Most of the time it’s “Hello! Do you have cookies?”

Sometimes it’s “I’m tired. You aren’t really going to make me work are you?”

More often than not, it’s “Hey mom! Good to see you! Do you have cookies?”

When Dave his trimmer comes, it’s “Oh no, YOU again?”

When I hose him off in the wash stall, it’s “I feel claustrophobic AND I’m getting wet! One wrong move and I’m outta here!”

When he was getting measured for the custom saddle coming our way, it was a combination of”I’m not sure what you are doing and I’m still deciding whether or not I’m OK with it” as the rubber bendy thingy was shaped to his back, to “What are doing? That sure looks interesting. Is that ME?” as he watched the fitter drawing the shape of his back on a large pad of paper. Then as the fitter moved around him, it was “Mmm. Those mints you gave me sure were good. May I have another?”

At least most of the time he’s polite in what he saying.

And yes, we were getting measured for a custom-made saddle that will accommodate his high withers and my long legs. I felt vindicated when the first thing the fitter said to me was, “you weren’t kidding about those withers!”. Really, I’m not exaggerating when I say they are the highest I’ve ever seen. And the fitter, who has obviously seen lots of horse backs, said he’d never seen any that high either! On a good note, he did say that Ace didn’t have any points in his back where my saddle had pinched. So while it didn’t have the clearance for his withers, at least it fit well everywhere else.

He apparently feels the need to challenge me occassionally in an attempt to reassert his role in the relationship. What he doesn’t know is that while he may outweigh me, I will always out-think him in the end.

Wednesday we got stuck out of the blue. No matter what I did, we were standing in the middle of the arena, never taking more than a step or two and never getting back out to the rail.

I went to the barn Thursday with a good attitude, hoping that Ace would live up to my high expectations rather than down to low ones. I mounted him in the far corner, where we weren’t stuck. But as soon as we got to the other end, we were right back to where we left off on Wednesday. Very slightly disappointing, but not unexpected.

One difference that second day was that I had dug out my spurs to make it a little harder for him to keep ignoring me. He didn’t like that! I could get him to walk a few steps eventually, but steering was non-existenent and we couldn’t get out of the middle of the ring.

I stayed calm and tried to work through it for about 15 minutes. Then Tracie offered to help from the ground. She grabbed a carrot stick/whip, and got ready to wave it behind Ace when I asked him to go. That finally got his attention! She waved it behind him once and he jumped a bit and pinned his ears. Second time we almost had some forward momentum. At the third, a hard loud smack on the ground, we were off. He launched forward and broke into a trot.

And just like that we were unstuck.

I rode Ace through the middle of the ring, stopped and started in the sticky locations just to make sure we were all good, and dismissed Tracie and her services.

We worked to the right for a while and then went to change directions. And then we were stuck. I wasn’t about to start that again, so after no response to my legs I applied the spurs. Ace didn’t like that! He started backing up to show his displeasure. But I kept after him, and when we had backed up the length of the short side and had no where else to go, I gave him a good boot.

He launched forward into a trot, and we haven’t had a problem since.

Oh, it started all right. Walk warm up, stepping over poles with nary a bump. Trot warm up, some figure eights, some trot poles without any touches. We weren’t overly energetic, but the bending lesson had stuck and we were navigating corners beautifully and going nice and straight down the long sides.

Then we trotted over some poles, and Ace caught his back foot. He didn’t even hit it hard enough to knock the pole out of position.

And then we were stuck.

For the next half hour, we were stuck in the middle of the ring, never going more than a step or two forward. I tried everything I could think of, from outhinking him to making it as uncomfortable as possible, to coercion. I tried just sitting there for at least ten minutes, hoping his brain would reboot and start functioning normally.

And he just stood there.

He wasn’t hurt. He wasn’t scared. He wasn’t upset. No matter what I did, he stood there with his head down, his ears up, refusing to move.

It’s like he didnt like something (hitting the pole), and so he suddenly refused to do anything.

Eventually I got off and led him out of the middle to the far end of the ring. I remounted (from the ground, which I haven’t tried in ages and was glad to discover I could still manage it), and it was like nothing had happened. I got in the saddle, took up the reins, gave the slightest squeeze with my legs, and we were off.

