The Hazard of Versatility

[posted to Morganlist, 30 June 1997, not long after making the switch to reining from dressage/eventing/hunters]

...is the occasional cross-training bobble. To wit: I was doing some fast, extended lope work in the jumping ring: it has far and away the best footing on the property for reining work. Since Corey was wanting to hold back a bit on the extensions, to encourage him I had lifted my rear end out of the saddle in more or less an approximation of my usual eventing seat. (Heels down, legs relaxed and loose at the horse's side, backside just slightly out of the saddle, weight balanced and carried on thighs, rolling with the horse's motion.) Worked great -- he really zoomed out on the extensions and zipped right back into collection as soon as my seatbones were back in contact with the saddle, asking for a slower cadence.

The trouble came when I turned on a circle in such a fashion that for a brief instant we were lined up on one of the jumps in the ring. Those foxy little ears snapped forward in target acquisition mode, his hindquarters sucked up underneath, forehand lightened, and every fiber in the little horse's body was fairly giggling "FENCE! ohmyohmyyesyesFENCE!" In the normal course of things a 2'3" jump is no big deal, but I am still less than rock-solid in a western saddle, and the thought of going over anything other than tiny X's in one makes my blood run cold. To forestall what looked like a real disaster in the making, I gave a half-halt, sat down on the horse and and made my seat very slow. Unfortunately, what I got back translated to "Wheeeeee! BIG fence!" and a powerfully collected and forward moving horse. At this point we are four strides out and in Do or Die mode. A slightly stiff outside rein and a goodly shove with the outside knee managed to snap him off the line to the jump... thank the Powers That Be. We continued on a long diagonal and did a couple of jog laps until Corey no longer seemed, by some perverse gravity, to be sucked into a line on every fence we passed.

The burning question that remains in my mind is have any of you experienced similar, unexpected training cross-overs with your multi-discipline horses, or is this merely my Guardian Idiot in action?

On horseback in the California Swine Country

© Phetsy Calderon 1995
[from email August 9th, discussing chance encounters with wildlife while horsecamping]

[Me:]..Wild hogs! Yikes, but feral pigs can be horribly dangerous!

...Yup--in fact, I did an excellent imitation of a wall-eyed, spooky wild mare when my friend from Massachusetts, and certified loca (ex-eventer) casually mentioned "wild pigs."

"Wild pigs?! Do you mean wild pigs, or do you mean wild hogs (javelinas)?"

"Oh, they're pigs."

"Are they feral domestic animals, or are they really wild."

"They're wild."

"Excuse me?!! WILD HOGS? DO YOU KNOW WHAT WILD HOGS DO TO HORSES?"

"Yeah, they come over & the horses snort & then they share their alfalfa."

[aside:] Holy Santiago, do you do non-Catholic horsemen?

"No, that's not what wild hogs do. They outrun horses and disembowel them if they aren't in a good mood."

Well, I called, did some checking, felt it was safe to proceed, and we did spot some porkers. If they were wild hogs, they were the biggest such to walk the Western U.S. I think they were many-generation feral. Worst thing that happened was the reaction of my friend Cassie, who was camping, first time, with her horse. We were sitting around enjoying an excellent camp meal (many-veggie stir fry, chicken breast slices, topped with a wonderful tamarind chutney over brown rice. Good zinfandel on the side). Suddenly Cassie yelped "It's a pig! It's getting in the food boxes!"

"Oh fuffle," I think, "I'm not quite finished with my zin."

"Phetsy! What do we do?"

I'm not really in a hurry to get up close & personal with this thing, but...my morning coffee stash is over there somewhere. "We go see if this is a pig or a hog--slowly & carefully."

We approach. We stay well out of the pig's threat space. It's a sow, with her trotters in our tortilla chips. And it is obviously not a javelina.

Aw hell, I think, we're gonna have food scattered from here to Fresno. So Cassie & I went into the stomp-whistle-yell routine that you do to rid the vicinity of undesirable alien animals.

Sow looks at us, thinks "Eh. Usual Ineffectual Two-legs," goes back to rooting in the Doritos.

