Smokey

[Jane&Ziggy]

You don't have to have a cavesson to lunge, especially with a horse who knows what he's doing. I have a cavesson but never use it - as you say, so heavy and jingly and dangly. It scares me, never mind a horse.

I lunge Sid (when I do, which is not often) in a well fitting headcollar. I have to swap the line over from one side to the other if I use the cheek rings, but if I use the leading ring we can change direction without a line change.

 

[KarinUS]

I dont think he knows what he's doing though. Lol
Lunging isn't really a thing for roping horses. His experience in the round pen is more running in a circle for exercise.
Since we likely have several months of not wearing a saddle I signed us up for a groundwork/lunging basics thing.
And it's strongly recommended to use the cavesson.
Not sure if I can get him comfortable with it though. I guess there's no rush since really the basics he'd learn first are perfectly fine in the halter

 

[Jessey]

I dont think he knows what he's doing though. Lol
Lunging isn't really a thing for roping horses. His experience in the round pen is more running in a circle for exercise.
Since we likely have several months of not wearing a saddle I signed us up for a groundwork/lunging basics thing.
And it's strongly recommended to use the cavesson.
Not sure if I can get him comfortable with it though. I guess there's no rush since really the basics he'd learn first are perfectly fine in the halter

Duct tape might be your best friend for minimising jingling until he gets used to it!

 

[KarinUS]

Duct tape might be your best friend for minimising jingling until he gets used to it!

Oh that's very smart! Thank you

 

[KarinUS]

Teeth done today. Fun fact: the front tooth that looked black when we first looked at Smokey had resolved itself. It was just a stain and eating hay wore off the stain.
His #9 molars will need a touch up in eight months.
Sadly Smokey has a permanent scar across his tongue from harsh bit use.

 

[KarinUS]

Oh and here's our update. One month ago versus today

 

[Jessey]

Poor guy, tongue scars are all too common.

Give yourself a pat on the back though, he’s making great progress and now his teeth have been sorted it will no doubt go on even easier.

 

[Jane&Ziggy]

Wow looking so much better! Also if you compare his facial expression in the two pictures he looks very much happier, though still anxious.

That poor little horse, with a scar on his tongue like that. Vile.

 

[KarinUS]

What was I thinking buying a roping horse?! I know nothing about roping.
Was just running an idea by the trainer from the horse rescue:
Should I use Bixby's bitless bridle instead of DJs eggbutt snaffle bit to keep things comfortable for Smokey considering the tongue scar?
Answer was: nope. With his training as breakaway roping horse he's used to nose pressure from the tie down and in his training it does NOT mean stop. So for now to be safe we will start with snaffle once he's even ready for anything.
I'm hoping there won't be too many things where my lack of his background causes me to make unsafe decisions.
I guess I should go watch some breakaway roping but then I feel bad for the calves...

 

[Jessey]

Yeah I can see that being accurate, but it doesn’t mean he can’t be retaught and learn a different way. Does he respond to nose pressure in a halter when being led?

I wouldn’t worry too much about the tongue scar, no more that you are worried about the other scars on the poor guy, chances are they are long healed and actually less sensitive than undamaged skin.

 

[Jane&Ziggy]

You could still use a bitless, but one that doesn't depend on nose pressure, like a sidepull.

If you have a headcollar (rather than a rope halter) you can attach rope reins to it in various different ways to mimic the action of the different bitless bridles, and see how he gets on with them.

He doesn't strike me as a horse who is likely to be dangerous to try out at walk in the arena if you want to get a feel for different cues and how he responds.

 

[KarinUS]

So the day I bought him I mentioned I had an enclosed arena and that I wanted to practice there first before going in the trail and the seller said he's very hot in the arena and he'll likely be more calm on the trail.
The trainer also agreed with that.
Breakaway horse basically means once he goes into the arena he runs.
Mentally I just can't bring myself to chance it on the trail without feeling comfortable in the arena first.
I'm terrible with bolting horses.
In fact all those years ago I bought DJ because on the test ride with the seller twenty years ago both horses took off and I managed to circle and stop DJ once we got to an open area and stay on. Lol DJ was stoppable and I'm a big fan of that
Bolting scares me so much.
As docile as he looks Smokey can spin and run like nobody's business. He's actually surprisingly athletic.
The 'hot in the arena' is actually part of why I wanted to do the groundwork/lunging course. It will give us an opportunity to get to know each other, work on voice commands and reset his expectations of what happens in an arena I think.

