One of the boarders at the barn was feeding his horse Poulin MVP and had to stop because it made his horse nuts. He had a bit left over and asked if I wanted to see if Lucy liked it. I decided it couldn't hurt (it's just vitamins and minerals) so I have been giving her a handful with each meal starting this past Saturday. Last night was the first day I've ridden her since I started giving it to her and she was like a bottled up rocket. I expected to get on and do at least WT, and hopefully some canter, but she was so UP that she could hardly concentrate enough to trot without bouncing around. So we spent almost 40 minutes walking, doing leg yields and shoulder in/out to get her attention, and then at the very end I got a few nice circles at the trot and we called it a day. It has to be the new grain that's doing it; nothing else has changed and she has been getting turned out full days in one of the bigger paddocks, too, so you'd think she'd be calmer. Needless to say, no more MVP for that horse!
I think she is also in heat. She is my first mare so this whole hormone thing is new to me, but she did not like me around her hind end last night, and seemed very sensitive.
One of the horses at the barn was having a bad colic last night when I got there, and the vet had to come out. Things were not looking good for a while, but luckily a dose of banamine and some fluids from the vet had him looking and feeling much better. He is one of my favourite horses at the barn and everyone at the barn was rooting for him. So, yay banamine!! He was looking much better this morning, too.
I also was able to buy a new tube of banamine to have on hand for future emergencies since the vet was there treating the other horse. The one I had bought when I first got Lucy was used on another horse at the barn a few weeks ago. I have felt uneasy about not having it on hand ever since, so I am really glad I had a chance to get a fresh tube last night.
This morning, Dr. Katz the chiropractor was at the barn bright and early to do an adjustment. As soon as he stepped towards her back end, she pinned her ears, tried to BITE me as I was standing there holding her, and swished her tail. Hello, hormones!
Despite her wanting to eat the poor guy, he was able to do a great adjustment on her, and said he was really happy with her progress so far. He said that she is 50% less sore than the last time he was here, and he's happy with her muscle development. Her pelvis was not nearly as out-of-whack, and she reacted much less to his palpations down her spine.
At the end we did some stretching exercises with her and her neck got a nice adjustment. She got some treats and then she was happy again. Silly mare!
Showing posts with label stretches. Show all posts
Showing posts with label stretches. Show all posts
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Friday, January 1, 2010
Resolutions for Lucy
Happy New Year!
Kenny and I spent some time last night coming up with resolutions for 2010. Personally I hate resolutions; I feel like it's my responsibility to continually improve myself, not wait for a calendar date and then madly scribble a bunch of stuff on a piece of paper that I'll lose in the next ten minutes.
That being said, 2010 is going to be a huge year for us. In September, we will be married. We have also talked about buying a house. In addition, Lucy will be turning four and hopefully moving along in her training. For these reasons, I agreed to write down my goals for the coming year.
Naturally, some of my resolutions were horsey related :)
1. First and foremost, Lucy needs to be fat and shiny by the time she sheds out in the spring. I feel like we are on the right track with this, but seriously, nothing will make me happier than seeing lots of dapples and zero ribs.
2. I want to conquer the canter (hehe).
3. I want to take L on trail rides once hunting season is over, because I'd prefer not to get shot this year.
4. I'd really like to start her over fences.
5. Once the spring rolls around, I want to put her in a little green horse walk/trot (or if I'm feeling brave, wtc) class at the barn across the street from mine, which is unfortunately a rather large fancy hunter barn and has hosts large and fancy shows. I'd prefer to go to a small, low-key schooling show where people would probably be more patient and understanding than they might be at a rated hunter show, but we'll take what we can get. We're lucky to have a barn that hosts shows literally across the street from us, so I don't have to pay a shipper to truck L all around Rhode Island.
Today I started the year off right with a fabulous ride. My friend Samera, one of my gorgeous bridesmaids, came and took some video for me. I laughed when I watched the video because I talk through the entire thing! So if you watch it, please ignore my incessant chatter.
Lucy has discovered that she looooves stretching. She loves it so much that she has started asking for it, constantly. Today she almost got a little bit demanding about it. I'm torn as to what to do about this. Normally I'd be like, ohhh good horsie! because I want her to stretch through her back. but at one point she pulled so hard that she almost pulled me right out of the saddle! After that, she got her stretching privileges taken away, and any time she pulled against me, I planted my hands and let her pull against herself. I will have to ask G about this next time I see her...actually, what I really need is to set up another lesson!
We did get some great leg-yields in both directions, some of which you'll see in the video. After Samera stopped recording, we also had a very nice canter to the left and a messy canter to the right.
After I was satisfied, Samera got on Lucy and walked her around to cool out, which was awesome! She has ridden Lucy once before, but doesn't ride on a regular basis. I walked beside them around the ring once, and then let Samera go. She had Lucy walking, halting, circling, and looked awesome through the whole thing. She is my bravest friend!
