both convenience and (theoretically) safety. I learned to ride with the split reins and I do well enough with them, but they are about a foot shorter than I'd like them to be.

The vaquero reins have been my go-to reins for the past six months or so. They are only 8 ft, so they are a bit short. The shortness works really well for me except when we stop for water: then I have to lean. 

Most recently, though, I realized that my son could benefit from a longer rein when he rides. I've also been thinking a lot about those scissor snaps and how the metal on metal probably isn't comfortable against Pi's teeth. So I had been playing with the idea of getting a third set of reins for awhile and I was just trying to figure out what would work best.

My son struggles with his hands when he is riding, which makes Pi resistant. I've put a lot of work into softening him up, but at his last lesson we realized that a longer, heavier rein might be a good aid to both of them. We discussed slobber straps as an aid to give Pi quicker relief. So I decided to try a mecate rein.

So my third rein, which I've just set up this week, is a mecate rein. I decided to try the full mecate set up after watching some YouTube videos showing how versatile the rein is and how it can be tied in such a way to allow for safe leading and tying on the trail. And I usually tie a rope around my saddle horn to act as a whip to compel Pi to move forward if he gets balky with me at all, and the mecate has that all built in. First it will be for lessons, but if it seems to be working well for us it may be my new trail rein as well.


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## Cathartes caballus (Feb 19, 2015)

*year 1: fall and winter*

About the time that Pi was done recovering from WNV I found a good trainer for my oldest son (8). He has done a little riding on friends' horses and trail horses in recent years, and I've let him play around on Pi just in the corral or round pen. But I wanted him to get some good formal lessons from someone other than me. You know... someone who really knows what they are talking about.

At first he was just riding the trainer's horses, but one day she mentioned to me that she would work with him and Pi if I wanted. So I started to occasionally trailer Pi to the indoor arena the next town over. It's a 20 mile trip, and in the winter the conditions can be quite dangerous. For a long time I refused to trailer him by myself and made my husband go with me. I just wasn't comfortable.

As the winter has progressed I have forced myself to learn to trailer alone. Now when we take Pi to the indoor arena, my husband stays home with my younger son and I do all of the hitching and loading and hauling myself. I feel pretty accomplished for finally achieving this skill set.

When my son started riding Pi in lessons my trainer started to point out some of Pi's problem areas. At the time, the big issue was that he was a habitual head-tosser. I knew this when I bought him: it was the one vice I was told about. I had been dealing with it all summer to the point where I had just started to adjust myself to it and didn't even notice it anymore. 

I realized that I couldn't expect Pi to be a good riding horse for my son if I wasn't riding him really well every time. That's when I started taking lessons, myself.

Last fall was a really good time, partly because of the lessons. My trainer set up exercises to get Pi soft to the bit and a little more willing and supple. In the mean time, I learned how to use my legs and my body more when I was riding and started working on doing leg yields with Pi. I had attempted this on my own, but having an instructor really helped me progress.

I started exploring more with Pi, too. I still haven't worked up the courage to take him into the deeper parts of the river, but I started exploring some of the little islands by crossing the narrower, shallower channels off the main trail.









_You can't tell for sure, but here we were standing in the middle of a wider channel._

I was also constantly adjusting my husbandry techniques. When I bought my corral it came with a big metal feeder on the wall. The kind with a trough for feed and a rack for hay. It took me awhile to figure out that the reason Pi's face was constantly beat up all summer was because he was putting his head down under the feeder to eat the hay that he dropped and then bringing it up underneath and hitting his head on the sharp parts. 

I did a lot of research and decided that I wanted him to eat head-down and have a near constant access to food. So I got rid of the wall feeder and bought a recycled tire feeder and rigged it so that I could clip a full bale feeder net inside. At first I clipped on both ends, but this allowed Pi to break the net. I repaired it for months before I figured it out. Then I bought a new net and only clipped it on one side and haven't had problems since.

Over the winter my trainer figured out that the reason the hair was getting rubbed off Pi's legs was because of the way he was standing and eating at the feeder. One day I actually caught him in the act of doing it, and then the rubber feeder had to go. I considered a lot of options before finally deciding to just tie it to the fence via a system of locking d-rings. It's been a great system ever since.










On the note of diet, I started Pi out with alfalfa. It is readily available here and I had been told it was the best thing you could feed. My first load of hay was these 80 lb bales of alfalfa. But the more I learned, the more I decided that grass hay was a better choice. 

Grass hay is harder to find around here for some reason. My first load of grass hay was decent quality except it was kind of stemmy. My current supply is nice and leafy, but it was left out a little too long before it was baled so it's a little drier and dustier than I would like. It's also got this woody-stemmed weed in it. Pi doesn't eat it, but I go through and pull it out when I see it as a kindness to his mouth and lips... and to my net! Hopefully in the spring I'll be able to find a really good consistent supplier.

I also recently added 3 lbs per day of Purina Equine Senior Active, which he seems to be doing really well on. 

Back to fall... at one point I noticed that one of Pi's boots kept falling off out on the trail. I couldn't figure out what the problem was: it was like they didn't fit him anymore, but I know they did when I first bought them. I talked to my farrier about it wondering if his feet might have changed much over the summer. She looked at the boots and pointed out that one of my gators was ripped. Still, if the boots fit him well they should have stayed on without the gators, and I was losing them on dry, level ground for no apparent reason at all.

I decided to try riding him without the boots to see if his feet had adjusted to the climate. I was told this would happen as his body adjusted. Sure enough, he finished out the year barefoot and with no issues at all. 

Later I found out that it's not uncommon for horses around here who are kept barefoot to get soft and sore in the spring when everything is wet and then be fine in the summer when everything is dry. With that in mind I'm thinking about the coming spring and whether I should attempt to repair or buy new boots to get us through the season.

Winter came kind of early this past year and with it came a whole new set of challenges for me. The husbandry challenges involved decided when (or if) to blanket and figuring out how to haul water.

Hauling water was a huge issue for me for most of the winter. The guy who sold me my barn had put a 300 gallon tank in it to make hauling water easier. So instead of hauling 50 gallons or so twice per week, he hauled 300 gallons once every two weeks. More or less: you get the idea. The thing was set up so that it was insulated top and bottom, and underneath it was a small incandescent light bulb to use in the coldest weather to keep it from freezing.

In order to haul water to it, I had a matching 300 gallon tank outside of the barn and a water pump with a hose system. So, you know, we would go fill the 300 gallon tank, bring it up to the barn and pump it into the barn. I only had to do this every 2 to 2.5 weeks over the summer. It was nice, but time consuming on a water hauling day.

The guy before me used to just put the tank in the back of his truck, but my tank has a camper shell. Which I like a lot. The tank won't fit in the back of the truck with the camper shell on it, but I also inherited a home made utility trainer that was used to haul manure. It was broken when I bought it, but I had a friend come over and weld it back together for me. So, every 2 weeks or so, I dumped the trailer, loaded up the water tank, and hauled water.

But early in the fall the trailer broke again. It was just stupid of us to haul that much water and put that much weight on that little trailer. The welds broke, and I haven't managed to get them fixed yet. The trailer is held together with heavy duty rachet-ties, but I don't dare put anything in it but a couple weeks worth of manure. And even when I finally get it fixed I'm not going to be stupid enough to haul water in it again.

So I went and bought a smaller tank. One that would fit in my truck and just live there all the time. I think it was 200 gallons. My husband put a spigot on the bottom of it to make it easier to drain. But we had to haul water in two separate trips on water hauling days now and sometimes there was water left over in the tank. We figured we'd leave it: the extra weight would be good in the back of the truck on icy roads.

Well you know what happened: the spigot froze. Once we managed to unfreeze it with a propane heater in the back of the truck, but we couldn't keep it unfrozen. 

And then the tank in the barn sprung a leak. It was pretty awful. We thought the leak was at a joint where the pipe went from the tank to the wall to empty into the trough, so my husband spend an afternoon trying to fix it, which was difficult because of the way the thing was boxed up with insulation. He got it all patched up and looking nice and I went to put water in it... and the leak was worse. We have no idea why, but I got to spend an afternoon trying to sweep water out of my barn with a broom and then pump the rest of the water out of the tank. 

We decided we weren't going to use the barn tank until the weather was warm enough to take it apart and really figure out how to fix it. But now that I've been hauling water the same way as my neighbors all winter I think we'll just get rid of the barn tank altogether. It's too much of a hassle, and I could use the space for a nice work bench.

