The Art of Natural Dressage

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PostPosted: Mon Oct 29, 2012 4:20 pm 
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So great that you are back, Karen! And so nice that you are working on this with Tam right now. Please make lots of videos if you can. :)

Karen wrote:
So all the focus is on the haunch and the job they must do, with less focus on the head/neck (only for small adjustments) and none at all on the forelegs. The foreleg will do what it will do as the haunches sink lower, OR you can ask for the action of the foreleg directly once the haunches are already bending.


Isn't it nice how different the approaches can be? With my horses it seems that ONLY a focus on the front part (as in rearing or leg lifting) let them realize in the first place that they can lower their haunches instead of only leaning back. Once they got the idea, it was possible for me to ignore the front part and focus on the hindquarters, but for us it only worked in that order.

Joc, I really admire your patience. I cannot tell whether it will work out this way or not because I have no experience with this and I think that for me and my horses other approaches are easier, but I think it's great that you try to do it like this and we can learn from your experiences. :smile:


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PostPosted: Mon Oct 29, 2012 4:29 pm 
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I wanted to add, that anything you do that helps Magik to understand to bend the haunches will help toward your School Halt! :yes: Strength is another matter, and it will come over time. I think every single horse will be different, and even those horses who we think have very strong haunches, have to build up the strength gradually to do this. :f:

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PostPosted: Mon Oct 29, 2012 4:40 pm 
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Romy :kiss: :kiss: :kiss:

Quote:
Isn't it nice how different the approaches can be? With my horses it seems that ONLY a focus on the front part (as in rearing or leg lifting) let them realize in the first place that they can lower their haunches instead of only leaning back. Once they got the idea, it was possible for me to ignore the front part and focus on the hindquarters, but for us it only worked in that order.


Of course you are right! It can be done this way obviously because the lovely Pia has shown the way.

When I was teaching Tam to sit on the haybale (something I have not done since, because I thought he looked so undignified sitting on that bale) I asked slightly back on the cordeo at his chest, and let him figure it out from there, but the haybale was right behind him, the wall was on one side, and I was on the other...so it was limiting his choices on how to figure out the puzzle. :funny:

I think that at times during this process, I asked UP and back with the cordeo too. They were all small adjustments though.

I do think that one has to observe the indivdual horse and see how they respond. If you ask them to lift a foreleg as the first thing, do they lean back slightly to lift the leg? If so, you have your starting point there. If you ask them to rear up, do they load the hind legs and bend them to lift up into the rear? If so, you have a starting point there. I think if Pia did not bend her hind legs to bounce up with the front end, would you have possibly tried something else?

I have a friend with a little paint mare who will pop up into something of rear while lowering the base of her neck and keeping her hind legs straight without bending them, so she will likely not be able to use the same method that worked so well with Pia.

I think we all will look for the little starting places that will change from horse to horse. :funny:

Mostly with Jocelyn, I was thinking of the approach where one is asking the horse to sit down (or nearly sit down) in which case, like Tam, my hands can make little adjustments to the front end, but my focus is on his haunches (waiting for little muscle tightness clues that he was thinking of lowering the haunch).

It IS different for every horse. :yes: :yes:

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PostPosted: Mon Oct 29, 2012 4:53 pm 
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A big :kiss: back to you, Karen.

There is one thing I wanted to mention concerning Summy's progress (which is slow but constant, and not fundamentally different from Pia's, which is why I do not write it all down again): Now that he is beginning to really understand that I am asking for bending the hindlegs and putting weight on them, he is doing it much slower and more consciously. The nice thing about him is that he is not nearly as much of an autopilot as Pia, so it becomes possible for me now to intervene in the movement right at the time when he is doing it.

Accordingly, yesterday I experimented with splitting my cue into first asking for an upwards movement of the front end (bending my knees, lifting my hands in front of my torso), and when he had done this I asked separately for leaning back (leaning towards him and pointing at his chest). It did seem to help, but I yet have to find out what exactly it does for us. :smile:


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PostPosted: Tue Oct 30, 2012 9:16 am 
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I finally got the chance to start working on this with Billy yesterday.
I decided to give it a go with a target. He did quite well and it was quite exciting for me to try to click at the slight movement of his weight backwards but before he takes a step. He would often still take a step but quite a few times I managed to click and treat before the step. If I find that he thinks he should be backing rather than just moving weight I might try placing a pole on the ground behind him as a bit of a 'guide'.