Until we had to turn early in one end to pass another horse and got close to the middle. Then we were stuck again.

I dismounted, led him away from the vortex of the ring center, and off we went again.

Now I’m stuck.

I don’t really know what to do about this. And past experience with Ace tells me that he will be stuck from now until I find a way to unstick him. He doesn’t usually magically forget and go on again as normal the next day. I can always hope though!

I just mostly hope we won’t be starting from scratch again when we do resolve this issue.

Ace gets a cookie for behaving so well for his bath. I gave him one the day after I bought him last fall, and he wasn’t thrilled. He stood well for the hosing, but backed up and wouldn’t stand while I scrubbed. Months and lots of work and trust-building later, he was a perfect gentleman. (we don’t have a wash stall or anything, so Dave, Tracie, and I tag team scrubbing and being a hitching post in the driveway).

Ace was absolutely filthy, but it was a deep down dirt so I just couldn’t get any “before” pictures to really do it justice.

In these few “after” pictures, you can see how ridiculous he is looking mid-shed. I have never seen a horse look so motley while he’s shedding, and that’s saying a lot.

The light hairs are his winter coat and the dark ones are his summer coat. It’s like having two different horses in a science experiment gone wrong. Just look at his face! And the color difference is even more pronounced than it looks in these photos.

And look at the weird spots he’s got on his neck and side:

He has ridiculously long, coarse winter hair, too. Just look at the ones that are still hanging on blowing in the breeze post-bath:

And here’s an example of why I have such a hard time getting pictures of Ace to illustrate his blog:

I can’t keep him far enough away from to get a decent shot!

With Ace, I’ve got two out of the three.

He Loads

Ace had been standing out in a pasture for two years before he came into my life. Dave went to pick him up and bring him to the barn, and he walked right on to the trailer like he did it every day of his life.

He Clips

Last night I pulled out the clippers for the first time. I just couldn’t take the 4-inch hairs growing out of Ace’s chin any more. I let him have a good sniff and rubbed his nose and face all over with the clippers off. He was a little concerned, but let me do it. I turned them on, and he just stared at the little buzzing things. I held them there in front of his face, and he inched his nose closer and closer until he touched them. It tickled of course, making him jump just a little. He took a good look, and when he didn’t give me more than a concerned look, I went at the whiskers on his nose. He jerked his nose a bit when they touched him, but his feet never moved and he was pretty good about letting me clip his muzzle. Ace took a nap as I spent some time clipping under his chin, and even the long hairs down his neck.

I was very pleased with how well he behaved for his first clipping session. I didn’t want to push my luck too much, so I left his ears for another day. He likes to have his ears rubbed and wasn’t too worried about the clippers, so I think he’ll be OK.

And he looks so much better! Check out these before and afters of my winter hairy beast:

I should have done this ages ago.

He’s Ties? Eh, Not So Much.

Ace is a little iffy about being tied. As long as all is quiet and I’m just grooming and there’s nothing to excite or scare him, he stands like an angel. But if something out of the ordinary happens and he starts to panic, he loses his head. It happened twice early on. No bigee, I always tie with slip knots so I let him loose as soon as he pulled back or reared, and he immediately calmed down. We worked up slowly to being tied in a stall and he’s been good for months.

Last week, something spooked him. He jerked his head up and caught the end of the rope. He jerked his head down (giving to the pressure, good boy!). But in doing so, he conked his nose on the wall, which I’m sure sent him over the edge. He then pulled back and started rearing, flailing his legs. Dave was in the stall with him and managed to get him untied, which caused him to settle.

But in the process, he caught the inside of his left front leg with a flying hoof and cut and bruised himself but good. He didn’t seem to do any major damage, but boy was he sore! The cut just below his knee was bleeding, but not deep enough to need stitches or anything. I cold hosed it, covered it with ointment and gauze, and wrapped him up in stable bandages for the night. The next morning there was heat and swelling just around the cut, but the rest of his leg was slim and cool. He was still really lame though.

He spent the next few days wrapped up and on stall rest so he didn’t stress it. By Sunday morning the heat and swelling was completely gone and the cut was healing up. He was starting walk more soundly also.

