Episode 313: Preventing Secondary Reactions: Preparing Your Horse for Success

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Episode 313.mp3: this mp3 audio file was automatically transcribed by Sonix with the best speech-to-text algorithms. This transcript may contain errors.

Speaker1:
If she is reactive. When I go to guide her, she will never become solid. So the spook, the original startle or spook or whatever happens is actually not a problem as long as her secondary reaction to my guiding Aids is actually a confident response.

Speaker2:
Podcasting from a little cabin on a hill. This is the Stacy Westfall podcast. Stacy's goal is simple to teach you to understand why horses do what they do, as well as the action steps for creating clear, confident communication with your horses.

Speaker1:
Hi, I'm Stacy Westfall and I'm here to help you understand, enjoy and successfully train your own horses. In this episode I want to talk about training for something before you need it. I'm going to explain how a horse tells me about themselves what the lighter, lighter game is and how it can set you up for secondary problems. And I'm going to give you a guide for what a horse's confident response feels like. But first, I want to update you on the horses in my barn. Over the last few months I have made quite a few changes and as I have been traveling around and talking to people, people have had different questions and observations, so I thought I'd put it all together in one episode to update you. So I sold Presto and Willow this summer, which for me was a really big change because I had owned them both for many years. And then I bought Luna, who is a four year old mare, and Enzo, who happens to be a four year old gelding. And then you may remember that in the fall of 2023, I bought a yearling that I named Ember and so I just started riding her. She was a June baby, so I didn't start her until later this year. So it feels like a whole new group of horses that I'm working with. So I've got Luna, Enzo and Ember that I'm riding, which are all relatively new to me riding.

Speaker1:
I do still have Gabby. She is bred. She is due in the spring and I think I just felt the baby moving this week. So super exciting. So Gabby is still here. She is on broodmare detail now I have another change to announce and that would be stormy. Stormy has now moved on to the next chapter of her life, and a reminder for those of you who may not remember who stormy is. Stormy is the little paint filly that was adopted from Last Chance corral to be raised with lefty. Lefty, as a reminder, is the foal that we had born this spring that became an orphan when my husband's mare, Lucy, died 12 days after falling from complications of the falling process. I'm about to say something that I have to brace myself for because yeah, I have to keep practicing this. So lefty, when he was born, got his name because his left front foot and left rear foot both have white on him. And so Jesse hadn't seen him yet. And I thought, eh, looks like a lefty to me with left front and left rear white. And when Jesse saw him, he agreed. But the thing I'm bracing myself for is just in the last month, Jesse applied for his registered name and he named him left Alone, which I'm going to have to practice saying and hearing before Jesse shows him, because it brings back the whole story.

Speaker1:
Every time I hear his now registered name of Left Alone when Jesse told me, tears immediately sprung to my eyes and I said, it's the perfect name. And it's a terrible name. And it's a perfect name. Well, okay, back to stormy. When we adopted stormy, we knew we would not be keeping her a year ago. Back in 2016, I adopted two horses from Last Chance Corral. Knowing that I wanted to keep one, which was Presto. And again, it's because it's recommended that orphans have a buddy that I ended up with two back then. So back then when I got the two, the plan immediately was to adopt the second one based on the idea that that horse would go to Asbury University, which is where Jesse teaches and become a police horse. For that reason, we picked a horse that was a draftee cross, and that's what happened. Justice, which is what we named him. He became a police horse. He went through the Asbury program, and he has been out there now for quite a few years, and he has worked at places like the Kentucky Derby, the Indianapolis 500, political rallies. So justice is out there as a police horse. Now, stormy, when she came here, she's not a draftee horse. She won't be a police horse. But Asbury also has a Western horse program where they teach Western performance events. So stormy will learn things like liberty and ranch riding and reining.

Speaker1:
And so that is where stormy went. Now she moved Down to Asbury. A couple of weeks ago and that move went really well. Lefty didn't miss a beat here at home. Wasn't at all disturbed. Like didn't even nicker when she loaded in the trailer and left. I think he might have been thinking this is even easier to get to migraine now because there's no competition. And stormy went down and moved into a stall for a quarantine period. Did really well with that, and is now out running in a field full of babies her age, and that transition went really well, so I couldn't be any happier with how smoothly that whole piece of it went. Now, circling back to some of my newer horses, Ember, Luna and Zo, one question that came up after I discussed Luna on the podcast and the idea that I bought her, despite some physical issues that were apparent right away, she was a little sore and her x rays weren't perfectly clean. People have asked, why did you buy her if she had known problems? And the reason that I bought her is because I've been in this industry long enough to have experience and to know what I'm comfortable guessing about. This got me thinking about how long I've been in the industry, and 31 years ago, I saw my first reining horse and I headed directly towards the industry, and I've been in it ever since.