Here is the video that Samera took.
Kenny and I spent some time last night coming up with resolutions for 2010. Personally I hate resolutions; I feel like it's my responsibility to continually improve myself, not wait for a calendar date and then madly scribble a bunch of stuff on a piece of paper that I'll lose in the next ten minutes.
That being said, 2010 is going to be a huge year for us. In September, we will be married. We have also talked about buying a house. In addition, Lucy will be turning four and hopefully moving along in her training. For these reasons, I agreed to write down my goals for the coming year.
Naturally, some of my resolutions were horsey related :)
1. First and foremost, Lucy needs to be fat and shiny by the time she sheds out in the spring. I feel like we are on the right track with this, but seriously, nothing will make me happier than seeing lots of dapples and zero ribs.
2. I want to conquer the canter (hehe).
3. I want to take L on trail rides once hunting season is over, because I'd prefer not to get shot this year.
4. I'd really like to start her over fences.
5. Once the spring rolls around, I want to put her in a little green horse walk/trot (or if I'm feeling brave, wtc) class at the barn across the street from mine, which is unfortunately a rather large fancy hunter barn and has hosts large and fancy shows. I'd prefer to go to a small, low-key schooling show where people would probably be more patient and understanding than they might be at a rated hunter show, but we'll take what we can get. We're lucky to have a barn that hosts shows literally across the street from us, so I don't have to pay a shipper to truck L all around Rhode Island.
Today I started the year off right with a fabulous ride. My friend Samera, one of my gorgeous bridesmaids, came and took some video for me. I laughed when I watched the video because I talk through the entire thing! So if you watch it, please ignore my incessant chatter.
Lucy has discovered that she looooves stretching. She loves it so much that she has started asking for it, constantly. Today she almost got a little bit demanding about it. I'm torn as to what to do about this. Normally I'd be like, ohhh good horsie! because I want her to stretch through her back. but at one point she pulled so hard that she almost pulled me right out of the saddle! After that, she got her stretching privileges taken away, and any time she pulled against me, I planted my hands and let her pull against herself. I will have to ask G about this next time I see her...actually, what I really need is to set up another lesson!
We did get some great leg-yields in both directions, some of which you'll see in the video. After Samera stopped recording, we also had a very nice canter to the left and a messy canter to the right.
After I was satisfied, Samera got on Lucy and walked her around to cool out, which was awesome! She has ridden Lucy once before, but doesn't ride on a regular basis. I walked beside them around the ring once, and then let Samera go. She had Lucy walking, halting, circling, and looked awesome through the whole thing. She is my bravest friend!
Here is the video that Samera took.
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
Trigger points are not your friend.
Lucy had her massage appt last night. Up until last night, she has been very tolerant of all of the poking and prodding that I have put her through. Last night we saw another side of her, though, and it wasn't very pretty!
The Massage Therapist's name is Meri and she is very nice. As soon as she arrived, she did a quick overview of Lucy and asked me what kinds of issues I had been having with her, and I filled her in on the story so far with her left side and hind end, and told her about the stuff Dr. Katz had done during the chiropractic evaluation and treatment. Within five minutes, Meri had pretty much scoped out L's entire body, and knew exactly where all the trigger points were.
She started on Lucy's left side. At first, Lucy danced around a lot. She was very very sore. Her neck and shoulders weren't too bad, which I was surprised about and so was Meri, given the history with her feet being torn up as badly as they were. She had trigger points all along the top of her rib cage, which Meri said was from the racing saddles they use at the track. She said the tree on a racing saddle is half the length of a regular saddle tree, and it ends about one foot back from the shoulder, and that is exactly where my poor pony was the most sore.
Once she got to the hind end, she found that Lucy's hamstrings were very sore and tight, and she has some scar tissue running along them. I got to feel what she was talking about, and instead of the muscle feeling like regular smooth muscle, it felt like she had guitar strings running up her back legs into her dock area. Meri assured me that with proper care and rehab, the scar tissue would disappear in time.
By the time Meri got to the right side of Lucy's body, the horse was beginning to relax (and dare I say enjoy the massage). Again, her neck and shoulders were pretty good, but once Meri got to her back, Lucy was clearly in a lot of discomfort. Just like humans, horses develop knots in their muscles, and Meri works mostly with direct pressure into the knot, to help release some of the tension. This can be very painful while it's happening, but it will help Lucy feel much better in the long run. Of course I couldn't convey that to her so she thought we were torturing her. She did show some signs of relaxation at times by yawning, taking some deep breaths, and relaxing through her back and neck, but that would only last for a few seconds before she was back to dancing around.
