Let's ride!

At our last visit, Dr. Jen gave us her opinion that Skip will be a ride-able horse in the future.  He is certainly too young and injured to try and ride seriously yet, but she didn't see any reason why we couldn't get him used to the idea now.  He will obviously never be a performance horse, but in her opinion, there is no reason why he couldn't have a comfortable life as a trail horse.  This was excellent news to us!

Coincidentally, I just came back from a three day weekend in Reno attending Pat Parelli's "Wild Mustang Taming".  He, along with a team of his trainees, took eight wild mustangs from wild to tame in three days.  None of the horses had ever been handled except in chutes and panels, and most of the horses were actually being ridden by the end!

This was Day #1!

The biggest thing that I got from this weekend was reassurance that Alicia and I have done a good job handling Skip up to this point.  Most of the things that we did with him, were done with these horses.  These professionals just worked a lot faster and had much more confidence than we did!  I particularly enjoyed watching how they approached mounting the horse.  Each person had their own technique, but the principle was always the same:  approach & release when appropriate.  Timing is everything.  You have to give respect to get respect.

The other lesson I learned was that we have laid ten times the amount of groundwork with Skip than those eight mustangs had before they were ridden...  soooo... it is time!!

Today Skip and I spent lots of time reviewing our groundwork and adding a few new things that I learned in Reno over the weekend.  I have to admit, we were a little rusty.  We "took the time it takes", and eventually Skip had not only caught up to where we left off, but he actually improved quickly beyond that. 

Before attempting to get on, I put the natural hackamore on and taught him how to turn his head from side to side with just the slightest suggestion of a rein from me.  I also got him to back up when I lifted the reins and ran my hand down them toward his neck.  I had a good lesson on how much you can simulate from the ground, and have them learn before you ever get on their backs!  The last thing I did for the day was lead him up beside the trailer (he is too tall to jump on from the ground) and lay over his back.  Of course, he was a perfect angel.  He took about two steps with me before stopping to chew on some hay on the ground.  I made sure to get on from both sides, and the second side was even better than the first.  I decided to end our day on that wonderful note.  Tomorrow I will be sitting on him!  :)

~Jackie