Speaker1:
And over those years, I have dealt with a lot of different things. And because Luna presented with issues, that wasn't the problem. It was the type of issues that she had that I was willing to deal with. So, for example, one of her issues was likely a shoeing issue, or let's say a lack of shoeing issue because she'd been standing in the pasture, she was footsore from stomping flies. That kind of stuff. And a lot of that was likely to improve with shoeing. Some other symptoms that she had were likely to improve with stretching and conditioning and balancing her body up. And the other thing I had in the back of my mind was that when I was evaluating her, she had a great mind, meaning she could pretty easily make a solid lower level riding horse, even if some of these issues that she had at the beginning didn't really completely clean up. So what I'm saying is, even if she wasn't going to make a high level performance horse because some of these things might hold her back, I believed there was a very good chance she could make a solid lower level riding horse to some degree, because a lot of her issues were physical, but not necessarily something that was going to be career ending. Now, I say that and I'm going to give you an update. I just want to contrast Luna for a second with Ember.

Speaker1:
When I bought Ember, she had excellent x rays. The vet was even joking about trying to find something to comment on because her x rays and prepurchase exam were so clean. And then if you were listening to the podcast, you'll know that she got injured out in the paddock in the run in shed, she got cast and hurt her leg and was lame for a month. So at that moment when she has an injury due to rolling over and not judging the distance between herself and the wall, it doesn't even matter that her x rays were 100% clean. When she's lame for that month, the question arises again Will this horse be sound? The good news is, now I'm past that she's sound. I can see a little thickening around that injury to her leg, but it doesn't seem to be bothering her. So clean x rays, but then a after purchase injury. You're right back into this question mark zone, then back to Luna. Luna was doing nothing but getting better and better and better from the time that I purchased her until last week. And then last week, her left front tendon was slightly swollen. No apparent injury, nothing dramatic happened when I was working her and she even appeared sound on it. Although I didn't do a lot of work, I just moved her around enough to see if she was favoring it or limping and she wasn't.

Speaker1:
So then it just started treating that cold hosing, treating that leg and that went down, recovered well. And then today when I went out to get her thinking, today is the day, I was going to put her back into some light work to see how that tendon responded. Today I went out there and she was three legged, lame Toe touching lame on a different leg. So now the right rear is the one that she's toe touching lame on. Mind you, neither of these legs were questionable on the x ray. So this leads me back to today's subject, which is it's important to practice things before you need them, because the thing that I need to practice before I need it in these examples is my mindset. My thoughts around horses and soreness and lameness and injuries and abscesses and whatever else might pop up. And much of my belief system around this has been built from a lifetime of owning horses, from decades of being a professional. And the first thing that comes to mind is breathe. This is all part of it. This week, one of my adult sons sent a text and he had bronchitis again. Breathe with Luna. I hope that the toe touching lameness that I'm seeing in the right rear is an abscess. The weather is right for the conditions for an abscess. The symptoms all line up for being an abscess.

Speaker1:
But I don't know right now with my son. I hope he heals quickly. And I remember this in both situations. Fretting. Worrying might make it feel like I'm doing more, but that's not a healthy kind of more. It's more in the sense that I carry more weight, or it's more in that type of weight that's heavy on me, but it's the type of weight that will break me down. In these instances, I decide what I can do and I practice deciding what I cannot do. And I know worrying won't heal my son any faster or my horse any faster. Soup. Rest. Medication. A peaceful mind. These things will actually help everyone involved. So becoming a human that responds to situations that come up instead of reacting is something I know I get to practice daily. So when the big stuff comes, instead of reacting to it, I have been practicing how to slow down and respond. My habit is responding, not reacting. Which brings me back to today's subject. Practicing things with your horse before you need it. And Amber actually volunteered to be the example of this. Amber Ember falls into the category of a lot of horse. And what that means to me is that there's a lot of potential, but there's also a lot of things to deal with because of that same potential. So when I say the Ember is a lot of horse, let me explain it a little bit more.

