Bree goes for her first trail ride!

www.LFEquestrian.com

Sunday was a big day for Bree... she finally got to hit the trails after about 1.5 months of getting her skills up in the arena. I have been working with Bree to teach her some ground games and riding skills. Bree has been riding walk, trot, and canter in the arena really calmly for a couple weeks now, so it was time to hit the trails.

This is a pretty big step for Bree because the farm where she has lived with her owner before training is fairly small and doesn't have a lot of space to expose her to different things... so even going up and down hills would be new to her.

When taking a horse out on their first trail, you can help set them up for success by:
- go with a group of calm, trained horses
- go with patient riders that will be willing to stop and wait for you if needed
- start on the ground walking with your horse, and only get on if the horse is relaxed
- be ready to dismount if the horse begins to get upset, confused, or anxious
- be ready to do some ground work if needed to help relax the horse during the ride

I started my ride on the ground, and I brought my lead rope and rope halter with me - I left it attached to Bree at all times, so it was ready to use if I needed it. To my delight, she was really calm as we headed out, following a couple of horses ahead, with a few quiet horses behind us.

After about 5 minutes I knew she was calm and relaxed because of her breathing, relaxed position, and relaxed movement. I decided to mount up and try continuing the trail riding.

Bree was fantastic! We went on roads, in forest, by open field, and over water. She was really well behaved and did excellent. She did start to run out of 'gas' so we took a few rest breaks a long the way - our ride was about 2.5hrs!

Bree wasn't a big fan of fast moving vehicles on the road - at first she was scramble her feet a bit and jump sideways. However, I stopped her right away, and then asked her to move forward once relaxed.

After a few cars, she had learn to stop and watch the car go by, and then continue walking.

It is always much safer for a horse to stand still and observe when they get nervous, than to jump around - this means that when a horse does get nervous or scared, it's our job to allow the horse to stop. It is important that we don't kick our horse past what is scary and tell the horse to just 'go', or the horse could go a lot faster than you want.

All in all it was a fantastic ride and Bree had a great first experience.

Key tip for this week:
Remember that the goal for a trail riding is a safe and enjoyable experience - so it's okay if you need to dismount or start on the ground to help you and your reach that goal.

Pictures at:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/lfequestrian/sets/72157628433031337/

The First Natural Horsemanship Association Play Day - and Gemma's first trail ride!

The First Natural Horsemanship Association Play Day - and Gemma's first trail ride!
www.LFEquestrian.com

The NHA playday is about bringing natural horsemanship people together and playing with your horses. You can watch and learn from each other and try new things.

We hosted the playday at Partridge Farm and set up various obstacles between our 2 grass rings. We started the day with a brief tour around the rings, sharing some ideas you could with each obstacle.

I decided to play with Balius - partly because Thetis is still having time off from her 25 mile Competitive Trail Ride we did last weekend, but also because I haven't been playing with my young guy as much as I want to, so it was nice to bring him out.

We had a few horses trailer in, and some people use some of my other horses. Marcie played with Shania, which was nice because Shania doesn't typically get a lot of attention.

We played all morning through the various obstacles - jumping the barrels, doing a squeeze, kicking the ball, and more!

After a fun filled morning of a bunch of ground games, we had some potluck lunch. There was tons of food - and lots of fruit and veggies :) The chocolate cupcakes satisfied the sweet tooth before saddling up for the afternoon trail ride.

I decided to take Gemma on her first trail ride - she's been riding walk, trot, canter very nicely in the ring, so I thought this would be a good time to try her on the trails with so many other quiet horses for her to show her what to do.

The weather was sunny and warm, the trails were quiet and beautiful, and Gemma was an absolute Gem! She wasn't spooky at all and we did forest, open field, and even road partway through a subdivision! We even rode walk, trot, and canter. She did give a large rock a bit of the look, and did toss her head playfully a couple times - but overall she was just fantastic... and we did about 2 hours of trail riding!

Marcie took Merlin on the trail which was a great experience for him too - he will be returning to his owner soon, and it was nice to give him an experience with someone different riding him (but still staff of LFE). Merlin was golden as expected - he really has become a super easy trail horse.

There are lots of pictures from the day:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/lfequestrian/sets/72157629932693224/

Going for our first Competitive Trail Ride!!

Competitive Trail Riding - Our first time!

On the May long weekend I signed up for a Competitive Trail Ride with 2 of my students (Marcie and Erin). We've been training since March to get our horses in shape for riding 25 miles (approx 40km)!

The Ontario Competitive Trail Riding Association (OCTRA) hosts a variety of events that involve long distance riding. The one you've probably heard of is Endurance riding. Originally we thought we would like to compete in endurance, but we realized the Competitive Trail Ride would be a better start for us.

