Casting about for Horsemanship knowledge

Every eight weeks I look forward to a visit from my horse shoer, as while he trims and shoes horses we discuss a lot on different topics from raising children, to the economy, to his problem clients and horses, and many others. I don't think we solved any of the world's problems, or even any of ours, but this past visit was particulary good as we discussed human nature where it seems many people, in whatever choesen field they are in, are only going through the motions and not seeking to master their craft. He talked about his early years as a horse shoer and how he had to actively seek experienced farriers out, often traveling a lot of miles to ride with them and learn. And sometimes despite the time and the costs in each trip he felt fortunante to learn one little thing that made a difference. We agreed that the whole process is recognizing and building on those moments of clarity and knowledge, but you can't get them without seeking them out as they seldom drop into your lap.

There are lots of different ways to learn. Perhaps the best is in person coaching, but most all discoveries are brought about by or started through verbiage - a person speaking to you. Maybe something a clinician will say that will mean something to you - turn a light on so to speak. Of course you have to be open and ready to receive that wisdom. And that moment of learning doesn't have to be brought about a top hand, as it could just as easily be from virtually anybody.

But on the top of my list is learning from watching someone who is really handy. This readily apparent in ground training as we can learn a lot from how someone really good with horses approaches communicating to a horse from his/her body position and cues, to timing and accuracy. Because of a string of days with bad weather, I was getting ansty about not riding so searching about I checked out one of the Martin Black virtual clinics. This one was a back and forth with Nick Dowers another accomplish horseman and competitor. Martin Black hosts these usually 2 hour sessions via signup on his website and link to a zoom call. You get a re-watch link and it's helpful to watch and listen at your own conveinence. I usually stop the video then start back up where I left off. And you can rewind to re-catch what was said. I recommend checking out Martin Black's site and virtual clinics.

This is how the last virtual clinic helped me......I have a new horse who was very green when I got him months ago. The story told to me was that this horse was intended to be a tied down roping horse but was undersized and the breeder was downsizing. I picked him up from Central Texas and brought him home. I started riding him right off and we went through the normal issues - bracy in the head and body being one of them. I don't know if him being started in a tie down had anything to do with it, but he was not the easiest horse to get soft. Anyway, I was not getting him to give me a soft feel with his poll equal to or just lower than his withers. Listening to Martin Black talk about competing in ranch horse events with his working horses and being docked in points for not having his horse's poll set low enough with the nose vertical, and his response (words to the effect) that he didn't care about the points and wasn't working his horses for competition, but for ranch work, and his horse's head would be positioned where the horse needed it in order to be balanced.

Well, the proverbial light went on in my head and I realized my issues with this new horse getting soft was that I was trying to get him to accept and perform a certain head set when what he was giving me was enough. I got caught up in this mental template I had about head set, and did not look at what the horse was giving me and how he was performing.

That right there, those 2 or 3 minutes worth of talk on virtual clinic, was worth a lot to me. I don't know if I would have self corrected myself, or just would have went on asking that horse for something he didn't need to give me. In figure 1 and 2 above, after I get vertical softness going, I ask for a soft feel at the walk, beginning for just a step and progressing to a point where he can keep it for a few strides, then build on that. You can see from Figure 1 and 2 that when I am asking him for a soft feel that his poll is not level, but just above a line with his withers - thats what I need to accept. In the Figures 3 and 4 (below) he'll turn around maintaining a soft feel and you can see the slack in the leading rein. I think the tail swish in Figure 4 was because my Antolian Shepard was was behind him. Or it was me offending him a bit. Anyway, my whole point is that widening the net and seeking knowledge from many sources helped me in a situation I should have knew better but it took someone saying something for me to get it. And now I'm cognizant of asking too much of him in other things as well.