In the meantime, I moved my trough out to the fence and just hauled a trough at a time like everybody else does. When I got frustrated with the spigot freezing I used the pump to pull water out of the top. That worked until the weather turned bitterly cold (lows near -30F) and the pump froze and burned out. AWESOME.

Then I siphoned for awhile. Siphoning is tricky, and when it's bitterly cold outside and you can't get the siphon just right... man it sucks. 

One day I was in line to get water and the guy in front of me was loading a 55 gallon barrel. I watched him take his spigot out of his truck and put it on his barrel before he loaded his water, and it was like a light bulb went on.

So I bought a 55 gallon barrel and my husband rigged the spigot from the other tank so it would fit the barrel. I follow that guy's example: the spigot lives in my truck so it won't freeze. I put it on before I haul and empty the barrel and take it off when I'm done. I haven't had problems since I switched... but man, figuring it out has been an expensive lesson!

I'm going to keep the big tank for the summer and I'll buy another pump. Because it seems to be the best way to set up a horse wash in the summer time.

As far as Pi surviving the cold temperatures, I did a lot of research on that. I didn't blanket him all winter because he grew a really nice winter coat and had constant access to food, water, and shelter. He didn't seem to have any problems. I did, however, get him a nice cooler blanket for days when I take him to the indoor arena and work him into a sweat. 

I continued to ride all winter, but trail riding was challenging. I'd never really ridden in snow before. I like riding through the deeper stuff because I felt like Pi was getting a good work out, but I also hated the feeling of not knowing when I was going to hit a hole. We did a lot less cantering on the trail for obvious reasons, and I know there were days when Pi was frustrated by my making him walk when he wanted to go faster.










My husband had surgery in December and I dropped my lesson temporarily to make a little extra room in the budget to pay for medical bills. I'm in the process of trying to pick them back up, but I also recently started a new job, as did my trainer, so we've been schedule-juggling to get it figured out.

As winter wore on the packed snow turned to ice. Going out in it made me nervous, and I realized it was affecting Pi, too. In January he started balking on me again. I set aside a day to work him on the trail head and push him through it, but then he started acting up with wanting to run home the second I turned him home and throwing his head and crow-hopping when I made him slow down. I took him home that day and made him work in front of the corral. After awhile he tried to bolt on me, and it was icy and I almost lost my footing.

After that I decided that I wasn't riding on the ice again this winter. It made me nervous and I think my being nervous made him nervous. And my confidence took a bit of a hit from it. Not worth it. So I've only been riding him in the indoor arena since... and not a whole lot, either, because of starting a new job.

Last week I brought him to my son's lesson for the first time in weeks (my husband had been taking him to lessons because of my work schedule, and he doesn't deal with Pi). My trainer asked if his back was out because of the way he was walking and holding his tail cocked to the side. His foot was turned out funny, too. I wondered if some of his recent behavioral issues might be due to pain.

So Pi has a chiropractic appointment tomorrow. My chiro is also a vet, so I'm hoping he can help me figure out if he's in pain from something else. He's also getting his feet trimmed and we'll evaluate him for foot soreness. After that, if all is good, he will go back into full time work next week. The weather has been nice and most of our snow and ice is gone. It's time.

Hopefully I'll also be able to get into regular lessons with him again, starting next week. Then we can pick up where we left off with softening him and making him more responsive. I'm pretty excited about it.

The only other thing that happened this winter that's worth mentioning is that I started using cross ties. I like to tie him in the run-in section of the barn because there is a wood floor that gives us both a nice dry place to stand. It's also nice to tack and untack in shelter sometimes, and it's closer to the barn door so I don't have to carry the saddle as far. But the only good way to tie him in the barn is by a tie hook at the back, and he dislikes it. He doesn't like not being able to see what's going on, and it makes him move around a bit more than I'd like. It also puts him in a position where his off-side is to the door, so I have to walk around to the other side to put his tack on. Well, I don't HAVE to: I've tacked him from the off-side before, but it feels awkward and I don't care for it.

So I decided that if I taught him to use cross ties I could tie him facing out. That way he could see around him more and maybe he would stand nicer. It also put his near side towards the door, which made things easier for me. So I did a lot of research about cross ties and how to use them and how to train for them and how to be safe with them, and then I put some up.

Pi's not a horse to panic very easily, which is great. So training him to stand in the cross ties was pretty easy and went quickly. And I do think that being able to see has made a difference for him. I don't have to correct him so often because he doesn't move much.

So here's what that looks like:










All in all, we've come a long way over the past year. I was just thinking about this time last fall when I had Pi in the arena and he just felt like he needed to run. My son had been on him, and he had been well-mannered for that, but you could just tell that he had some energy he needed to burn. So my trainer suggested that I get on him and run him around the arena a bit. To my surprise, he went into a hard gallop. I let him run until he he wanted to stop on his own, and then I made him go a little more. I never felt out of control on him: he just needed to run. But that's the kind of thing that I couldn't have handled a year ago.

I think I'm pretty well matched with him. He's just challenging enough to make me solve problems and make goals, but he's not mean or aggressive. My challenge for the new year is to work with his mind a bit more. He has a very interesting personality. He loves to work for a reason and a goal and responds very well to positive reinforcement. He also responds very poorly to being pushed too hard. Right now I'm working on ways to resolve arguments without having to get too aggressive with him and butting heads, because if his mood is right he will push back to the point where he can become dangerous. When he finally gives up in such a situation he doesn't become more compliant: he completely shuts down and won't try anything. So I think for him it will be about outsmarting him and maybe being a bit unconventional. Fortunately for me I have a trainer who is really open-minded and willing to help me figure it out.


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## faith04 (Nov 22, 2015)

What a great write up. It sounds like you have come a long way in the past year. Pi is beautiful, although I know zero about western tack and riding, I'm compelled and really like your story. I'm subscribing to this for future updates.


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## Cathartes caballus (Feb 19, 2015)

Last Friday Pi got his feet trimmed and went to the chiropractor. The chiropractor said he was out to the right all down his spine: neck, withers, lower back and hips. Pi got two days off to rest and adjust, and then it was back to work again on Monday.

On Monday I rode Pi down to the arena early in the afternoon for a lesson. The arena is a little bit of a walk from my corral, and it involves crossing a road that can sometimes be busy. Fortunately Pi was in a good mood and walked to the arena willingly enough.

I beat my trainer to the arena by almost half an hour. Pi warmed up with a little walking, flexing, and backing. He did all this pretty well, though I noticed he was still a little reluctant to flex to the left at first. This improved over the session with some work, though, so I don't know if he just needed to warm up or if the memory of pain from flexing to that side made him resistant early on.

I didn't have any trouble with him until I asked him to walk the perimeter with small circles every 10 steps. Every time we turned back towards the gate he tried to trot back without finishing the circle. At first it wasn't a big deal to correct him, but he got pushier and pushier. By the time we got to the other end of the arena he'd decided he'd had enough and he turned and bolted for the gate. I caught him and shut him down pretty quickly and he responded by bucking once. I stayed on, but I was pretty surprised. I made him chase his tail a bit before we continued on.

We finished our perimeter walk without the small circles and when we got back to the gate I got off and lunged him a bit. I probably should have lunged him first, but he's usually not a horse that needs it. He was a little hot lunging at first, but there was no bucking or seriously bad behavior so I just let him burn off some energy. This is what we were doing when my trainer showed up.

I was a little worried that he might still be in pain, but my trainer felt like he looked much better than he had before the chiropractor and commented that with his feet finally shaped correctly (he had been stood up on high heels through the fall and early winter), recent back adjustment and the warming weather he was just feeling really good. 

He was good for his entire lesson, too. I think that engaging his mind and putting his energy to use in a different way really helped bring him down. We worked on collection and leg yields and there were moments where he was really with me and trying hard to do what I was asking him to. My trainer was pleased with the session and so was I. All in all I rode him for almost two hours.

He got a little feisty again on the walk home, though. At first he was just walking fast, which was fine. But he picked up a sudden burst of speed and transitioned into a fast trot right as we were getting to the busy road. I got a little nervous: the last time I worked him in the arena walking home was not an issue and I've never had to worry about him running out into traffic. I reined him in and we walked across the road, but once on the other side he tried to trot again.

Again I did a half halt and asked him to walk slow. He tossed his head and tried to go fast again. I slowed him again and he crow hopped.... but after that he resumed at a fast walk. He tried to trot again on the way back and responded to the half halt with another head toss and crow hop. After that he walked back nicely and I had no further problems with him.

