Peanut 4/25

Today was Peanut's first day in training. He is a coming 6 y.o. TWH that is "barefoot and bitless". He was in training with me last year due to a lack of 4-beated gait and a need to be able to canter on his right lead. He would either pace or trot. He has a "slow" left hind, meaning it tends to stay on the ground just a TAD longer, which of course means he would have trouble getting his right lead and would throw off the 4-beated gait. He also had some kind of abusive practice/training method used on him prior to his current ownership, as some things "trigger" abused/panicked responses from him, such as lunging in open areas, whips, and occasional headshyness. His owner has worked through many of these issues using NH techniques, and I am continuing her work in those areas.

In the 30 days training I had done last year on him, he was taught framework, as he was mostly a pacey horse and needed to be taught self-carriage in a frame and how to half-halt to put more weight on his hindquarters, round up and then he would gait perfectly. To correct the "slow" left hind, he was taught to bring it up off the ground when I would tap with a dressage whip, both in-hand (with sidereins---yes, you can do that bitless!! and an in-hand whip) and from the saddle. It retrained his gait and muscle memory to gait properly and keep the 1-2-3-4 even step sequence. To fix his canter, I taught Peanut lateral work in hand and did tons of 45 degree head to the wall on the left rein to have him step out with the left hind, and tons of shoulder in work also, to strengthen the left hind and get him more ambidexterous overall. By the end, he was consistantly taking the right lead canter, could rebalance with a half-halt, and was sustaining a 4 beated gait for longer and longer periods (up to a half hour or more) on straight lines. He was JUST learning how to "gait and bend".

In the past year, his owner has taken lessons with me to learn how to "shape" the gait, how to sustain it, how to get it back when he falls out of it, and how to ask and consistantly get the right lead canter and support his balance in the right lead canter. He also learned how to jump (another hind quarter strengthening exercise) and she was learning to jump also. Once all of this was successful in the ring, we began to focus on trail work.

Peanut's focus in this training month is to "tune up" his gait, as he's had much of the winter off, and to expose him to as much trail work as possible to continue bombproofing him.

The first training sessions was short--pretty much just fitting all of my equipment to him, confirming his memory of the in-hand work I taught him, trying to work through a little of his fear of lunging, and re-introduction to siderein pressure. He showed his return of a weak LH, but worked through his fear of going forward on the lunge and was willing to walk, gait a few steps, and stop in both directions. When giving him a longer line, he would stop and turn in. Due to the "abused mind" wiring, aggression to "send him on" in an open space causes him to short circuit and panic, pulling back, launching backwards, running backwards etc. He's fine in the round pen with or without a line attached. He only exhibits the behavior in the open when he has possible "escape routes". Ignoring his occasional stopping behavior and using gentle and positive-only reinforcement works well in getting him to calmly start walking again.