Working in the Lines

Since I am not riding at the moment, Harley and I have been doing most of our work in the lines: one or two.  On afternoons after work I usually lunge him and save the long line sessions for the weekend when I have more time.  Harley has been working like a champ.  Yesterday, I lunged him and he demonstrated his skills for a barn-goer who was interested in the art of lungeing.  Harley did all his transitions from verbal commands and stretched his head to the ground with this lovely springy trot.  He got compliments for being so obedient and relaxed.  Thinking back to how he used to motorcycle around me on the line and could not handle the balance to canter a circle that small, I realized that he has come an amazingly long way.  I never really considered him a model lungeing horse, but I guess he had other plans!

This past weekend we returned to the long lines for the first time since the failed experiment of raising the lines to the upper rings.  Thankfully, the experience had melted away and he had no resentment for the lines now comfortably placed in the middle rings on the surcingle.  We got right to work with some nice walking and stretching into the bridle.  I love how the long lines allow me to warm up my horse with circles and straight lines, just as if I were riding.  I try to turn my hips and shoulders before using my hands to turn my horse.  It is a fun challenge to see how little I can do and Harley understands.

In the walk, most of the changes of direction are relatively easy, but the trot is a whole 'nother thing.  I cannot allow Harley to trot straight ahead for very long, because I am walking with him.  My lines have to be organized and my hands nimble for clear communication.  Most of the mistakes that I make in long lining come from the lines getting too long or too short and trying to manage the whip.  I absolutely hate catching my horse in the mouth, because I didn't manage my lines properly or turn him soon enough to prevent myself from getting left behind.  His expression tells me that he understands that my intent was not to hurt his mouth or turn him rudely, but it still disturbs the flow of his work, which can be very nice.

I am trying to develop some strategies for effective long lining.  This is what I have so far:

1. Give my hands separate jobs.  Keep excess line draped (not wrapped!) in one hand and the whip in the other.  The whip-hand is also responsible for re-draping extra line or letting more line out.  This is still not easy, because I have small hands and the whip gets heavy.
2. Keeping the whip in my whip-hand (right), move the whip from one side to the other when we change direction.  This means that the whip is crossed over the lines when we are traveling right.  So far, this seems to be less awkward than trying to transfer the whip to my left hand, which is holding a bunch of line.
3. Always have excess line available.  This is important if I need to let more line out so my horse has time to turn or so he can stretch.  This is also important if the horse jumps forward suddenly.  Thankfully, that is rare, but it is a possibility.

Long lining reinforces many concepts from riding and I really like how Harley and I can still share a connection through the bridle, but it is definitely a different art and has its own feel.  I am looking forward to finding ways to finesse our practice.

If you have any strategies to add to my list, please let me know!

Long Lining and Allergy Update

Allergy Update:
Harley coughed so little yesterday, that I almost forgot to give him his allergy medicine!  We spent several hours together and he only coughed a few times.  We had a long lining session and I rode him a little bit and he barely coughed at all!  Yay!  Today could be totally different, but I am still going to celebrate yesterday.

I tried something new.  Grooming seems to send him into coughing fits, even if I groom him in the washstall outside, so I decided that he needs a "dust mask", just like I used to wear to clean stalls.  I draped a small towel from the noseband of his halter.  He looked kind of silly, but it actually worked.  No coughing!  I might try an old t-shirt next time, since it will be a lighter material.  He seemed to think that I "forgot" the towel and kept trying to grab it with his mouth.  So his dust mask doubled as a source of amusement.  I fed him some treats to inform him in terms that he can understand that towel = good.  I guess this is just one more use of a towel to add to The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy!