The possibility of pain is in the back of my mind, but he is crow hopping on me specifically when he wants to go fast and I make him go slow... which makes me think it's more of a tantrum than anything else... especially since he was seen by both the chiropractor and the farrier last Friday. He did the same thing the last two times I trail rode him alone: crow-hopping tantrums when I wouldn't let him run home. It's not at all how he was riding in the fall and early winter, but maybe the warmer weather is just getting into him?

To be fair, he hasn't been ridden consistently over the past three months. Ridden, yes, but not consistently. He lost a lot of muscle and top line over that period of time. I also started him on a senior feed, and I wonder if the extra calories and nutrition is contributing to him having extra energy that he just hasn't been able to burn.

I'm taking him to the indoor arena tonight and we'll see how he does over there. He's usually more sluggish indoors than he is outdoors. I think this might just be a case of needing lots of exercise and wet blankets and perhaps a lot of work that involves using his mind. I guess there's nothing for it but to get it done.


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## Bondre (Jun 14, 2013)

Hi Cathartes, I'm very much enjoying your journal. Pi looks a really nice horse. And he sounds like a twin spirit to my own horse, Macarena. So many of the comments you make about him, his behaviour and his reactions to certain situations ring true for me. The main difference is that my horse is younger and greener - she's just six - but the basic character is very similar. Fascinating to see the issues you have together and how he reacts to your way of dealing with him. 



Cathartes caballus said:


> I think I'm pretty well matched with him. He's just challenging enough to make me solve problems and make goals, but he's not mean or aggressive. My challenge for the new year is to work with his mind a bit more. He has a very interesting personality. He loves to work for a reason and a goal and responds very well to positive reinforcement. He also responds very poorly to being pushed too hard. Right now I'm working on ways to resolve arguments without having to get too aggressive with him and butting heads, because if his mood is right he will push back to the point where he can become dangerous. When he finally gives up in such a situation he doesn't become more compliant: he completely shuts down and won't try anything. So I think for him it will be about outsmarting him and maybe being a bit unconventional. Fortunately for me I have a trainer who is really open-minded and willing to help me figure it out.


All this could be equally true of my horse. I have been having balking problems with her, since she had a bad scare out riding last summer, and I have found the best way to work through this with her has been using positive reinforcement, more specifically clicker training. I have written about all this in some detail in my journal (Macarena and Flamenca). Have you been using clicker training with Pi? I remember seeing your user name on a CT thread several months ago.



Cathartes caballus said:


> Again I did a half halt and asked him to walk slow. He tossed his head and tried to go fast again. I slowed him again and he crow hopped.... but after that he resumed at a fast walk. He tried to trot again on the way back and responded to the half halt with another head toss and crow hop. After that he walked back nicely and I had no further problems with him.


Sounds like your recent ride was remarkably similar to my last ride! I was having the same problem with her going home in a relaxed fashion, I allowed her to trot and got a whole bunch of crow hops and bounces in response. Really weird to read that Pi was doing the same stuff, albeit in a slightly more mature fashion as befits his greater experience. 

I think you're right when you attribute this behaviour to excess energy and a recent lack of consistent work. Time and kilometers (or miles) together are the solution. 

Looking forward to reading the next installment of your journey together.
_Posted via Mobile Device_


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## knightrider (Jun 27, 2014)

I love your journal. I wish every new horse owner would read it! They would learn a lot. Thank you for sharing.


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## tinyliny (Oct 31, 2009)

your journal is good. well written. I think you're doing an excellent job feeling your way with this horse. really good!

you might try the tactic of letting him go to where he wants to go (of course, you can't let him trot across the road) but maybe do all your work on the barn side of the road. anyway, let him go to where he wants to go, and then start active work. not punishing him, just quick work, then ask him to leave, and if he chooses to turn and head back, let him, and as soon as you get there, work him


you can even do it in a relatively small area. you ask him to leave the desired place, he goes a bit, then he tries to swing back, you let him but the minute he starts to face the desired place, you start your legs banging in an annoying way on his sides and have him do cirecles. alway stop the banging of your legs when he is facing away from the barn/gate/buddy (the desired place). if he keep going around to reface the DP, you start banging him and ask for a circle, and as soon as he's facing even partway away from the DP, you stop the busy legs.


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## whisperbaby22 (Jan 25, 2013)

I'm glad you were able to figure out the feeding problem.


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## Cathartes caballus (Feb 19, 2015)

Thank you all for your nice comments! I'm glad someone is reading and enjoying. It's nice to be able to come here and write stuff down in a place where other people can read and comment.

I think what I'm going to do about the crow hopping nonsense is work him hard when we are out and try to keep him engaged on the return trip. He is learning leg yields right now, and I've noticed that when his mind is engaged he seems to get these naughty ideas out of his head. I was also thinking about trying transitions and asking him to trot before he starts to rush himself, and then up/down him a few times so we aren't rushing home. I don't really have a problem with disciplining him for the crow hopping, but I prefer to avoid going head to head with him when I can. He has this personality where, when pushed, he will either rebel or shut down (and sometimes shutting down is a form of rebellion) and then pushing through it is sometimes beyond my skill level.

I have used a lot of positive reinforcement with him. He loves working for a clear food reinforcer and that is one way to keep him interested. The draw back is that as soon as I lapse into negative reinforcement techniques he slowly loses interest and gets bored. It's probably something I will continue to do with him, though, since he responds so well to it. Last summer when he was balking (towards the beginning of the season) I took a multi-faceted approach to fixing it: I got him boots, learned to push him by slapping him with the end of a rope, and I started making a point of making trail rides more fun for him by getting off and hand grazing him around the halfway point. It worked really well, and I was never sure which approach worked the best, but I suspect the grazing played a bit role; over the winter when there was no grazing I saw his enthusiasm for trail riding drop off steeply for the first time in months.

My trainer teases me that I spoil him, and I do worry about that. But he works so hard when he knows there is something in it for him and he can get downright dangerous when he is pushed to do something that he just plain doesn't want to do. I just... prefer to avoid the situations where he pushes back and I have to get bigger and bigger in order to win.

BUT... sometimes those situations just happen. Sometimes he kind of forces me to go there.

Last night was my son's lesson. We trailered to the next town over for it. I'm getting really good with the trailer, and Pi has always trailered well for me, so it's getting to be a non-issue to have to leave our home facilities.

Pi is very good with the kids. He takes pretty good care of them. Once last fall he was feeling fresh during a lesson. My son was trotting all over with him, and Pi kind of stepped into a canter, which he sometimes does. But he only cantered slow for a couple of paces and my son was able to easily bring him back down to a trot. When the lesson was done I jumped on him to work him a bit, asked him to canter, and he ended up tearing around the arena at a full gallop. I lost track of how many times we went around before he asked to stop. I pushed him to go a little more after that. But the point is I think he really needed to just be opened up to really run, but he knew better than to do that with a kid on his back.

So I wasn't really worried that he would act up with my son last night. Even so, I figured he would benefit from being lunged before being ridden.

He did a few easy circles for me at a walk and then at a trot when asked. I intended to keep him going at a trot for awhile, but after a few circuits he decided he was done trotting and just walked. I couldn't push him back up into a trot and after awhile he stopped and just looked at me like, "ha! You can't make me do anything!" So I got out a flag. That worked for a bit, but after a circuit or two he decided he didn't care about the flag and stopped and gave me the same look. Next step was the lunge whip, and while he would walk for that he still wouldn't trot and kept looking outside the circle, not paying attention at all. He tried to bolt once or twice and I just couldn't hold him with one hand while managing the lunge whip with the other.

So the trainer stepped in and took over. And put some fear of God into him. And it took awhile to get him going along compliantly. There was some rearing and a buck and, I think, one or two attempts to bolt. Then Pi did that thing where he was pretending to be compliant, but he still was looking outside the circle and he wasn't stepping out with his hip. He also wouldn't turn and go the other direction when asked. So... more tough love for him. 

It was handled well, I thought. The trainer asked nicely and then really went after him immediately if he didn't comply. All emotions were left out of it: just business. 

When it was over, I stepped back into the arena and lunged him both directions and... surprise surprise... he was perfect for me. 

I'm not afraid to get tough with him, I just suck at it. I'm all arms and ropes and... also only barely strong enough to hold him. Hopefully it will come and I'll get better at it. I'm pretty good at getting his respect in other situations (I make him stay away from me when I'm filling his grain, for example), but lunging is something I'm just not good at. And he knows it. Hopefully I'll get better.