It was really interesting to watch him and think about what muscles have to stretch and contract to create the movement.
I'm looking forward to working on it again soon and excited about the prospect of learning something new... We haven't really done any 'training' in a very very long time. :D :D

I really enjoyed watching all of your videos too and seeing how creative we all are at adapting our teaching to our horses and all coming up with different ways to train something. So cool!

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PostPosted: Tue Oct 30, 2012 5:20 pm 
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sweetleigh- that was my problem at first too :) It was hard to get the lean back without the backing. Almost as if my horse was trying to take the next step for me like “the next step is backing so I’ll do it for you!”. It helped him to put a fence or wall behind us for a little while. He ended up targeting the wall with his rump but once he got it the hand held target did the trick :)


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PostPosted: Tue Oct 30, 2012 5:39 pm 
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There is also a nice method you can try. Reward your horse for doing nothing a few times. If you can't quite get the timing right to catch the idea to lean back without a foot moving, then ask...but reward the horse immediately after you ask - BEFORE he does anything at all. This kind of resets his brain. :D It is a nice way to eliminate the incorrect guess. Not sure it would work for everyone, but I used this with a class of kids while teaching them tact on a single reing, and lateral bending of the poll.

Most of the horses the kids were using would guess to back up as soon as the kids made any contact on a single rein. They weren't prepared to guess "turn my head slightly to one side". They would lock up the poll and step back instead. I had the kids ask, but release before the horse did anything at all, and all the kids got the horses to stop guessing to back up.

Hope that helps! :f:

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PostPosted: Wed Oct 31, 2012 2:59 pm 
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Quote:
There is one thing I wanted to mention concerning Summy's progress (which is slow but constant, and not fundamentally different from Pia's, which is why I do not write it all down again): Now that he is beginning to really understand that I am asking for bending the hindlegs and putting weight on them, he is doing it much slower and more consciously.


This is also Tam's way, Romy. He is such a good "seeker of answers" that he does things in such a way that haleps him figure out what part of it I'm rewarding him for. This also means that I can isolate parts of the movement easily. Maybe this comes from having certain things built from little parts in the beginning? So one can build a movement from many separate parts, or one can deconstruct a movement into many separate parts.

It was just so cool yesterday to have him watching me carefully as I asked him to try this and he would do one thing first, then stack other things with it...figuring out that more than one thing had to occur for him to lean back (relaxation of his poll, height of his poll, relaxing the underside of his neck, slight lateral flexion, engage the hind legs, lean back). You could see him stack these responses one on the other. This allowed to work on some of the individual parts by clicking for the first, the second, the third, etc. If I waited too long he would pop the forelegs off the ground, at which point the relaxed poll, the relaxed muscles under his neck and the lateral flexion might disappear...so it was a lovely exploratory session that let me break it all down smaller than I have bothered to do in a very long time.

In this session I lost the overall picture of what I was shooting for, so I've now printed out a picture or two that I can take to the arena and pin to the wall. :funny:

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PostPosted: Wed Oct 31, 2012 3:08 pm 
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I should also say that among Tam's guesses, was to step back, stretch out, rear up, and plant one hind leg well behind the other. He was also guessing too much about his neck to the point where he would put his head up very high and tense his neck to the point that the underside of pushed forward...NOT what I want him to think at ALL. :ieks: So it was necessary to put his cavesson on and direct his thinking very clearly.

We rediscovered something we played with in the past but had sort of allowed to fall by the wayside - that when I raise an inside rein, he should step his hind legs under himself a little (not a lot...just a little). By the end of the session, I could lift the inside rein (either side), and he would tip his head slightly toward me and step under himself behind just a little. I didn't care at that point if he leaned back or not...it was such a lovely thing that I rewarded for that alone many times and could concentrate on the quality of just that response. It is easy from that point to hold the position without reward and then he will guess to add another aspect - leaning back slightly. I don't want to shoot for the whole thing right now because it will be nice to have him develop this slight leaning back to the point he can lean back a little and offer to hold himself there for a second or two without thinking he must add more of anything. You see this in this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f8kk7TazAAM

It's beautiful.

