Bebe's Explosion - Conversation with Carol Coppinger 5* Parelli Instructor and Long Line Driving with Sundance

Bebe

Email I sent Carol -

Hello Mrs. Carol,

I've got a little puzzle for you. I have been trying very hard the past 2 months or so to figure this one out, and am getting a little progress but not as much as I should be getting in this length of time. Bebe my 5 year old quarter horse LBE  dominant / RBI ( ? very hard to determine absolute horsenality), has done very well with Level one and two, been a star actually. Then the beginnings of Level 3 have been great, until he had to get out on that 45 foot line in the circling game. I have worked through, with him, a lot of fear of getting out there 45 feet away from mom. He didn't seem comfortable at all without mom holding his hand, but now with some brain storming he can get out there a lot better. He started to feel comfortable and get the idea when we did some one rein type driving where I ask him sideways until his HQ's are toward  me and then ask  him to move on until he finds the end of the line and then proceed onto the circle, and if I wiggle the carrot stick towards zone 2 he needs to face out and get out a little farther. This has gotten good at the walk, and got a lot better at the trot as of today. Where things go wrong is where he "suddenly" explodes, here are the series of events. Something (who knows what or 'who' is that something) disturbs him, he squeals loud (sounds dominant) and jumps in the air and canters, therefore gets his adrenaline up which makes him go right brained, when he feels he can get a hold of himself or needs my direction he very abruptly stops and tries to come to me. Sometimes when he stops he re-explodes and goes back out, all the while I try to keep very low confident energy. I am not sure why he does this, he can go from LB to RB and then back to LB in a matter of seconds and I am not sure what is triggering this. I would love your thoughts and help on this!

Thanks so much in advance!

Mariah Helms 
Little Patch of Heaven Stables
Private Boarding & Riding Facility
704.233.446 /  704.499.1019       
Now offering affordable Private
lessons and Ground work classes
http://www.mariahpnhelms.blogspot.com/

 

Carol's Response -

Hello Mariah,

Great to hear from you.  It sure sounds like he is very unconfident out on the 45 and does not know he is doing OK and may even be going introverted on you.  I would really work at building his confidence at a walk and then a trot at 22+ feet and work up to 45 a it sounds like you have been doing.  It is scary out there!  Not to mention a carrot stick out of the blue just when he thinks he is doing the right thing possibly.  Make sure he is asking questions.  Which way are his ribs?  If they are in then he is thinking going out.

Just a thought.  Slow it down and reward more often and see if you can build his confidence and get him asking questions.

If you would like to call and discuss it,  that would be fine.  The best time to reach me is in the evening at ***-***-2039.

Thanks,

Carol

Parelli Natural Horse-Man-Ship Licensed 5 Star Premier Instructor

If you reply to this message PLEASE leave the e-mail message I sent you attached.

Note: e-mail address is: carol@carolcoppinger.com
website is: www.carolcoppinger.com

 

I talked with Carol, she was sweet, funny, helpful and outgoing as usual. She made it a little more clear for me and reassured me I CAN DO THIS! She knew I was kind of struggling with it because I am such a perfectionist and always wants to be the one with the answers as a future instructor. (Me and my stupid predatorial ambition) I could tell in her voice she was still grieving over Ranger pretty bad, so I assured her I would be praying and she said she needed all the prayers she can get... so I would appreciate all of you that are coming along with me here in my journey to pray for Carol's strength and help her get through this hard time. She is such a precious lady, I can't wait to spend more time with her.

Here is the email I sent to her, and will explain how the session went -

Hello Carol,

He occasionally looks out with his ribs towards me to get out on the line then when he is out there he does better.

I made our session different, today instead of asking him to go on out there at first I held him back and let him go out when he offered and only when I wanted him too. He only broke into a trot 2 times and was pretty easy to get back down to a walk, he never jumped up or squealed or became right brained. He offered to get out all the way to the end of the 45 foot line at the end of the session but his druthers we're pretty bad, he was at a 45 foot length towards the half where the barn is and the other half was about 20-25 feet.  So now the problem is the druthers, I cannot do this any closer to the barn because of weeds that are about 4 ft tall... I wish I could to make him more comfortable but can't. Maybe I can do some tasks to help those druthers disappear I am just not sure which to do. You know this frustrates me! And you know why too,  I as a future instructor should have an know all the answers! (Haha, but that's how I feel.) So I appreciate the help. Bebe showed some new positive traits today, he put his head down a lot beside me, licked his lips and yawned within a 2 minute period which is very odd. He also, for the very first time started to run beside me and walked to the barn with Sundance and I as I was long driving him on the 45 foot line and wanted to stay close to me while I was working with Sundance instead of going up to the barn with the alphas. How Interesting! With his horsenality, I believe innately he is a Moderate LB Extrovert but can become an unconfident LBE then snap into the RBE category.

Stop by my blog sometime to see what Sundance and I are up to, http://mariahpnhelms.blogspot.com/.

Thanks for the help!

Mariah Helms 
Little Patch of Heaven Stables
Private Boarding & Riding Facility
704.233.446 /  704.499.1019       
Now offering affordable Private
lessons and Ground work classes
http://www.mariahpnhelms.blogspot.com/

 

Have any of you had any problems with druthers? How have you handled them?