He was pretty good when I rode him after that. To be fair, I don't know that he wouldn't have been just fine before that, either. Lunging is just not a part of my normal routine with him. But I got on and gave him a little warm-up, and then my son got on and did his lesson. It went well enough. Pi was a little hard-mouthed to turns at times, but he was happy enough to cart my son around at a walk.

I got back on him after with the intention of letting him trot off any extra energy, but I had to really get after him to stay in a trot. So I didn't do that for a long time because he didn't seem to need/want it. Lunging must have worn him out.

I had to work today, so Pi got the day off. Friday is supposed to be nice and my husband will be home to watch the kids, so I will be doing something with Pi. I just have to figure out what I'm going to do with him.


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## whisperbaby22 (Jan 25, 2013)

This seems to generate a lot of controversy, but with the trail riding, I see no reason to not bring along a snack for the horse at the half way point. If this makes him enjoy the ride I'd do it.


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## Cathartes caballus (Feb 19, 2015)

Tiny: I'm going to keep this in mind and reread your post on Friday. Maybe this will be the thing I do with him next time I ride. 

Whisper: I taught Pi to bend back and take a treat from the saddle when he gets his "bridge" (basically his click) specifically so I could do stuff like that at opportune moments. I haven't used it on a trail rode in something like 9 months because I haven't had to... might be time to try again. At least to get the nice ride back for the summer.


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## Cathartes caballus (Feb 19, 2015)

Oh! Today is the one year anniversary of the day we brought PI home. I can't walk away from today's updates without making a note about that.


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## weeedlady (Jul 19, 2014)

subbing. 
Your journal is very will written, a good, entertaining read. I think you are doing a great job. 
thanks for sharing.

Just one thing.....we need PICTURES. MORE PICTURES 
M


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## Cathartes caballus (Feb 19, 2015)

I had another super busy day again today and I didn't think I'd have time to do any work with Pi. Which, honestly, was a huge bummer because the weather is absolutely beautiful. It's mid-50's outside at the moment with sunshine and no wind... NOT the norm for this time of the year. We got three inches of snow yesterday morning...

BUT- I've had it in the back of my mind that I need to try to do something with him every day if I can... even if I only have 20 minutes. So today when I went down to the corral for evening feeding I realized that I had a full 30 minutes to feed and clean and do whatever else I needed to do before I had to be back home again.

I worked up half a strategy on the drive over. I figured I'd feed first. It's just that time of day and I knew that when I drove up he would be thinking "food!". He would have gone with me if I had asked him to before feeding him, but his mind would have been on his dinner. Fortunately he has free choice hay and it doesn't take that long to eat his grain. I cleaned and then brushed over him a bit with the shedding blade while I waited for him to eat. When I could see that he was done and just stalling (he was licking the bowl), I asked him if he wanted to work and he happily followed me back to the barn door.

I thought about riding him, but I didn't really have time to tack up. I had to be home in time for my husband to get to work (long story) and I didn't want to put him out by being late. So instead I figured I'd work on the thing we had trouble with on Tuesday: lunging. And since there is plenty of room in the corral I figured I'd do it right there to make things easier.

I was a little worried about the whole thing. I wasn't really worried about getting hurt, more that we would hit that wall and I wouldn't be able to push him through it. I didn't want to walk away with him having learned THAT lesson. 

So I decided to think about lunging him differently. Rather than approach it from a place where I assume he knows what I want him to do and he's just being willfully defiant, I decided to assume that he didn't understand. I decided to use food reinforcers (yes... the dreaded treat) and ask for little approximations to quickly get to trotting circles.

This part might make some people cringe... but I make no apologies: I got the end result that I wanted.

I started by asking for a circle at a walk to the left. He hesitated at first, but I could tell he was thinking. I decided to give him the benefit of the doubt and I asked him twice. He moved off on the second cue. He did one circle, then I stopped him, (he stopped nicely and turned to fully face me and look at me), I gave him his bridge word, then petted him and slipped him a treat.

Then I asked for him to lunge to the right. He took the cue immediately. I let him do two circuits at a walk this time before stopping him.

We progressed pretty quickly. I was pretty happy to see that he mostly picked up the trot easily when I asked him to. He circled to the left and trotted to the left much more easily than to the right, and I also noticed that on the right he wasn't really disengaging his hindquarters correctly. I corrected him, but I've got a pin in that because stiffness on that side is consistent with the chiropractor's findings last week. I'm wondering if him having been out on that side caused a difference in muscle development that we now have to work through... I'm hoping it's not still soreness. 

At one point I glanced at the time and realized I needed to get home. It was going so well that I wanted to keep going, but I realized the fact that I wanted to keep going meant that it was a perfect time to stop. 

It will give him something to think about. Tomorrow the weather is supposed to be nice again and I will have a lot more time. I think I'll lunge him to see where his brain is and see if he still remembers, then play around with riding him and see what I can get him to do happily.

Here are some more photos. I don't have a lot of recent ones, but the first one was just from last Tuesday.









_My oldest son at his lesson last Tuesday. _









_Lunging in the round pen about a month ago. The snow is all gone now..._









_My oldest son and I last fall. We don't really ride double. We had just gotten back from a trail ride where he had ridden a friend's horse. We dropped them off at their corral, then rode double a short distance back to mine. That left stirrup looks weird because I was unbalanced; I'd shifted my weight to the right to turn for the photo._


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## whisperbaby22 (Jan 25, 2013)

Seems like we never have enough time for our horses, but that just means that we really enjoy what we are doing.


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## Cathartes caballus (Feb 19, 2015)

I went out to work Pi right after lunch today. I'm dying to go on a nice long trail ride, but I've resolved myself to building up to it: if I'm right, we'll be back up to long rides again soon enough.

I'm not going to lie: I was a little anxious about riding today. It's funny because I've been able to handle everything he's ever thrown at me so I should have all the confidence in the world. I think what I react to is the tension right AFTER a little tantrum: there's a sort of pregnant pause of waiting to see what will happen next. Will it get worse or better? I think that's the feeling that I hate more than anything else.

I tried to mentally prepare myself to be calm and relaxed. I focused on breathing and relaxing before I even went into the barn. I had a light bulb out that I had to change before I got started, so I opened the door and let Pi stick his head in to see what I was doing. I talked to him as I was working.

I took my time putting his halter on. I didn't even use a lead rope to set him up at the crossties: he followed me and stood willingly. I took my time grooming him and picking his feet... all the while focusing on relaxing and taking deep breaths and talking to Pi. He relaxed enough to drop, which is unusual for him during grooming. So maybe it helped both of us.

By the time I got the saddle on him I was thinking a lot less about my physiological reactions because habit took over and I was all business. 

I lunged him first. We did it right there in the corral. I kept it low energy, though. I mostly wanted to see how he was thinking and let him get a light physical and mental warm-up. I did the same process as yesterday, except I asked more from him right away: more behavior for less reinforcement. He did very well.

When I finally got on him and we headed off, I just let him go where he wanted to go. He's pretty predictable: he went right over to my friend's corral. He enjoys riding with them and is always hopeful that we will be picking them up. We didn't, though, and when he saw that there were no humans there and that I didn't stop him he just kept walking.

He wandered around the corrals for awhile. I didn't let him rub noses with any other horses, and I didn't let him stop. Otherwise I let him pick the direction and the pace. After awhile he did head back to the corral, but he did it calmly and when we got there he didn't stop but kept going. He did this twice.

The longer he walked around, the more anxious he seemed to get. In my mind, he was worrying about what I was going to do when I finally did something. To keep his mind off it and remind him that I was still on his back and paying attention I started asking him to collect a little. He's still learning collection, so I didn't ask for much. Just a few strides and then release. Then a little later on I'd ask again, then release.

When we passed the corral the third time I decided to make things just a little harder. I decided I'd take him to the trail head, take him backwards along it, around to the front of the facility, then back into the corrals again. He didn't appreciate it when I started calling the shots again, and when he saw where I was taking him he tried to quickly turn and head back the other direction. When I caught him and turned him back, he balked.

I was hoping that he'd been going on along well enough that we could have avoided this fight, but I guess not. But the ground was dry and I was warmed up enough to be feeling relaxed and confident and I felt like a match for him. So I worked him through it. I had to use the tail end of my mecate as a whip, which was challenging because he kept whirling on me. And we had a moment where I could just feel him considering getting nasty. But I stayed calm and didn't get angry. I let him have his moment to think about things, and then he made the right choice and walked on calmly.

