Advanced Horsemanship

So I just registered for next semester classes (sort of/mostly), and upon discussing what I need in order to graduate with ms. Baker, we decided that I was going to need six classes. Sort of a drag for my final semester, but she had an idea. She suggested that I do the EQU363 class, which is called Advanced Horsemanship, but is really just an independent study. I thought, gee, that's all well and good, but what does that mean? exactly? It means that Dee gets to be my class project, apparently! Still lost? Let me explain...
Basically, this summer I will set a goal and keep a training log for Dee, taking pictures and videos to document her progress. Once I've gathered up all the information, I'll make it into a full paper and video presentation. Fun! Class credit for playing with my horse!
So now, the big question: what ARE my goals? I want to keep them pretty loose, but here we go, my goals up until the start of school:
1. Get Dee's canter to be balanced, and get the correct lead on the first try most of the time.
2. Start over fences

So how am I going to achieve this? Through lessons with Nancy, Steph and Bettina, hopefully!

This week has been a good one for Dee and I. Tuesday, she spent most of our ride pretending to be a giraffe, but after a million walk/trot transitions, she finally began doing this absolutely beautiful stretchy trot... I was amazed! She was long, low, forward and totally balanced. We achieved this for the equivalent of 4 times around the ring, so I just quit, telling her what a wonderful mare she is. Wednesday I was running terribly late and didn't get a chance to ride. Yesterday was more transition work.. yay. Her transitions really aren't terrible. She's very sensitive to the seat, both from walk to halt and trot to walk. She was pretty good overall... didn't get the same amount of fabulous stretchy trot, but we did get some, so I was pleased. If it's not pouring this afternoon, I'll be riding her again, otherwise she may have to wait until tomorrow or sunday.
I am also happy to report that she has suddenly decided that getting her butt curried is the BEST THING EVER. However, she shows this by leaning into the curry comb, which eventually ends up with her butt against the wall and me struggling to reach it and yelling at her to move over. As to the mystery gray situation... she has a WHOLE lot of it, especially right around the point of the hip and the butt. There's less on her back and neck, but there is some. What a weirdo... it will be interesting to see what color my horse is this summer!

Free Jumping (Launching?)

So, I decided to have Dee do a little bit of "free jumping" yesterday. I didn't let her off of the lounge, because I didn't want her to just run around. I set up the 13" height next to the fence with a guide rail on the open side. First I put a side down and let her walk over it (no problems), then I sent her out to tackle the full 13" solo. She was adorable, to say the least. Approached it just the way I like to see - stretching her neck out and looking at it - and then just LAUNCHED herself over it. her HOOVES were about a foot and a half over top, and her body? I don't even know. I think her reasoning was, 'well, I don't know what to do with these big long legs I have, so I'll just jump SO HIGH that I don't have to worry about them'. Abbett used to do that a little bit. She trotted over it about 5 times and then I got ambitious and put one side of the jump up to 2' (left the other side down for her). It didn't phase her at all. Same ole' quiet approach and huge leap. We only did that once because I really didn't want her to do too much and she was such a good girl. I made a huge fuss over her and told her how wonderful she was, and I swear, she had quite the little spring in her step on the way back to the barn. I think she was proud of herself.

Bath Time!

Miss Dee got her first soapy bath of the year yesterday, since it was ridiculously warm. It felt weird to be sweating bullets with no leaves on the trees, but I guess that's New England for you.

Gone Gray?

So, the dentist was supposed to come on Friday at 1:30, but for some reason, she never showed. At 2, I called and left a message. At 3 I called again. I called and left another message yesterday. I don't know what's going on but I'm none to happy right now. I mean, I'm pretty sure now that the weight issue was her worms, but she still needs her teeth done because its that time of year. I won't harp on it anymore than that, but I'm thinking I may need to find a new dentist, because that sort of behavior is incredibly unprofessional.
With the warm weather, Dee's really begun to shed out. That's all well and good, she's looking sleeker and fancier and less like a ragamuffin, but what did I find underneath her fuzzy winter coat? GRAY. Lots and lots of GRAY. That was a bit of a surprise. Her butt and her back have tons of little gray hairs all over... not so much on her neck. Seriously, though, what's up with all that gray? Look:




Weird, right?

I'm thinking that today is going to be bath day, because it's really warm out. The other day, I hosed her legs down because they were just disgusting with wet, goopy mud. Well, as I was toweling them off, Dee expressed some interest in seeing the towel. I let her see it, expecting that she just wanted to take a sniff. She proceeded to grab the towel and start swinging it around like a dog would. I took a few pictures, but I didn't get any really great action shots, just Dee standing with the towel hanging out of her mouth.
Look at that cutie pie:

Itsy, bitsy, fuzzy wuzzy worms.

I never thought I'd say this, but YAY, my horse has worms! Dr. S found a pretty hefty population when she did the fecal, so it looks like the powerpac was just the thing, and since she's already on the strongid daily, we should be able to keep the population in control! All of her blood work looked wonderful, and she's officially innoculated for the season (with no reactions to the shots, thank goodness!). Now I've just got to get my copies of the rabies and coggins and we'll be set for any competitions we want to go to this year! Also, miss Dee has been utterly DEE-Lightful lately. She's been very good about her daily dose of icky wormer, and was a doll for Dr. S. I also think that (gasp) she may be starting to enjoy this grooming thing!
Dr. S thought that she was very cute... commented on how nice her shoulder is, what a nice eye she has, and how BIG she's probably going to get!
The dentist is coming for a visit on Friday, so if the teeth are causing trouble, too, then they'll not be causing trouble any more.
On another note, I'm about to pull my hair out, because while we HAVE been feeding the max-e-glo pellets, I ended up having to get the mash, and it is a MESS because it has to be wet. It gets all over Dee, all over the stall, all over the buckets.... there is rice bran EVERYWHERE. I'm already sick of it and it's only been a few days. Oh well.

Steps 2 and 3

Well, the vet is coming tomorrow to pull blood and maybe do a fecal. If she thinks Dee isn't sick or anything we're also gonna do spring shots. The dentist is going to come up April 2nd. While I'm not looking forward to all the bills about to head my way, I just want to get this sorted out... cover all my bases.

Step 1

I'm implementing operation "Get Dee Fat". Step 1? Powerpac. Do I think she's wormy? Not particularly. However, it can't hurt and you never know, so she started her power pac today. I've got calls in to the vet and the dentist, too. Those are the next steps. I want to get her teeth done and some bloodwork. Plus, she needs her spring shots, so I may as well have those done while I get her blood looked at.
Also, I feel the need to share this story, because it was really creepy. I know we all like to think our animals can understand us even though everyone says it's just intonation. Well, I was just talking to Dee while I groomed her today and asked her a question (just because I do things like that...). Well... she nodded at me. So I said, "Did you understand me?" SHE NODDED AGAIN. A little weirded out, I waited a little bit and then asked her, "Dee, do you understand english?" SHE NODDED AGAIN. My mother suggested that if I ever want to say something negative about her, I'd better learn another language. I love my little mare!