Do You Ride Horses? V.4

[Luzien]

@Totakeke
I get a little prickly when people start talking about the halter division of QHs. THOSE poor beasts are intentionally breed to look like that, their even trained & if I remember right, fed to add even more useless muscle bulk. I think I've read somewhere that a lot of them aren't ridable, seems silly since that's what most people like to be able to do with their horses. I get prickly about them because some people seem to think that's what real QHs look like, that's untrue though, real quarters can actually do things. While the breed norm is to have large e.i. powerful hindquarters & good muscle in general, the halters are in my opinion, grotesquely shaped & muscled. I'm sure everyone has their opinions on halter style horses, I personally wish they hadn't become popular >.<

Off my high horse about halters now... I really wanted to ride a week ago when it was 45 F out, but the 'arena' would've been slippery & the yard was either a slogging mud pit or a sheet of ice, it might've been fine in the pastures, but again no way of knowing if someplaces would be slick or squishy & soggy.

Thats also so true, i did see some QH in a Show jumping Event and one in lower dressage Show and one or two in a halter open for all breed foal Show with there moms, they did not look at all light this..."horses", more like they should- like a nice working horse should look with maybe a touch to much arab blood somewhere^^ so lets hope that all go down from the Train of muscle Monster for some halter Shows- atleast i did read it somewhere that more and more go away from this sort of horse muscle breeding and "training" to the normal one as the health is bad with this horses.

Hope that you can rid this week, maybe you can go out on the trails, or a nice meadow that you know has a slight sloop so that you know that there is no much slippery ground as the water runs downhill?

@ Mustang: im terible sorry for you that you cant fully ride as bevor because of you injury and did sold you horse, but maybe ist for the best, but you still can do laisure riding so ist not to bad, or start with driving, its also fun, and maybe bether for your leg?
Good luck and tell how it works out, and if you find a new stable^^

The filly ...maybe a Hanno but then with a touch of TB, but Looks cute^^

[stirrupirons]

@Totakeke: Yeah, halter QH breeding has gone to crap. It's disgusting and sad. However, not all QH's look like that. I am good friends with nice QH owners and have owned two (if I count Seren) QH's myself... most don't actually look like that. The huntseat style QH's (some are Appendixes) are gorgeous AND correct. Here's an Appendix http://www.equine.com/horses-for-sale/h ... 99564.html no good conformation shots but from what I can see, he looks good.

@Vintage: Stay in your comfort zone and don't make your anxiety about jumping big worse. If you are freaking out above 50cm then don't force yourself to jump bigger. Wait until you are completely 100% confident in your flatwork and up to 50cm and until you're itching to go higher. If possible, try jumping bigger on a school horse to get your confidence up.

@Luzien: Thank you :) she was definitely much rounder! She's gotten so much better and I'm so proud of her. It's taken a while and we've worked very hard on it but I think she's going to be absolutely fantastic in a few more months. I am planning on taking more lessons with her, yes :) My trainer is good friends with her and is letting me haul Ellie out to her once a month or so. I actually think she's coming back sometime this month. Very very excited!

@12spot: I'd rather not give out the clincian's name for privacy reasons, sorry! Ellie's difficult. She has built up this defense mechanism of going way above the bit to avoid contact due to her previous owner, they had very harsh hands and would see saw in her mouth to force her on the bit. It caused her a lot of pain so she associates contact with pain, but she's gradually getting away from that. It takes A LOT of leg driving her forward into my hand and a steady outside rein and a softening inside rein to get her to come up to my hand. This is why I use spurs and a whip lol.

