And she ran, she ran so far away

So after my wonderful weeks with Skye where she was following me around the pasture, then the week where she was questioning me a little after she was top of the heap o' mares in her pasture, I was ready for the other shoe to drop.  It did.

Lovely, huh? Not so fast . . . .

Yes, she looks beautiful there, doesn't she? So peaceful and happy with her new servant Caroline there beside her. This is how I found her when I went to get her on Tuesday evening. I walked up to her, and as I started to put the halter on her, she wheeled away and trotted off. So I then chased after her, and kept her feet moving for a good bit, figuring if she wanted to go, I should make her go. I'd also heard from several different sources that if they run from you, you need to take charge and chase them until they want to stop. The obvious problem with that scenario is 1) horses can run faster and further than people and 2) pastures are big.

So she and her minions, i.e. every horse in the pasture, cantered down to the gate, with me huffing and puffing behind.  When I got close to Skye, I just looked her and gave her my "are you kidding me?" look, which I swear she understands. We stood looking at each other for what felt like several long moments. Then she moved her left front leg almost imperceptibly in my direction. Good enough. I stepped forward and put the halter on her.

Leading her out of the pasture, I was diligent in my leading, not giving her any room for anything disrespectful but not in an angry way. At first I was amazed at my patience, but then I realized something - I thought it was funny. I had seen that this kind of something was coming, but I also knew that in reality it had very little to do with me, and everything with her new boss mare attitude. Yes, I am going to have to be more authoritative with her, as her respect is a little harder to come by, but I probably needed to do that anyway. Now it's not an option.

I took her directly to the round pen for what I call "listening lessons," ground work to get her remembering I'm the brains of the operation. She was a little resistant at first, but she came around pretty quickly, and was relaxed and rhythmic enough at the trot for me to have her canter a little as well.  In the past, she would get nervous at the canter, but as she gets in better shape, I need for her to canter to get used to doing it again. And she sure as hell had felt like cantering when she was running away from me.

While we were out there, Erin started spraying an insect fogger in the arena. Skye did not like this at all. She stopped stock still and stared at it, then glanced at me, then stared again. I put myself between her and evil fogger, grabbing at the opportunity to position myself as her protector.

"What the hell is that? I better get behind this woman that chased me around earlier."

She was funny because she was both interested and nervous. When Erin came around the other side of the round pen with the fogger, I crossed over to talk her.  A moment later, I felt breath on my neck. Skye had come up behind me to get a better look at the sprayer, trying to hide behind me as she did it. Now, I could certainly stand to lose weight, but I'm pretty sure a horse cannot truly hide behind me.

I lunged her a little in the arena over the cavalettis to work her back, then picked her feet, sprayed her for flies and put her back. As we approached the pasture gate, her attitude began to deteriorate again, so I backed her a couple of steps, then led her in and moved her around a little once inside the pasture. When I let her go, she let me pat her good-bye then she walked off. She moved up into a trot and headed back to her beloved herd.

This might seem like a small thing, but the fact that I just accepted it and dealt with it instead of taking it so personally is a huge step for me, and therefore for my Skye.

I'm heading out to the barn in a few minutes for a lesson with Sara. We'll see if I'm so content about it if she does it again.

Return of the Queen

Yes, as the title suggests, Skye has been returned to her rightful position as Queen of the Pasture. I always love observing herd dynamics, and this recent move to a pasture full of mares has been very interesting to watch.

Mare herd. It looks like Tahoe is bowing to Her Highness.

Skye was alpha in the group of three mares she was with when I bought her, then again lead mare in the Greenway pasture (though secondary to Magic, her big black TWH boyfriend).  She was a very good alpha in what we called the Pony Herd, because several of the horses in there were small. The Pony Herd needed a good alpha as Ginger was running the show, and though we all love Ginger, she is a bit of a bully when she is in charge (not that I'm comparing her to Dolores Umbridge, but you get my drift. And if you don't know who Umbridge is, go get out your Harry Potter for Pete's sake).

When Leo was put in the Pony Herd, he and Skye fell in love at first sight. This brought out the bully in Ginger, who had no intention of giving up her second place status, and it brought out an attitude in Skye that I can only describe as "I don't care about nothing but my man." She and Leo became their own herd and the others became their own herd under Ginger's nefarious leadership. This also led to extreme buddy sourness with Ginger and Reebok. At that point, Erin decided that things needed to change, and she separated the herds into geldings and mares. In a smaller mare herd with Ginger, Skye was suddenly beta. I hate to admit it, but it was hard to see her bossed around by Ginger.  However, I could tell that Skye was only going to take so much from Ginger, but that Ginger strangely could not see this.

Then Erin moved the small mare herd in with the larger one in the huge pasture. Skye got some scrapes and kicks, and we were all holding our breath hoping Skye would be boss mare, since she is a good one. She is respectful and well-behaved, and neither bullies nor tolerates bullying in her herd. Alas, it appears that the ladies all formed three distinct cliques, and Skye was not the boss of any of them. Ginger still ruled in her little pod.