I'm wishing my mom were around with her .38 (she once dropped a wild boar in a German forest with a pistol), Cassie is getting exercised. "Phetsy, she's not leaving. How we gonna get rid of her?"

"I dunno, but if she gets in my coffee supplies, we're havin' fresh bacon for breakfast & my pocket knife's gonna be dull. Hey, Cassie, where'd you go?"

Cassie had grabbed a folding chair. She heaved it at the ol' pig & beaned her right on the snout. Pig snorts, squeals, starts scrambling away.

Then she stops & looks back at us--Cassie standing in front of me (she's got the lantern).

"Phetsy, she's looking at me."

"Well, shoot, Cass, if a cat can look at a queen..."

Cassie starts backing up. Into me. She's a couple inches & 15 pounds bigger, and not ethereal in her conformation. She's moving me back toward the hitching rail where her 15.3 TWH is hiding behind my 14.2 Arab.

Her horse kicks. And his butt sticks out past HRH Prince SquirrelFoot.

"Uh Cassie..."

"God that's a mean looking old sow...What if she comes back? Omigod what if she runs at us?! What about the horses?!!"

"Cassie, she can't see this far. See, she's heading to somebody else's food. Cassie? Cassie?"

Cassie is Not Receiving. She backs me up farther.

So I calmly stuck my right index nail in her flank and said, "Pass left, pass left, goood girrrl Cassie, pass left, Whoa."

She did a beautiful transvers to halt.

Only other thing that happened were a few Arab snorts--HRH Prince SF thought piggies stink--and the old sow came & rooted at my emergency tools kit, which was sitting under the pickup tailgate for the night. I yelled at pig to "Go away & let me sleep." She did. Oh, & SF undid both himself & Cassie's horse Rusty on 3 different occasions, so I ended up tying the buggers on bowlines & threatening SF with no ride if he did it again. He may not know English but he recognizes the I Have Had It tone...

Boink!

© Susan Evans Garlinghouse 1997

Date: Tue, 23 Sep 1997 18:45:57 -0700
CC: ridecamp@endurance.net
Subject: Re: Night Riding

Hi,

Well, trust me to have some dumb story for all occasions, even including night riding. The only time I did a ride at night was the '93 Western States 50, where they started you at 1 p.m. to do the last 50 miles of Tevis about the same general time of day (and night) that you theoretically would be doing it a month later at Tevis.

I rode most of that day with Jeff Wall and Rushcreek Rawhide, he was getting ready for the North Am. Championships and I was getting ready for Tevis. We both wanted to do as much night riding as possible, so we squirreled around all afternoon long, taking 45 minutes at 15 minute holds, meandering along, etc., which not only used up alot of daylight but also totally baffled both Rawhide and Cato as to just what the heck we two yahoos were doing messing about like that. Around sunset, both horses finally were totally fed up with our wasting time and took matters into their own hands and went roaring off down the trail like scalded cats. Big fun.

Going down through the California Loop at night, even though there was a full moon, you were riding underneath deep shade from the trees and without light, you couldn't see your hand in front of your face. Neither of us were riding with flashlights or glowsticks or anything else, but the horses really moved along at a big trot (asking for canter, please) and neither ever put a single foot wrong.

Anyway, the last few miles of the WS 50 was along an old quarry road alongside the American River, where alot of whitewater river rafting trips were going on that weekend. The rafters camped at night alongside the river and apparently two of these happy adventurers felt the urge for a little more privacy and one-on-one camaraderie and so carried their sleeping bags up behind the camp where, lo and behold, there was this lovely flat bit of trail where of course, no one would bother them out here in the middle of nowhere, right?