 

[Jessey]

Yeah I can definitely see why he'd be hot in the arena, those roping horses come in full bore, but I think you are right that doing other, slower stuff in there will quickly reset his expectations, though I would probably not ride him into your arena for a long time, simply get on in there.

 

[KarinUS]

Had a cute moment yesterday. I like to sit in the barn aisle and Minnie likes to come stand and cuddle with me.
Yesterday though she left to eat some hay. Smokey is still very shy and honestly I can't tell if he likes it when we pet him or just endures it.
But he chose to leave his hay to come stand next to me and put his face close to mine similar to Minnie.
I look kind of terrified because I wanted to be still and not spook him but I was so thrilled. I also noticed he prefers a kiss on the nose to hand reaching out and petting him on the face. It's doable but makes him a little anxious. Kiss seems to be okay though. In fact he places his nose close to mine.
It will be interesting to read through my notes next year and either go : "oh weird. He's such a cuddle bug!" Or “yeah nothing much changed. " Lol

 

[KarinUS]

Last time I haltered him was for the dentist appointment. Today was the first time he did not let me halter him!
I think the dentist appointment was pretty stressful for all of us. Plus his body condition is getting better to where some spice has returned and he runs off tail high thinking he's hot stuff. Lol
After trying a few times I changed strategy.
Only horses on lead ropes get to leave the horse area to graze in front where we got grass.
So we left him free like he wanted and only took Minnie who had been patiently waiting during our shenanigans tied to the barn.
Minnie got to walk out and graze while he watched. He quickly came to the gate watching her graze.
Are horses able to understand concepts like this? I guess we'll find out tomorrow when we try this again. Lol
Today the 'live with the consequences of your actions and miss out on grazing' felt like a good idea.
I'm wondering if the thing about tying a tire to his head really was about building neck muscle or if the guy was just unable to catch the horse. Hmmm ...
I'll take the phone tomorrow to take a picture if he takes off again because he does look quite glorious dashing through the trees, tail up and full of himself.

 

[Jessey]

I know people who study these things say horses don't understand consequences, but I could swear they do to some extent.

Have you seen that communication study where they can request things (blanket/rug, food etc.) by touching a picture panel on the fence, to me that shows an understanding of what comes after an action. I see it with my mob regularly, Jess really dislikes her grazing muzzle and she knows the difference if I bring it or a halter out, she will happily run from the muzzle, but if I stand by the gate out to the grass holding it she will come and let me put it on as I don't let her out without it in spring and I think she gets that.

 

[Jane&Ziggy]

Do you remember in Horses Never Lie how Mark Rashid's team taught the horses in the dude ranch string to walk tidily to the barn to get their lunches?

They let a random horse go. If it ran to the barn, it was caught and tied up outside. It if walked, it got to go in and get its lunch.

Over the period of about a week every single horse learned to walk tidily to the barn. It saved them masses of time.

I think this conclusively demonstrates that horses can "watch and learn".

 

[KarinUS]

Do you remember in Horses Never Lie how Mark Rashid's team taught the horses in the dude ranch string to walk tidily to the barn to get their lunches?

They let a random horse go. If it ran to the barn, it was caught and tied up outside. It if walked, it got to go in and get its lunch.

Over the period of about a week every single horse learned to walk tidily to the barn. It saved them masses of time.

I think this conclusively demonstrates that horses can "watch and learn".

Oh yes!
Now I'm kind of excited about the opportunity for my little experiment.
Let's just hope the grazing is important enough to him to want to learn.
After all he's a horse that gets fed three times a day anyway at least until he's back to normal weight.

 

[KarinUS]

He made it to grazing but only barely.
Same shenanigans at the barn so we walked out without him. This time he followed closely and was quite disappointed not to make it through the gate.
I went back to get his halter to give him a last chance at the gate.
He he did let me halter him there so he did end up getting to graze.
I figured this might help make the connection (halter equals grazing) . I'm just hoping it doesn't start a new thing of having to halter him at the gate all the time.

 

[Jane&Ziggy]

Yay! It worked and he looks happy. Let tomorrow look after itself...