I let him go several paces being relaxed and willing, then I stopped him and reinforced him with a pat and a treat from the saddle. He was very surprised! I was a little worried about getting him going again in the right direction, but he walked on easily when asked.

We had another little fight at the trail head. I feel like he had mentally made up his mind that I was going to ask him to do it and he was going to try to refuse much earlier than when we actually got there. But it wasn't as big of a fight as the other one. He just tried to sneakily walk in the wrong direction ("what? This isn't what you wanted?"), balked at the trail head, then went through it when I insisted.

Then he was rushing through and wanting to turn and go up the trail to the right. This direction is what would have taken us out onto the main trail, but it also takes us in the general direction of home, as it runs parallel to the facility. So I think he was all about, "hey, I know you want to go this way. So let's go this way! And I'll even trot! And if we happen to somehow end up home in the process, then that's okay!"

But he was wrong. I stopped him at the intersection, praised him for going through the trail head, then asked him to go to the left.

He tried to rush to the left, too. I relaxed myself as best as I could and half halted him. I tried not to expect a crow hop, and I was surprised that I didn't get one. We did many half halts along the trail. Each time I released him when he slowed and asked him to walk, but he kept trying to rush and I'd half halt him again.

He was tense and a little firey when we got off the trail. He wanted to run home NOW. I stopped half halting him and started asking for leg yields at whatever speed he wanted to go. We'd leg yield all the way to the left side of the alley, then I'd stop him and praise him and reinforce him. Then we'd leg yield all the way to the right. Repeat. We did this all the way back to the corral and it was great. It focused both of our energies and our minds so that we weren't thinking about fighting with each other anymore.

When we got back to the corral I decided to do the loop one more time, since I thought we could do it better. We just leg yielded back and forth past the corral and kept going towards the trail again. When we got to the spot where he had balked before he hesitated a little like he was thinking about starting some crap again. I ignored it and kept encouraging him to leg yield. He totally had this mental break through where he decided to just give in and keep working. It was great!

When we got over to the trail head, we were on the left side and the trail head was off to the right. I leg yielded him right on over, then turned his nose and in we went. I honestly don't remember him giving me any problems here except, again, to seemingly consider whether he wanted to cooperate. 

Again on the trail he tried to rush, and again I ignored him and just kept on with the leg yielding. The trail is narrow here with thick brush on either side, so there wasn't a lot of room for sideways movement. Even so, it worked to keep him going at a moderate, relaxed pace.

When we got off the trail I stopped giving him direction. I slacked the reins and just let him walk. And he did! He was relaxed and happy. When we finally turned for our last leg home, I asked him to trot. He didn't want to, which was kind of funny, so I had to kind of stay on him to get him home that way. I was mostly just thinking about doing things that he didn't expect that maybe would get ahead of what HE wanted to do, anyway.

When we got back to the corral I decided it was time to stop riding. That last loop had gone really well and I didn't want to push it; better to end on a good note. However, I had already decided that whenever the ride was finished we were going to lunge again right inside the corral. So we did.

This time I lunged with a little more energy and asked for a lot more trotting. The first time I didn't ask for direction changes without stopping him. This time I did. He was doing reasonably well with it, though he was having problems changing direction from counter clockwise to clockwise: he kept trying to turn out instead of in. I kept correcting it and just trying to work him through it and he seemed to be trying hard. He's really having trouble disengaging his hindquarters in that direction, and I think that is the problem more than being willfully disrespectful.

Towards the end I had him going counter clockwise and I tried to turn him to go clockwise and he wouldn't turn at all. He kept blowing past me. So I decided that if he wanted to go in that direction he was going to go hard. I made him canter for several circuits. This is a big deal, because it is traditionally hard for me to get Pi into a canter when lunging him. My trainer and I suspect that it was physically difficult for him in the past (high heels and out of shape).

After a few circuits I asked him to change direction again. This time he did it. I put him back into a trot and let him do one circuit then I had him stop. And then I stopped for the day to let him think about everything.

He's still really stiff on the right, but I checked him good when we were done and I couldn't find any soreness in his back or his neck or any problems with his legs. Again, I'm hoping it's just muscle weakness from having recently had his back out on that side. If it doesn't improve or gets worse, though, I'll have to address it again. I don't know if we have a good massage therapist here, but maybe that would be a good place to start.

I'm encouraged by the work we did today. Hopefully it won't be too long before we are out beating trails again.


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## Cathartes caballus (Feb 19, 2015)

The weather has been rotten this week. Temperatures dropped about 30 degrees from last week and we've had snow and high winds nearly every day. It's kept me from riding, which is a bummer. I couldn't even ride in the indoor arena because I have to trailer 20 miles in the open to get there and I was afraid of hauling in the crosswinds.

Pi saw the vet on Wednesday. Once every couple of weeks the vet comes and sets up shop in one of the corrals to do all-day farm visits for the people who can't or don't want to drive 50 miles to the clinic. We have a vet in town, too, but I far prefer this vet. Pi had just been out to the vet's for his chiropractic appointment, but I waited for the farm visit to do all the maintenance stuff since it involved sedatives and it was just easier without having to worry about trailering him (if ya know what I mean...).

I felt bad for the vet. It's all outdoor and the weather was nasty: cold and windy with blowing snow at times. He had partial shelter in the 3-sided horse shelter, but otherwise he was out there all day. Pi got his dental, his sheath cleaning and his yearly vaccinations. It's been less than a year since Pi's last dental (he was done in May, I believe), but he needed it. The vet found that some of his hooks have grown back and he had ulceration on his cheeks. Mostly, though, the vet said Pi's teeth were in very good shape for his age.

The vet was even nice enough to help me walk my drunk horse home afterwards. He manned the tail.

The weather finally started to get better today. It's still cold; if it got above freezing today, it was only by a couple of degrees. But the sun was out and the wind was just breezy and not gusty. I had an hour before dinner so I snuck out to do a little riding.

I texted a friend to see if she was up for a short trail ride. I knew Pi would be happy and behave well with another horse, and I was in the mood for an enjoyable ride. My friend agreed to ride with us, but she would be at least 20 minutes behind.

I did the same routine as I did last time: I gave Pi half his grain to take the edge of his anxiety to get fed it. While he ate, I scooped poop and went over him with a shedding blade and a dandy brush. When he finished, he met me at the barn door for a halter and I was able to easily turn him around and put him in the cross ties.

After I saddled him, I lunged him lightly just as a reminder about how to lunge and to see if he was listening. He was happy enough to circle to my left, but when I asked him to go the other way he had trouble turning. We'll keep working on this.

Once bridled and mounted I took the time to do some lateral and vertical flexations. He was a little resistant at first, so I was glad I did it. We finished with that and there was still no sign of my friend. It would have been easy just to ride straight to her corral like we usually do, but I decided we'd do just a little solo work first. My plan was to take Pi the long way to my friend's corral and go towards the trail head past the spots where he's been wanting to balk. Then, instead of doing what he expected and going on the trail head, I'd stop him at it, reinforce him, and then we'd walk past it and head back into the corrals in a loop to meet up with my friend.

He balked, as expected. I gave him a chance to get going with light cues, but he wasn't having it. So I spanked him with the tail end of my mecate rein. It only took once before we were off again. At first it was slow and reluctant, but after a few strides he picked up the pace into a reasonable walk. We carried out the rest of the plan and he seemed pleasantly surprised that I didn't make him go down the trail. 

I could feel his excitement in turning and heading back into the corrals and I felt him want to pick up speed. I didn't pick up on the reins to slow him but instead channeled it into leg yielding. It worked really well and it wasn't long before we met up with our friends and I didn't have to work as hard to keep his attention on the rest of the group.

Pi was used as a trail horse for years. As far as I know he always went out in a group and often took up the rear as he was carrying kids. As such, his job was basically to follow the horse in front of him. And he was really good at it... and still is. The problems come when we do independent work. I'm aware that if I was a more experienced and confident rider we might have less problems, but I fake it the best I can. Last year we were able to get past it to the point where we rode out alone most of the time, and we will get there again this year.

I was pleased that Pi took the lead to the trail head when I asked him to. He hesitated a little actually going through the threshold, but he never stopped walking. There were a couple of times when I could feel him thinking about peeling off and drifting towards home to see if I would notice. I just gave a little leg and tipped his nose back in the right direction to let him know I was paying attention and he stopped being stupid.

