Born of the Sea
In an attempt to keep my blog more updated on mine and Morgan’s daily shenanigans, I’m going to tell you guys the story of our schooling session today. First, I have to explain a bit more about Morgan. He’s an American bred mutt pony. Nothing fancy, but a sturdy little bugger, and a well trained one. He never bucks or acts up under saddle. He’s the best $700 auction pony you could ever ask for. Not scared of anything. Except, of course, water. He’s simply terrified of it. The funny thing is, his name (Morgan) means “born of the sea”. Ironic. Since Morgan got hurt, he’s been stalled 24/7. He hates stalls, and has never had to be in one so much in his life. Lately he’s been getting light turn out, but only in a very small paddock, not big enough to do anything more than a lighthearted trot. He’s had quite a bit of pinned up energy, which I had been enjoying. However, mixing his extra energy with the massive amount of rain we got today was a recipe for a disaster. Not only does he hate water, he hates the sound the rain makes when it hits the roof of the barn or indoor.
After successfully getting an antsy Morgan tacked up, I got mounted up and we headed to the indoor. We did the “jig of death” to the arena, and around for a couple of laps. Finally, he began to relax and we started trot work. Normally when it rains, he’ll do a couple of weak attempts at hops-to-the-side spooks and he’s fine for the rest of the ride. I guess the pinned up energy had something to do with the fact that after about five minutes of trotting, he took off, throwing actual bucks. I was so shocked! We continued on with our trot work. While giving him a walk break, he took off again. This time no bucks but I really thought he was going to take us right out the gait. I did a hard right rein turn and circled him until he came back to me.
After this, my trainer, who happened to be schooling at the same time, told me to work him out long and hard at the trot. At this point, it was no longer raining, he was taking advantage of the situation. So, we worked at the trot, and worked, and worked, and worked… I kept him collected, the entire ride. Being hunters, we’ve never been much for collection. I rode a half halt every step he took. He hates contact and being collected, for much of the ride he remained behind the bit. Because I had him collected, I started to be able to feel when he was going to take off and could prevent it as he tried to take the first stride. We did lots of figure 8′s, serpentines, half circles, 20 and 15 meter circles, 10 meter half circles, and even some leg yielding. He wasn’t a happy pony after almost an hour of walk/trot work, but he was far better behaved and had even started accepting the bit. Because he is still recovering from an injury, we didn’t want to push him too hard. Since we wanted to work long, we had to keep it light with only trotting.
Even though the ride may sound as if it went dreadful, we actually made quite a bit of progress. Morgan is getting so much stronger in his gaits, especially the trot, which was always his weakest. He also managed to deal with being collected and having contact on the reins for nearly an hour, without killing me. The last thing that we’re getting really well is bending. He’s always been the pony with no “bad side” for bending, but I feel like I’m finally starting to understand my seat and leg’s purpose in keeping him balanced through the turns/circles. Maybe I try too hard to look on the bright side, but I never think of it as a “bad ride”, something had to be learned from it.