Long Lining:
Since I had a week off, there was a long list of things to get done that I normally do not have time to do.  With the baby coming in less than three months, it was more critical than usual that I take advantage of this time off from work to get some work done at home.  Of course, this includes Harley.  I trimmed his front feet and I am happy to say that the preemptive strike worked.  No hoof wall separation or flare developing and the trim was pretty fast and easy.  His hinds will be next time.  Re-introducing Harley to the long lines was also on my "must do" list.  Although I am feeling great, my saddle days are definitely numbered.  I needed a couple days where I did not have to rush to bring out the surcingle and lines so that Harley and I could get reacquainted with long line work, before I feel too much like "Humpty Dumpty". 

Our first shot was on Monday.  Unfortunately, Harley's allergies were not cooperating, but he was still willing and the work was not strenuous, so we were still able to have to some fun and accomplish my goal of re-introduction of the lines.

Harley was just about perfect.  Unfortunately, I cannot take photos while long lining and I did not think to bother someone else to take any, so you will have to take my word for it.  He looked great!  I had power-steering.  He stretched into the lines almost immediately and used his back and topline in some really beautiful ways.  We circled, we went straight ahead, we walked figure eights and even trotted figure eights!  The last time that I tried trotting figure eights we had some trouble maintaining the trot for the direction change (and I had some trouble keeping my lines from tangling), but this time Harley just marched right through the change and I managed to keep my lines in check.  It was too easy.  The grand finale was a little bit of canter.  Cantering in the lines is still new for us, but you wouldn't have guessed it by the easy way he picked up the gait and rounded up into the contact.  I was delighted.  Long lining this spring is going to be fun!

The only thing that did not go excellently was the trot-walk-trot transitions.  For some reason, he preferred to shorten his trot and do this beautiful little collected trot instead of transitioning to walk.  I am not terribly worried about fixing our communication for that one.  I rode him later and realized that I release the reins when I ask for walk.  In the lines I mistakenly increased the contact, which must have told him to stay in gait and collect.  What a problem, right?

Trial and Error with emphasis on Error:
Training a horse involves experience, time, and some trial and error.  I do not like to make training mistakes, but I also think that you have to make some, or you never learn what not to do.  I made a training mistake yesterday.

After Harley's hoof  trim, I decided to take out the lines again and re-test, but this time I got the brilliant idea to put the lines through the top ring on the surcingle.  I normally use the middle ring with him and he likes this very much.  I have tried the top ring before and it was a fail (he balked and felt trapped), but I was tempted to try again.

Why use the top ring?

• The upper position is closer to my hand position.  Harley likes my hands carried above his withers.  The middle ring seems to pull down on him sometimes, which is contrary to our training MO.  
• I drape the lines behind his butt and I thought the top ring would make it easier to keep the lines up and out of harms way.

Harley was very tolerant, but it became clear that the upper ring is still wrong for him.  He did not stretch into the lines at all and by the end of our trial period, his back was completely turned off.  There was no swing in his step, although it sort of looked like he had more suspension in his front end.  I think this was false suspension and result of him pulling his forehand up instead of lifting with his abdominal muscles.

Eventually, he sort of went "on the bit", but his neck was short and the bloom of muscle infront of his withers was missing.  My teacher and I have worked diligently to help him release that part of his neck, so that was pretty much a deal-breaker for me.  The look in his eye was unmistakable, too.  He gets this blood-shot looking edge to his eye when he is stressed and unhappy.  His mouth was also barely moist.  He usually has a nice rim of foam.  He did his best to work forward, but eventually started to tune me out and ignore my vocal commands.  I am not opposed to pushing my horse's comfort zone for the purposes of growth and improvement, but that is not what this was. 

The final straw was the line getting stuck up, under his tail!  I cannot believe that he didn't freak.  His tail was clamped down pretty tight, so it was just a matter of time before he gave the lines the "hoof".  I reset the lines to the middle ring after that and chastised myself.

"Never try the top ring again.  Never, never."

Oh well, live and learn.

It took several minutes for Harley to relax and get even close to the wonderful work that he did on Monday.  He stretched his neck and back in relief immediately, but was resentful of the lines.  He showed his resentment by rooting against them aggressively as he walked around.  I gave him as much slack as I could and told him "no", when he rooted.  My power-steering was temporarily gone.  Thankfully, he was mostly back to normal after a few minutes. 

