Free Jumping the Pony

The pony has been feeling great lately! Between the bitless bridle and clicker training, he really feels good. Over the winter with his anxiety spiking and him dumping me a bit, I was kind of getting done with trying to do anything with him. My priority for him right now is to use him as a stand-in for my future second horse and to have something going so that if a friend comes to ride with me, we can go into the hills together. But he's doing much better now! 

He's a really good trail pony

We kind of got into this odd little routine in our work where he'd be super lazy for a bit and then he'd wake up and immediately get anxious. Like his body needed some time to loosen up but then his brain couldn't handle being loose/forward/whatever? I don't know what was going on. When that would happen, after about fifteen minutes, I'd spend about five minutes having him do something basic (like turns on the forehand or something easy) and then we'd be done with the ride. 

Over the last few weeks though, he's been having this really pleasant time in between the laziness and the anxiety where he'd feel really damn good. But he'd still worry, so we'd end with some basic stuff and be done. Last week though, we had a really good ride where instead of worrying, he just got very ON. There was a confidence about the energy and looseness that hadn't been there before. I had to kind of talk myself into doing more given that every time he's felt like this, I've either fallen off or come close to it (not like he's far from the ground lol but he's quick!). But I was feeling really good about my ability to breathe and visualize him staying with me and he did. 

We saw a snake recently!

Last week, I decided to longe him and see if he wanted to do a little bit of jumping. I turned him loose in the ring while I put up the world's tiniest cross rail. Normally I don't work with him at liberty because he thinks that eating leaves is way more interesting than anything I want to do with him. But this time he was super into hanging out with me! 

He immediately walked over the jump and got clicks for that, then turned around and did it again for more clicks. I wanted him to warm up for real though, so I sent him around the arena a few times before actually pointing him at the jump.

He warmed up fairly quickly and got clicks for moving forward and releasing his under neck. Once he was warmed up, I sent him over the jump and he happily hunted it down for a click. We did that several times each way and he was so game that I decided to put the jump up to the second tiniest cross rail that has ever existed. 

I love these trails, it rained this weekend
so they are not usable for a bit

He did jump that one a few times, but I noticed that his jumping arc was starting to change. He'd fling himself over it and then land heavily, tossing his head. I can't adequately explain how tiny this jump is. We have those white cavalletti blocks and I made a crossrail out of them with them on their side (not standing up). The poles are actually pretty crappy (going to replace those) so they were sagging a bit. It was SO small. He was giving it more effort than required and I think it was because the actual apex of his jump was well after the jump. He was cutting down right after it too. 

One too many hard landings and he was super over it. He galloped by it kicking out at the jump, then started to spin hard away from it. 

Now, I don't care about jumping this horse. It'd be convenient to be able to jump tiny cross rails like I did last summer on him so that I could practice what I'm learning in my jumping lessons in between. But I also feel more confident jumping now so I don't think I necessarily need that. I've tried my best to emphasize to the pony that he is no longer expected to do anything. He is on an R+ ONLY training plan. Good things get rewarded and bad things get ignored. 

So instead of pushing the issue, I put the jump down to poles and had him end on a good note trotting over the poles. It definitely got me thinking about the jumping issue though. 

And a deer!

I'd like to try to clicker train him to jump a bit softer. He seems super into the jumps until he lands hard and then he's not as excited about it. I'm curious as to whether I could teach him to jump in a better way that has him rocking back and jumping rather than just flinging himself over his shoulder to do it. If I could teach him to land softer, would he enjoy jumping more?

So the plan is to have him jump at liberty once a week and to shape him with clicker training. I'm going to start with canter poles and slowly build him up into the world's tiniest grid with the world's tiniest cross rails. 

We'll stick with the R+ only training so if he decides that he'd rather not jump, oh well, we will stop. But I figure it'd be a fun project for me given that I'll probably want to free jump my next horse a bit and shape the way he jumps. Kate did that a ton with Flounder and I think that's a huge part of why I love riding him so much. 

Always game for trails

As much fun as I'm having with the pony, it's definitely showing me that I really want another horse with TC's personality. The pony is a bit on the quirky side personality-wise. He's kind of hot and cold. Super into what I'm doing and then not that interested. Standing super toned staring at me aggressively with his happy pony eyes and then totally ignoring me. 

I don't know how much of that is nature vs nurture, but I appreciate TC's constant happy-go-lucky attitude and how personable he is. The pony has pretty good conformation, like I think in his youth and mine, I could have done something pretty spectacular with him. Whereas TC's conformation makes him more challenging to ride. But he's always super game, which I really appreciate. 

I still love the pony, I just think that I'll be after a Flounder/TC type for my next horse!