Ruffian: So much energy!

March 20 2010

After I played with Twosox I played with Ruffian. He had followed us up to the riding ring when Twosox and I went up and stayed there the whole time so I decided to play with him. It was so much fun! He had a lot of energy so we had a fun time played with that. All Ruffy wanted to do was run, run, run. So I let him. We got some really nice circles as a result! At first I just let Ruffy canter as long as he wanted but after  while I started doing different things. We did some transitions (Ruffy even galloped!) change of directions, jumping, and some other stuff. I couldn't believe how much energy Ruffy had!  

At one point the rope got caught under Ruffy's leg so I just let go considering he was cantering rather fast, then the rope flew up and got caught under his tail... which of course clamped down as soon as Ruffy felt that. So I just stood there watching. Ruffy gave a couple good bucks then proceeded to run around the riding ring. After a couple laps he stopped and looked at me and then came over and we continued. I decided not to let Ruffy run to much more in case he scarred himself again. So after that we did some Touch it, sideways over the barrels, falling leaf, and some other stuff. Ruffy did really well and was asking loads of questions! 

I decided that I wanted to teach Ruffy how to lead by the chin. All the other horses know how to do it but I never took the time to teach Ruffy so I took the lead rope off and off we went. I only had to use the halter as a back up a couple times. So that was really good. Normally Ruffian will just toss his head and really resist it but today he did very well and followed the feel perfectly!! We even did a little bit of trotting. After that we played at Liberty for a little bit but then Ruffy realised that he could leave (out part of the fence where the top rail is broken. So he trotted off and went down the hill into the corral. So I went and got him and brought him back up. I could have ended down in the corral but I wanted to finish want we were playing with. Ruffy came back up with me and we finished up and then I let him go. He stayed with me though so I rubbed him for a while before I had to leave.

I am really going to try to play with Ruffy and Twosox more and still keep up the 3-4 play times a week with Prince. It will be really hard once summer gets here but I have to try. It might mean cutting back on other things but this is really important to me. So hopefully I can figure something out. If I could play with three horses each day that would be fabulous but I highly doubt I could keep that up for long! I will try for two horses a day though. One in the morning and one in the afternoon and once summer comes and the bugs get back I will do one in the morning and one in the evening... or something like that :)

Natrually,

~Keri