Speaker1:
She has told me about herself with her behavior and the things that she has told me both fall into the category of her physical characteristics, attributes, strengths, and her mindset, her emotional level, her training level. So these are different things I have to separate out because yes, she's young, so there's a level of sassiness that can come with being a youngster. But combined with that, Ember is exceptionally athletic. She's very light on her feet right from the beginning. Whether she's turned loose and she's out there playing or whether I'm lunging her. She has wanted to be very light on her feet and do lots of airs above the ground. She would be the kind of horse that you would want to sign up for. Something like the Spanish Riding School. The idea of doing airborne movements comes naturally to her. That means she jumps up in the air, not bucking and landing hard on the ground. She literally has that hang time up in the air. She feels really light and sensitive on her feet. So I have joked over the last year of owning her that I wasn't going to ride her until I could reliably create situations where she wasn't airborne. I say I joked about it, I was also serious about it, but the reason I say I joked about it is because I'm not going to punish her for that Strength, some of that lightness on her feet, some of that athleticism is going to be amazing for her performance career.

Speaker1:
So I actually don't want to totally shut it down, but I also don't want to ride it when I can't control it. So I was serious about being able to reliably create situations where she's not airborne. I need that to be a thing, but I also don't want to punish her or discourage her, and then expect to be able to bring that up again later. So it's a little bit more like I want to be able to create an on switch or off switch that's a little closer to this description of what I was after. One easy example for me to say is that I do allow her to play with her airborne self, with rules around it, and one of the rules is she's never allowed to display that behavior when saddled. So there's a dividing line, the playfulness that's there and that lightness on her feet. There are places that I allow her to do that. But one place she's never allowed to do that is when saddle. So she told me with her behavior that she has a lot of athletic ability. She told me with her behavior that she's higher energy. She told me with her behavior, a lot of different things, and I listened. What that means to me is I didn't pretend it wasn't there.

Speaker1:
I'm not pretending she's not high energy. I'm not pretending she's not light on her feet. I'm not pretending that she's more sensitive. I'm accepting it and figuring out how I'm going to mold it or work with it. I also didn't try to totally remove it. I think sometimes when people think that they want to totally remove something that's a little bit innate in the horse, like, for example, her higher energy level or that lightness on her feet. If you try to totally remove it, be sure that you are not walking very close to pretending it's not there. There's two major lessons here. Number one, I'm not pretending that it wasn't there and that it's not a piece of her. That lightness on her feet. I'm seeing the strength of it and the weakness of it. And I'm not trying to totally remove it, because I do see the strength of it. And at the same time, I am creating ways to harness it, to guide it. Amber told me with her behavior, these things about herself, and I listened. I've talked before on the podcast that one of the hardest transitions to teach is a loose rein riding to contact, and the best example that I have of this to. Illustrate the challenge is that the time that this transition is most needed. Is when a horse spooks or startles. So I want you to imagine that you're riding along on a horse, let's say at a walk or a trot and you're on a loose rein and the horse startles or spooks in that first second of that horse, startling or spooking when you're not sure yet what decision they're going to make.

Speaker1:
For me, it's a very practiced response to immediately begin to gather the reins so I can direct the horse where I want them to go. I don't want to wait five or 10s where that could be escalating bigger and bigger, because I might not be able to shut down that reaction as it builds bigger and bigger. So I know that I want to practice being able to take hold and gather that horse up if a spook happens. One of the reasons that it's a challenging transition to go from loose rein to contact is this often the very same horse that's likely to startle or spook is going to be wired more like Ember is? They're going to be more athletic and more sensitive inside of that. What frequently happens is that when the horse goes from a loose rein to a spook or a startle, their body goes into motion, and then my body goes into motion to go from the loose rein to contact, to guide them. And if that is not something you've practiced, then a secondary spook will often happen. So that means the horse startles and begins to react. The rider begins to gather the reins, and the horse has a secondary spook or startle as the rider goes from a loose rein to contact.

