All the Therapy and a Ben Update

At Goggles last chiro adjustment, his vet noted some consistent soreness in his caudal thoracic/cranial lumbar area. Her feeling was that he is a big and long horse and gravity is doing its work there. She recommended the Equiband. However, he also wants to very much tilt his pelvis under and immobilize it, so just the belly band, not the hindquarters band. This seemed like it would be safer for me too, given his proclivity to kick first and ask questions later. I had bought this for Yoshi way back when, so I dug it out of the tack trunk to try on him.

His first reaction, as suspected, was to kick at the band, but it was only once. He's starting to put a little more trust in me it seems. The second time I grabbed it from the underside he put his ears at odd angles but then accepted it. 

We just did 10 minutes on the line with the rope halter. I haven't lunged him since this time last year at the GY's. He did a lot of long lining at JT's though. It's probably a good hole to fill in anyways, so after letting him eat some we did some walk-halt-walk and then added in a bit of trot. The trot was instantly rushed and anxious, but after several circles he came back down to earth. I've got some trot poles set on the lunge circle and he politely aimed himself at those. He did them in two ways: the slow, articulating the joints more way, or the rushed almost fall on the face way. After a couple repetitions of the correct version we called it quits. It will definitely be several sessions before I even dare to ask for a canter. I want that anxiety waaaayyyy down before we go there. Since I haven't lunged him since last year I don't actually have a comparison for with equiband vs. without, so that will be something to experiment with over the next few weeks.

He also has a tarp living in his field now. The first day we introduced it I had my husband lead Ben over it several times and then had Ben stand on it while Goggles watched. Then I left it in Goggles field in a 3 foot x 12 foot section with landscaping timbers to hold it. The next day I rolled it into a 8-12" section (still 12' long) and had him go over it in hand. There was a LOT of angst and going backwards and at one point he pulled away from me and galloped around the field trailing the rope. I tried to bring my own energy level very far down and eventually he got over it. We went back and forth until it was kind of casual and then called it good. 

The next day we started off better even. He went right over in hand with some rushing still, but more willingly than the day before. We repeated, slowing each step down, to make sure he was truly thinking about it. Then I rode and had a good, productive ride. I finished the ride back in his field going over it on as loose a rein as I could. He launched the first few times but got more relaxed about it pretty quickly.

The next day I made it slightly larger and took him over it in hand again. That's the plan going forward, increase the size very gradually every few days until he's chill with a normal sized liver pool and then with a tarp in general. It's probably good for his pasture grass too, I set it in the fence line where he likes to run next to Ben, and I'm pretty sure he's still avoiding it when I'm not there, giving the trough he created a minute to fill in. We're in the rainy, sunny, grass growing time of year right now. 

Second width, pausing to make sure we're using all the brain, not just rushing it to get it over with 

As noted above, Ben now lives at the same farm as Goggles. This spring I was seriously thinking about listing him for sale - I don't really have time for two horses in full work and maybe his dainty feet would be better suited to a career on footing such as local HJ or dressage (with someone who doesn't care about his tongue). But then he came up bilaterally sore up front after a trot set on decent pasture footing. And I threw in the towel. I talked to his vet and farrier and we pulled all four shoes. His farrier offered glue on composite shoes as an alternative, but I don't need him to be sound right now, so yanking all the shoes was the final decision. He came down from the mid-Atlantic region two years ago barefoot, so maybe he is a horse who needs his vacation time barefoot to stimulate sole growth? The more we tried to protect him, the easier his feet bruised. 

Through some changing circumstances, he also needed to be out of the GY's about two weeks after his shoes got pulled. Goggles' farm owner offered to keep them separate if I wanted and was delightfully accommodating with moving Ben in on relatively short notice.

Herro!

Other than a complete inability to keep a fly mask on Ben (thanks Goggles), it's going shockingly well. I thought they would get soooo herd bound that taking one out to work the other would cause a scene. But it hasn't. The barn owner let me throw Ben in a stall Saturday when I took Goggles away and then she put Ben back out a few minutes after we left. I also gave him trazodone. It was only his second day there so I wanted to set him up for success. I guess he was completely fine while I was gone with Goggles. 

When Ben and I walked up to the road up front, Goggles did a bit of pacing the fence line, but no screaming. And he was pacing at a walk, so really not that bad. 

They do really love each other, but I'm happy enough with them separate but able to talk over the fence line. Ben is probably grateful he's got a defense against Goggles' hind feet. Knock on wood (that is still standing), they haven't taken down boards yet, so that's nice too. 

