It does look ok at the moment. although he’s rubbed some more out this week so it’s thin at the bottom. I bathed him yesterday and put some tea tree conditioner on as it’s looking scurfy, and some Bye Bye Itch. I’m really hoping he doesn’t take too much more out.
Here he is yesterday – I *think* that lump is actually a smidge smaller:
It probably wasn’t clear from the video the context of what we were doing then – we were really focussing on ‘forward’ and just ‘forward’ when asked and not worrying too much about what it looked like as he can be very backward and behind the leg. The reason I was quite pleased with the footage is that he was moving really well and off the leg reasonably well but that did mean his transitions looked a bit more panicked than usual – although the head throwing is a Thing.
I do a *lot* of walk to canter. We didn’t start cantering under saddle at all until he could pop it from walk but there’s certainly more work to do as he’s only been cantering under saddle for a few months so I’ve read your comments with interest Sue! :db:
From my point of view M having a more experienced loan horse around that knows how to canter that I can sit on and get my riding a bit better will be very nice and looks like it might happen! 🙂
Jumping is probably his favourite thing Beth! It doesn’t look anything like as bad as it felt and I’m glad that might instinct when I get his stride wrong is to throw the reins at him a bit and not catch him in the mouth. I need to do some proper work on the jumping, probably with my instructor calling strides for me for a bit until I get my eye in, or cantering over poles so I can get a feel for what 3 strides looks like! 🙂
Video update! Here are a few short clips from our lesson on Monday. He’s going better I think but I’m nagging a lot still :-[ Constructive comments welcome! My canter in particular is dreadful.
NB: Excuse quality – instructor took it on her phone. Can’t embed as I uploaded to Flickr, not YouTube as it doesn’t ruin the quality as much, sorry!
Bit of fun today! Proper my camera up on the side of the school and did some jumpies! He’s getting much better and really beginning to enjoy it…even though I think his stride is a lot shorter than it is and regularly misjudge his take off :wall:
<3 my baby 😀
It’s been a very very busy August and then I finally had a weeks holiday myself in Cornwall (Oh how I :wub: Cornwall!) but it’s back to work now until Christmas so we can knuckle down a bit more.
His jaw seems ok, he’s pain free and the lump isn’t getting any better to my eye. He’ll be back in the CT scanner in a few weeks just to check there’s no more trouble brewing but *fingers crossed* that’s all behind us now and we’re just waiting to see what rate of growth the jaw tumour settles down to ultimately. After some drastic changes of routine and one drastic change of feed to go I think we’re on top of the lami. He’s lost quite a bit of weight (about 3 inches on the tape but hard to know what that translates to in actual kg – find out when he goes back for his scan) so I’m pleased about that. Hopefully he’ll take to the new diet and we’ll be good for the winter! He’s been very unhappy about this dieting lark though, poor thing.
Things are generally going quite well riding wise I think. My lessons are starting out well with the lovely Claudia helping me to get to grips with my lack of contact and getting him moving forward. He’s much more off the leg even in a couple of lessons. We’ve been experimenting with his bit as he didn’t seem very happy but to be honest I think we need to view him as a baby in this regard and teach him how to work into a contact. Contact is next on the list of things to work on now we have some kind of ‘forward’ going on. Hopefully going to try and do some hacking out with my friend Claire again over the winter for a bit of variety and build some muscles and now he’s more comfortable in his feet we need to do some pole work and maybe a bit more jumping.
I had a jumping lesson on a riding school horse on my holidays which was very good. I went to Newton Equestrian Centre and I think they are a pretty well run little BHS school. The horse was nicely forward and off the leg, the instructor was kind and sympathetic and corrected all the things you want her too – no kicking or shouting in sight. And their ponies all live out when they’re not working which I think it nice. I enjoyed the lesson and haven’t totally forgotten how to jump but my canter is a bit rubbish. I need to work on that! I’m not sitting deeply enough or absorbing the movement properly, which I guess I knew already. More work without stirrups coming up I suppose…