Category: Magic

Magic and I rode again today. It was very windy but Magic is level headed. One day I had parked the four wheeler in the lane so the horses had to pass it. It was windy that day also. The other horse snorted and squeezed past on the other side of the lane as far from the booger as possible. Magic walked between the booger and the fence on the close side and never gave it a second look. We are making improvement with the flexing. We rode in the Ash pasture again.

We have high hopes for improvement this year. I hope to learn a lot from Paul Roten. Magic and I have made enough progress with the basics (trail riding, loading, trust, etc.) that we are in a good situation to learn.

Magic and I rode today. Very nice weather. I have not ridden much recently because of the holidays and cold weather. Magic was very good. We just rode in the Ash pasture. Glory and the girls are in the Oak pasture which means we would have to open and close two gates and worry about Glory’s very infrequent but very powerful horse kicking. I will fix a ride around for that soon because the grazing in the pasture is valuable and I like to ride up on Shirey.

I have had some thoughts about Magic’s disrespectful pushing. Recently he nipped me when I walked past his stall. My memory of how Magic acted when he first got here last February does not include this behavior. I have noticed the past month or so Magic has started being more assertive in the herd. At first he was very passive and enjoyed Little More because Little More is even more passive than Magic. Now they both are being more assertive getting in tight spots with Newt and nipping him and trusting that it is play and they won’t get killed. It was so serious at first with Little More that he would plead with me to let him stay in the barn lot and not have to go into the pasture with the crowd. I just left him loose and he never caused any problem unless the ponies were out with him. They led him down the driveway and down the road one day. A neighbor saw them and came to tell me. I was not here but it worked out anyway because they all followed him to the house. Now some days I will leave Little More in the barn hallway and take the others to the pasture. I shut the gate and meet Little More coming to be with his buddies. It took Little More four years to get this much confidence. Little More, Magic and Newt are all Thoroughbreds off the track. TB’s have a nice childhood with their moms in a pasture but that is the end of normal horse life. They stay in a stall except when they go to the track to exercise or race. Little More ran 54 races in 6 years. He had no experience with mature horses in a social setting in a pasture. I think it takes lots of time for them to “settle in”, even years. I think Magic’s learning how to get along and not be so passive in the herd led him to try the same thing with me. I do not have a strict, follow the rules relationship with animals. My dogs go to work with me and everywhere without a leash. I do my job and they do theirs which is mostly sleeping and greeting the rare visitor. But we do not have a routine where I say “sit” and they sit down and do not move until I say so. (That’s boring, especially when somebody is showing me how obedient their dog is.)  Anyway, that is why I think this behavior showed up in Magic at this time. I do understand that it is unacceptable behavior and we will get past it.

Magic and I rode up to the spring on Pinnacle Mountain today. Nice bright, cold morning. Magic was at the top of his game and was not interested in practicing. He used up most of his patience and good will yesterday so we mostly just rode. Today he had plenty of exuberance and almost more energy than we could contain. He was very determined to show me his jog trot. He is a good boy and never did a wrong thing. It was a good ride. Invigorating.

Magic and I worked on our exercises this morning. I have been lucky to achieve success in my efforts training bird dogs. It did not come easy. It took close to 30 years. My definition of bird dog training success is that they will point and hold birds. I worked at it with plenty of good dogs for 20 years but I never was certain that they would not bust birds. And they very often did. In my last years of bird hunting Roger Harness and I had from 10 to 14 very good dogs. They all would hold birds. We usually got a pup or two each year and at the end of the first year of hunting, they would be trustworthy. And it was no trouble at all, just fun. Since success was so difficult to obtain, I reflected a lot on what made success happen. (I learned a lot from friends that were good trainers and we finally found a place with enough birds.) I never identified the key to our success but I did recognize one huge difference. We expected the dogs to point. The doubt was gone.

Magic and I have not gotten there yet but we’re on our way. Magic stood perfectly still when I mounted this morning. (!?) The bending of the neck has improved. He often would turn but stop sooner. Once or twice I was able to ask for the bend and he gave it without moving his feet. We’ll see what happens tomorrow morning. I’m looking forward to it.

I worked him in a halter this morning rather than the snaffle bridle both on the ground and while riding. I was surprised that he seemed to be more responsive to the halter. It is a rope halter with two knots on the noseband. I tried to ride bareback but he is a little too tall for me to mount without stirrups even with the mounting block. I want to train him to position himself for mounting when I climb up on something. I did that with Glory just to get my foot high enough to find the stirrup.

When I rode with Paul Roten Sunday he had two suggestions that I am working on. The first was for Magic to bend his neck laterally. The second was to work on Magic’s inclination to push me around when I am on the ground, particularly when he is nervous. The suggested solution is to keep my feet still and get Magic to move his feet. Another solution to the pushing is to control his tendency to move past me by stopping him with the bit. I worked with Magic on the ground yesterday. Today we did the ground work and I rode him for a short time.

Flexing his neck laterally seems to work good on the ground either with the rope halter or with the snaffle bit. When I am mounted and we are stopped, I ask for him to bend with the rein and place my hand holding the rein solidly on my leg. His reaction is to flex his neck and move his feet in a circle in the direction of the bend. He seems to give his head enough that there is no pressure on the rein as long as his feet are moving. When he finally stops circling he puts pressure on the rein. I hold my hand solid waiting for him to give. He may give but he starts moving his feet again. The desired behavior is to give to the rein and stand still. He is supposed to do both at the same time. Instead, when he gives to the rein, his feet are moving. When he stops his feet, he puts pressure on the rein. I have to be very patient and wait for the short instance where he does both and then give the rein. It is not so much an intended action on his part but an accidental coincidence when both happen.  We are working on it. I can tell he gets impatient after this goes on for a long time but he is a good horse and does not explode.