Harley is a forgiving horse, but he did inform me that I owed him a canter under saddle after that.  I obliged and it was a wonderful canter indeed!  That was what finally made him (and me) feel better about the whole thing.  Some happy snorts and stretchy trot were my apology accepted.  Thank goodness!

Long Lining: A Fresh Perspective

Yesterday, I decided that I wanted to do something different with Harley.  We rode on Monday and Wednesday with suppleness over the back and tempo as our main goals.  It felt like he remembered our work from Monday by the second ride.  We had some very nice trot work where I could feel the energy flowing right over his back, maybe better than I have even felt in him.  There was an opportunity for him to tense up his back when another horse trotted by.  He shortened his neck and tightened up, but this time I was able to coax him to stretch again with lots of leg taps and a steady outside elbow.  I am certain that I tend to give in to him too often.  I do not want to exert massive control over my horse, but I am not doing him any favors by dropping the support or giving him fuzzy boundaries.  I need to be more responsible in this way as a rider.  That is my personal goal.

The stretchy trot was better.  He stayed slower in the tempo, but now I think that it was too slow and we lost the connection over his back.  He was stretching down and forward, but I did not feel the energy coming over his back like I did earlier in the ride.  I imagine that it will be very difficult to keep that energy without losing his balance forward in the stretch.  This is going to be a challenge, but I think we will be much better for the practice.  I coached myself into staying tall in the saddle.  Leaning forward was not going to help him balance.  Again, more responsibility on my part.

Back to yesterday...
...I thought about lungeing him, but I began picturing him doing his fast nose-to-the-ground trot.  It is beautiful, but I thought that it would contradict our training goals at the moment.  And then I remembered the long lines.  We have only long lined once this summer and I had meant to do more.  The summer is not getting any longer, so I decided to pull down the surcingle and go for it.

I made a change to my long lining technique.  I finally decided to give up trying to hold the excess line in my left hand and just let the two lines drag behind me on the ground.  I do not like this, but it did give me much better use of my hands and I could finally direct Harley through a figure eight without fumbling the lines.  I was also able to be much softer with the rein cues and I could feel more, so that I knew when to give the rein forward and when to hold for support.  Harley appreciated the change in technique and he went very well.  He moved into the bridle and looked very round and beautiful.  It was so neat to be able to "ride" my horse and see him at the same time.  This is a major benefit to long lining.  Unfortunately, taking pictures at the same time is beyond my capabilities.

I made some interesting observations.  Harley moves nicely in the lines and rounds up while in gait stretching into the contact, but his first reaction is to break the connection in the upwards transitions.  This was especially bad going into the canter, where he did a couple head flips that I would say were just plain disobedient.  The other thing that I noticed was that when we took a walk break, rather than stretch evenly down with his neck, he rooted against the reins, jerking them through the rings in the surcingle.  He continued to do this even though there was slack in the reins and I was not holding him.  I tried tapping him forward to encourage him to stretch evenly and less abruptly.  This helped a little, but I could see that this was a problem.

Is that bad behavior that should be corrected or is he objecting to the placement of the lines in surcingle?

I ran the lines through the lower ring which he has seemed happy with in the past.  I tried the upper ring once and I got the impression that he "hated" it, but now I am wondering if the top would be better.  It would be more similar to my hand position.  I am a little concerned that the lower rings are pulling him down too much, disrupting his balance.  Using the upper ring would also mean that the lines would not have to drape behind his hindquarters, which proved problematic when I had to half-halt strongly on the outside and I believe the line pinched him, because he kicked at it.  Or was that just more freshness?

The long line work was very good for practicing transitions.  I carefully maintained the contact and asked Harley to trot or canter.  He was obedient about moving forward, but he wanted to flip his head, which I read as "tightening his back".  My plan to change his habit was to gently sponge the outside rein as he was transitioning up.  This worked and he showed me that he is capable of making the transition nicely and with a quiet position.  Of course, this was easier going into the trot than the canter.  I felt like I had to concentrate and focus completely to the get the timing right.  I wanted to support him without restraining him or conflicting the upwards voice command.