Sundance

Well, after the Beebsters and I got done playing I walked to Fabio since he was near and decided to go back to some old tasks we did in stages 1/2 since I had the 45 foot line in my hand. He never really got the flying change well on the line but mastered it at liberty (How weird!?) but did really good on the line this time. I remembered reading and that we were going to be doing more long line driving on the 45 ft line so I snapped it on and we started to play. This is only the second time he had done this with me, so I was surprised on how well he did. We walked, trotted, cantered, sidepassed, stopped and backed and had LOTS of fun! I forgot how fun it was, and I am sure we will zoom through the tasks when I officially start them. We had lots of lip licking and ears forward, Fabio just wanted something new to do and learn. I can't wait for the next session! Sundance is so fabulous, fabulous Fabio. Oh, and I learned a new way for Sundance to help me up bareback! I will have to video it and show ya'll, it's a lot of fun.

 

I have been busy with rodeo friends and lessons, I had one today and will have one tomorrow thankfully. I am saving up for a fluidity saddle for little Bebe, so maybe some lessons will pick up and I will have enough by next summer or spring.

Quick Video Update

Something I threw together this afternoon, I will be taking a high quality video when Sundance is actually in a good mood... he wasn't very enthusiastic today but had enough footage to make a little update video.

Time goes by so fast...Officially Done with Stage 3

Okay, the last time I blogged it was Saturday... so I will start there. Saturday morning one of my precious students and I went to Mephibosheth Farms for their annual Walk-A-Thon, it was fabulous. I met some other Parelli enthusiasts and another of my blog fans, Rebecca, that volunteers there often. It was funny because I was just standing there listening to a conversation and here pops up this sweet girl, saying "Hi Mariah, I'm Rebecca!" I had a moment of slight panic, I was saying, "Rebecca... Rebecca? Rebecca! Oh, crap. I don't recognize her.... ugh! How does she know me? I should know her if she knows me! Ah, crud!" in my head, but of course I said "Hi Rebecca!" on the outside. It was a sigh of relief knowing that she was a fan I had never met, I know so many people... I want to be good at recognizing them and their names and it kills me when I don't! But it was great, she seems like a sweet girl. I know your probably reading this Rebecca, here's my email savvysundance@hotmail.com, if you still would like to come over and ride, Bebe's waiting on you! When I got back from the Walk-A-Thon, I had a Brooks reunion to go to then a double party whammy at my house. Early Sunday morning Sundance and I went to Charlotte's for a Parelli Varsity Team practice, last one until October 12th at Chetola Farms. Charlotte informed me of another performance we will be doing in February in Pelzer, SC at the South Carolina Horseman's Council Weekend Celebration, which is pretty exciting I'd say. Visit http://www.foxpointfarms.com/ for more information on what we are doing, what were about and what we plan to do. I've got to practice before the performance, we have to do some pretty complicated dances and patterns on our horses for the demo and I want to get it just right. Here is the Parelli Varsity Team requirements chart I made for Charlotte that she'll be putting up soon, how's it look?

(Click picture for larger view)

Sundance and I can do all these pretty easy, no problem. About 16 + people and their horses showed up in the tiny arena, I am sure there will be less than that because not everyone can do them from what it looked like... they did good though! I hope most of them can make it, but not too many because it was pretty hectic. I wonder how many there will be, and still have questions about the order of our performance because that was not discussed. Hmmm... Oh well, Charlotte always follows through. I still need lots of prayers and thoughts going towards the Parelli Celebrations performance, I really really hope we can do that but Charlotte hasn't heard back from Pat or his legal team. Just got to keep on working hard and staying positive! If you do it usually works out pretty well. Of course, Sundance and I did play the days before the practice. He offered a perfect flying lead change at liberty for the 2 days that we played, CHECK! All of Stage 3 complete. Yesterday, the day after the practice, I was sure Sundance was still a little tired and wanted to do something different so I put on my natural performer and cradle bridle on an moseyed around. I absolutely cannot recall the last time I put that saddle let alone any saddle on that horse, I think it's been months because we have been working so hard on online and liberty. To be honest, I was afraid he was going to feel pretty cruddy because I hadn't done this in a while. Boy was I as wrong as the day is long, he was AMAZING! Like eye popping amazing. I barely had to use the cradle bridle and when I did he was as light as a feather, the saddle was so uphill on him too, he was all uphill and did a tiny fluid canter that felt so good and on the right lead too! His right lead is the hardest, so I was surprised. The session only lasted about 10 minutes because of the darkness so as soon as he gave me that right lead so beautifully I gave him a cookie out of my parelli cookie waist bag and rode straight to the barn. Oh, and my jods I got, they ride beautifully. When I am standing the bottom of my pants are slighly bunched up and touching the top of my spurs, and when I get on Fabio they aren't bunched up but they still touch the top of my spurs, so thank the lord I now have the perfect riding pants. Back to Fabs, I have seen this liberty build up his hindquarters a lot, the first thing Char noticed about him was how big his hindquarters have gotten. He has gotten real light at liberty too, that is the reason why he moved so well and was so light in the saddle. All I could say and can say is WOW! The senoirs feeding schedule has changed in preparation for the winter, so I have to feed and wait for them to eat in the mornings... so I have to scoot and let them out. I will update on our next session if I can, hope ya'll have a great week. Please comment, I love feedback.

XOXO

Mariah Helms