Landed Gentry

Hi peeps!
It's been a long time - or at least it feels like it! So much has been happening and I'll try to cover it all.

First and foremost, Tux has now been barefoot for coming up to three weeks. The first couple of weeks seemed almost unbelievably easy. The last week, since the second trim, have been a bit more interesting. Kirsten took a little more than she was planning to as we had decided to forgo Bungendore ODE last weekend in the interests of sanity. More on that later! Since that trim, Tux's hooves are a lot more correct in shape but he's become quite 'footy' and finds it difficult to walk on the gravel road. He's perfectly fine on grass, bitumen and the mulch of the arena.

I've taken some pics from the last trim:

You can see that the feet are a generally good shape, though the off fore is a bit flared and high in the heels, and the hind feet are still a bit steep in the angle of the hoof, but are improving. Kirsten really set the shape up for the next few weeks of growth and change as his frog and heels start to take more weight more correctly, and his hoof becomes more concave. Hopefully, the sensitivity will diminish over the next couple of weeks. I don't think the rain helped on the day before the trim - they were standing in water for at least a day:

That makes hooves a little more porous and I suspect a bit softer. Certainly, I've found the ideal conditions for tough hooves is dry, hard, clay. And lots of exercise over it!

So, we were aiming for Berrima to be our first comp together but, after attending Manuela Mclean's clinic together, we realised there was a LOT of work to be done before Tux was ready for even trot poles, let alone a course of jumps! Tux is not a raving hot loon as first thought, but a pure stress-head. After getting past the initial couple of rides (only one of which I actually attempted myself, instead enlisting the help of the wonderful Martial (French Showjumper extraordinaire) to sit on the snorting beast, I've found underneath all that is a willing but confused and probably poorly trained horse. Yes, he holds an outline, yes he can produce a powerful trot and a measured canter, and yes he probably looks pretty good while doing it. But he doesn't understand most of the nuances of the cues from the bit - he's only got a basic understanding of what a direct turn is, preferring to turn stiffly from an indirect turn. He still won't transition from a walk to a trot without quite a bit of piaffe, pig-rooting and head-tossing. He finds it very had to maintain a slow rhythm and really struggles to stay straight and forward in self-carriage while not charging. He is very weak through the back, hindquarter and stifle and will take a fair bit of hill work to build all that up.

BUT. He is such a fabulous horse underneath it all. I feel the power in there, especially in the canter. He's going to be a cross country machine! And he's pretty trainable. The worst he does is a bit of plunging about and being an idiot. No bucking bronco work or truly dangerous stuff. I don't feel unsafe on him and he does start to listen. I feel like he needs a lot of time to get the basics right but, once we've got them, he'll be a champion.

So, Manu's clinic was very good, as usual, with great timing for me having just acquired a challenging horse. The first lesson was extremely helpful, focusing very much on establishing that slow rhythmical trot out of a walk, using trot/walk and trot/halt, and also 'almost' transitions - walk to 'almost' halt by stopping the hind legs and just as the last front leg is about to halt pushing on for walk again. This was really helpful as he was reacting well to the definite transitions but just taking up the super-fast trot with the head tossing and stuffing around straight away. The 'almost' walk gave him another correct answer - 'slow down' - that he hadn't contemplated. This seemed to clarify the rein aids for Tux a bit so that he didn't fight when I half-halted him as I was trying to slow him in the trot.

There was a lot to concentrate on - as always! Manu wanted me to 'lock my body' a bit more, basically turning on my core stabilisers, squeezing with my thighs to create the feeling of 'narrow in front' and this really helped keep Tux active and straight while strengthening my position so I was a lot more centred and could cope with his idiotic carrying on. I also focused on closing my hands to 'hold the little birds' as I was learning to do with Assegai, not opening my fingers but holding a light contact and simply closing my fist when I wanted to use a rein aid. That seemed to work well too in stabilising his head.

The second day was a private which was really great. Lots of stuff to work on. Slowing and controlling my rising was a big part of the lesson. Using that 'positive tension' and switching on my core was helpful and counting to myself so that I would simply rise in that rhythm no matter what Tux was doing. After about 10 mins we had a much more definite and stable rhythm and I was pretty stoked. We will work on that quite a bit, as well as 'wiggly lines' using direct turns and a real focus on allowing with my right rein to help his left hind come through more strongly. We even popped in a canter which was remarkably calm and well-maintained. He clearly finds canter easier and less stressful than trot. Interesting - also fed into our theory that it was confusion that led to his behaviour issues, not an inherent reactivity or 'being hot'.

All this means no Berrima next weekend. Major bummer, though I thought it would be a real stretch! Harden at the beginning of August looks like the first comp for us now, and that one is not a bad start. I'll still be judging at Berrima, though, as is now becoming my privilege to do every event, and I'm really looking forward to that.

The farm is slowing shaping up, little by little. The yards have been started, and will hopefully be completed on Monday. The first of our order of Electrobraid from How High has arrived and now I have to figure out what to fence with it first! Water troughs are next and a way of watering the horses must be devised (do we use the dam water, tank water, tank water from the stable to go only to the troughs, dam water trickle fed to a tank that will then fill the troughs by solar pump....the options are many!). We've gotten a few round bales of second season hay to help keep the horses' fibre up and reduce the pressure on the only paddock we have right now. All are looking well, fingers crossed they'll keep out of trouble!

Massive blog post over. Til next time!