Great white ... stallion

As from today I have another horse to ride and look after for a month and a half - my friend's 6 year old stallion called Pressing. I'm excited and nervous at the same time. He is ridden in a classical way so that's how I will ride, but we will try to learn some gound skills in the meantime. I'm glad Juliano's halter fits him, cause on his stable headcollar I'm sure he would drag me behind like a kite.

Speaking of on-line mishap, just remembered a funny scene from last winter. We were doing some circling in the indoor arena, which was filled with other people riding. I was not looking at Juliano, talking to a friend, he was supposed to be trotting around. Juliano spooked at the sound of snow falling for the roof and started running towards the other end of the arena. He pulled me, I tripped and fell. I couldn't let go of the rope as my friend was riding a stallion J hates. So I got dragged 20m on my belly. So just like in windsurfing in horse riding we can also do a body drag :)

Back to the great-white stallion here are some photos for you to see what I'm dealing with form now on :)

More snow = more fun

Paddocks are covered with a fine 20cm layer of snow. It is safe for barefoot horses to run and play now! Juliano and his gang were the first ones today to "destroy" fresh surface of snow that fell overnight. I was lucky to be there with my camera :)

Paddock games

As there is no grazing now Juliano is thinking of creative ways to spent time out in the paddock. The ground is still hard and there is just enough snow to cover it horses try not to trot or canter. But they have to do something.


Juliano and Rytmika (young mare) decided to play the game of "pass me the stick". After a while they lost the stick and J decided to start licking Rytmika on her chin. Every time he licked her she shied away so the game went on for at least half an hour cause J wouldn't give. Interesting... what was on J's mind.

First snow

Winter is officially here! Days are short and we waited for the snow to fall. During winter if we don't make it to the stables before sun set we ride in the woods after dark. Snow makes everything look bright at night. It also makes the woods look magical.

Every time we ride at night in snow the forest is so quiet. Horses are relaxed and seem very happy. They don't spook at all. Most of the people say that we are crazy to ride at night and are surprised every time they see us leave into the woods. On our first night ride I was a bit worried but soon found out there is nothing to worry about. Horses never trip or miss a road and they seem to be looking after us on their backs as they tend to steer clear of trees with branches at rider level. Its truly a magical feeling - dark forest, white carpet of snow and just the sound of horses snorting in trot.

Iridology

Few years back I studied equine iridology with Ellen Collinson. I wanted to study iridology as at Technical University of Szczecin, where I graduated IT, our professors created a diagnostic tool for humans based on changes visable in the iris. It was also the time when I met Juliano. Thanks to Ellen I could learn more about iridology for horses. I soon found out that it is very accurate and can help horses and their owners with a lot of problems.

Once in a while I take photos of Juliano's eyes up close. I keep them on my computer and compare from time to time. If I see that something is happening in the eye (discoloration, stress lines, spots) I try to work out what's wrong either alone or with Ellen on the phone. It's a great way to prevent problems, cause you will see it in the eye before any other symptoms occur. For example calcium deficiency, stress in back muscles, problems in lungs etc. Also if you are unsure what's the source of lameness the eye will show where the problems lies. Pretty cool stuff.



The story I wanted to tell you is about Juliano and his mysterious colic in 2007. One day I came to the stables to discover that J didn't drink any water for almost a day. He pooped into his automatic drinker and no one noticed this. As he filled himself with hay and had no water to drink he soon started to show signs of impaction. I called Anna and we started standard colic procedures. He got better after few hours. So we went home after making sure he is ok. The next day J was fine, went out for a bit, got hay and bran mash but in the evening the same thing happened. He looked disinterested, sad which I know means he is not well. This scenario continued for another day, ok during day, sick in the evening. At that time we knew this was not to do with impaction any more. We consulted another vet and started thinking of going to an equine clinic in Berlin. I decided to take photos of his eyes and give Ellen a quick call. She was home and quickly downloaded J's photos. We both looked at them and Ellen said "There is something going on with his spleen, it's under too much stress even for a horse after colic". Ellen suggested giving him spleen and liver herbs, the build up of toxins also started putting liver under pressure. Ellen posted the herbs to me and soon J was on them. He was not feeling well for 5 days at that time. But after 2 days of feeding him herbs with mash he started to improve. On the 3rd day he was fine both day and evening. The herbs worked. Thanks to Ellen he was fine again cause who know what might have happened next.

Juliano never stands still like this unless he is napping

This exhausting week for both of us tough me two things:
1. Always put an extra bucket of fresh water and don't depend only on automatic drinkers.
2. Horses are never sad without a good reason, so if you know your horse well never ignore even the slightes change in behavior when the horse is at home.

Savvy string trail riding

When I first started riding Juliano I didn't even dream about riding him bridleless. I longed for the day when I would have just slight control over what J was doing and how fast he was going.


Today we went for another savvy string hack. Two horses, two dogs and us. Juliano was calm and maintained gait that I picked. What's amazing is that he can be in front of other horses now with just savvy string on his neck and I have no problems with control.

More Polo

We are getting better at polo. Juliano learned quickly to follow the ball but not to go directly over it. We practice polo with just savvy string on J's neck. J treats his responsibilities seriusly: don't change gait, follow the ball.




I must say that for me polo has proven to be a great way to practice focus. When you sit on a horse and you want to go to the ball you simply have to focus on it. Your body automatically turns towards the ball, the eyes on your shoulders, knees and bellybutton as Linda often says do the trick. You don't have to imagine a point on the ground, which is also great but you can easily get distracted or if you land near the spot you think "Oh well, good enough". Here you have to get to the ball, hit it and than again travel point to point.