Of course, Ace did this the night before I left for Equine Affaire. I did his initial treatment that night and the following morning, and then had to survive on twice daily updates from Dave. Dave took great care of him while I was gone.

I finally got to go see him for myself last night, and was glad to see he was much better. He’s still a little off, but not that noticeably unless you really know him. My best indicator that it still hurts is actually watching his face rather than his movement. He’s super expressive.

So, he’s definitely sound enough to be turned out again, but not ready to be ridden just yet.

And now we have something new to focus on: learning to tie.

I taught two completely different horses the canter depart this week ….

… Ace’s left side …

…and Ace’s right side.

Anybody who has ridden horses for a while knows that it’s completely different riding a horse in different directions. Just because he learns to do a nice canter depart to the left doesn’t mean he’s also learned to do it to the right in the process. Just because I can get his hindquarters to move one way, doesn’t mean they’ll move the other.

Horses have a favored side they like to do things with, just like people have a stronger hand.

Ace is very clearly left-hoofed.

He likes to go that way better. He’s happier. He’s more balanced. His gaits are smoother. He’s less resistant. He bends.

Ace on a right rein is stiff and less responsive. He doesn’t carry himself as well.

So, just because after three rides we had a very nice canter depart to the left from a feather light outside leg cue, I wasn’t surprised it didn’t automatically work when we tried it to the right for the first time.

It took four different tries before we were able to pick up a right lead canter. And boy was it ugly. Ace was all over the place and couldn’t maintain the gait for more than a few strides. It was like Ace’s right side had never talked to his left side to tell him what the canter cue meant. I had to start from scratch.

So, I did my best to maintain my position and balance, ask for it gently at first, then with more pressure, and finally with the crop until we did an ugly shuffle from trot to canter. And then I praised him like crazy. It wasn’t pretty, but he gave it to me several times so I quit.

Today we warmed up and did lots of walk trot transitions, predominantly on the right side. We cantered to the left once just to get him thinking about moving it up a gear his easy direction.

I walked Ace, and asked him to trot at the same spot in the arena where I intended to ask for the canter. We trotted a little, came back to walk, and again asked for the up transition at the canter spot. After three times, we kept trotting. When I hit the magic spot halfway through the turn at the far end of the arena, I sat down, put my outside leg back, brushed his side, drove him forward with my seat …

And voila! It was a beautiful canter depart to the right.

We did it two more times, cantering several times around the arena each direction, and called it a day.

So, Ace’s left side and Ace’s right side officially know how to walk, trot, and canter both directions.

(Have I mentioned yet that Ace has a gorgeous canter? Easily his best gait. )

Last Friday, I showed up in the barn dark-and-early at 6 am to do chores. Typically my horse is happy to see me and trots up to me with ears pricked and looking for treats (he has learn to do that with manners, by the way). But this time he blinked his bleary eyes a few times, and stood on the other side of the arena staring at me. I could almost see him cocking his head. He was very obviously saying, “What in the world are you doing here, mom? You NEVER come here this early.” I had to walk up to him for his greeting forehead rubs. And he kept kinda looking at me like I was crazy. But then I stuck him in his stall and gave him his breakfast and he decided he liked seeing me first thing in the morning.

The next few days I was quite sick, but Dave and Tracie were gone, so I took care of all the animals. By the next day, Ace had gotten over the shock of seeing me in the early hours of the day. Then it was back to insistent whickering … “Feed me, woman!”

With my being quite under the weather, Ace got a whole week off from doing any work. Typically he gets rusty after just 2-3 days off, so I was worried we’d have to go back to the drawing board when we rode last night.

I got to the barn around 6 (pm) and started doing chores. Like normal, Ace walked up to me to say hi as soon as I arrived.

But he’s smart, and he knew that me showing up in boots and breeches meant that I wasn’t there just to feed him this time. He kept his ears at half mast and wrinkled his eye lids in his worried/annoyed look. I wasn’t thrilled to see that look, because it usually means he’s going to misbehave and be a pain in my butt.

After finishing up the barn chores, I tied him up in his stall for grooming. He relaxed and happily took a nap while I scratched him and unearthed an avalanche of dust from his coat (and even a few loose hairs! He’s ever so slightly starting to shed!).

