We Trotted!

As planned, I rode Barokko today. In the beginning of the walk he cleared his airways a lot, and coughed a few times, but was more forward than last time I rode him. I did some bending work with him, transitions between walk, halt and rein back, and a little shoulder-in and haunches-in.
Then I tried a transition to trot. Good transition, but a very unenergetic trot. Initially I thought oh no, it's just like it was before, he'll fall back to walk within a few steps, but then he kept going! He trotted a full 20 m circle before I brought him back down to walk. Then I tried again, and same thing, not a lot of power, but it was trot, and he kept going until I said stop. We trotted 6-8 little trot sets, without resistance. It was the flattest, dullest, most boring trot in the world, and yet totally, amazingly fantastic :D

I'm beginning to believe now that we've gotten past the worst of it, and that it'll be forward from here. It's a loooong road back, but it looks like at least now we've gotten started!

Progress on the Longe

I've been longing Barokko the past few days, and he's been progressively better and better - maybe, maybe, maybe we've broken through, I hope I hope!

Today, he trotted like I can't remember seeing him move in over a year, he was loose over the back, softly seeking FDO, a consistant hoof's overstride (he otherwise hasn't even tracked up in ages unless he was head up and hot as a firecracker). He seemed very energetic, and gave me good, sharp transitions.

Tomorrow I'm going to try riding him, I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I'll be able to feel just a little improvement under saddle, too!

4 More Weeks

I haven't been quite satisfied with how Barokko's been doing in these past weeks since he finished treatment. He's slowly becoming more fit, he can go on a 1 hour trail ride (walk and a little trot), without becoming exhausted (he'll be tired, but I don't feel like I need to get off and carry him like I did in the beginning;-). He no longer hyperventilates, even after exercize, which is a big difference.

But he's still very unwilling to go forward unless he's either being pulled along by another horse, or he's high as a kite (for ex alone in the woods). In calm circumstances he will walk very slowly no matter what I do, and when I ask for tror he'll willingly transition, but after 3-4 steps fall back to walk. I've tried getting after him with the whip once, I just wanted to be completely sure that I wasn't being too soft on him because I'm worried, and he's just taking advantage of that. Well, he got pretty mad about the whip, and did run off, but as soon as I then stopped using it and rode properly again he went flat :(

I talked to the vet, and although she said it wasn't good news, she also said sometimes pneumonias take a long long time to clear up, even though all of the bacteria are gone. He's been in light work for 4 weeks, and she said to continue 4 more weeks. If he gets any worse I'm to call right away, as that could indicate a new infection. If there's no change she'll take a look at him after the 4 weeks, as it could be a sign that there's permanent damage to the lungs. If there's improvement, great, then he apparently just needed more time.

Our arena has finally thawed, so I've been able to longe him the past few days. He's seemed a bit more energetic, yesterday he even gave me a small buck and popped into canter - only for a few strides, but still, taking the initiative to canter at all is definitely a new development! So I'm keeping my figners crossed.

Spanish Walk

I've begun project spanish walk with Barokko. Did the first lesson last night, introducing him to the concept of "hey, she has treats!" and then on to "hmm, I think have to do something to get those treats," followed by "oh, doing stufff without being told to doesn't get me treats."

This is what we're working toward, although I think we'll do it without the silly costume :P



I tickled him with the whip on the leg at the same time as lifting up on the inside snaffle rein (in the finished spanish walk under saddle the lifted rein will be the only aid). Praise and a treat when he lifted the leg. Initially I rewarded any lift, and once he understood that concept I waited to praise until he held the leg in the air for a bit, rather than just plonking it down again right away. I didn't reward if he moved around, I wanted to make it clear that I wanted the lift, not movement. Then when the jambette is good I'll add in forward movement.

Barokko is VERY motivated by food, and with about 20 small treats I got him to lift and hold his leg up for about a second and a half, by rein aid alone. Pretty good for the first lesson :)

Bouncy Boy

Barokko was very bouncy today. I lead him out on a walk - well, when I say walk I mean I walked, he trotted when he was being good, and jumped around all over when he wasn't ;) Luckily, he never gets strong on the rein when I lead him, even when he's being silly. He was very obedient to my stop signal, he'd stand completely still when I told him to, but walking calmly was beyond his capabilities today.