Enter Caroline, a new palomino mare. Erin introduced Caroline to Symphony first, letting them hang together in the round pen for a day to get to know each other. Then she swapped out Symphony for Skye. Skye instantly became alpha to Caroline, then took that attitude back into the big pasture. I suspected Skye had pushed her way to the top, then confirmed it yesterday at the water trough. Skye took her place, and all the horses, including the leaders of the group, made way for Her Royal Highness to come through. Then they drank in the order she allowed, as she drank first then didn't object when the leaders drank beside her, but she swung her head and flattened her ears at bit at the yearlings and Phoenix (who just turned 3 but has a bit of an alpha personality). Skye also keeps looking back at her herd, feeling responsibility for them. Girlfriend is back on top.

No need to curtsy. She's not a very formal monarch.
Obviously, since she is sticking her tongue out
in this picture. 

But not so fast, that's not all good. Just when Skye and I were very simpatico, all this happens and now she is challenging my authority since she is now remembering she's pretty damn good at being in charge. So, she has been in a bit of bitchy mood (which may have been partially based on being in heat) and not respectful. However, I feel like I have a lot more tools in my arsenal to keep her respectful without being a jerk to her. I just need to remember to apply them in the pasture when I get her.

Nevertheless, I have had very good days with her lately. Saturday I lunged her over the ground poles and groomed her and let her graze nearby while I talked. Yesterday, I tacked her up, lunged her a bit to get her respect back, then took her for a short and lovely trail ride. She really wanted to go back most of the time, but she still listened to me, and I used her energy to my advantage in letting her march forward nicely and use her back over the dead limbs and little ditches.

Plus, I like that my mare is Queen. I just like it.

Relationship Status

So I started this blog with the intention of tracking my progress with taking Skye from a borderline neglected horse to realizing her potential as a great trail partner and arena horse, then when things really get rolling and improve, I get too busy to write! Aagh. Because quite a bit has been happening, I'm doing three posts in a row.

Anyway, although it has been a while since I wrote on here, partially from vacation, spending time at the barn and the pool and lolling about on my back deck with a beer in hand, I really do want to relate my progress so I can see the continuum of her training and my evolution as hopefully a better horsewoman.

Hard to believe this gorgeous girl would need to progress into being a
better horse, but we are working on it anyway.

I have been continuing to work with Sara on getting Skye in better shape. My girl seemed to have two problems under saddle. First, she didn't seem to want to give to the bit. We suspect she was just jerked around a bit before she came to me but had not really gotten the concept of the bit as a means of communication instead of "the thing that must be avoided because it jerks me around." I totally understood this, as that theory matched her behavior to a t. My reaction to that had been to give her a completely loose rein, assuming she would learn over time that I am never going to jerk her in the mouth. My soft hands are one aspect of my riding that I am particularly proud of. I was taught to ride without stirrups or reins, so leaning on them or against them has never been my problem.

However, Sara has pointed out to me that since I don't jerk on her mouth, I can teach her to trust me by making soft contact and using it as communication more than for steering. This has been excellent advice, as Skye's reaction to the bit has improved by leaps and bounds.

Skye's second problem is the hollowing of her back. Part of that is the reaction to the bit, but it is also somewhat related to lack of strength in her back. So Sara has helped me work her with side reins, over trot poles and getting her to go forward at a nice marching walk with contact, which is helping her round up at least for short periods. I also do some exercises with her to engage her hind quarters, and have taken her on a couple of trail rides, particularly on hilly terrain to help her. This is helping slowly, but we have had so damn much rain that the trail rides have been less frequent than anyone at the barn would like.

All this is to say that I am finally enjoying riding my horse. Ever since I moved to my present barn, I have been enjoying her presence and working with her, and having pride in how beautiful she is, and how well behaved on the ground. But riding her was stressful.  But now I am back to remembering why I wanted to buy her in the first place. Because she has great spirit, great potential and she's intelligent and kind. And pretty. Pretty counts for horses.

Peaceful. And pretty.

When I worked with a different trainer last summer, Skye's attitude toward me worsened. The trainer told me that was to be expected since we were making her work. Not so now. Although she has her off days, not a one has been as bad as a typical day last summer when I couldn't get her out of the pasture without a struggle with her balking every ten feet and planting, or pulling back like a mad thing, or just generally giving off an "I hate you" vibe. There were several days I cried driving away from her pasture last summer, as it was the opposite of the experience I wanted.

Now, she knows I am her person, and she likes it that way. I recently went roaming around her pasture hunting for her fly mask, and she followed along beside me every step of the way. It just filled me up. She walks up to me in the pasture, and now that she is in a different pasture, she tends to graze right across from my van. Yes, I know it's probably a coincidence, or at best a recognition of where the treat machine comes from, but I like it anyway. And Skye loves Sara. Skye watches every move she makes with a soft alert expression, never the annoyance or fear I saw with the other trainer. Sara has her own barn and website. Here it is:

http://partnershipequestriancenter.com

Best of all, I have really begun to enjoy riding her. We're still working it out, but she is getting in better shape, and is trusting me that I'm not punishing her, I'm teaching her what we can do.