I tacked him up, and he took his usual moment to sniff the saddle and pads before I set them on his back. He kicked his back leg a few times to show his annoyance at his brushing boots (he seemed to have the tiniest big of swelling above his pastern, but was sound). And he followed me willingly out of his stall.

Ace still had his wrinkled eye-lid look as I lunged him a few times around both directions. But he was listening to me and his ears were up.

So I tightened his girth, stuck on his bridle, and swung up. He moved right off, easily responding to my leg cues for forward and even sideways when he was bulging and running me into the wall. I asked for trot and he moved right off at the first squeeze, and kept going.

It was like he hadn’t had any time off at all.

I only managed to ride for about 15 minutes before the dust and my cough forced me to uncermoniously hop out of the saddle.

Through my coughing, I rubbed Ace all over to let him know he was a good boy. It was exciting to discover that his lessons are starting to cement themselves in his brain, so that even after time off he continued to respond and go just like he had been.

We’re on track to start a little under saddle cantering very soon! In the meantime, I’m going to take some of Jane Savoie’s advice about sensitizing Ace to my leg. I just found out she had a blog, and you can imagine how thrilled I was when the first new post to show up in my feed reader had to do with getting your horse in front of your leg! This is definitely a blog worth subscribing to if you haven’t already.

Now I just need to kick this cough so that I can actually manage to ride for more than a few minutes…

One of the lessons Ace taught me back in the fall when we were starting under saddle is that he doesn’t like to feel pressured. I was asking too much at first, go forward, be energetic, stay straight, bend on the turns. And it was just too much for my horse who had been standing in a pasture for two years. He taught me that I needed to just focus on one thing at a time. And when I did, everything else started falling into place, too.

When we finally started back post abscess and Christmas, he shut down under saddle. Planting his front legs and refusing to move.

So I went back to ground work.

We started honing the fundamentals; pressure and release, moving different parts of his body, getting forward and back. We got up to circling, which has typically been a problem area for us. (He stops whenever he wants and goes backwards when I try to send him around again). But we’ve had some breakthroughs with that, and I’ve been gradually adding more trot work for my out of shape boy. He’s circling around me no problem. When I’ve sent him backwards, he comes forward to me at my first request. We’ve seen a lot of improvement in our “forward” on the ground.

Now I want to transfer that success to under saddle, but without any major battles.

So, I decided to hop on him bareback and just sit there for awhile. No asking for anything. Just letting him relax and feel like I wasn’t always going to be asking for something every time I’m on him. Undemanding time.

As soon as I swung up, he tensed. He picked his head up, and kinda sorta pinned his ears. Definitely not my normal, happy, playful, interested horse that he is on the ground.

And I just sat there.

I rubbed his neck, played with his mane, laid my chest on his withers.

Every once in a while he’d let out a bit breath, chew the bit, or put his head down a fraction of an inch. And still I just sat there.

After a few minutes, he took one halting step, and then another, and walked across the arena to the gate. And scratched his head on the gate.

I let him.

I rubbed on him some more. And then I just laid on his neck.

He let out a few more big breaths. Chewed the bit some. Rubbed his head some more.

And then he let out a huge sigh, relaxed his head down to his kness, and started licking and chewing.

I got off.

I want to do this for the next few days until he is obviously relaxed when I’m on him, not wondering what I’m going to do next. I want him to see that I can be up there without constantly pressuring him. I don’t know if it will work. But I’m hoping that it will be a useful step for curing our resistance problems.

I finished with the game we’ve been playing for the last two weeks: I turn him loose in the arena, grab a handful of cookies, and get him to chase me. He’s starting to like this game. (Really, he just likes the cookies). He’ll follow me everywhere I go at a leisurely walk. Across the arena, in little circles, big circles, and backing up. He’s got his ears up watches me the whole time. I’ll run from side to side, trying to get him to move his front end like a cutting horse. And he plays along. He’s typically laid back about it.

Last night, I grabbed the cookies and bolted to the other end of the arena. To my surprise, Ace jumped into a trot and ran after me …. nickering the whole way. Yeah, he got a cookie right away for the one.

We played some of our other games, running in circles, backing up. Cookie.