Hee hee. Wrong. By this time, Jeff and I and about a dozen other riders all came roaring down out of the California Loop. All the horses were feeling really good, so we were letting them loose, running along baying like a bunch of congenital idiots at the full moon. Jeff was in the lead and all of a sudden, Rawhide gives an almighty spook, leaps something dead smack in the middle of the trail and keeps scampering on. Jeff, being a gentlemanly sort and never at a loss for words, turns in the saddle and shrieks back, "YO! BOINKERS AHOY!!!". Well, you'd warn other riders of a hole in the trail, wouldn't you? I was fifty yards behind him and sure enough, there the two little love birds are, except pretty much all you could see in the moonlight were giant staring eyes...well, all right, you could see alot more than eyes, but let's not get too graphic here. Feel free to refer to imagination and anatomy books, because it was all on display, though as far as I could tell, not very productively or impressively at that point. And of course Cato, who is a little light on Genteel Manners in the Face of Vulgar Public Display, just HAD to slam on the brakes, snort, stare like he's never seen such a thing (which he hadn't), prance past with his tail flipped up over his back, then spin and go scampering off like he thought he was being chased by the Great White Hiney. Talk about Riding In Denial---try riding this scampering imbecile and urging him to GO ON ALREADY while trying to nonchalantly look the other way and pretend you've noticed nothing, nothing at all, REALLY, and oh, look, isn't that the Little Dipper? To make things even more difficult, other riders are also now slamming on the brakes, more horses are piling into them from behind, lots of swearing, comments on "If THAT's all you've got to offer, fella...", and a ring of horses all staring, snorting, stretching out their necks to get a better look and making rude comments to each other. And one horse who had been apparently waiting for such a break in the festivities all night long and took the opportunity to stretch out and have himself a nice comfy splashy pee right next to the sleeping bags. AND so another rider could whip out her flashlight and turn it on to check the color and quality. Of the pee, that is. We already knew of the physiological condition of anyone else of interest .

Nobody got hurt except I believe to the egos of the river-rafters and eventually we all managed to drag the utterly riveted horses away and on down the trail to the finish line. Potato of course said that if he'd known they were gonna be there, he'd of sent someone down to hang a glowstick off whatever appendage seemed to be the most available.

Happy trails,

Susan and Cato, Who Has Now Seen It All

Merchant of dreams...

[farm advert from 2000 Diamond Jubilee horse show premium]

Return postage -- guaranteed!

[10 June, 1998: breeder's discussion group -- problems with getting semen shipment containers back in a timely fashion]

It seems that most people put some kind of ID tag on their Equitainers -- return labels, etc... The best one I heard about was a Standardbred breeder who had nice large, badges printed up with their farm logo encircled by words to the effect of "Auntie Mae's Bucket O' Love". Bet those got returned promptly -- dropped a lot too.

Runaways while driving

[from a private discussion list, 16 March 1998]

Oh yes indeed, I have had a runaway while driving. Amazingly enough, no one was the worse for wear when it was over. What makes this amazing is that the entirety of my (tiny) driving ability is restricted to fine harness horses, race horses and horse-drawn farm equipment. I live in awe of all you carriage driving people. Just so everyone here knows what kind of an idiot I am, this is what happened...

Some years ago I had a friend with a talented Ladies Fine Harness gelding who really didn't like being put to a show cart, and would get really strong with her at shows. (Good argument for getting out the four-wheeler at home more often, to my mind.) The upshot of this was during shows I would jog Chubs Commando (AKA the Bay Bomb) in the morning for Julie. One morning at Del Mar I was up at horrible A. M. getting Mr. This-Thing-Is-Going-To-Eat-Me sorted out. At this time, the backfield of the Del Mar race track opened directly unto the warm up area for the show barns. Hopping back in the cart after popping the check with a thought towards a leisurely cool-down stroll in the direction of breakfast, Chubs sticks his nose and tail in the air and takes off like a shot. Lovely, one of those mornings. Taking a feel on the lines gives back the reading "tied to an iron post." The good news was we were pointed down field, and the better news was the backfield gate on to the track was open, and it was a pretty straight shot. So I figure why not -- let's treat this right, and we go roaring out on the track as though the hounds of hell were running under the axles. While we're blasting out of the far turn, some early morning (TB folks are crazy- why else would they breeze horses at 5am?) workout people headed back to the barn catch sight of this nonsense and come hotfooting up to the rail... to watch.

