Big Ride Today!

Sonny had to return to earning his keep today. Yesterday we had quite a bad storm that produced a mini twister. It blew over some trees which landed on fences & required fixing straight away. The rest I left until today. I was going to walk around the boundary fences but decided to ride Sonny instead.

So wearing his Easyboot Trails on his front feet I rode him in a halter with the bareback pad on. I just wanted him to walk but as usual he had other ideas. He just can’t help himself! lol He pig rooted, farted, squealed, grunted, humped up, high kicked particularly going up or down a slope. There are much easier ways to get bucked off than when he does his high kicks when he is frustrated that I won’t let him go at the speed he wants to go at. Any amount of pre-ride work is always 5mins too much  or too little for him. He’s such a card!

So we mostly walked around the boundaries a total of a bit over 1000m (1km) on soft soil through a lot of long thick grass. I tried as best I could to find gentle slopes into & out of the creek so as not to overwork his front feet too much. I tried very hard to give clear signals for riding since it was his first ride in 19mths (& mine too) other than the few ultra short rides in the round pen during the last few weeks. I didn’t want to have to get firm with him for being exuberant but I didn’t want him going silly & hurting his feet. So if he went along 50m without acting up I stopped him & gave him a treat carrot ring. That is new for him.

So I watch to see how his feet are over the next several days. The new highway opened tonight so I now have the old highway bitumen road to ride him on to exercise him & his feet.

There still isn’t very much growth in his feet. They were looking good today so I didn’t trim anything off prior to booting him. He has a nice evenly thick wall around all feet now where it touches the ground. My new camera has arrived at the retailer so I will hopefully pick it up later this week. I can take some photos of his feet then.

I have been ground working him at a trot & canter (usually booted) around some road markers that I set up in various patterns including knee high jumps over logs. He likes that as it reminds him of gymkhana. I’m aiming to increase his exercise daily as much as my body will tolerate without putting him online or overworking his feet. For him I think online is not good as he develops lazy biomechanics. While I rode him today I could feel the muscles along his back working. He hasn’t used them for a long time. They used to just go limp & I could feel his backbone. So he must now be using his topline & HQ much more now. So the less online I can do the better I think. It would also be due to his feet not hurting probably too.

 

So yet another milestone! More good things happening.