Icelandic Horse & Zoe

Today we went on the trail with an Icelandic horse-Keeko.  It's not very often that we go out with a horse that is smaller than Zoe.  Zoe is usually the smaller horse when I go out with a group.  But today was different.  Keeko is going to do an endurance ride next month, a 30 miler.  So she wanted more trail practice.  Keeko is a nice horse, not a spooky horse and has good manners.  I've been told that in Iceland the horses really don't have any predators, there is nothing there to be "scared of", so these horses tend to be curious rather than spooky.  And I learned today that some Icelandic horses tolt better than others, the tolt gait can be "stronger" in some horses than others.  Keeko isn't considered a horse with a strong tendency to tolt.  But she can tolt, her owner has worked on it.  She was slow up the hills but kept going.  Her owner wanted me to be in front for the ride so I kept my eye on her as we did hill work.  We took some walking breaks and stopped a few times.  Zoe didn't mind going out with a "new" horse.  Today we went to 3 spots that overlooked the lake.  Here's one of our stopping places...Inspiration Point.

Different Wednesday Ride

On Wednesday I usually go on a trail ride with just me and Zoe.  I find that I need to do that at least once a week in order for Zoe to be accustomed to being out by herself.  There was a time when I was going on the trail all the time with other people and then I tried to take Zoe out by herself and I had a horse that didn't want to go out.  So I find going out by myself once a week helps with that.

However today (Wednesday)....we did something different.  I had a friend ask me if I'd go with her-she has a foxtrotter.  My past experience with foxtrotters told me that our two horses gaits would not be compatable.  So I was thinking that we could leave together but we might end up going home our separate ways.  So it would be an adventure-something different.  My friend also said that her horse can be high energy-barn sour tense energy-especially on the way home.  So I said we'd give it a try.

The first half of the ride was good.  The foxtrotter was faster at the walk but we could keep up.  And trotting was okay, we stayed pretty much the same speed.  We got to the KBB Hills and worked some of them over and over again.  Then headed towards home.  That's when the foxtrotter turned into a different horse.  He was naughty...jigging, tense, not listening.  Zoe didn't feed off his "energy",  she remained calm but was mad at him.  Every once in a while she would lay her ears back at him as if to say "knock it off".  So we decided to go our separate ways.  That way the foxtrotter could get the extra "work" he needed.  And go extra miles if needed.  Zoe was fine going down a different trail.  She doesn't really know this horse very well, there was no attachment there, so I think it was easy for her to leave him.  We walked, did some extended trotting, collected trotting, took a less traveled trail-all the while heading home.  She was fine.  So I guess I did end up going out by myself.

Show time

At our stable we have a horse show once a year.  We just had one today.  It was the first year we had dressage tests, we had introduction tests A, B and C.  I decided to do a pleasure class, 18 years old+ -walk, trot and tests A and B.  I wrote in a previous blog about trying to do dressage in this years show.  It was an interesting experience and I look forward to improving my scores.  Test A was 53% and test B was 54%.  I'm told that a score in the 50%'s is ok, satisfactory.  The 60%'s would be considered good.  If one gets a score in the 60%'s or higher three times in a row they should consider advancing to the next test.

The tests seemed to go by so fast.  There were things I knew I could do better, things that I knew Zoe could do better.  There were other things that we did better than the "satisfactory" 5 score.  Each part of the test is scored 0-10 and comments are written next to certain activities.  Basically, if I can get more impulsion out of my horse the scores would be better.  Rhythm is so important.  I also found out about 4 days before the show that the rider is not allowed to give verbal cues to the horse.  So I've found myself with another bad habit-clucking to my horse.  So I've spent the last few days concentrating on using my seat to move up and down in my gaits.

 I did find out that my equitation isn't as bad as I thought.  On the dressage tests I got a 6 and 6.5 on rider's position.  And in the pleasure class I got 4th place-the judge said she would have scored me 1st or 2nd place if it was an equitation class.  So my equitation is improving.  I use too much foot movement in the pleasure class to look pleasurable.  So it was my first year riding english and it was interesting.  The dressage is so precise and challenging, I think I'll enjoy working on it.

 Patti with the flag

 Jeni and Zeke came to visit 

 We had to scoop poop

 

Fly masks

I almost hate to say it, I might be jinxing myself but here it goes...all 3 of my horses have not destroyed their flymasks this summer.  Each one of them is still wearing the same mask they started with at the beginning of summer.  This is amazing to me.  Zoe usually goes thru a couple of them.  Sky gets about 2 a summer.  Skippy is the only one that seems to keep one mask thru the whole summer.  Maybe Skippy has been giving the other 2 lessons!