When Meri got to her hind end on the right side, Lucy started to get really annoyed. At this point, Meri had been working on her for almost two hours and I think Lucy had had about enough. She was very sore and very tight through her right hip and SI, and when Meri got to the really really sore spots, Lucy kicked out at her and tried to reach around and bite her with her ears pinned against her head. I was shocked! I hadn't seen this horse make a nasty face at anything up until this point! Meri said a lot of the hind end issues come from the starting gate at the track. When a horse launches all 1,100 lbs of itself into a flat out gallop from a standstill, that obviously takes a huge effort from the hind end, and the wear and tear placed on Lucy was very obvious last night. Thank goodness she came off the track before she sustained any permanent injury. All of the issues Meri found last night are fixable with proper conditioning and stretching.
Speaking of stretches, Meri showed me a few that I can do with Lucy to help her loosen up through her hind end, topline, and shoulders. One is the "carrot stretch", where I coax the horse to turn her neck and head around towards her back end to reach for a carrot. Lucy tried to "cheat" by turning her hind end and basically doing a spin, but we got her to do the real stretch by putting her closer to the aisle wall, so that she couldn't get her back end around all the way. We did that stretch on both sides, and then moved on to stretching her front legs. To do this, I am supposed to pick up one of her front legs and gently pull away from Lucy's body. The idea is that she will kind of pull back, and then give into the pressure, allowing her shoulder and back to get a nice release. Again this was done on both sides of her body, and then she got lots of treats.
So I hope with all this therapy that Lucy will be on the mend soon. I am supposed to give her today off, and then I can start riding her tomorrow and just do some low-key "long and low" work with lots of circles and serpentines. By the end of the week we should be back to the regular wtc workout that we have been doing.
The Massage Therapist's name is Meri and she is very nice. As soon as she arrived, she did a quick overview of Lucy and asked me what kinds of issues I had been having with her, and I filled her in on the story so far with her left side and hind end, and told her about the stuff Dr. Katz had done during the chiropractic evaluation and treatment. Within five minutes, Meri had pretty much scoped out L's entire body, and knew exactly where all the trigger points were.
She started on Lucy's left side. At first, Lucy danced around a lot. She was very very sore. Her neck and shoulders weren't too bad, which I was surprised about and so was Meri, given the history with her feet being torn up as badly as they were. She had trigger points all along the top of her rib cage, which Meri said was from the racing saddles they use at the track. She said the tree on a racing saddle is half the length of a regular saddle tree, and it ends about one foot back from the shoulder, and that is exactly where my poor pony was the most sore.
Once she got to the hind end, she found that Lucy's hamstrings were very sore and tight, and she has some scar tissue running along them. I got to feel what she was talking about, and instead of the muscle feeling like regular smooth muscle, it felt like she had guitar strings running up her back legs into her dock area. Meri assured me that with proper care and rehab, the scar tissue would disappear in time.
By the time Meri got to the right side of Lucy's body, the horse was beginning to relax (and dare I say enjoy the massage). Again, her neck and shoulders were pretty good, but once Meri got to her back, Lucy was clearly in a lot of discomfort. Just like humans, horses develop knots in their muscles, and Meri works mostly with direct pressure into the knot, to help release some of the tension. This can be very painful while it's happening, but it will help Lucy feel much better in the long run. Of course I couldn't convey that to her so she thought we were torturing her. She did show some signs of relaxation at times by yawning, taking some deep breaths, and relaxing through her back and neck, but that would only last for a few seconds before she was back to dancing around.
When Meri got to her hind end on the right side, Lucy started to get really annoyed. At this point, Meri had been working on her for almost two hours and I think Lucy had had about enough. She was very sore and very tight through her right hip and SI, and when Meri got to the really really sore spots, Lucy kicked out at her and tried to reach around and bite her with her ears pinned against her head. I was shocked! I hadn't seen this horse make a nasty face at anything up until this point! Meri said a lot of the hind end issues come from the starting gate at the track. When a horse launches all 1,100 lbs of itself into a flat out gallop from a standstill, that obviously takes a huge effort from the hind end, and the wear and tear placed on Lucy was very obvious last night. Thank goodness she came off the track before she sustained any permanent injury. All of the issues Meri found last night are fixable with proper conditioning and stretching.
Speaking of stretches, Meri showed me a few that I can do with Lucy to help her loosen up through her hind end, topline, and shoulders. One is the "carrot stretch", where I coax the horse to turn her neck and head around towards her back end to reach for a carrot. Lucy tried to "cheat" by turning her hind end and basically doing a spin, but we got her to do the real stretch by putting her closer to the aisle wall, so that she couldn't get her back end around all the way. We did that stretch on both sides, and then moved on to stretching her front legs. To do this, I am supposed to pick up one of her front legs and gently pull away from Lucy's body. The idea is that she will kind of pull back, and then give into the pressure, allowing her shoulder and back to get a nice release. Again this was done on both sides of her body, and then she got lots of treats.
So I hope with all this therapy that Lucy will be on the mend soon. I am supposed to give her today off, and then I can start riding her tomorrow and just do some low-key "long and low" work with lots of circles and serpentines. By the end of the week we should be back to the regular wtc workout that we have been doing.
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