@spring: Those are some incredible opportunities, very happy for you! :)

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I've been so busy bleh. Ellie has been 20x better. She's consistently in my hand now and accepting contact and I am so proud of her. I have a lesson in a few hours and I'm so excited. :) I've been working a lot so I haven't had the chance to ride Cosmo this week but his leaser is coming out today (older lady who just walks and trots) so I'll wait til whenever I have the chance to hop on him this week, lol. I want to try to get a video today of Ellie but my phone is being really stupid and dies when it's cold out, so not sure how I'll manage that... my friend took this cute picture of Ellie and I Friday night. It's a little awkward and my headphone is hanging down but it's still sorta cute? Hahaha

Since I've been working so much I spoiled Ellie and myself and bought a few things too... I ordered a new girth, an anatomic leather Dover brand one, and I'm so excited. Also got Ellie a new Horze bonnet (http://www.polyvore.com/cgi/img-thing?. ... d=99086561) and Cowboy Magic green spot spray, and ordered myself another pair of Roeckl Chester gloves in white for shows because I hate my Heritage show gloves and I'm a Roeckl snob. xD But seriously, best gloves in the entire world. Nothing beats them. I just found out they make fire engine red gloves and I'm so tempted...

[BlingBling]

Too cold and windy to do much riding but got cute pics of the jerk! It's been a while since I posted Cherokee pics <3

With a mare rubbing her bum on a fence in the background 8D




PLEASE SNIP IF QUOTING :UU

Why must ponies have such cute faces??

[Shirosashi]

We have a beautiful old barn from around 1990-something on the EFS property that was remodeled in the last 3 months that just became ready to use so I moved Rusty up there since the stables are way bigger.

Plus, I just got three wonderful riding dresses; green, blue and tan, all with white fringe on the neck and hem. They're so awesome, tan is my favorite. Ian, a good friend came over the other day and Rusty liked him, I'm so happy!

[inkyy]

little update or whatever! <3
Things have been going good, Ive been riding him 2-3 times a week. (Its still too dark to ride after school)
I have most of the test memorised but I still think Ill have it read out on the day, becuase it is my first time ever showing.

A couple of things have been annoying me. First off his mane. I want to plait it for the day (plaiting isnt required though) but since he's a native pony I either want to keep it long or with a running plait. the second one looks good on him but theres a chunk of mane 3/4 down his neck thats shorter than the rest, then it continues at the normal lenght.

This makes it really hard to keep the plait unless I keep it really tight and not going down (if that makes sense) I wondered if anyone had any experience with this and any tips? xD

Im also going to do a small horse related rant here~
On sunday a friend and I had planned to practice the test and maybe go out for a hack afterwards. Another friend who is new to the stables invited herself along with her horse who /doesnt/ school. Like he just gets bored of it. And being new, she had one of the people from the stable with her who complained to me about my walk "He's too eager, he shouldnt be doing arena work"

It had taken me /ages/ to get that nice active walk and she wanted him to walk around like a slug. Then she said to my orgianl friend and me "isnt there some other time that you can practice??" We had only warmed up and she wanted us to go out and babysit the new friend.

In the end the adult spent more time standing in the arena (at the place that 90% of the circles in the test started) chatting to people so we left with no schooling and hacked out.

This really annoyed me because at the end we where planning on doing fun games?? Like races and cones and stuff. eue

ignore my rant sorry xD

[Atheon]

Found this on fuglyhorses and I'm curious: do y'all think this horse can even run with that hind end? Those post legs and well everything else just screams unhealthy. I can't find a single picture or video of this poor stallion moving and honestly I want to know what it'd look like compared to say... Good ol' Gunner


Confo sure has gone downhill these past 10 years; most Quarter Horses are starting to look more like sickly cows than lovely equines :c/rantover

I hope that first one is photoshop. It's poor bum! I've always seen fairly good horses around here that aren't as unhealthy as the first guy.

[Hime]

@HorseLover!: Cute, but maybe tad long for Copper? Did you find instructions on how to make or did you just wing it?
Blind corners are nightmares for drivers as well. : P But you should be able to hear if a car is coming, so you can prepare and move out of the way if needed. Also I'd say ride on the outside of the curve instead of inside, so you are seen better. If it's not super super busy road, then I think you should be fine.
Honestly you've had quite lot of issues when it comes to jumping with Copper and some flat work issues as well, if I remember right, and Copper pretty young, so I think it's only reasonable you haven't shown so far. Some super easy class might be okay, just to show Copper what it's like to be at a show. But only if things go nice at home, as you really don't need the extra tension from the show enviroment if things aren't pretty solid.