Just for the record though, I still miss Reebok and the dinkies.

Wild Wild Horses

While on our annual beach trip to our own version of paradise, Emerald Isle, NC, Laeti (our former au pair whom I call my French daughter but who now lives in London and works like a dog but gets to meet famous British people with some regularity) and I decided to embark on a trip to Shackleford Banks. Shackleford  Banks is an uninhabited island just off the mainland across from Beaufort, North Carolina, which is one the oldest towns in the state. Descendants of Spanish horses brought over during the initial European arrivals to North Carolina live wild on the island, so it's even more worth the trip for me. The horses are pony-sized because the conditions and nutrition on the island, so they are often called Banker ponies, as Shackleford Banks, as well as other islands along the NC coast line, are all part of the Outer Banks. (For folks outside of NC, or for folks not from the coast, the area called "the Outer Banks"  by tourists is further north, and the area we visit is considered the southern Outer Banks.)
 

Skye and Laeti. Laeti knows a good thing when
she see it!

Laeti, my other French daughter Morgane (I'm so lucky; I have two!) and I took this trip several years ago, and trekked for what seemed like forever in 98 degree (F) heat and finally found a herd in the center of the island. This time Morgane was not with us (we missed her!), but my son George came with us since his twin brother Sam went fishing with his dad.

We took a ferry over from Beaufort, and ride was beautiful. When we last went across the sound there, Laeti, the boys and I had gone over to Cape Lookout, and we saw dolphins playing in the water beside the boat, sea turtle tracks from a nest on Shackleford and the ponies taking a dip off the beach. This time nothing of note happened, but it was just lovely all the same.

They let us off at the end of the island, and remembering our last trip, we headed around the sound side (side facing the mainland) which we now knew the ponies preferred. We started looking casually for shells as we walked and before we knew it, we had handfuls of our favorites. My favorite shell is Sinum perspectivum, whose common name is Baby's Ear. Take a look and you can see why.

My favorite shell.

For years I rarely found one, but this year I found over 50. George and Laeti found a lot for me and a lot of others as well.

Just as we started to put a little life in our step to go on a pony safari, Laeti spotted a dark horse about 500 yards away. Excitement! Yes, I see horses all the time, but seeing a wild one in nature is still a thrill. We headed in that direction and even after we lost sight of him or her, we knew we were on right track because . ..

Hoofprints in the sand! Thrilling.
My unpedicued foot, not so thrilling.

We're just like Aragorn in Lord of the Rings with our tracking skills, aren't we? We don't miss a thing! You would think having seen this, we would not be surprised to look up and see, literally right in front of us . . .

 A wild pony. Her name is Ariel, which is just another way that she is perfect.

Yet, somehow we were surprised, perhaps because we thought that the ponies would somehow give a toot that we were standing there and move away. Happily, they did not. We backed off a little to make sure they didn't feel threatened just in case they were just pretending that they couldn't care less.

Almost immediately two young women dressed in what looked like Steve Irwin outfits walked up. They were students from Princeton studying the horses for the summer, and needed to gather some of the ponies' poop for analysis. We asked them a couple of questions, but they weren't very forthcoming. Not so much because they had a secret mission, but it felt a little like "you wouldn't understand." This could have been Princeton attitude or perhaps just Yankee attitude. I was tempted to say "I've been coming here since before you were born, young lady!" But that sounded old and crotchety, so instead I mentioned how I had seen a sea turtle lay her eggs on Shackleford when I was my son's age. The one I told just nodded. I'd rather be my age and thrilled to see a wild pony than be her age and not thrilled by anything. Her job beats the Hell out of mine though. (I would in fact rather roam the beach searching for pony poop than be stuck in an office, but that's a long story for another day.)

Then as we were walking away, we spotted something else interesting.

In case you can't read it, it says "Edward Daniel Brown, Beloved Son." Obviously a gravestone or memorial of some type. Very curious. This was just a matter of feet from the water's edge, so it wasn't the wisest choice of gravesite, what with the constantly shifting sands and all. In any case, this is a testament to the fact that someone very much loved Edward Daniel Brown, and I saw the evidence of it. And now so have you. Mission accomplished.

From there, we trekked through the hot and sandy interior of the island hoping to catch sight of another herd. After a far amount of stoicism from Laeti and me and a far amount of complaining from George, we were rewarded.

Another herd. That's Beaufort in the distance.

George got tired of looking at horses pretty quickly. And yet he is related to me. Weird, huh? We continued on through the dunes separating us from the ocean, then arrived on the unspoiled beach to eat our lunch.

George on this unspoiled beach. He magically transformed into his ebullient self after
some Oreos and water. Amazing!

We then played around on the beach and looked for, and found, a bunch of shells. We then left too late to catch our ferry, requiring us to race in an undignified manner to get our trip back to the mainland. It would take more than that to spoil a day like that though.

To learn more about the ponies at Shackleford Banks, go to:

http://www.shacklefordhorses.org

We also have wild horses in the northern Outer Banks. To learn more about them, go to:

http://www.corollawildhorses.com