Endurance riding is like a race - but over long distances of usually 50 or 100 miles and through forest and country trails. There are vet checks where your horse will be checked over to make sure the horse is 'fit to continue', and if your horse is still healthy you are allowed to continue racing.

To ride in endurance races, and have a chance of placing or doing well, you need to be very well practiced and your horse has to be very fit. Many endurance riders choose Arabs because they can handle long distances, and their heart rate can usually come down a lot quicker than other breeds - so they are more likely to be 'fit to continue' at the vet check point.

Given that we've only been practicing since March, and we were taking 2 Thoroughbreds and a mustang, we wanted something that would be more fair to our horses.

We decided to try Competitive Trail Riding (CTR). A CTR is a long distance course, we did 25 miles. An 'optimal time' is set based on the trail. For novice riders (riders new to CTR) it was 5 hours and 45 minutes. For open riders (experienced) it was 5 hours and 15 minutes.

The goal of CTR is to have the best horse for a long distance ride - it teaches you how to pace a long distance ride, and take care of your horse during a long distance ride. You are scored at the beginning of a ride and every little scrape, swelling, scratch, etc is recorded. When you finish your ride, your horse is assessed again and you get points for every new scrape, swelling, etc. The goal is to have a score of 0.

You get points if your horse's heart rate is too high during the vet checks, the horse finishes with more scrapes/scratches/lameness, if you are too slow or fast on the ride (if you don't finish within 5 minutes of the optimal time), if your horse doesn't behave well during the vet checks, or anything negative about the horse's health could give you points.

One neat thing about OCTRA events is that it is a 'camp with your horse' type of event. People come for the weekend and set up temporary paddocks/stalls for their horses. They pitch a tent or bring a camper, and stay for the weekend. It is a very neat experience because I am used to hunter/jumper shows where typically you arrive and leave the same day, or if you need to stay over you rent a stall and book a hotel room.

We arrived Sunday morning at 6am with the first two horses - I have a 2 horse trailer and was taking 3 horses... but I only lived about 30 minutes away from ride. Dream and Shawna were the first to be dropped off. However, as Dream backed off the trailer she stepped off the side of the ramp and scraped her leg a little bit. Nothing major, but it was bleeding a small amount.

I didn't think much of it, so I headed out and picked up Thetis. So far everything was on schedule and I was back with Thetis at about 7:30am, and ready to take our horses for their first vet check. We headed over and had our vet check, but Dream wasn't allowed to ride because of her hind leg. Although this wasn't good news, I am happy that OCTRA really looks out for the well being of the horse.

So the ride manager was really nice and allowed us to delay our start time so that I could go take Dream home and pick up Flower instead for Marcie to ride. We were supposed to ride at 9:03am, but instead we started at 10:14am.

Because everyone is riding through the forest, they start riders in groups of 1-3, a few minutes a part so that the trails don't get too congested.

We were very excited and headed out on our ride - myself on Thetis, Marcie on Flower, and Erin on Shawna. Before we left we were instructed to follow the white trail. This is because there was a white, blue, and orange trail that had been marked for 3 different types of rides happening that day. We were doing a 25 mile ride and instructed to follow the white ribbons.

We head out on our trail. It started with a little loop along the field, into the forest, onto the edge of a crop field, and then we came to the road. We saw an orange arrow pointing left, but didn't see a white ribbon so we continued straight. After about a kilometre or so of not seeing anymore white ribbons, we realized we were a bit lost.

We rode back to the last white ribbon, and continued straight again. We didn't see any white turn offs so we decided to follow the orange arrow left. Sure enough we turn the corner and there was a white ribbon in sight. Silly us!!

We continue down a road that leads to another forest trail, across a hay field, down some more forest, and onto another road. This leads us to the Ganaraska forest and we spent many kilometers in the forest. Eventually we get to some water troughs that have been set out for us. We let our horses drink, and we sponge them with cool water to help lower their heart rate.

We continued riding through the forest, and then back to a road. Then we reached the ½ mile mark. There was another water trough to stop and cool your horse and let your horse drink. We were instructed to take our time, but when we were ready that we would have to trot the ½ mile into the vet check point. This is so the vet can take a pulse.

We cool our horses and then do as instructed. We trot into the vet check point. We are instructed to take 4 minutes to unsaddle our horses and cool them off. Wow does 4 minutes go fast! There was enough time to give our horses a quick sponge over, and then into the vet check we went.

Shawna had a perfect score and was allowed to continue, but Erin would have to wait for Marcie or I to ride with her, because she is under 18, she needs to be with an adult on the trail at all times. Both Thetis and Flower had heart rates that were too high, so we were given another 10 minutes to cool our horses.