@Totakeke: Because ponies <3 I've yet to see a pony without an cute face.

@Halter QH: What saddens me the most that these horses look like that at very young age... Like the horse posted, is now 3 years old, making that pic be of him at age of 2. I don't think a 2 year old should have such muscles and I'm not sure if I want to know what sort of things have been done to get them like that. Though I'm aware the big butt is what they are born with, but still that type of muscle doesn't come from just eating good hay and playing around with other horses.
Oh, and the sire of the horse posted in action: see here
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It was soooo pretty at the stable yesterday, even though at home it wasn't so nice. Like there was fresh snow and no slush, and it was snowing nice and lightly too. Ended up free lunging Heta and she ended up doing some snow work out on her own, by going up one snow bank and moving in the deep snow there. XD And she did that several times, first in walk twice, then in trot few times again and finally once at canter. Silly pony. She wasn't on very speedy mood, but listened nicely and went to both directions in 3 gaits(with correct leads in canter) so no complains. Then she followed me around free for some time and I ended up getting on bareback with just halter... Didn't go so bad, but definetly not so great either(turning to left was bit hard and she didn't listen to seat so much, but lucky for me she listens voice really well). But hey, got 4 gaits out of her and managed to keep them for more than transtion. I think that was also first time cantering bareback. Though Heta still wasn't quite sure would I stay on, so she'd only agree to canter long sides and then slowed down before the corner and she did go quite slow in the canter. But still it was nice to notice I can actually sit canter while bareback.

[ShortyTheHobbitess]

@Totakeke - That pony is freaking cute!! I love short rides (13.3-14.2hh), they still get you places & you're so much closer to the ground!

@Halter QH - Am I the only one who thinks that that stud seems to have really short strides? He really doesn't seem like a pleasant mover, but maybe thats just me... He seriously reminds me of a feeder steer, it's fine for a riding horse to be well muscled & another to look like a beef cake -.-

@Hime - Yay for bareback! I've loped bareback a few times, I can't saw that my seat was the best, but it was certainly fun!

@Luzien - Too late now, the temp dropped back down & it snowed, but one of the cow pastures is right next to the horse lot has a good slope on it, but then I fear if I did ride there Shorty would get silly someway or the other & riding around on a hill might not be the best option

[Luzien]

@ Hime: wow that is great that you had such a fantastic ride
i think snow riding and working with horses is a big fun ...and when somebody takes a tumble of the horse ist soft fall but lets try to stay on^^
when Heta is a bit hard to one side try to tap her with the leadline-reins on this side or soft Hands while giving her a tap with the foot ...Drotti now react to her "bad" side bether with this, sometimes when she is in a real good mood she even goes when i hold one rein to her neck...the best is for her to learn faster when you do it when you nearly are with the nose at the fence....so she sees "wow she means that i should turn faster to the side or i run in it..."...atleast i think that, not sure if this works... , i did it two or three times with a fence and a tree, then she reacted faster^^
But she sounds like one nice horse that looks after her poor rider as she slows down for you to stay on safely
Was it fun to canter her bareback, like sitting on a soft chair? and how is your hurting shoulder-arm ?


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@ to the strange QH trend...found this as i looked in it why they are like this and found out that its some typ of a disease gene that can get active, that some breeder specific breed as they think ist beautiful...(i understand when a pet gets this per accident(there are other animals who can get this gene, but most of them dont get paralyzed or die so early as this horses...), but when somebody breeds this to get them more beefy, its sad and strange)
http://showhorsegallery.com/articles/ho ... _beef_cows

[why.]

I'm just starting bareback now and I need some help. Serious help. Lace(a pony I'm riding) is sweet and gentle, but I still don't feel really comfortable mounting/riding her bareback. I feel like I'm hurting her everytime and I feel like I'm about to fall with out stirrups......help?