Correcting his pushing seems to go pretty good. Of course it is very helpful that he does not do it much when we are here at home. So I am putting more effort into having him stand untied and stationary while I groom and tack up.

We are being very deliberate with these exercises. We don’t do much else and the session is short. I hopped off in the pasture and removed the saddle and bridle. Kind of like a reward. He took off and cantered into the barn. Well, maybe he did enjoy the release.

Magic and I went to the Krooked Kreek Cowboy Church cattle sorting practice today. That is a mouthfull but that is the name of what we did today. Cowboy Church has built an arena at the sale barn north of Harrison. Someone brings cattle, actually roping steers, that are put in the arena and you can ride your horse and cut, or sort, cattle. It happens every two weeks weather permitting. They put a fence across the arena with an opening, or gate, in the middle. There were about 20 people and maybe 15 horses in attendance today. There is also a time to run, or ride, barrels and rope steers if you have such an inclination. It is very informal, costs nothing and everybody is nice. It was the first time for Magic and me and we had fun.

Tommy and Wanda were there with Levi and Rio. Paul Roten attends regularly and was there today. I met Paul about 20 years ago on a cattle drive Don Miller had to move his cows the 5 miles from his pasture on Well’s Creek to the home place at Macy Spring. Paul had trained a horse named Wendy for Don and we got to talking about horse training. Paul told me that there was a new trend in the horse world to train horses with gentle methods and more consideration for the horse. I was raising three kids and not active in the horse training world but it was something that interested me and I remembered what he said. Paul has been to many, many clinics and seminars. He seems to pick up something from each clinic, or “performance” as he calls them and he uses what works for him. He is very interested in horse training and the human – equine relationship. He is very willing and eager to share what he has learned. Not everybody wants suggestions but Paul has figured out that I am interested, I want to learn and welcome suggestions. So he talks to me a lot. This is a good situation for me and Magic. I am very lucky.

Magic loaded good with the help of a rump rope. He was excited at the new place with new horses, the stockyards, cattle trucks with jake brakes, etc. He is very good when I am on him but tacking up involved quite a bit of moving around which I am sure Paul noticed. We rode in the arena for quite a while before the working steers arrived. Magic was excited but he does not act up when I am on him. There were lots of kids running their horses and Magic paid attention. When we started working the cattle, Magic was unsure of what was expected of him. “Are you sure you want me to walk into the middle of that herd of horned beasts and start pushing them around?” I think Magic learned from watching the other horses. We made lots of improvement and I was happy with the way he was cutting, moving and heading the cattle.

We had a lot of fun. We learned a lot. We found a very good learning resource in Paul. And Nobody made fun of the only helmet and English saddle that has ever been to a Krooked Kreek Cowboy Church cattle sorting practice.

Magic and I had a short ride today. It is still deer season so we are careful. I do enjoy riding Magic. I trust him a lot. We rode in the Ash pasture, across the dam, in the arena and around the Oak pasture. It was a good ride.

Magic and I went for a short ride today. This is the first weekend of the 3 week deer season with guns. We did not go into the woods or very far from the barn. It was very windy. Magic is a very brave horse but did spook just a little today. Well, considering that Magic so seldom spooks it was noticeable but considering how most horses react to a spook, it is almost not wort mentioning. For my needs, He is a very good horse. We rode a little in the arena and then around the Oak Pasture. We are working on bending by doing serpentines, figure eights and circles at the walk and trot. I think I will mark off the 16 and 20 meter circles with ground paint and try that again. I feel that we are progressing in general but we don’t seem to be making much progress with bending in particular.

Since the last time the farrier was here I have been cleaning Magic’s hooves thoroughly and tapping with a hammer similar to the blows necessary in shoeing. Wanda Graham suggested this when I mentioned Magic’s shoeing problem. I do it every time we ride. It does not seem like much but sometimes repetition like this solves big problems. Magic does not exhibit the bad behavior when I do it but I do it anyway. We need a solution to this problem. I need a sedative that I can give if this does not work. Tomorrow will be 6 weeks since the farrier was here.

Magic and I rode trails on the Buffalo National River today. There were 14 horses and riders. We rode up-river from Pruitt. The plan was to ride out at 9am and that is when I got there. I need to get up at 4:30 to make it to Pruitt by 8:30. It is only a 45 minute drive but there’s lots to do. Luckily there were several people later that I was. Magic loads good when I use a rump rope. He gets a little nervous when we first get there and is bad to push me with his nose. He does not do it otherwise. (I need to pay attention and confirm that.) We rode up to Blue Hole just below the Erbie campground and ate lunch on a gravel bar. It is about a 12 to 15 mile round trip, about 5 hours riding time. On some sections we were able to take different routes on the way back. There was about a mile of gravel road and the rest was back country trails. Some sections were on abandoned old wagon roads and others were just paths. There are a lot of rocks and boulders and some places it is slick bedrock. Magic and Nancy’s horse Rambler jumped one boulder filled stream bed. We crossed the river 8 or 10 times. River crossings are sometimes belly deep. At river crossings there is usually a drop of 4 to 10 feet to get down to the river bed. It might be sand or mud and there are always rocks and roots to negotiate. Several of these drops are slides going down. Once Magic and I were sliding down the bank and there was a traffic jam at the bottom. We stopped just before running into the horse ahead of us. I think the horses enjoy trail rides. They get to see other horses. It’s fun.

We rode with Ted Spears, Nancy Deisch, Evelyn Mills, Wanda and Tommy Graham, Nadine Houghton and 3 friends,  Don Penquite, Mr Howard, Sheri Ricketts and Andrew Hendirix.