Checking to see if I was still tied to the iron post, (affirmative), my mind is divided into many parts, foremost of which is working on setting up the last turn into the homestretch in a fashion that will avoid miring a wheel where the track is a bit cut up... another is thinking too bad this sucker isn't trotting because this boy is fast... finding the presence of mind to nod to the nice man who waved as we went flying by... trying to see if we still had four shoes on up front, and lastly the perpetual grump is mentally measuring the sofa for a bay slip cover in case the cinnamon rolls are gone by the time this bit o' fun is over... all while womanfully working to ignore thoughts of what it is going to be like if Speed Demon up there flips this rattletrap over with me wearing not a whole heck of a lot more than a pair of shorts, a T-shirt, dock shoes and a pair of Ray-Bans.

While trying not to obsess about all the things mothers tell their daughters about appropriate intimate attire for engagements at the emergency room, we get through the turn, no thanks to me. A lift of the inside hand gets a glimmer of eye, but no decrease in velocity. Good thing Del Mar has a big endfield, because we did a really wide, two-wheeler that brought all of that maternal advice back to the forefront of my mind. A few lengths out of the turn, Mr. Happy decides on a breather and drops to a big ol' trot. Doing a quick check to be sure he is not blown, lame or missing a shoe (negative on all counts- pretty darn perky, in fact) and that there is indeed a rate-able horse between those shafts (finally!) I do the necessary thing and give a swat and move him off again. Nothing loathe, Chubs picks up the pace, although with somewhat less speed and a great deal more control. This time the nice man nods, and I wave.

By the time we were in sight of where we started, it has once again been established that the human is the part of the team who sets the pace -- always, no matter what, no exceptions -- all without recourse to thoughts of injury, ambulances or underwear. Returning to the backfield, I noticed the warmup areas have gotten pretty busy. Chubs, seeing all the people , decides somewhere in the depths of his murky little horse brain "oh, it's show time!" and worked the last bit of the track in what was probably the best trot of his entire existance, the idiot. Who says show horses have no endurance?

Clopping up to the barn, Julie, (who is usually not sentient until after a pot of coffee or the gate opens on her first class, whichever comes first,) gives us a really fuzzy look and asks "Good workout?" The plate of cinnamon rolls she was holding out was the *only* thing that saved her.

Moral to this story? Not only is it possible to survive what looks like sure disaster, but anyone who thinks Saddlebreds are dull obviously hasn't been to shows with me.

Training Gone Wrong: Incident No. 12 --

Silly things dressage judges say

[Edited from a rec.equestrian post, Tuesday, June 14, 1994]

I don't know that I would so much call this silly as kind...

Back a few geologic ages ago (I was 6 years old) a local club in the Phoenix area started sponsoring open dressage tests. After making a fulsome pest of myself about it, I wore down my father into agreeing to haul myself and his old school horse to one of these events. (Pauvre papan- a rider all of his life, given the best training Saumur has to offer, and stuck with a daughter who wants to ride for a "real" dressage judge.) I suppose his thinking was that an elderly schoolmaster that had trained dozens of riders all the way through haute école could be relied upon to safely cart his offspring around the field...

So -- much schooling and excitement later, The Day arrives. I don't recall the actual pattern of the test: the US tests were much different then, but as is traditional, it began with a trot down the center line from C with a halt at X to salute the judge. Having spent a rather short lifetime hearing my father exhorting students to "boldly and completely ride the horse to the halt" I was determined to do exactly that: mindful of my driving aids, I rode old Avatar del Sol right up to X and asked for a full halt. Ever obliging, he did indeed halt, and then some -- I found myself aboard a horse performing a fine, if slightly arthritic, levade...

I was in a state of almost complete panic -- I had NO idea what I had done to bring this about, so I froze, fearing the least -twitch- on my part could let loose a barrage of bouncing courbettes or caprioles. CENTURIES later, Avatar calmly lowered his forehand, stood himself up, and waited for his rider to return to a state of sentience. Somehow, I managed to salute the judge and complete the ride -- of which I haven't the least memory.

...Later...

Standing under a tree, still mounted, my father examing the pair of us with an expression generally reserved for small obnoxious animals. This unhappy and silent tableau was broken by Kevin (my father's partner in the farm) whistling up to us, golliwog grin spread across his face and a piece of paper in hand. Mon papan reads the paper and hands it up to me. It was the test score sheet- and the judge's comment for the first movement of the test was:

"Good cadence and impulsion; over-collected at the halt."