Ben is... surprisingly sound without shoes. The first two weeks he was definitely a bit sore up front, but then he adjusted? His feet look like absolute trash right now, chipping all to pieces, but he is looking pretty good on them. I'm not riding him partially because I'm not sure if my visual of him looking pretty good is going to translate to him feeling pretty good under saddle, but also partly because I'm questioning his saddle fit again. 

Freshly pulled shoes, doing some in hand work in the GY's arena before moving

Braining so hard 

Since I dug the equiband out for Goggles, I figured why not throw it on Ben. I haven't been happy with his topline in a while (hence my questions about saddle fit), so it would do him some good. Goggles' saddle isn't a bad fit on him so that's what I put on to anchor the equiband in place. I have a surcingle but I don't love it and I'm really trying to avoid pinching his withers and trapezius which I think the saddle does a better job avoiding than the surcingle. 

Excuse me? I thought I was retired

I don't think I'm just tricking myself that there have been some positive changes in his topline since the photo at the GY's 2 weeks prior 

"Ermagerd, MOOS!" - Ben. He was definitely sore on the road, but we just walked onto it then turned around and walked back home. Gradual exposure to grow those soles (I hope). 

He was cracking me up, he spooked at the cows and tried to eat grass while walking all within the same ten seconds while he was supposed to be lunging. I don't think I've ever lunged him on grass and we keep having to have a conversation about working vs. eating. 

We've got some walk poles set up raised at one end that he's doing multiple times every time he "works" and then also have the trot poles on our lunging circle. We're doing backing in hand with good posture and working on ToF in hand too. I'm hoping this will all help his topline and then after 2-3 cycles without shoes we can consider putting him back in some up front. 

I don't have goals for him right now. He's given me so much. I flipped back through a few of our show summaries the other day. For a horse who is a chicken at heart, he sure has tried his heart out for me over the past two years. He's also a pleasant dude to be around, he's tolerating pasture board quite well (knock on wood again!), and I'm conducting my own barefoot vs. shod experiment with him. I don't think he'll ever be able to gallop XC without shoes on, but I'm hoping in some way we can create feet that can tolerate trotting around for 20 minutes without ending up bruised. I'm not ruling out him someday finding a home with someone else who will love and appreciate him for everything he is, see above about time and money, but for the foreseeable future we'll be hanging out. 

Wednesday Walks (and Warwick)

Goggles and I have ventured further and further from his barn recently, mostly strolling along on a loose rein. We've made it about half a mile down the road, which doesn't sound like much, but since we're progressing along solo, I'm pretty darn proud. 

The kiddo is clever too. There's one house where there are usually people in the yard, under the trees, doing things. And he always pauses there for a minute to check out if there's anything going on. He also actually wanted to see the donkey and horse who live across the street and continued our little hack on longer on purpose to find them. 

I've been using more and more of Warwick Schiller's methods recently. Our trail ride last week was a great chance to use his principle one in training: make the right thing easy and the wrong thing hard. It's a different version of the approach and retreat I used last year on Ben. The second they turn away from a spooky thing, you trot a largeish circle, making them work a bit before pointing them back at the spooky thing. As long as they're facing it, they get to chill, but the second they turn away, work. Occasionally you ask for a step a bit closer. It's pretty darn similar to the cowboy's method for trailer loading - if you're straight to the trailer you get left alone, you just occasionally have to give us a new try. 

Beautiful day

New territory for us- there are cows and horses in this field, but they were alllll the way in the back. He could smell them though and was definitely looking for a visual to match to the scent. 

The spooky stump

That eventually we got close enough to that he sniffed it... and then started eating it... (he's got a salt block, but I'm going to get him a mineral mix too... weirdo)

You can't see the terrain very well, but this is what I have for hills at home - ditches along the roadside. We were doing some serpentines through them, very good for his proprioception

Home is to the right there, but he kept going past the driveway looking for the donkey and horse

Supervising work on the lawn mower once we got home

He's really, really found his groove of leaving the other horses and not caring at all. And I am just delighted. He's getting quite fun to explore on, power walking down the road on a loose rein for the most part. I saw glimmers of this when he first arrived, but then we went through a year long phase of feeling very very attached to our friends. I'm hopeful that through consistent, positive repetition, and maybe a touch of him just growing up, we've got a new outlook on leaving our friends.