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PostPosted: Sat Nov 03, 2012 1:13 am 
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Today while working with Tam, I did a little more on the school halt. The last time I played with it (in my diary) I got a bit lost...I mean, I sort of lost the picture that I need to hold in my mind of how a movement should go, so that I can shape Tam slowly towards it. I hope that makes sense. ;)

So I printed out a photo of Bent Branderup doing a school halt and pinned it to the bulletin board at the stable. Now when I get lost, I can go stare at it. 8)

I tried very hard today to concentrate first on making sure Tam is squared up, then asking for just a little leaning back, and then finally asking for the leaning back and hold for a second or two before walking forward again. So I wasn't trying for more than the leaning back, but I ended up getting more because when I asked him to pause, he took that to mean it was good enough and offered to bend his hind legs AND hold there for a second (I didn't ask for two seconds). :clap:

Because of this, I stopped working on it. I could not possibly ask him to repeat something so lovely given that he gave me more than I was expecting.

I will play a little with it each time, as long as he's up for it. :f:

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PostPosted: Sat Nov 03, 2012 4:45 pm 
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I shared this on facebook but thought I should post it here too. Two wild stallions and the School Halt!
http://www.mustangwild.com/p238537202/h49ee9e1a#h49ee9e1a
Image

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PostPosted: Mon Nov 05, 2012 7:16 pm 
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Such a funny picture, Karen. :) I just wanted to say that I so enjoy reading your detailed descriptions again. I am sorry that I do not have much to contribute right now, but over the last days I have been busy with chores at our pasture and therefore only done some bits of groundwork and play now and then but no serious training.

Titum is really joining us in the school halt training now, although in about 70 % of the cases it is combined with his super-low (10-30 cm) rears. I am not trying to get rid of that for now but instead only focus on the hindleg engagement, and totally ignore whether the frontlegs leave the ground or not. I am not sure yet how I will manage to get/keep both - I loooove the long and low rears, so the last thing I want is to change them for school halt - but I guess that will come when it is time.


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PostPosted: Wed Nov 07, 2012 11:51 am 
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Had small but helpful insight with Mucki yesterday. I was working on School Halt a little bit again, which was working OK, but no real quality change. Mucki is shifting weight back fine and if I reward early enough, he does not back up. But if I ask for more engagement of the hindlegs, he usually steps back with one leg.
Yesterday I asked for a leg lift (backwards, like when picking hooves), before doing the weight shift. The leg lift alone resulted in square hindlegs, lifted forequarters and an automatic weight shift back even without cueing it. When I then asked for more weight shift, I got a hint of bend in the haunches :thumleft:

I don't know if the leg lift will cause problems in the longer run, but I think it's a simple way of communicating my intent to Mucki, so I will experiment with it further.

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PostPosted: Wed Nov 07, 2012 1:06 pm 
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Great, Volker! :) It's so nice when something that blocked the way suddenly is removed and you have an idea how you can proceed. That happend for me and Pia as well this morning. I decided that it did not matter if we destroyed the whole school halt but that in order to give her the idea of "sitting down" more, I had to get her to stop relying on that frontleg so much. So once she did her weight shift, I simply asked her to lift it. I did not care whether she hopped or fell back into doing these hectical little backwards moves or did not put much weight on the hindlegs anymore at all, as long as what she did involved taking weight away from the frontleg.

We indeed destroyed the school halt for now, but I can already see that it is getting better, with her first leaning back and then lifting the second frontleg less abruptly than in the beginning. She still stumbles back immediately when she lifts the leg (thus, she walks backwards with her hindlegs), but the movement is getting smaller already. I do not know yet where it will take us, but I got the feeling that this will work. And it reminded me of my arts teacher when I was a child who told me not to be afraid to destroy my artwork when experimenting - something much nicer might come out of it. :smile:


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PostPosted: Wed Nov 07, 2012 1:45 pm 
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Yes, can relate to that Romy! It reminds me of a TED Talk, considering the common ground of science and play. I remember that stepping into the unknown was an important asset of a good scientist ;)

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