Mustangs are also known to be really good for long distance, and Shawna has been training since March - so it wasn't surprising that Shawna had such an excellent recovery time. Flower is also a mustang, but she hasn't been training because Marcie thought she would be riding Dream. Thetis has been training, but is a Thoroughbred, so they take more time to get into long distance riding.

We sponged cold water on our horses for 10 minutes and then had them checked again. Both Thetis and Flower passed the heart check, but Flower was starting to get a girth rub so she wasn't allowed to continue. This was disappointing for Marcie, but at least she was able to do the loop.

The ride was set up with the start, middle, and finish to be all at the same spot. The 25 mile ride was a 12.5 mile loop that you ride twice. This meant Marcie had already gotten to see the whole trail, but just wouldn't able to ride the second half.

So Erin and I headed out on Thetis and Shawna for the second loop. This time we remembered to turn at the orange arrow! We also had to ride faster because our first loop we took extra time getting lost, but also we went slower because Flower wasn't in the same good shape as Thetis and Shawna.

I used an app on my blackberry to track our kilometers and time so I knew how fast we needed to be going. Most of the trail we trotted, with walk breaks when our horses needed them or on the gravel road. We did some gallops on the open wide stretches too.

We ended up making up all of our time and reached the ½ mile mark with about 15 minutes to spare before the optimal time. We were able to drench our horses with cold water to cool them off before going into the final vet check.

We made it back and had our final vet check. Shawna had a perfect score. She only had a few points for 'lack of impulsion' when she trotted for the vet, and her presentation - total score of 7.25 points (remember 0 is perfect). Thetis got perfect on most things except she was a grade 2 lameness on her right hind - I remember on the ride we were on a hill and she stumbled a bit, I suspect she pulled something so we took it easy the little distance we had left. Thetis also needed the extra 10 minutes to have her heart rate back down. We finished with 22 points.

We finished up, let the horses eat, and had some BBQ food ourselves. After dinner they presented the awards. Thetis was 6th and Shawna was 2nd! We were really excited about that, and it was really neat to read the score card to see how we were graded.

After a long day we finally headed home. All and all it was a great learning experience and something I am looking forward to doing again!

Check out pictures at:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/lfequestrian/sets/72157628433031337/

Playtime for the pups!

This past weekend we had some friends over for a trail ride and potluck - both the human and furry kind. Quigley and Whinnie enjoyed the company of our friend's pug 'Whinsten'. The were having a blast running around the farm.

It was a great weekend with lovely weather and the trail ride was excellent (of course there was an super excellent trail guide :) )

New Puppy! Welcome Whinnie to the farm!

We are excited to have our new puppy - Whinnie! Whinnie is an adorable Pembroke Welsh Corgi puppy, and new playmate for our Corgi Quigley. James spent a weekend driving down to PA just to get her - it's so difficult to find Corgi's up in Ontario, and we were picky and wanted a red/white colour (Corgi's can also come with black).

Whinnie moved in and acted like she owned the place - barking at Quigley for the chew toys, and sleeping on whichever bed she pleases. At first Quigley was a bit nervous around her and would stay far away from her... but now he realizes that they can play together so they are having a lot of fun!

New Horse! - Welcome to our new horse 'Dream'

I've been thinking I wanted another school horse for our lesson program. I wanted something fairly athletic and with a bit more 'go' then a lot of our other horses. I was hoping to find something that could keep up on the trails, train for endurance, and learn some jumping.

My search was over when I found Dream. She is an 8 yr old TB mare - she's actually had a foal too! She is just lovely to handle and she is exactly what I was looking for.

On her first day I rode her around the ring walk, trot, canter and she behaved really calmly and understood all the cues. She doesn't have any training with lateral work, collection, or bending - but this can come with time and practice. The most important part was that she had a willing attitude and calm manner.

The second day at the farm we went for a trail ride and she was a pro. She didn't have any spooks or startles, even with the forest, open field, puddle, and riding on the road. She was great!

Right now she is training to do a novice Competitive Trail Ride, and she is learning to jump. I am excited to see Dream progress over the summer!

Gemma Goes for her First Canter

Gemma Goes for her First Canter
By Lindsey Forkun, www.LFEquestrian.com

Gemma is a very quiet and willing horse - a little on the lazy and slow side though. This just means that I have to be careful to keep Gemma motivated, because if I were to just push her to go, go, go then she would eventually shut down and become quite sour to go.

When asking her to canter I knew I wanted it to be her idea and for her to think it was an easy thing to do. If canter seemed like a ton of work to Gemma then she could easily become a pokey horse.