The right lead canter was excellent.  As close to perfect as I could have hoped.  He was forward and round.  It only took two transitions to quiet his neck/back tension and then he blew through his nose and seemed to enjoy himself.  The trot between canters was light and easy to guide.

The left lead was more challenging.  The canter itself was okay to pilot, still forward and relatively round, but the trot afterward was so heavy.  Holy cow!  He pretty much blew through my half-halts and barely stayed on a circle around me.  That was when I had to half-halt so strongly on the outside rein that he kicked at the line.  It was not pretty, but I was glad to have the opportunity to see what he looks like when he does that.  We took a few circles in trot to settle down and feel balanced again; then we went back to the canter transitions.  The canter felt much more controllable than the trot afterward.  I had to really half-halt on the outside rein, while keeping the inside rein so that he didn't leave the circle.  I also had to give the outside rein, so that he could bend around the circle, otherwise he had no where to go.  It was very challenging and then I remembered later that this is only the second or third time that we have cantered in the long lines.  He finally backed off in the trot and balanced himself instead of running like a freight train.  I think that this is just one more thing that I need to be vigilant about under saddle.  If he were someone else's horse that I was riding, I would not let him get away with that.  From the ground, I felt like I was seeing him from a distance with a fresh perspective.  Undersaddle, it did not feel the same way as it did from the ground.  He was very, very strong and ignoring my equally strong requests to rebalance.  We did improve by the end of the session, but I could see that this was good for us and we need to do more.

After a relaxing walk around the ring several times, I pulled his tack and let him eat some grass in the ring, so that I could wrap my lines before giving him a shower.  I wondered if he would be upset with me for being hard on him and demanding that he maintain his frame or slow down.  To my surprise, he walked up to me, completely tack free, and stood right next to me while I organized the equipment.  I just kept petting him and telling what a good boy he was.  I guess I thought he would be mad at me.  It is tough when you love the horse you are training.

Long Lining: DON'T PANIC.

"DON'T PANIC."  The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams, 1979.

I decided to long line Harley the other day.  He had been so good under saddle the day before.  We had practiced quite a lot of sitting trot and canter, so I wanted to give his back a rest, but still keep him limber.  Long lining seemed like a good solution.

I had also been thinking about which rings I use on the surcingle.  I tried passing the lines through the stirrups on my saddle one time.  Although we were able to proceed with some walking and a little trotting, this was a fail.  He kept rooting up against the reins and I had a difficult time keeping the lines from touching the ground, so we abandoned that long lining technique.  I usually use the middle ring, which places the reins at the level of Harley's mouth when he is standing normally.  This seems like a perfect setting for him, but I have been wondering about the top ring.  My horse likes it when I hold my hands a little higher than his withers.  Maybe he would like that in the long lines too?

I ran the lines through the top ring and told Harley to let me know how he liked it.  Walking around, he seemed fine, but he was not stretching his neck like he usually does.  After a couple circles and changes of direction, I asked him to trot.  He trotted off and then stopped dead and started to rear.

DON'T PANIC.

I immediately put slack in the lines by walking toward his shoulder and cooing "easy" to him.  Thank goodness he did not feel trapped enough to lose his mind.  He really only lifted up a little bit in front, but I was not about to let that escalate, especially since we have had such good experiences in the lines.  I do not want to ruin all the calm work up to this point or risk injury to my beloved.  I asked him to walk for half a circle and then halt, so I could adjust the lines and put them on the middle ring again.  He relaxed and chewed his bit.  I apologized and told him that "now we know".  Low and high are no good.  The middle ring is best for Harley's conformation and mind.