I ran in front of him, changing directions every time he moved his shoulders. And boy did my thoroughbred put his head down, changing direction and crossing his front legs like a cutting Quarter Horse. Cookie.

I had one left, and wanted to see if I could get him to trot after me again. I left him at the far end of the arena and took off running as fast as I could toward his stall. I heard this funny sound behind me, and looked back to see Ace take a little crowhop, jump into a high stepping trot, shake his head, and come after me.

Nickering the whole way.

Here’s a complete list of your suggestions:

Aces Wild
Ace Of Hearts
Winning Ace
Chocolate Ace
Acential (Acesential/Essential)
Aces High
Ace of Spades
Ascension
Aced
Aces
Graceful
CyberspAce
Innerspace
Ace of Swords
Flying Ace
Hidden Ace
Outer Space
Bay Ace
Brown Ace
Decor Ace
Sturdy Brace
Charming Ace
Loyal Ace
Gambler’s Ace
Ace Inhibitor
Embrace
Backspace
Aerospace
Boldface
Interface
Poker Face
Outrace
Ace King
Ace Decor
Ace It I’m Good
Ace of Spades
Ace in Space
GamblinMan
Audacious
Confident
Kinetic
Oddity
Genuine
Deuce
Avant Garde
Trenchant
Face the Ace
Ace of Pace
Pacer Ace
Fair of Face
Top Ace
Icing on the Ace
Leather and Ace

I know there’s a lot to choose from, but leave a comment and tell me your top three favorites and why. Read my original request if you need a refresher on what I’m looking for and a little about my horse.

I’ve gotten up close and personal with Ace’s poop this week, as Dave and Tracie are on vacation and I’m responsible for animal care while they are gone. Sure I’ve cleaned his stall before, but it hasn’t been day in and day out. And here’s what I’ve discovered:

• He poops like a gelding. Great, big, honkin’ piles. Not like the dainty, neat little ones I’ve been picking up from the girls.
• He poops on the edge of his stall. He’s pretty neat, and keeps his piles on the edges where he we won’t step in it.
• He poops in his water bucket. On purpose. Dave had just finished cleaning his stall once when Ace backed up to his bucket, lifted his tail, and let loose. I discovered that he did it today. So gross.

Doing full care for my horse is fun, because every single time he sees me he nickers. It’s this deep wuffling nicker that melts my heart. And he does it. Every. Time. I thought at first it was just cause he wanted food. But he can have a couple of flakes of hay and still nicker at me with his mouth full every time I come into the barn.

That’s the fun part of taking care of my horse myself. The not fun part is all the other animals, when I’ve had to deal with some health issues. Classic is the 24-year-old thoroughbred mare who has arthritis in her hocks. I’ve had some trouble with her lying down and not having the strength to get back up. We have to provide some extra motivation (a small cattle prod) and pull on her tail to rotate her back end up so she can get her legs underneath her. Once, we almost couldn’t get her up and it was worrying. But she’s been fine since. It’s been a challenge, but one I’ve been able to deal with and work through this week. Fortunately, when Dave and Tracie come back they will also bring back the two young Foxtrotter geldings, who help keep Classic on her feet and whose absence we think is contributing to why she’s going down so often. But the week is almost over, she seems stronger, so I think we’re out of the water.

Because I’ve been spending the last week taking care of 3 horses, 11 cats, and 2 dogs on top of a full-time job and my regular activities, I haven’t had a whole lot of time to work with Ace. I pulled him out to do some groundwork tonight for the first time in a few days, and was amazed at how well he did. So far, he doesn’t usually respond to visual cues well; he needs a little bit of pressure to understand what to do. But tonight, as soon as I wagged my finger at him to ask him to back up … he backed up! Usually, this is the game we fight on the most. He usually needs me to swing the rope with my whole arm before he’ll respond. And a little wagging finger did it! It wasn’t a fluke, because I tried it twice more and he did it every time. Ace is one smart cookie, that’s for sure.

In our Parelli ground work, he does very well with the Friendly, Porcupine, Circle, and Driving games. He’s ok with Yo-Yo. And we still don’t get much Sideways.He’ll do it a few steps moving to the right, but won’t do it at all to the left yet. Still, that’s pretty good for just one month of work!