The Porcupine Game was up next, Blue would yield backwards by the nose and chest, yield his forequarters and hind quarters with the first phase beautifully. Next was the Driving Game, again he yielding backwards, his forequarters and hind quarters all with the first phase. He is just so light and responsive it makes me very proud of him and happy with how far he has come. In the beginning it would be phase four all of the time and I’d be tired long before he was ready to yield. Yo-yo game was a breeze, he has always excelled at that, I just start to reel the rope out and wiggle my finger and back he goes. Then some Sideways Game up and down the small slope without a fence line for guidance, sometimes his back end gets a little behind his front end but he is getting better and better. The most challenging part of the Circling Game was getting Blue to keep up the pace around the circle, my horse which used to be all go is way more whoa. The Squeeze Game was simple, had him squeezing between me and the fence with a tiny maybe 2’ gap.
Next came time to play with the newest purchase, a big yellow exercise ball. It had been sitting in the round pen the entire play session that I had with Blue but we just worked around it and pretended it wasn’t even there. I figured that Blue might be a little upset or concerned with it seeing as Anna was playing with her filly Lexi and she had started to bounce it around and both Blue and Kallie came running out of the woods to see what was going on. Kallie snorted while Blue just watched intently at the fence line.
But when we played Touch It with the ball Blue did it confidently and curiously. He touched it with his legs first, pawing at it, then he would bump it with his knees, he had no fear about it bumping his legs or bouncing away from him. I next picked it up and walked around with it, leading Blue, he put his lips on the ball so I then proceeded to play the Friendly Game with the ball and Blue didn’t get unconfident or worried at all. He did start yielding to the slight pressure that the ball placed on his hindquarters when it was there and would yield around in a circle so it took awhile to get him to stand still and realize that that wasn’t what I was asking. I was also able to bounce the ball off his back and hindquarters with him standing there relaxed, licking and chewing.
Knowing that Blue was relaxed and Left Brain I decided to hop on, but that is easier said then done. Normally I can hop up easily and wiggle my way onto his back (which is a far way to hop seeing as he is 16.2hh), but I quickly realized that I wasn’t going to easily be able to hop up on him like I normally did seeing as he has become ahem . . . a bit rounded over the last month or so. So we had to improvise, I climbed up on one of the barrels that was in the round pen, this was the first time I had ever mounted Blue from a barrel, but once I got him lined up he happily stood there and let me get on.
We worked on brining up my energy to get Blue to go, and bringing it down to get him to stop. The 9 Step Back up which quickly went to a 1 Step Back up, he caught on very fast. We also worked on the Indirect Rein and the Direct Rein which he did easily as well. I even worked on bringing up my energy to get him to trot which worked rather well.
And for the first time since I started working with Blue he actually yawned while I was riding him and when I put him back in the paddock he followed me around at liberty and had a few more yawns. He was a happy and relaxed horse.
~*~
Next it was Kallie turn, we went through the normal drill with lots of Friendly, Porcupine, Driving and Yo-Yo game, and all of which she does on the first phase easily. I then desensitized her to a spray bottle, she has a bad fungal infection on her legs which she came with and I have been trying to clear it up now for ages and it has slowly been getting better but I using the MTG seemed so wasteful. She was worried in the beginning but I never stopped rubbing her and she soon realized that she wasn’t going to be hurt by the spray bottle and was able to spray her legs fully as well as a few spots around her withers and tail head where a few of the rain rot scabs remained.
After playing the 7 Games again it was time to introduce Kallie to the big yellow ball. She would allow me to draw her towards it or send her towards it and touch it with either her nose or legs. When I picked it up and walked around with it she was a bit worried. I was able to rub her lots and eventually replacing my hand with the ball and rub her with the ball all over on the left side. With the right side she was more hesitant and tried moving away from it. So I took a few steps back, rubbed her with my hand and slowly worked it up to rubbing with the ball. She was licking lots, back leg cocked, eyes blinking slowly, ears on me.
I then had her Squeeze between two barrels, with lots of space, next the ball went into the Squeeze, so Kallie had to squeeze between the barrel and the ball. I gradually made the space between the ball and barrel smaller and smaller. She would get a bit worried about the smaller space so I would back it up a bit then move it a bit closer. Eventually she was bumping the ball out of her way with her legs. She really wasn’t sure what to do at first but once she got it she let out a huge sigh and licked and licked and licked.
Figuring that was a good place to end I gave her some treats and we walked down to the paddock. When I went to take the halter off she eagerly tipped her nose towards me and allowed the halter so slide off her nose. For this she got more treats. She didn’t walk off right away she stood close to me allowed me to rub her all over. And I was the one who walked away from her first.
So another wonderful day with the ponies!
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