Solo missed yet another weekend of work, not that he is complaining, the weather has been lovely and he and his buddy Waldo are enjoying the time in the paddocks. I was lucky enough to ride in the Mary Wanless clinic at the Royal Canadian Riding Academy near Newmarket, in Ontario. I had read Mary […]

The sudden change from perfect summer weather to a deluge today made me realise that it’s time we started riding Solo outside the roundpen. The roundpen was unusable today and will be flooded for the next week at least. Solo’s ponying privileges are also at an all time low. Last week he bucked while on […]

Today we had a major spooking problem with Solo. On his way into and out of both his work area and his paddock, he has to pass by some reflective windows on one side, and a fence line that sometimes has washing hanging on it on the other side. For some reason, he has always […]

When it was decided that Solo’s education would receive a necessary boost by ‘Going to the Royal’, we had to think carefully about how we wanted this to impact his daily routine. At the moment he is living outside most of the time, only coming in to be worked or during inclement weather. We had […]

Solo’s education so far has been pretty much blip free other than one thing. He is inclined to spook at things and when he does, he feels it is his right to stop for as long as he deems necessary. Since we have not eradicated his saying “no” , whilst he is in-hand, I am […]

To begin with I led Solo around with Selena on his back at the end of each work session. Sometimes he will only be ridden back from the roundpen to the stables but he is ‘backed’ every day. The next step, was to let him out on the lunge with the rider in place. After […]

Solo has had a few quiet days this week. We had a busy carriage driving clinic hosted at Hawkridge followed straight away by my being away for two days. I try not to have breaks in a young horse’s training. I like to keep them quietly going forward six or seven days a week until […]

Routine is a really powerful training tool. Horses thrive on routine. They seem to unwind and blossom as soon as they are put into a structured lifestyle. I find the two most exciting aspects of the days routine, are feeds and turnouts. Because he gets fed at the same times each day, Solo’s digestive system […]

Part of a good training routine, is to ensure that the horse is as relaxed and settled with his surroundings as possible. The right turnout buddy, if he is to have one. A friendly neighbor in the next door stall or paddock. A stall where the horse is comfortable and calm. A daily routine that […]

As soon as Solo was fit enough, we took him out the roundpen and ponied him from an calm, well trained horse. On his first trip, he was just walked on the lead for about 20 minutes to see how he would take to it. Other than the occasional nibble at his patient lead horse’s […]