
Photo by Nicole Handley
In Bend, we have “early release” Wednesdays. Kids get out of school 1-2 hours early. Our intermediate and advanced students take group lessons on Wednesdays and Saturdays. We have been trying to do a show on Saturday for a couple weeks now, but the weather was never good enough. So, I promised the kids the first sunny Wednesday or Saturday, we would have our show. It was sunny yesterday, though a bit cold – around 45 dropping to mid 30′s by the time we left. Still, that was good enough for us!
As the kids are getting a little older, it’s been hard to know what to have them wear. Do we try to create a natural horsemanship show attire of our own? Do we dress Western or English? It’s kind of confusing when your horses are in English saddles and bosals, or in a treeless saddle and a bitless bridle. We want something that looks classy and makes the kids feel like the show is important and for the parents to take the shows seriously. I feel like wearing a hunt coat for shows helped me feel confident dressing up for job interviews as a teen and young adult, so for now, we’re going with hunt coats and breeches.
Since we only had a little over an hour and a half, we did 5 classes – Liberty/Online (where the kids were judged on their ability to warm their horses up on the ground), walk/trot pleasure, walk/trot equitation, walk/trot/canter pleasure, and walk/trot/canter equitation. This was actually our first show offering a walk/trot/canter rail class. It’s way more than people realize to ask kids and ponies to canter on the rail in a group. They have to maintain their spacing, keep the horse going at a reasonable pace without breaking gait, and reassure the horse that just because everyone is cantering doesn’t mean there is something to be scared of.
I really liked having the show be after school because it kept it short and sweet, which meant it was less tiring for us, and more like half again as hard as regular lessons rather than 4 times as hard. I think the shorter schedule and the fact that the show fit almost right into a regular lesson slot reduced some of the kid’s anxiety. Coming from school, they came from a bustling social atmosphere, into a bustling social atmosphere, rather going from home to the show. They didn’t have much time to worry about getting ready, which meant they had less opportunity to work themselves and the horses up. All in all, I think it made a lot of sense.
We usually play music at our shows, but we didn’t have time to set up the PA system, so we went without. I missed the music. I think it is easier for the kids to stay focused with the music and helps keep the horses moving. Horse shows are all about hurry-up-and-wait and it is hard for the horses to go from standing around to riding in a class, then back to standing around, then back to riding.
For Hannah and Linnea, this was their first show doing a rail class. Last year they were still on the longe. This was Gillian’s first show ever. The kids did a good job on their spacing. That’s probably been the hardest thing to teach. I had to really ask myself, what do I look for when I try to find a new spot on the rail? How do I know how much time it is going to take me to get from where am I to where I want to go? Is the spot still going to be open by the time I get there? What if it’s not? Where do I go then? Passing is a hard thing to teach. Sometime I’d like to do a study to see if horseback riders are in few car crashes than normal drivers. I bet they are because we have to be good at judging distances and being aware of our surroundings.
Something that is kind of cool is that almost all the advanced kids have taught themselves to braid tails, and a few of the parents, also. That all came from me teaching Maddie and the other kids picking up on it seeing her do it. Braiding tails is kind of a “high barrier of entry” activity. It takes about 10-15 minutes to do, you have to stand directly where you could get kicked, and it’s easy to mess it up. Despite being challenging, it is a really good skill to have, especially if you want to french braid your daughter’s hair one day
Horse tails are much easier to learn on. Plus it makes the horses look so much more put together.
This was the first show we clipped up the ponies. Emma and Morgan, who are now 14 and 15, did Thistle and Ilo. Ilo is really interesting because she’s the only horse we have who truly loves to be groomed. Most horses put up with it. Ilo likes looking clean. I had never introduced her to clippers, and she clipped perfectly for me and for Morgan. It was pretty amazing. She’s such a girly horse! Thistle used to be terrible about clipping, but clicker training was really effective for her, especially because we had her stand tied and watch Ilo get treats first. That got her motivated. She was actually great for Emma and Morgan to clip. It’s funny, but clipping is another surprisingly challenging thing for a horse to do. To clip under the chin, the horse has to stand well with the halter just around her neck. It’s pretty amazing that they can learn to stand and be clipped when they could easily just leave. Something I’ved noticed about clipping – most horses are either ok with their legs or with their face. If one doesn’t work, try the other and work your way from end to end. Usually by the time you finish with one end, they’re ready to get started on the more troublesome area. I thought it was good experience for the kids and ponies to know how to clip, plus it made us all feel a little more like spring was coming, even though we all know that in Bend it isn’t Spring until June.
Recently I was reading about Native American scouts in the army. Apparently they could pass all kinds of amazing tests. For example, they might be asked to sleep in the woods, and the scouts would somehow always wake if there was a person sneaking up. However, when they got their military hair cuts, they could no longer perform as well. I’ve found that our ponies with the most mane are the most sensitive, especially auditorily. I’ve been playing with braiding their manes and seeing how it affects them. They are more sensitive when it is loose. Clipping their muzzles seems to be good for making them calmer also. It makes sense to me. It must be hard to be pet on the muzzle all the time when someone touches your whiskers first. With our horses that need to be a little more sensitive, I’ve been leaving them Mountain and Moorland style/hippie pony style – all unclipped. Just one more tool for making our interactions with horses a little less complicated.