It's not about the creek!

The coast is blooming! Everyone is enjoying the beautiful flowers which have all of a sudden sprouted so tall, that the baby nearly drowned in them. She hopped through them like a bunny rabbit and gave us a good laugh. Perhaps they tickled her tummy.
The excitement of summer is in the air in Half Moon Bay with a fresh ocean breeze, and surfers and sunbathers crowding the beaches. It has been very, very long since the last time we rode across the creek. Mainly because of Steal's laminitis and Madeira's suspensory desmitis they both have not been fit for long rides, and for all the time we spent hand walking them, unable to cross the mudhole by foot, the creek seemed like a good turnaround point.
Well couple of weeks ago, unsuspecting any trouble we thought we'd take a longer ride across the creek. It is not usually, that Madeira turns out to be the braver one of the two, but while she had no trouble stepping into the gooey, muddy water, that she sank down to her knees in, it was Steal, who put on the brakes and refused to go any further. Hmmm... How interesting!
Steal is a very introverted horse, who is mostly left brain, but when he goes right brain he has a tendency to freeze. He is not a big, mean, scary horse who would out up a huge fight at all, in fact he would be rather easy to intimidate, and push through just about anything without much predatory effort. However, our goal is to have horses who trust our leadership and are able to THINK their way through problems, going through them from their own will. Had we pushed Steal he would have gone through that creek, but we would have lost all rapport and he would no longer see us as good trustworthy leaders, but recent us for it.
So we took our time with approach and retreat at the edge of the creek, in between the heavy traffic of rental horses and wranglers passing through. Each one of the wranglers stopped to offer us help to whip the horse through the creek. So to make a short story long... How do you explain people, who see horses as robots and slaves, that the issue is not about the creek! And the objective is not only to get the horse to cross the creek, but to go through it confidently.
So when we finally decided to quit and go home after Steal became left brain LOOKING towards the creek, people thought we had miserably failed. We did not bother to explain, that for Steal it was the first step in crossing the creek confidently, that he was able to THINK about it. Far more important to stop there and reward him, than to go on pushing him through. Sometimes taking a step backwards is actually taking a huge step forwards.
Of course one must be skilled in knowing how to READ horses to be able to determine whether he is thinking or not, left brain vs right brain. (You can study about this at www.Parelli.com ) Because if you quit while the horse is still right brain you will only have made matters worse. This is why most people say: "You can never let the horse win" without understanding, that horses are not arguing against people for winning, they are just plain scared and as long as they are scared they cannot think, and as long as they cannot think, they cannot learn anything. Therefore it is more important to get the horse calm and thinking and then quit rewarding that state of mind, whether he crossed the object or not, than to go on pushing him through while he is still scattered. Now do you see how it is not about the creek!
The next weekend we went back and it took less than half of the time for Steal to think his way through and he actually OFFERED to cross the creek.
(I can't really blame him. The creek doesn't look like something I would want to step in either.)
Love is... sharing a carrot with a friend.

The Trail Less Travelled

This video was made by "savvygirl19"

Good news, bad news.

Travieso is home! He was away at the trainer for what seemed like forever. He raced and won! It's really all the same. I'm happy he is back in one piece. And he looks amazing!

Only right after Travieso's race a filly named "Eight Bells" ran her last race at the Kentucky derby. She came in second, not far behind "Big Brown" and a few strides after passing the finish line collapsed with two broken front ankles. A condylar fracture on the left front broke through the skin. Eight Bells was euthanized immediately.

Why, why, why do we keep letting people torture these beautiful animals at their young age, when their bones aren't nearly developed enough to endure such stress they are forced to undergo. Racing horses is NOT a sport! It is an inhumane act of animal cruelty for the benefit of crude, selfish people and their millions of dollars invested in betting.
In the "New York Times" Mr. Jones, the trainer of Eight Bells quoted: "These things are our family" (Things!?? Does he call his children things too?)

From the New York Times by William C. Rhoden: "Why do we refuse to put the brutal game of racing in the realm of mistreatment of animals? At what point do we at least race the question about the efficacy of thousand pound horses racing at full throttle on spindly legs?
Horsemen like to talk about their thoroughbreds and how they were born to run and live to run. The reality is that they are made to run, forced to run for profits they never see. Thoroughbred racing is a brutal sport. Why do we keep giving it a pass?"

I don't have much to add to that, except, that these ongoing tragedies at the race tracks don't seem to face some people. Most who like the racing are more interested in the money and fame, than what's good for the horse. To them horses are but object, that get hurt sometimes. It's as simple as that. No remorse. And it's because of those kind of people, that the so called "sport" continues to put the horses lives at risk. And it's because of that, that Travieso is not staying home for long. Soon he is to go back to the trainer and race again. :(
In memory of Eight Bells.

Body language

PHASE ONE PHASE TWO PHASE THREE PHASE THREE AND A HALF