Visits and Carrots

Visited Rocky in his paddock yesterday and ........ he was in a shocking mood, do horses suffer the blues like we do, do they get bored, pissed off, lonely, frustrated.

Well I think Rocky was all of these things, he welcomed the carrots and ate them up quickly but did not want to talk to me, in fact instead of licking my hand he teethed it, it was not a bite. It was just a press my closed teeth against your skin sort of thing.

I don't know but I do know he needs activity this one. What to do as I am only getting out to ride on the weekend, needing help so restricted to riding when someone is around.

Do I take him to a centre where things are going on all the time, do I get in a trainer, do I take lessons once a week, then ride with others on the weekend.

And, how is he going to be around other horses. I just do not want to fall off again as this can quickly shoe Rocky just how to get rid of me.

Oh well, I did ask for a challenge didn't I???

Lovely boy

Handsome man

Some photos from the first ride

A new rug

First ride

Walking nicely

a bit more walking

oh and the same photo

way over there, still walking

He is so hansome, and I think we are ok together, I hope to keep losing the weight so that we can look really good together, good enough for the local show Standard Bred section would be a dream come true, and a goal for both of us.

First Ride on Rocky

This guy is fabulous, he is everything I would want in a horse and more. Okay he is cheeky and stubborn but I think as we work together and get to know each other we will work through this although I have a feeling he will always keep me on my toes.

How do I know all this, the second ride, heheheheh, well it wasn't as calm as this photo shows on the first ride. The second ride was much more interesting. We went down to the arena with Lou and Maggie to see how Rocky would go with another horse in the vacinity.

He was a complete peanut, he was sure he was off to the races again and kept jumping about and wanting to do things his way.

Prior to me getting up on him, I walked him around Maggie as she was being lunged, he did a few head tosses (his way of objecting to the current status quo). And then as I was standing wanting him to stay quiet next to me he thought it would be great fun to have a roll in the sand, AHHHHHH only trouble here was that he was wearing his new saddle at the time.

So with a lot of pulling on reins, yelling and Lou swatting his backside with the lunge whip we finally got him back on his feet, the indignant look I got was priceless. I was so thankfull that we managed to avoid the roll, he was down on his belly and ready to have a lovely roll thank you very much.

When I got aboard with Lou's help, I began some simple walking from point to point trying my leg aids and accessing how I was going and how he was going, what ended up happening was Rocky dancing about, shakeing his head about and doing little jumps, can not call them a pigroot at all but just him being totally full of himself. Was I scared, well, a part of me was, but mostly it was excillerating - I just love love love this sort of horse. His stride is so smooth and comfortable with a spring in it that feels like this horse is ready to motor. I have no doubt at all that Rocky can go when he wants to.

Keeping him in the walk was pretty easy, keeping him going to the right was not, he really resisted and just wanted to go left, is this a retired standie thing?? He did have this tendency in lungeing.

I don't intend to make the poor boy do circles for the rest of his life, we did long stretches of the arena, turns, figure eights, Lou called out the letters and I headed for the appointed one. This went very well with her riding Maggie behind me. Rocky didn't seem peterbed at all at another horse being around but he was certainly more fizzy than the first ride I had in the round yard.

I don't have any pics of this day as I forgot the camera and really had my hands full with Rock.

Lou had to go at 11am so she headed up the hill on Maggie, stopping to check if I was ok, he was getting a bit head up about Maggie going and him being held back, so I kept him busy with lots of manuevers but he was getting really fed up and could hear the other horses at the stables and just wanted out.

As things were relatively okay at that point I decided to walk him out of the arena and head up to the stables, keeping the first big ride fairly simple. Well, what happened next was a bit unexpected to say the least. Rocky decided he needed to leap over the sleeper defining the edge of the arena. It must have looked like a 5 foot jump to the boy, I promptly lost my right stirrup, Rocky cracked his hind leg on the sleeper, did a few pigroots, pretty sure this time, and off I came, a not to ineligant dismount except that I didn't land on my feet, but on my well padded arse. Oh, dang that hurts, so letting go of the reins, Rocky took himself off up the hill for the girls to catch for me. I sat for about 5 min and then slowly slowly eased myself onto my knees and then up. No great damage done, but a very sore butt for a few days.

I did not get back on as I know I should have as I was really sore and just couldn't face it. So I slowly unsaddled the man and got him back to his paddock.

And the comment from the girls "Oh she's fine, she's walking" ha, lol.