I did some trot work with her in the ring, and to help set her up for success I made sure to do a few things:
- I had someone on the ground ready to cue from the ground if she didn't understand my cue from in the saddle
- I used both a verbal cue (a kiss noise) that she is used to from the ground, and my leg cue
- I asked for canter as I was going toward home

Together these things worked like a charm and Gemma picked up canter on the first try, correct lead, very controlled and relaxed. I didn't end up needing the person on the ground, but it was good to have them. It is important that horses learn what the cues mean, and it can be easier if you can have someone cue them from the ground (which they are used to), at the same time as the riding cue. Then the horse can put two and two together and figure out what the riding cues mean. Asking for canter towards home just meant that Gemma had a little extra incentive to get moving because horses like to be closer to the barn and that’s where I was asking her to canter to.

It was important that when Gemma picked up her canter that:
1) I was careful to move with her in the canter and not bump her mouth or bounce on her back
2) I didn't ask for a lot of canter, about 5-8 strides
3) I gave her a lot of praise with rubs and voice for being calm and stopping on cue

Making sure to go with a horse in the canter helps the canter be comfortable for the horse and an enjoyable thing for the horse. Asking for only a little canter helps the horse understand they did the right thing (because they were rewarded) and it helps to keep a slower horse like Gemma motivated. Lots of praise for doing the right thing helps to give Gemma confidence that she can try something new, and it keeps our partnership fun and positive for her.

Key tip for this week:
When teaching your horse something new, make sure you set you and your horse up for success. Think about what will make doing what you want easy to understand, fun, enjoyable, or what might help to motivate the horse.

Bree Learns Sideways Circle

Bree Learns Sideways Circle
By Lindsey Forkun, www.LFEquestrian.com

Yesterday I was playing with the big Clyde x Friesian mare named Bree. I was teaching her some new things, one of which was the sideways circle. Bree has already learned the basics and can do circles, haunch turns, forehand turns, etc so I have been working to test her understanding and our communication with more difficult tasks.

I decided to teach her sideways circle because it is an exercise that has the horse focus on me, think more, and establish myself as a leader. This is because it is an exercise where I stand in the centre of the circle, and the horse steps sideways around me. It is an exercise where I stand still and the horse does all the moving - which helps the horse realize that I am the leader of our herd because I don't move, but they do. The horse is always facing me so the horse learns to focus on me and follow cues. The exercise gets the horse moving sideways with no forward or backward movement which helps the horse become more of a thinker because sideways takes a lot of thought.

Bree is a very smart horse and she picked up the cue really quickly. When teaching a horse something new, it is good to remember:
- be patient: allow the horse time to think about what you are asking them to do, don't expect an immediate response
- quit when you have understanding: once the horse gets what you are doing, reward the horse by moving on to something else... if you keep practicing the horse will start to think they are doing it wrong and they could give up or get very frustrated

After Bree started to move in the sideways circle, I allowed her time to stand and think. Then we started doing something familiar to her - the circle - so that her mind could take a bit of a mental break. After some circles we did some work with hula hoops - getting her to stand with her front feet in the hoop. Then I asked her to do sideways circle out of the hoop - to my delight she remembered the cue and did it perfectly both directions!

Key tips for this week: Horses can only show you how smart they are if you move beyond the basics. Challenge yourself to try and teach your horse something new.

Merlin goes for his First Trail

Merlin goes for his First Trail

This past weekend Merlin, one of the horse's in for training, went for his first trail ride. We've been working on a lot of things including steering and speed control in the ring. One of things we also worked on was emotional control and confidence building so Merlin could be safe out on the trails.

Some exercises we have done to help Merlin become confident:
- Going over poles both forward and backward
- Stepping in hula hoops
- Going for walks around our track
- Pushing a ball

Exercises that help Merlin to think through an obstacle because he has to back over it, go sideways, etc help him to become a thinking horse instead of an anxious horse. Exercises where Merlin meets new obstacles and props like a ball or hula hoop help to teach him emotional control - because it teaches him these new things aren't scary.

All of the preparation worked paid off in Merlin's case. He headed out on a trail with 9 other super calm and well trained horses. He rode in the back so he could follow all the other calm horses up ahead. He did walk and trot on the side of the road and in the forest. He was super!

Some things to remember when out on the trail with a new horse:
- Get off your horse if either you or the horse becomes very tense. You can always walk part of the trail and then get back on.
- If you want to teach a horse to be calm and relaxed, then you need to ride the trail calm and relaxed. It is best if you don't do any fast canter or gallop on the first couple rides until the horse can understand to be calm and relaxed out on the trail.
- Monkey see, Monkey do. Horses are prey animals and follow the herd. If you ride with a bunch of anxious horses that spook and startle, chances are high that your horse will spook and startle too. If you ride with calm and relaxed horses, then it should help your horse to be calm and relaxed too.

Key tip to remember this week: If you want to trail ride, it is a good idea to practice some exercises in a controlled area first (like an arena) and introduce your horse to new things, and teach your horse to be a thinking horse. That way when you hit the trails, you have a horse that is more likely to be confident and thinking - which makes for a much safer horse.