Once the lines were in the middle ring, he was excellent.  He started stretching his neck in walk and trotted off without a hitch.  I absolutely love how the lines allow me combine curved and straight lines.  We practiced some trot-walk-trot transitions.  I watched him figure out how to lift himself into the trot without popping off the contact and without the many variables of a rider.  I can feel his balance in the lines and see his body at the same time.  Very, very helpful.  And beautiful to watch.

We cantered in the lines for the first time earlier this summer.  He was going so well that I decided to canter on this day as well.  The right lead is his better lead, so we started there.  Unfortunately, I was not as tactful as I should have been...

I kissed.  He cantered.  And then he started to take off.

DON'T PANIC.

I know that I usually try to describe everything in detail, but this time I just can't.  All I can say is that I did not panic and he stopped almost as soon as he took off.  I went into instinct mode in order to diffuse the bolt.  I used my voice and the lines and even the whip, but the combination escapes me.  When it happened, I wasn't even thinking about how I was stopping him, I was trying to figure out why.  I knew we would have to repeat the transition in order to preserve our training progress.

From what I can gather, here is what I did wrong:

1. I kissed.  This was too potent a command.  I should have used my body language by cantering myself, like we practice on the lunge.
2. I was too far behind him.  I was in a very strong driving position.  
3. I was over confident.  He was going so well at the trot, that I forgot that we have only cantered once in the lines and it was a very free-form, short canter in each direction.  Ego be damned!

The good news is that he did not hold a grudge.  He did hop around a bit when I asked him to canter again (I was still kissing instead of cantering myself.) and almost bolted a second time, but then the outside rein started to work.  I was able to half halt in the canter and encourage him forward without running.  He was fussing, but then it looked like he was also collecting more.  I think that the lines connected to me and the ground along with feeling them behind his hocks put him in a good situation to experience collection without my weight.  A part of me wonders if he started to run, because the lines made cantering feel so different to him.  Maybe that was scary.  Either way, we got through it.  By the time we cantered left (his trickier side), I had realized my mistakes and dropped the kiss.  I also moved up closer to his shoulder so it felt more like cantering on the lunge.  To my relief, he barely tossed his mane in this direction and looked quite round and relaxed.  We ended with some figure eights in trot, which was a first for us, but seemed anticlimactic after the excitement earlier.  His trot was no worse for the wear.  He looked great and he felt great and we tacked some more long lining miles under our belts/surcingles.

For the Hitchhiker's fans, I always keep a towel at the barn.  Tons of uses.  But I have yet to determine how the number 42 fits into training a horse.  I am sure that it does!

Long Lining: Techniques and the Canter

Memorial Day was a hot one, here in New Jersey.  Ninety-three degrees!  I decided that it was too hot to ride, so I took down the surcingle and brought out my long lines.  Why make the horse work hard when I can run myself ragged?  After all, horse people put the horse first. 

Exercise horse.  Check.
Exercise human.  Check.
Schedule medical appointment to have head examined for doing this on the hottest day of the year.  Nah.

Disclaimer:
All horse-related activities are inherently dangerous, as respectable horse people know, but I just want to be explicit in saying that long lining is not something to try without experienced help.  A year ago, I asked my teacher to give me a long lining lesson with Harley and we had a great experience.  She introduced him to the lines and demonstrated her technique before I got "behind the wheel".  We now have this tool in our repertoire, but I am certainly not an expert and I am definitely still learning the ropes, so to speak.  
Please be safe with your horse!

I long line Harley in a surcingle and his bridle.  I have flat cotton long lines with rolled black nylon sections that clip onto his bridle and pass through the middle rings on the surcingle.  For safety purposes, I leave the lines disconnected and I wear gloves.  I also roll the bridle reins and secure them with the throatlatch to prevent them from flipping over his head.  I carry a lunge whip or a driving whip.  I prefer the driving whip because I can use it like a super long dressage whip and it doesn't have a pesky lash to get tangled in the lines.  Also, I am terrible at cracking the whip, so the lunge whip is not much use to me.  There is seriously enough rope to manage without a whip lash to untwist!