I cleaned out his tail and re-braided his mane - when I undid his braids, a big chunk of mane fell out, yanked out by the root :( But he's got so much mane I couldn't even see where it had been pulled out from, there are certain advantages to having Friesian genes :P

Exciting Encounters ;)

The weather right now is really messing with the footing, freezing, then just warm enough to get everything soaking wet and then freezing again, sigh. Yesterday was one of the freezing days. I tried to do some ridden walk work first in the arena then in the flattest area of the pasture, but it was just to hard and bumpy, Barokko took teeny tiny steps and couldn't relax. So instead, we walked out to the woods with another boarder.

There's a lake just at the start of the woods, and yesterday there were kids skating on it, playing hockey = some very wierd noises echoing through the ice every time they hit it with their sticks. Both horses got themselves pretty worked up about it, but we made it past with only a little dancing.

Then we had an exciting encounter with a Daschound and its owner - it came running up from behind, yelping like mad. Barokko's not normally scared of dogs, but he really didn't like having it running around right behind his hind legs! The owner came running out of the woods screaming at the dog (not making my job of getting Barokko to relax any easier), and then he decided that throwing a glove at the dog would be a good way of distracting it - well, that might have worked, except he hit Barokko instead of the dog >:( BUCK! and a HUGE flying leap forward, but he didn't run off. I was able to stop and turn him right after the initial shock reaction. I gave him a good pat, and as soon as the dog had been leashed we walked on.

No further encounters until we had to pass the lake again on our way home. They both tensed up as we got close to it, and when we turned the corner - away from the scary sounds and toward home, bad combo - they got themselves worked up, Barokko would have set off at a galop if I had let him, while T was bucking in place, and unseated his rider (she was riding without a saddle). Luckily, she caught his reins so he didn't run off, but he jumped around the rest of the way home, completely uninspired by Barokko, who had now calmed down and was just mosying contentedly homeward.

I was very pleased with my horse after that ride, good boy :)

In-hand in the Cold

In-hand in the cold, originally uploaded by eudiaptumus.

The ground is frozen solid, and unfortunately there's quite a bit of ice in the arena, so it's not good for longing or riding right now.

I got the book "Twisted Truths of Modern Dressage" by Philippe Karl and the DVD "Classical versus Classique" with Philippe Karl and Christoph Hess for Christmas, and have re-watched my PK DVD's (again). I've begun working with PK's bit flexions in-hand in halt and walk while the arena is no-go, as it doesn't take much space, and I can do it even in the pasture or the stable ;)

I've done a bit of this work before, but this past year has been very confused trainingwise with my injury and Barokko's illness, and we haven't really gotten into a rhythm of doing it regularly. I've done a lot of cavesson training with Branderup inspired trainer, but I've forgotten the bit work. But now is as good a time as any to get back to it :)

While Barokko works really well on the cavesson, he has a tendency to hang heavily on the bit, so my focus is to get him to relax his mouth, and lift his head instead of bearing down on my hand. You can actually see in the picture that he's on the way to pulling down on the bit when I was trying to bend his neck away from me.

This evening I trained with him in the stable aisle, the third day in a row of these exercises. He was much more relaxed today than the previous days, playing with the bit, and bending his neck more freely (because of the relaxation). He seemed very comfortable with the bit, and even after we had finished continued to play softly with it while I cleaned his hooves and got him ready for bed.

Happy New Year!

Welcome to 2009!

The past ten days I've put Barokko very slowly back to work, riding or longing one or two days, then one day off, walk work with short trot intervals. He tires quickly, and is hard to motivate for trotting under saddle. On the longe he's more willing to go forward as long as I keep the intervals short, he's even popped into canter a few times on his own. When we ride with another horse he'll happily follow in trot (again, as long as the intervals are short), so I use that to get him trotting a bit.

We've got a very long way to go, but now we've started the journey :)