Leadership... DUH!

Friday was a very very very very VERY interesting day with Dakota. The farrie was coming on Saturday morning so mission one was to get him over to my aunts house so he would actually be present to get his feet trimmed. Trailer loading is not his favorite thing to do, but he did it really pretty good for him. Coming home was more messy, but thats later.

When I unloaded him at auntys, the first thing he did was check out and start responding to all the calls from the other horses. It really didnt help matters that Pride and Candy were in heat, and giving him the "rape me" eyes. *sigh.. ponies...* So right off the bat, I had to make a choice. Let him go off into his own world, OR attempt a productive session by upping my leadership a zillion points to command more attention than the other horses.

Given the title of this blog, one should be able to disern which choice I made. I got particular. NOW. I didnt get mean or mad, I got effective! And I am so proud!! I played a few games by the trailer, then over to the tack room door - where we had to play some confidence games because apparently doors eat big yellow horses - until he could stand still and I could brush him. He was really dirty, I am embarassed to say. When he was as clean as it was going to get we went over to the gate.

Well, I went over to the gate, he backed over to the gate. Candy was there, looking pathetic at him so I protected my herd and made her leave. Once in the gate I had quite the wannabe stallion on my hands. UGh. I love my home version of Kota because hes so calm, quiet and dependable. Even with Mo and Indy. Give him another gelding to look and and suddenly he decides he has to be Mr. Macho. Apparently no one mentioned the lacking anatomy to him ... NINE years ago. But thats not important, have to play with the horse who shows up.

Right away I went into "a zillion things at once" to get his attention. When I had it, I would lay off and let him rest or do something simple and easy, until his attention wavered again and then it was off on the zillion thing train again. I used the logic that he would HAVE to pay attention to me more than the others because he would have to keep an eye on me to see what crazy thing I was going to do next! So we flew around the ring doing circles and sideways and yo yo's and yeilds and falling leaf patterns, and.. , and...., and. Until he FINALLY started to stay with me!

I have to say, I was pretty ecstatic at that point. When I was sure he was going to stick around I went over and saddled up. Also, for the first time in... a while.. I bridled him, with Mo's myler bit that is a Comfort Snaffle with a C1 mouth piece - but is NOT the Cradle. I would love to experiment with the Cradle, but havent the money. I usually dont ride Dakota in a bit because he objects and doesnt like it - since I usually am just riding freestyle with him anyways, it really makes no difference. This time I wanted to try for something more, so I decided on a bridle.

All preflight checks passed. Girth tightened, everything set, I mounted up. On a casual rein we started around the rail at a walk. Everything went great until Candy came up and went "Hello Lover!" and Dakota went all studdy. Guh. Instead of just trying to run away from her I got Dakota to go closer to her sideways and then used my savvy string to smack her bum. Blissfully, she ran away. Not far, because shes lazy, but some. I probably could have returned to a casual rein then and been safe, but I didnt have his full attention, which was really the goal of the entire situation.

Whether or not it was the correct thing to do, I kept my concentrated reins and went around the arena doing a million transitions, steps of sideways, backing up and everything I could think of until his attention came back to me. Of course Tucker was standing at the fence line so everytime we passed him Dakota went into this fancy show off trot. We did eight hundred million things until he offered to go by Tucker once without showing off - he focused on me instead!

At one point Indy, Ivy and Candy were really in the way so I had to chase them out, which was hard because Candy kept wanting to come back to Dakota. In the end, Indy took the hint and then actually kept Candy away from Dakota and herded her out of the ring and into the pasture. I had to laugh at that.

Dakota and I continued our a million things theme. Interesting to note, that he was confident on the concentrated rein. A) He usually isn't and B) WOW! I had uber power steering, speed control within gait, he offered me a super slow collected canter which culminated in an almost canter pivot going around a corner once. I am wondering if it is because he was more right brain that he was looking for more 'hand holding'? Mo not hates, but she adores freestyle and gets a little annoyed when I 'hang off her face' [her opinion] in a concentrated rein.

So I was quite surprised with Dakota, since usually he really objects to anything finesse, and here he was actually enjoying it and trying really hard! Hmm... pays to win leadership points doesnt it... hmmmmmmmmmm!!!

This delightful leadership lesson was reinforced when on Sunday, I took Mo to play at a friends house and she went right brain in an OMGCOWS fit. It was basically a repeat session of what I did with Dakota, but with more repitition instead of changing things up. Still a need to step up my leadership though. How interesting!

Very interesting and learning-full weekend...

:-)
S