Summer sores

I hate summer sores.  This blog is usually about Zoe and me but this time it's about another horse I have-Sky.  He's been getting summer sores the end of every summer for about 3 years in a row.  I have an idea about this.  Every since I've been deworming him 2-3 times a year (dependent on his good fecal tests) I have to deal with summer sores.  So I think I'm done with the 2-3 times a year deworming and will go back to my old schedule.  Maybe he's just a horse that needs to have the extra protection.  We'll give it a try and hopefully I'll remember and write about it in a year and it will be better.  Anyway here are some picts of this year's sore.  I've been working on this since July and here it is Sept 23 and it's finally healed.  Wrapping and Prednisolone.  Normally I don't give the Pred for this, but this one was nasty.

Rain in September

I love going on a ride after it rains.  I say that now-in Sept.  Come March, I may not be so happy about the rain.  But it's been a normal long dry hot summer, so in Sept I can appreciate the rain.  It smells so good, the dust is down, no wet slippery spots yet, the horses have been worked all summer so they are obedient (for the most part), it's not freezing cold yet, the poison oak isn't so "juicy" so it's harder for me to get a rash, animal prints are easier to identify, the "naked ladies" are blooming, did I mention that it smells so good....  I'm sure there are other things that will come to mind after I finish writing.

Camping

This year we went to Skillman for horse camping.  The trip there was easy on the truck as we were only 3700 feet.  Last year the trip to Wrights Lake was too much for our truck-almost didn't make it.  This year the trip was shorter and the uphill grade was not so steep and long.  The smoke from the American Fire wasn't bad.  It was very slight in the morning and then it blew away during the day.

In my last blog I wrote about ponying horses and the problems/resolutions that came up.  The first day we went on a short ride on trails around camp.  I ponyed Sky off of Zoe.  The combination worked fine.  The trail we chose had alot of hairpin turns in it, but we did ok.  The next morning we went for another ride.  This one wasn't as fun.  We took our dog camping.  In the past we always had 2 dogs at horse camping and we left them back at camp and they were fine.   Last November we had to put one of our dogs down leaving just one for this trip.  We didn't want to leave just one dog back at camp by herself.  So we took her.  The first day she was fine.  The second day she caused some problems.  The dog is 1/2 healer so she liked to stay behind the string of horses.  On the second day she must have done something to spook Sky.  We were on a narrow trail.  Sky starting running up on Zoe and spinning (as I'm holding on to his rope).  Because Sky was spinning, Zoe thought it would be a good idea to do the same.  Now I'm riding/ponying 2 spinning horses at the same time.  All I could do was hold on and yell at them.  They all stopped, I got everyone turned around and we continued on.  Not fun.  Then Zoe and Sky decided it was time to eat.  Every 20 steps or so one or the other would stop and eat.  It's not easy for me to control that behavior with 2 horses at the same time.  So we got off the narrow trail and that took care of the eating problems.  At that point we stayed on a wide road and went back to camp.  So the ponying combination went fine, I just didn't plan on the dog causing problems.

Once the 3rd rider showed up I no longer had to pony a horse.  When Zoe was little I would pony her everywhere and as time went on I got tired of it.  Ponying horses is something I can do but it isn't my favorite thing to do.

We went on a nice long ride that afternoon.  We took the Hallelujah Trail out from camp, met up with the Pioneer Trail by Hwy 20 and rode back to camp.  Zoe was in the lead on the Hallelujah Trail.  She did pretty good leading on a trail she had never been on before.  There were alot of hairpin turns on this trail and it was no problem for her.  We mostly walked and did very little trotting.  All the horses were excited when we first started and it took quite a while for them to settle down so walking seemed the best choice.  But after a while they calmed down and trotting was ok.  We almost took the wrong trail to get back home.  I was glad I had the map with us.  It was a pretty good map-for those 2 trails.  Not sure about the other trails.  Those were the only 2 trails we traveled on the whole time we were there.

The next day we went on a short ride in the morning as we had family visiting later that day.  It was good to see everyone again.  No one wanted to ride and we were having too much fun visiting.  The next day was our go home day.  A short ride in the morning was all we had time for.

 Site 15 had 2 corrals so we highlined a horse.  It worked out just fine.

 Mom, I'm busy eating!

 Skippy doesn't even bother to look up.

 Sky did great on his high line.

 Relaxing

 Relaxing

 Skippy

He was only there for a few minutes and the dirt just jumped on him!