Speaker1:
This is a real thing and this is an actual challenge. If you have a horse that's wired like amber and just like I don't pretend with Amber that she's a naturally quiet horse and it'll probably all work out. I don't pretend that. I don't pretend that this concept of a secondary spook to my aides, I'm not going to pretend that that's a small or an easy thing. So with a horse like Gabby, that's not as reactive, not as sensitive. This conversation almost seems like you don't even have to have it, because with a horse like Gabby, she's less likely to spook. The first time and she's less likely to spook the secondary spook or the secondary startle when you go from the loose rein to contact. So Gabby's not as physically light on her feet. She feels amazing, but she feels more like driving a luxury car that has a lot of power, where Ember feels more like a fast, light sports car. The kind of car that you don't want to teach a driver's ed class in. That's what Ember feels like. Both are really responsive, but the responses feel different. Long before I ever put a saddle on, I could see what she was telling me, and I could see that the potential challenge or problem was that a horse that's on the naturally reactive side and is very athletic. Also means.

Speaker3:
That.

Speaker1:
She's going to most likely be sensitive and feely, and it's going to be easy for somebody to make the mistake of. She's light and she responds to a light cue. So I give a light cue and she responds to a light cue, and we get stuck in what I call the lighter, lighter game. And the lighter, lighter game ends up with the potential problem of something startles her. I take hold to support her or to guide her so she doesn't jump in front of a car, and her secondary reaction to my movement escalates the first reaction to whatever startled her in the first place. The solution to this lighter, lighter game, the solution to this snowball of problems, is developing Ember's confidence in my aide's confidence in my.

Speaker3:
Aids.

Speaker1:
Is.

Speaker3:
Evident.

Speaker1:
When there is rhythm in her movement, when I apply and release the Aids. My belief is that my willingness to go at the pace where I can feel ember develop very rhythmic gait, rhythmic walk, rhythmic trot and rhythm that's not disturbed when I go from a loose rein to contact. My willingness to go slow and develop her confidence in my Aids before I need it. This means for me, in a controlled environment, it means that I take hold and release. Take hold and release hundreds of times in each ride. I believe that at this stage, I am building her confidence now so that I will have it when I need it. But this I know for sure she will only get better when her secondary reaction, her response to my guiding aids is a confident response. If she is reactive when I go to guide her, she will never become solid. So the spook, the original startle or spook or whatever happens is actually not a problem as long as her secondary reaction to my guiding aids is actually a confident response. Now, sometimes people will ask me to describe what a confident response feels like. The first thing to remember is it feels different physically on different horses. But there is a guideline I can give you. So while on one horse, a confident response might feel heavier than on another horse. This is a guide that really does work. There are basically three different options. Too light, too heavy, and in the middle.

Speaker1:
Too light to any aid means the horse avoids or reacts to that aid. They can be too light to your legs. They can be too light to your hands. Then there's too heavy. They can be too heavy in the reins. They can be too heavy to your legs. This horse pulls routes or seems to ignore. And then there's in the middle where the horse responds. And in the middle is what you're aiming for. And the more experience you gain, the more you will be able to understand what that in the middle feels like on different horses. And it feels a little bit different. So my sports car, Ember, is going to have a different feel than my luxury car. Gabby. And that makes sense. It's not that one car is too heavy or too light. They both feel good, but one is lighter and one is heavier. But they're both in the middle. They're both responsive rather than you aiming to know exactly what the middle feels like. If you focus on the idea that a horse can be too light or too heavy, and that you want something in the middle that will be a better gauge for you as you begin to understand what the middle in between those two extremes feels like. Now, let's wrap up on this. Maybe you're listening to this, and there's a little piece of you that's thinking, that's fine, and that's great. You knew what you needed before you needed it with Ember. But what if I discovered after the fact that something was missing.

Speaker1:
What if I didn't know what I needed until after the problem? Well, the good news is, if that's where you're at, you are now very aware of why you need what you need. I am very aware of what I need with Ember, because over the years I've ridden lots of reining horse colts that were very athletic and light horses that could easily unseat me. And so I developed techniques to address this. If you are in a situation where you've been unseated, now you know what you're up against. If you want to learn more about this concept back in episode 187 of this podcast, I talked about the backwards cycle of learning after, during, and before and how normal that cycle is. If you have experience, you'll be able to train for something before you need it. You'll be able to see potential problems and come up with solutions for how you want to address those things before they happen. It's much like a fire drill. You need to practice for it before the house is on fire. But you might not have that before type of knowledge, so that might just mean that you see your horse's needs more clearly after the fact. And at that point, learning how to support your horse is still equally important so you can help them going forward. That's what I have for you this week. Thanks for listening and I'll talk to you again in the next episode.

Speaker2:
If you enjoy listening to Stacy's podcast, please visit Stacy Westfall. Com for articles, videos and tips to help you and your horse succeed.

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