which_chick | Pony project update

Trys and I played ponies over the weekend (glacial progress is still progress) and that went well.

We caught the ponies (This means "stand at gate and yell PONY PONY PONY and they come running". It's not very effortful even though the ponies are loose in a big field. They never, ever get grain in the field but if we catch them, then there is a small amount of sweet feed which is like candy for ponies. Thing is, ponies are very food-motivated and so "come when called, we have candy!" is super easy to "teach".

First time: Yell PONY PONY PONY three times, like three efforts, with pauses in between. Then catch ponies. Then feed ponies small amount of sweet feed. And do whatever. Repeat next time you go to get the ponies. Yell PONY PONY PONY three times. If ponies don't come over, go fetch them and then feed them and then do whatever.

Our ponies are smart and they've gotten on board by three days worth of PONY PONY PONY. It helps that the work sessions are short and honestly pretty easy, but the food motivation inherent in ponies is the real star of the show, here. Also, this is part of Work Smarter Not Harder. I don't want to trudge over frozen wasteland to retrieve ponies if I can avoid it. Also, it is a lot easier to find the time to work with ponies when I can get them to canter over to me at the gate.) and fed/groomed them and did the usual ground work to be in a working frame of mind.

This included bridle and bit-wearing practice, which is coming along. Snap and Switch are almost ready for real reins attached to a bit, after three exposures to wearing a bit, because they can hold a bit quietly for most of the time now and only resort to spit-the-bit efforts if they are somewhat worried. (Why might a pony be worried? Because we were leaving the familiar security of the Driveway Work Area and going on our second in-hand (not riding) expedition ever Across The Road. Change is scary for ponies. They'd only been there once before, so... they were worried. The scary expedition Across The Road concluded near the pear tree, where the ground is made lumpy by windfall pears harboring somewhat frozen yellowjackets. Ponies did a few circles of easy rope work followed by two pears each and then we went home. Expedition not so scary after all, plus bonus snax!)

(What does a pony doing spit-the-bit look like? Like this. This is day 2 of Switch trying to spit-the-bit. She was much better on day 3 but I didn't get video of that because there wasn't much to see. In this effort, you can see she's blinking and not horribly horrified. Day 1 was a more-vigorous spitting effort that almost never ceased but pony was still not horribly horrified.)

Trys and I did little rides with the ponies, down to the woodpile and back, with some great big huge circles en route. It's a distance of maybe 100 feet? Like, they're still tiny little short rides, but they involve all the features of riding. Start walking, steer left and right, continue over the (scary) puddles, go where aimed, etc. The brakes are currently at "turn a small circle" levels of functional because pulling straight back on both reins has not got tons of meaning for the ponies yet. We're working on it.

For these little rides, there was nobody alongside them walking and there wasn't a buddy pony to follow along or walk with them. They were "solo" little rides by themselves while the other pony did other things and they had to go off by themselves. The other pony was 100% in sight the whole time, but it was a less-supportive, more independent effort.

These do seem like pathetically small steps forward and I'm sure the audience is "Why are you twinking about?" and "Nothing is happening here" but honestly? We've not done a ton of work sessions.

We've done... five? six? work sessions. Not a ton. The ponies come when called. They are easy to catch and halter. They know all their ground work skills. They pick up their feet. They work a gate well. They stand to be groomed and tacked up. They are reasonably easy to bridle and unbridle, to put bareback pads (These are our "saddles" for now. We don't have saddles that fit adult asses and pony backs at the same time, so it's bareback pads for us until the ponies ride well enough to put kiddos aboard in kid-ass, pony-back saddles. The ponies have indeed worn real saddles with stirrups flopping and stuff, that's part of Meet The Tack, but our adult asses do not fit in those saddles, so we use bareback pads without stirrups for our rides.) on and girth up.

They stand quietly for mounting from either side and do not automatically walk off. They don't overreact if someone brushes their butt with a foot while swinging a leg over. They don't care if you knock over the "mounting block" bucket or if they run into it when walking off. (These are ponies FOR CHILDREN. If you are under 13.2, adults don't want to ride you. These ponies need to be tolerant.) They stand well for dismounting.

They steer left and right at the walk. They know how to back up at least three steps. They have some idea of halting. They know how to walk on and they can patiently stand still under saddle. It's kinda seriously like riding... just small, short rides, is all.

They are getting *better* at things and they are learning things. There is definite progress happening, here. Also, neither middle-aged pony handler has fallen off, been bucked off, been hurt, etc. Neither pony has felt super pressed about things. There has been absolutely no pony "misbehavior" or "being bad" because we have taken the time to 'splain everything in small, easy-to-digest pieces to the ponies, with every increased ask a small enough change that the ponies can handle it.

All things considered, it's going quite well. We'll do some more small rides (with handlers changing horses) this coming weekend. Trotting might happen before the end of November. Stay tuned for more... unexciting updates. :)