My friend's horse was a little fresh, too. She's ridden him even less that I've ridden Pi in recent months. There was one point where Pi gave just the slightest hint with body language that he'd like to turn and go back home. I caught him quickly and he never fully turned, but the other horse took the cue and decided it was time to go home. He spun completely around and my friend had to work him a little to get him back on track. Pi just stood there calmly watching the whole thing like, "what's his problem?" 

We did about three miles. Not a lot, but enough to give the horses a little work. We did just a little trotting and cantering; not as much as usual. 









_Not the most scenic part of the trail, but at least I remembered to take a photo! _

When we headed back Pi took an easy lead. It's so funny because I really have to get on him to walk out nicely (the QH outwalks him...) but coming home he steps out nice even when he's not rushing. I use the term "funny" tongue-in-cheek, of course. I expected him to try to rush coming coming home, but he never did. Actually, I took both of these photos on the way home and I was a little on my guard for him to suddenly decide to fast trot and knock the phone out of my hand... but it never happened. In fact, in the last half mile when I expected him to get really anxious to go home he fell behind and let the QH take the lead. I had to ask him to trot to catch up!









_My friend usually rides this horse bareback. She's had problems with him getting cinchy with the saddle she uses. I think there's a saddle fit issue, and she won't disagree, but she prefers to deal with it by riding bareback. _

When we got back to the corral I put the lunge line back on him and lunged him a bit. I didn't lunge him a lot, but I asked him to trot so he was working fairly hard. Again he had trouble changing directions. When I couldn't turn him, I made him canter small circles for several laps then tried again. After I got several good trot circles to the right I stopped him and took him into the cross ties to unsaddle him. I didn't work him super hard, but he was sweating and panting a little. Poor guy is pretty out of shape.

I'll have to try to find some good pockets of time this weekend to go out and work with him some more. I'm going to try to do that 3 mile loop alone and maybe stop him for grazing at the halfway point. We'll see how it goes.

A.


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## whisperbaby22 (Jan 25, 2013)

Nice to have a vet that comes to you. Sounds like you are doing well.


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## Bondre (Jun 14, 2013)

You sound to be doing an excellent job with Pi. Barn sour horses are very trying on the patience, but you're clearly advancing in leaps and bounds. I can relate to your ups and downs together because I am in the same situation. 

As you say, positive reinforcement is a very useful tool but it will only take you so far. At some point you have to establish that your horse doesn't make all the decisions about where to go. You have had your showdown with Pi, you made that critical moment easier to work through as you've prepared your horse well using positive reinforcement and he trusts your judgement, and thanks to your preparation you have made an important advance with him.
He will probably still try repeatedly to go home at critical junctures on the trails, but each time it will be easier to convince him that you are right. The opposite is equally true! If you lose an important battle of wills, next time it will be even harder to convince him and so on.



Cathartes caballus said:


> I'm not going to lie: I was a little anxious about riding today. It's funny because I've been able to handle everything he's ever thrown at me so I should have all the confidence in the world. I think what I react to is the tension right AFTER a little tantrum: there's a sort of pregnant pause of waiting to see what will happen next. Will it get worse or better? I think that's the feeling that I hate more than anything else.


I know just how you feel! That little worry in the pit of your stomach that you try to ignore as you know it will make you tense and that your horse will pick up on it. My horse has never offered more than I can handle either, but sometimes she is challenging and I often wonder "what if TODAY is the day when she pulls out all the stops??" And in the middle of the tantrum I'm thinking "OK, I can handle all this, but what if she gets worse?" 

I don't worry excessively but I can never manage to entirely extinguish those little doubts. And I hate feeling worried about interacting with my horse.



Cathartes caballus said:


> The longer he walked around, the more anxious he seemed to get. In my mind, he was worrying about what I was going to do when I finally did something. To keep his mind off it and remind him that I was still on his back and paying attention I started asking him to collect a little


This is funny! See, he is worried about what you might do too. "Unpredictable human, why doesn't she ask me to do anything?? Why does she just let me wander around? If she doesn't tell me what to do, I can't disagree with her!! This is weird, I don't like it. Tell me what to do, please! Then I'll let you know if I'm prepared to do it or not."

After all those doubts, he's dying to do whatever you ask for. 

Very good tactic. 
_Posted via Mobile Device_


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## Cathartes caballus (Feb 19, 2015)

Thank you for your comments.

Today I was lucky enough to have a beautiful sunny afternoon with no wind and TWO free hours for horse time. 

I lunged Pi before we headed out. Again, the before-ride lunge was low energy: a few circles in each direction with a full stop in between. He seemed to be in a good mood and followed my cues well. 

I flexed him laterally and vertically when I first got on. He was softer laterally today than he was yesterday, though he was a little slower on the vertical flexation. When that was done I asked him to walk, but gave him no direction.

My plan was to wander aimlessly through the corrals for awhile, but when he headed straight for my friend's corral I was surprised to see her there unloading hay. We stopped to talk for a few minutes and then when we got going again I was more in the mood to just get on the trail.

Since we were leaving from my friend's corral we ended up heading to a different trail head from a different direction. I got no balking from Pi at all, though he sneakily tried to evade the trail by walking sideways instead of straight towards it. Even so, he went through the thresh hold so easily that I stopped him on the other side and praised and reinforced him before we continued on.

After that we just rode out. I didn't see any nasty behavior from him at all, just the crooked "should we go back to the barn?" walking that I'd gotten used to a long time ago. It didn't take much to keep him on course: just a light nudge with the rein and a little leg to redirect him. 

How far we've come in a year! I remember this time last year I was struggling with learning how to deal with balking. Once, on a day like this, we were riding out and I was feeling pretty good about how Pi was stepping out. I decided to ask him to trot. It was a good place for it: good even, open ground. But instead of picking up the faster gait he stopped dead in his tracks. How DARE I! Couldn't I see that he was moving along just fine? Why on earth should I expect him to go any faster? Cheeky thing. Don't worry, though... I've long since resolved the issue of picking up the correct gait when I ask for it...

So we rode out about a mile to a spot that I had used as a grazing-reinforcement spot in the past. It involved crossing a wooden bridge that was icy and slick the last time we crossed it (and the horse that was behind us that day had freaked out and thrown a fit, plowing into us). He hesitated just a little, then bravely and boldly walked across it. When I turned him into the grassy patch he got all excited with a little more bounce in his step: I NEVER go that way except to let him graze.

I'm trying to establish a pattern for him to keep him happy to walk out and less anxious to get home. Last year it was common for us to stop and graze at the halfway point along a trail. This year I'm adding in lunging when we get home... at least for awhile. Hopefully these things will click in his brain quickly: riding out = grazing, riding home = work. 

I hadn't seen any signs of emerging spring grasses, but a couple of weeks ago I noticed that he still gets excited about the prospect of being allowed to graze even on dormant winter grass. I think it's the act of grazing itself that's important to him. After all, he has an all-you-can-eat hay buffet at home. 

Last year I bought a halter bridle so I could remove the bit to let him graze. This year I'm trying out a mecate setup (which I've previously explained). This was my first time trying it. I didn't love letting him graze with the bit in, but I did like that all I had to do was use the tail end of the mecate to get down and then I could let him graze immediately. I didn't have to fuss with taking a bit or bridle on or off, which made the whole process flow a bit easier. 

Pi got to grazing and immediately found that there were, in fact, emerging green shoots beneath all the brown stuff. Leave it to a horse. I let him graze for a good long time, but he eventually got tired of it and stopped and looked at me like, "okay, let's go!"










When I pointed him towards home he did get excited. I let him trot a bit, but asked him to keep it slow and controlled. We didn't go very far before his energy dropped off and when I asked him to walk he down-shifted and then stayed there with no further requests. I was really proud of him going home. We took the long way home. Along the way there are lots of points where the trail breaks off, and each juncture offers a faster, more direct route home. He knows this, and every time we got to one he would look hard in that direction. But I barely had to tell him to stay on the longer route: many times all it took was body language and I didn't have to use the reins at all.

When we got to the part of the trail that runs the length of the corrals, he slowed a lot and looked hard at the route that we usually take to get off the trails. I asked him to stay on it, which he did, and went a step further and had him trot a bit. So we went PAST home, at a trot even, and then at the far edge of the facility I turned him off the trail. There was a small hill, which he tried to canter up, but I asked him to stay at a trot. And when we got to the top of the hill I down shifted him to a walk and he walked calmly on a loose rein the rest of the way home. 

