When we left the arena to go walk in the fields Darby was striding out as a man on a mission. He wanted to out-walk Highboy, despite the fact that Highboy's legs are nearly a foot longer than his. This was ok in the beginning, because Highboy was preoccupied watching our neighbor's horses meander out to their field after finishing their breakfast.
Things changed once we went around the northwest corner of the back field. Suddenly Highboy couldn't see the neighbor horses, and with him it's out of sight, out of mind. Darby became his new focus. Highboy began to take longer and faster steps, quickly closing the distance Darby had worked so hard to create in the lead. Once they were neck and neck (still walking), Darby began to jig a little. This is highly out of the ordinary for him as mostly he prefers to shuffle along looking at the scenery and smelling the flowers. Highboy gave Darby the side-eye look down his long face, and then Highboy squealed.
The squeal is the first auditory indicator that Highboy is about to become airborne, similar to the revving of a plane engine just prior to takeoff. He tilts his head towards his buddy, in this case Darby, then squeals, and then three or more hooves leave the ground. There is a brief moment between the squeal and the launch when I can sometimes circumvent the acrobatics, but today it was not to be. Highboy kicked out with both hind feet, then landed and propelled himself into the air with all four hooves. I growled at him a bit which at least got his attention, and we resumed walking. Highboy was just waiting for the next opportunity to challenge Darby to a drag race.
Highboy repeated these shenanigans at least half a dozen more times between the west perimeter fence and our return to the barn. Each time he would approach Darby, Darby would scuttle forwards at the trot, Highboy would squeal and leap. Eventually Darby got irritated with not being able to settle this argument and he took a couple frustrated swings at elderly Sara who he was still leading.
It was a circus of nonsense, as so many of Highboy's rides are. We did eventually make it back to the barn, so all's well that ends well. At least Highboy enjoyed himself.
It must have been a good day for shenanigans, because Note was silly today too. He started out fine, standing politely for grooming and tacking up, walking nicely down to the arena, standing quietly for mounting. He even walked off in a mannerly fashion. Then for some unknown reason, maybe it was Miles the Border Collie's attempt at a leprechaun practical joke, Miles stalked and pounced on an orange cone.
Those cones are in the arena all the time, and the dogs almost always ignore them. Emphasis on the "almost". Today Miles felt the cone needed to be caught, so he pounced on it, snarling and barking. He lifted it up and began running around the arena shaking it hard enough to snap its neck if it had one.
Note does all of his training rides with the dogs in the arena, but he has never seen the dog go after and kill an orange cone before. He felt this was just cause for concern, and he began jumping and bucking, kicking out at Miles. He didn't seem scared, though, so it's hard to say whether he was defending himself from a predator, or playing with the dog.
I quickly dismounted and put the cones out of reach of the dogs. This is yet another example of why it's so important to learn to do moving dismounts so I can safely get off even if the horse is in motion! Next I put Note on the lunge line to get his ya-yas out, but he proceeded to race in circles around me, kicking his heels over his head nearly every stride. When I asked him to halt he would slide to a stop, sit back on his haunches to spin in a western-style rollback, and take off galloping the other direction. After a few minutes of this I could see he was only winding himself up further and we weren't going to get a tired Thoroughbred this way. So I stopped him and then set up three ground poles in the path of his lunging circle.
I like to use this kind of technique when I have an incredibly fit or hot horse. He must slow down so as not to hit the poles or stumble on them, and it works well to get his brain engaged since I know I'm not going to physically tire him out. If the three poles hadn't worked I would have set up more, or raised some of them off the ground so he would have had to focus not just on the distance between them but also the height. Since I can't make him physically tired I go for mentally tired. Today I had with me the luck of the Irish, and it worked. Note put his brain back in his head, slowed down to a measured trot, and worked his way through the poles in a civilized manner.
Once he had demonstrated he was willing to work with me in a thoughtful way, I mounted again. However, Note was still looking for an excuse to be silly. Some pigeons obliged him by dive-bombing us, initiating a few good bucks. I'm not sure how today's pigeon predicament came to be, because this morning I also had both owls perched in the rafters of the arena. But the pigeons were still remarkably brazen. In the end I did most of Note's ride in the outdoor half of the arena just to avoid the conflict. Sometimes you have to pick your battles.
Note eventually settled under saddle a little and I got a few good topline stretches out of him with a couple nice hops over the crossrails. When another rider joined us in the arena he behaved himself well. I do have to acknowledge that Note hadn't been ridden for four days because we have had 40 mph wind here, so in balance it was still a good ride. However, I sure would like to talk to Miles about why he chose today to go after that cone, as well as have a talk with the owls about why they allowed so many pigeons to join them in the indoor!
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