Line management is something that I must relearn each time that we practice long lining.  I have tried holding folded line in each hand, but this makes it difficult to feel down the line and impossible, at least for me, to adjust the line length.  The hand that also has to hold the whip becomes especially clumsy.  Thank goodness Harley does not overreact to the whip and is patient enough to stand and wait while I organize my lines for the umpteenth time.

After some careful trial and error, I think that I have come up with a line technique that works for me.  I fold the excess lines to a workable length together (but disconnected) and hold them in my left hand.  I do not wrap the line around my arm or hand, which is a big safety no-no.  I carry the whip in my right hand.  My left hand's responsibility is to hold all the line and feel my horse at the end.  My right hand's responsibility is to direct the whip and adjust the line length for my left hand.  I will carry the right line in my right hand with the whip when changing direction or straightening my horse, but when we are moving along I can stay connected to him solely with my left hand.  I am right handed, so I find organizing the lines and directing the whip much easier with my right hand.  I tried switching the lines and the whip when we changed direction, but this was very awkward and unsuccessful at best.  I gave it a couple tries, because the rider in me wants to strive for ambidexterity, but it just was not practical, especially for figure-eights.  So the main downside to my technique is that when traveling right, I have the whip in my right hand and I have to reach across my left arm to touch his hindquarters.  The horse might be inclined to stop with the whip in the handler's "front" hand, but Harley has accepted it without any upset.  My clumsy readjustment of the lines and whip in an already tenuous directional change was far more aggravating to our practice.  In fact, he would toss his head up and look back at me like "would you quit messing around".  I was creating a lot of static, while he was trying his best to listen.

Memorial Day was the first time we had long lined in several months, so I spent a lot of time in the walk.  When I felt organized and he understood the plan, I asked him to trot.  At first he popped up in front, pushing off his front end to move into trot, but once he got moving he stretched into the lines and gave me some beautiful collected trot.  What I really like about long lining, is that you can offer your horse information about balance and straightness, but unlike side reins, you can also offer him more rein to stretch.  Long lines are like "living side reins" that give and respond just like a rider in the saddle, but without the number of variables that accompany carrying a person.  Having me walking or jogging slowly on the ground, encourages Harley to slow down and engage.  I can touch his hindquarters with the whip to inspire him to step more under and the outside line draping behind his body helps him think about using the posterior region of his body as he moves.  My teacher was the one to point this out.  The outside line actually creates body awareness, something that is difficult to duplicate with a single lunge line or even in the saddle.

My original goal for long lining was to help Harley balance in the canter.  Also, if I ever decide to pursue an Advanced Instructor certification from NARHA, I must be able to demonstrate long lining.  Up until this point, I had never ventured to canter him on the lines, but today felt really good.  I decided to go for it.  We only had to canter for a couple steps and I would consider that a success.  From the trot on a nice circle, I gave him the verbal cue and hopped myself into canter.  I loved the look on his face.  He was concentrating and seemed to understand that this was something very important.  It took him a couple attempts.  He jumped into the canter, but felt the outside rein and immediately returned to trot.  This was a good thing.  He was thinking.  I asked again, and finally he stretched into both reins and cantered on the left lead.  The engagement of his hindquarters and the lift in his back was gorgeous.  I encouraged him on with my voice and my energy.  I marveled in how easily he turned around me.  He was turning himself; the lines were just there to give him boundaries for his balance.  This was what I had always wanted for him.

We repeated the transitions a couple times and then changed direction through the walk.  After a break, he was equally stellar on the right lead.  Being his more balanced lead, he found the collected work easier, so I encouraged him to stretch his frame in canter.  Despite the heat, Harley looked good.  Without a saddle or passenger, he was just a little sweaty under his tack and around his hind legs, an indicator that he was working the correct muscle groups (Yes!).  I, on the other hand, had sweat running down my face, but I was having way too much fun to notice until my horse halted for the final time with a huge "Good Boy"!