When we got back to the corral he let me take his bridle off and then just kind of stood there with his head hanging low. I think he might have had some idea of what was coming: home lunging. He didn't argue with me, though, when I sent him off. This time I kept the energy higher and did a couple of direction changes with him. I probably only lunged him for five minutes or so, but he was sweating and breathing hard when we were done. He was really good with direction changes today. He's still a bit stiff circling to the right, and the idea of actually circling is still hard for him in some spots. But he's getting better, and I really liked that he took the direction changes so much more easily today.

I'm going to find time to ride again tomorrow, but my friend might go with me. I like switching it up: we are still working on riding out solo, but Pi really enjoys riding with friends and it's nice to keep him guessing about what kind of ride we will have when I put the saddle on his back.


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## tinyliny (Oct 31, 2009)

way to go!!!!!


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## whisperbaby22 (Jan 25, 2013)

Yes it's nice when our hard work at figuring out our horses works so well.


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## Cathartes caballus (Feb 19, 2015)

*First Day of Spring!*



whisperbaby22 said:


> Yes it's nice when our hard work at figuring out our horses works so well.


This is why I got a horse: I missed that "aha!" moment of figuring something out and then the simple bliss of enjoying the product of your hard work with an animal. That, and the close working relationship. I trained birds professionally for almost 10 years. Horses are different in many ways, but the same in many ways as well. Pi has really helped to fill that void in my life.

It was a beautiful day today. I think the highs were in the mid 50's, but with the sun shining and the wind absent it felt like the high 60's. It was good day for hauling manure. I love those warmer, dry days because it's so much easier to empty my manure trailer. It was warm enough that I had to take off my jacket and shovel in my t-shirt.

I had a limited amount of time for riding this afternoon. I really only had about an hour and a half, but I ended up pushing it to two hours. That was pushing it: my husband was almost late to work (although, as I told him, he could have dropped off the kids with me at the corral for those last 15 minutes).

I rode with my friend, J, again and her horse, Buster. I did not lunge before the ride this time. This was partly because I was short on time and partly because I figured he'd be good with another horse.

We rode out a different way than we usually do. This time we went along a part of the trail that goes along a somewhat busy road. We often ride this loop on the way home when we need to get home faster because it's a straight shot, but it's not as scenic so it's not as nice to ride out on. I picked it because I thought it would be good for the horses to keep them guessing a little bit. Pi slowed WAY down when we first got on the trail, but he never stopped and balked so I count it as a win.

J wanted to do a bigger loop, which usually runs about 6 miles total. I knew I was short on time, but it's been awhile since I did a longer loop and it was just such a nice day. So out we went.

Pi was pretty good, if not a little pokey. Since we were going a different way I really didn't have problems with him trying to drift towards home: he doesn't have those habits on this route. There's a place where the trail crosses a dirt road at a park. We sometimes head back at this point when we are riding a shorter loop, so the horses both asked to go home here. We insisted, and Pi ended up being the hero who took the lead and was the first to go through the thresh hold back onto the trail.

He did get a little slow again on this trail. I tried to drive him forward a bit with my legs: lightly at first, then harder when he ignored me. He tried the old trick of, "oh, maybe I'll respond by going even SLOWER" so that he was barely moving. So he got spanked with the end of the mecate. It probably wasn't the smartest place to do it, as there was a steep drop off on one side of the trail. Fortunately when he jumped he jumped UP the hill a bit instead of down. At any rate, it served it's purpose: he didn't ignore my requests to pick up his walk again after that.

The trail took us all the way down into the river bottoms where the ground is softer and nicer on the horse's feet. We often do some cantering in this area, but cantering is for horses that are in good control of themselves and listening well to their riders. We aren't ready for that yet... but soon.



















Pi was actually pretty good. I didn't really have any major problems with him. Most of the time we went along on a very loose rein. J was having the kinds of problems with her horse that I was having with Pi a couple of weeks ago: spooking easily, balking, and a little crow-hopping in protest. Nothing big and dangerous, but enough to make the ride less fun for her.

The horses got a little fresh on the way back, but I was pleased that Pi took gentle direction to calm down in stride and walked nicely after half halts in key places. There was one place, though, where the horses both got spooked by a dog that was hard to see the bushes. Her horse gave quite a few crow hops when she blocked him from bolting. Mine just danced and offered one mild crow hop. I just stood him and rubbed his neck until he calmed down enough to walk on at a slower pace.

TBC...


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## Cathartes caballus (Feb 19, 2015)

(spring, cont.)

When we got back to the corrals I was pretty much out of time, but I made sure I lunged a little before I headed home. That kind of sucked. Pi was super tired. But, you know, the best training is accomplished with consistency. I did go a little easy on him, though: just enough circuits in each direction to get him going along good and then I stopped him and called it a day.

Overall it was a pretty nice ride. Each ride is better than the one before it, so we are making good progress. Hopefully soon we can be on with the business of happy summer riding.

The more Pi sheds, the more obvious it is that he lost weight over the winter. My trainer used the weight tape on him a couple of weeks ago and he was under 1000 pounds, but he stands at 15.2 hands. He is built a little narrower than the quarter horses that are so common in this area and he has high withers... but he is definitely under weight. I increased his senior feed right after we measured him, as well as his BOSS. His teeth were done last week and I wormed him today, so hopefully with the warming weather he will start putting on weight.

He's had three days in a row of riding and I'm not done with him yet. Tomorrow is my lesson day, so we'll be mixing it up with some arena work. We are doing slow work right now, so he'll get to use his brain more than a lot of physical energy. I'm sure he's probably a bit sore from all the extra work he got this week, so maybe he'll appreciate a change of pace. 

Tuesday is my son's lesson. For that we trailer over to the indoor arena in the next town (if it's nice, we use the outdoor, but my trainer works out of the other town on Tuesdays). It's supposed to rain on Tuesday, so we may or may not make it with Pi, depending on the wind and road conditions. So he will either have a light day on Tuesday or a day off.


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## Cathartes caballus (Feb 19, 2015)

On Monday I had my riding lesson. I'm currently paying for two lessons a week: one for me and one for my son. The goal of my lesson is making Pi a better horse through me riding him better. So, really, it's my trainer teaching me how to teach my horse the things he should know.

My husband was working so I had to bring both of my kids with me. We managed alright. I thought ahead and packed them each a lunch and brought them things to do. I even parked the truck at the arena instead of the corral (more walking for us) to make sure I had a place to stash them if I needed to. They were really good, though.

Pi didn't have to do a lot of physical work at this lesson. We long trotted a little and did some figure 8's with counter circles, but that was about it. Most of what he had to do was mental. We are doing a lot of work with him on leg yields. He really doesn't like to give his shoulder. I did a lot of work with him on disengaging his shoulders from the ground in January and February and now we are working on it from the saddle. My trainer doesn't think this is something he has ever learned and it is hard for him. He is trying really hard, though, and I'm sure we'll eventually get there.

One thing that my trainer pointed out is that he is moving a lot better than he was several months ago. He is really extending his legs better and he's not as stiff to bend. 

I've long suspected that Pi actually trots just before hitting the canter. Remember that he is gaited, so usually when we refer to "trot" with him we are really talking about his medium gait, which is a rack. But sometimes I will feel him pull out of a rack into a "broken washing machine" gait without going into a canter. He did this when he was long trotting on Monday, which I know is not something that is desirable in a gaited horse. But since he did it while my trainer was watching I was able to confirm, finally, that it really is a true trot. It's a rough trot and especially difficult to post in my Aussie saddle, so I don't like it and I don't encourage it. But apparently it looked nice from the ground because he was nicely good through it.

This is a big deal because last year we were dealing with a lot of weird movement. I feel like we were trouble shooting weird movement for most of the year. It was WNV and then it was a poor hoof trim with long heels and then it was chiropractic. Now, though, it's nice to see him feeling good enough to be able to move.

I've also noticed he doesn't really trip anymore. Not over nothing, anyway. He's gotten to be a lot more sure footed since I've put so much work into fixing the physical ailments that were making him move weird. It's good to see that change.

Here are some photos from the day:









_Waiting for the trainer to show up._









_Walking back to the corral from the arena. I like my youngest to ride so he doesn't get underfoot. He usually wears a helmet; I'm not usually a terrible parent._









_When we got back to the corral my oldest wanted a turn riding so I let him putt around a bit. Again with the helmet... I had left the darn thing in the truck, which was inconveniently parked at the arena._

The weather turned later that night and we got several inches of snow through Tuesday. Now it's back to being windy and cold. So my son's Tuesday night lesson got cancelled (neither me nor my trainer could get horses to the arena) and I haven't been able to ride since.

