Inquiring minds want to know….
| July 14, 2012 | Posted by Melinda under Uncategorized |
I’m finishing up a story that I’m titling “Farley and the Pigs” and I want to know, what would YOU do if faced with this scenerio? Post in the comments or post on your blog (but put a link on the comments here so we can all go and read it!).
You have just saddled up your horse, whom you haven’t ridden in 2 months (or at least, you can’t remember the last time you rode it). You are in a dressage saddle, jeans, and don’t have a halter on under the bridle. It’s a rather windy day. Your plan is to go into the arena and do some walk/trot dressage, 20m circles etc. You know there are 2 market pigs in a pen on the end of the arena (hidden by the arena’s solid walls) that are sometimes let into the arena for exercise. You mount up and notice that your horse is a wee bit skittish. You do a lap and realize that the pig pen gate is open and 2 largish pigs (whom you have met and know are friendly and not a menace) are lurching towards you and your horse. Your horse freezes and snorts. What do you do next? How do you handle the situation? How do you conclude the session?
I’ll return with “the rest of the story” and how this situation is perfect for conditioning the endurance horse soon! Please comment on how you would have approached this –> inquiring minds want to know!
I’m going to first off kick my feet out of the stirrups and get myself to the ground…incoming pigs…what a thrilling scenario. From an experience perspective, I’d say the crap is about to hit the fan.
I’d get off. And then work my horse from the ground until she was comfortable…which after my work last night with her I’d venture to say she’d go batshit crazy seeing pigs. Can’t wait to see how you two handled it…
Say, “Hello, piggies!” and then go about my business. If the pigs are allowed to be out and they’re friendly, it’s no big thing. Useful distraction to work, and potentially handy source of impulsion. Jackpot!
I stay on, we face challenges better when mounted. I might try to “chase” or herd the pigs, we do that with lots of wildlife. But if my horse can’t settle, and is really worried, I get off! I’d rather live and walk him past the scary thing then end up in the ground.
As a side note: we have a woman in this area who rides a long-horn steer. On the trails. I haven’t encountered her yet, but friends have, and horse reactions have been everything from “I’m gonna die” to “ho-hum.” I really want to see what Major would do!
I once tried to ride a solid ranch horse past of a pen of pigs and he freaked out. Like vertical rears and true panic. So I turned around and rode out of there on a very agitated horse. I never did get him past the pen of pigs. This stuck in my mind, for some reason. So I would probably stay on my horse (I feel safer aboard, oddly) and leave the arena and go for a trail ride if my horse seemed not to like pigs–as I wouldn’t be up for a reenactment of the aforementioned vertical rears. If he didn’t care about the pigs, then I’d go on with what I was doing.
I’d sit deep, but relaxed, and then ask Hank to move towards them. I’d also talk to them. lol This sort of thing is always a great training opportunity. If he moved willing towards them, I’d ask him to follow, or “chase” them slowly, following where ever they went, then get back to doing what ever I had been working on.
Meh, had my answer before the pigs showed up in the story. Horse not been ridden in 2 months? Already agitated? Longe time, for sure. But I’d keep the pigs in the arena, and have a pocket full of treats to reward the horse for progress in getting close to the pigs.
Stand my ground, soothing voice, move-on command.