I'm a bit distracted because my husband and I just went under contract on our first house. It's all very exciting but, as many will understand, it's also very stressful and the whole thing is causing a big disruption in our lives right now. Between all the house stuff (which includes my husband picking up overtime hours) and the weather I'm finding it hard to find horse time again. How frustrating! But I'm going to keep working on it. If nothing else, the house stuff will eventually be over and life should get back to normal. More or less.


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## Cathartes caballus (Feb 19, 2015)

So it's been a long time since I've written anything. Sorry about that. Life got kind of busy. We finally were able to close on our house and move. We've been moved in for about two weeks now and things are finally getting back to normal.

A lot has happened. I'll try to write about it briefly.

I had some rides where I started having trouble with Pi again. The last time I attempted to ride him out alone we had a really bad ride. He kept trying to run for the barn. I was nervous, anyway that day, and not riding with my head. So rather than work it out by keeping his mind busy I just kept telling him to stop. He started crow hopping and progressed to bucking, which really scared me and just made things worse. Eventually I had to get off: it's the only time I've ever felt unsafe enough to the point where I had to get off him. He was so worked up that he ran in circles around me right there on the trail and I just stood there and basically let him lunge himself until he was calm enough to stop and lead home.

My trainer came out and worked him hard after that. He just had ******-all in him. She did a lot of ground work and eventually was able to ride him out along the same trail that I had trouble on. When he got nervous she just took him in circles until he calmed down. 

A few days after that one of my horsey friends came out and told me, point blank, that I had to take him off the senior feed: that it was making him hot. She said she'd had the same problem with her normally-trustworthy geldings in the past and it was always the feed. Looking back, when I was having problems with him over the winter it was about the time I started him on the senior feed and I had recently increased it because Pi had lost a lot of weight over the winter and was looking a little thin.

My trainer didn't want me to take him off the senior feed. She wanted him to have lots of energy for her to work him hard through some of this problems. But the reality is I'm not paying her to train my horse: I have to ride him, myself (I pay her for lessons and the rest she has just kind of done for me as a kindness, so I don't feel right about having her come out all the time to work my horse unless I pay to formally put him back into training). So I took him off the feed.

He was immediately better and I was able to ride him again. I was scared though, so I wouldn't ride him alone: only if I could get a friend to go with me. I've stuck to this, and I have slowly gained some confidence back. But between having to work around my schedule and my friends' schedules I have only been able to ride about once per week. 

I had originally put him on the senior feed because I was aware that the grass hay he was on was not as nutritious as I needed it to be. I remembered that he had been thin coming out of winter last year, too, and that he had done really well on alfalfa. So I borrowed some alfalfa bales from a friend to hold me over until I could get out to the farm and buy some more. I ran out a few weeks early and I have been using alfalfa pellets instead. During this time he has continued to get grass hay in a full-bale slow feeder net (so he has hay available 24/7) and I increased his BOSS to 2 cups per day.

I was watching him hoping he would slowly gain weight, but he didn't seem to be gaining. I didn't think he was losing, either, though, and the weather here has been so awful. I figured that he would start to do better when it really warmed up. Then we had a week of windy, cold, rainy (sometimes torrential rain) weather and he noticeably dropped weight in just a week. In hindsight, I think there were a couple of days last week when I think he was barely eating his hay because it was outside in the downpour - I only noticed because he wasn't out of hay in his net when he should have been. He also had extremely low-energy and appeared anemic with a scruffy coat and very pale gums. 

He's already been wormed (twice) and had seen the vet for vaccinations, a physical, and a dental this spring. So my trainer and I worked off the assumption that he just wasn't getting the nutrition he needed from that stupid grass hay I bought late in the fall. 

So I worked with my trainer to come up with a plan to get him gaining again. I hadn't been blanketing him; he'd always done really well before. But since he had lost so much weight I started using a turn-out blanket whenever it's cold enough for me to wear a jacket UNLESS the sun is out and it's not super windy. The idea being, of course, that he won't have to expend any energy keeping himself warm. I also started him on some supplements and went out and bought him some alfalfa/grass hay (heavier on the alfalfa). So in addition to free-choice hay he is also getting 1.5 pounds of beet pulp and two pounds of alfalfa pellets (soaked together) with 1 Tbsp. Red Cell, 1/2 cup of Calf Manna and 1 cup of BOSS... twice per day.

This mixture was a direct recommendation from my trainer. I have researched all of the ingredients and I know there is a lot of controversy about how each one should be used or even IF each one should even be used. But at this point I'm just trusting my trainer and trying to give this a chance to work.

So far it seems to be working well. My trainer said we'd know in a week if it was helping. After two days I noticed that Pi was much perkier and his coat wasn't dull and scruffy anymore. Actually it was a huge change: I couldn't believe how much better he looked.

Naturally he is still thin. We weighed him with the weight tape and he weighs approximately 940 pounds... so he is at least 100 pounds underweight. That being the case, I'm expecting it to take awhile to put 100 pounds back on him. But I'm encouraged by his coat looking so much better and his attitude being better.

I was warned that the Red Cell would make him hot.... and based on his energy level I think that could be the case. But I'm not planning on keeping him on it for very long. Hopefully with the reintroduction of free-choice alfalfa hay he will be able to maintain himself after he recovers. He did so well on alfalfa last year that I wish I had never switched to grass. I only did it because I'd heard so many good things about grass over alfalfa, but I had so much trouble finding quality grass hay that it just wasn't worth it. Around here everyone wants alfalfa, so that's what the farmers produce. And the ones who produce grass seem to be doing it as an afterthought: to clear a field that had grown wild and whatnot. I wish I would have figured this out before I put him on it for the winter.

I'll keep him on an alfalfa hay from now on and I'll use the blanket more often next year. Maybe even beet pulp or something over the winter just to make sure he's getting enough calories so he doesn't lose condition again next year.

I feel terrible that he's been in such poor condition, but I have no intention of letting it happen again.


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## whisperbaby22 (Jan 25, 2013)

Feeding our horses is quite a problem. Good fodder, lower quality fodder, supplements, senior, all these advertisements coming at you that shout your horse must have this new la de da. Plus you have to balance all this out with what is available in your area, and what your wallet can stand. I am constantly considering changing up my horse's feed, I think that now that horses are moving over from livestock to pets we are going to have to just deal with it. Just do the best you can and leave it at that, that's what I do.


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## Cathartes caballus (Feb 19, 2015)

Pi has been improving on his new weight gain regimen. We weighed him again after he'd been on it for about a week and a half and he had gained about 45 pounds. His coat is looking better and his gums have better color in them. He's put on some fat around his hips, top line and over his ribs, though he does still have some visible ribs. I've cut back on the Red Cell by half and I am just about out of the alfalfa pellets and won't be replacing them when they are gone (since he has better hay now). I'll continue the beet pulp, calf manna and BOSS until he is at a better weight... as well as his blanketing for storms and wind.

He was trimmed about two week ago. The farrier trimmed him just unbalanced enough that it really bothered his legs and he went a bit lame. She came back and reevaluated him and trimmed a bit more to balance him. She said he was only off by a little but it was enough to bother him. He seems better, so hopefully that is a problem that won't last.

He has been getting stone bruises on his feet. He typically has lovely hard feet and in the dry season he goes really well barefoot. In the spring, though, it's so wet and rainy that his feet really soften and become a lot more sensitive to the gravel on our trails. So I decided he needs to be booted again until everything dries out better and his feet harden up again. This required reevaluating the fit of his boots from last year. I was having trouble with one towards the end of the summer because it kept falling off. Sure enough, it still fits a bit loose. So I remeasured both of his feet and discovered that they are now different sizes: he has dropped a size on the one foot. Now, he really is right on the edge of sizes (he's wearing Easyboot Epics) and the difference between sizes is just millimeters... but it's enough that the old boot just doesn't fit anymore. So I had to order him a new one for that foot.

I haven't been riding him because of all of these issues. The new boot should come next week and then maybe he will be recovered enough in everything else to start riding again.


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## jaydee (May 10, 2012)

*This journal has been closed due to prolonged lack of participation by the author. Journals that have no active participation by the author for a period of time greater than 18 months will be considered abandoned and will be closed until the author asks for them to be reopened.*


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