Hi folks, Charlie Horse here.
I received an interesting letter from Kelly. He describes what his human calls "natural horsemanship play-days." This stuff sounds like it might be a very good thing for the equines of this world. Without further ado, here is Kelly's letter.
Hey Charlie, How are you doing? I just want to let you know what is happening in our pasture family this spring. Some very interesting games are going on here. My human says they are natural horsemanship games. First of all, Gypsy and I have a new pasture mate. Her name is Shadow and she is an Appoloosa pony cross. She said she was 20 something but wouldn't elaborate any further on the subject. She is in good shape for an old girl and is a lot of fun to chase. Her human was fun to chase for a while but she is being coached by my human on how to tell me "NO." That wasn't fun at first because I felt like I was losing control of the situation around home.
Now, I'm going to explain some of the games I mentioned and they are proving to be a lot of fun for me. My human started taking me to another horse place late last fall to what she called play-days. It was infrequent until about 2 months ago. I think she told Shadow's human that it was every 2 weeks. Anyway, now that the humans are starting to get the hang of the equine language it is really fun. Shadow and her human are going also.
It took several times for me to realize that she was using our language. She calls it body language but to me it is just how we communicate with each other all the time. She is getting a lot better at it and that is what makes it so fun. I can actually understand what she is saying and it makes me feel better. I am beginning to see her leadership abilities become more stable and now it makes life easier when she is around. She tried before but wasn't consistent and it made it real confusing for me.
Let me explain a little about the games we are playing. First one is the backing up game. It starts out with her giving me that frown and the ears back look. At first I wasn't paying attention and so she would increase the pressure. She wiggled her finger at me. The next increases were wiggling her hand, then her elbow and the final step was her whole arm. I only let her get to the whole arm a couple of times. With every increase of pressure I could feel the hard metal thing move under my chin. With the whole arm moving the hard metal thing clunked me on my jawbone. I didn't like that so I won't let it get that far anymore. When I back up she releases the pressure.
That was easy to figure out and so I just back way up before it gets painful. When she smiles and cocks her foot I know I'm back far enough. Sometimes I try to sneak back to her when she is relaxed but she puts her ears back at me and I have to step back to get her to relax again. To make life easier I pretty much stay back until she asks me to come to her but I just have to try every once in a while to see if I can get her to move her feet. So far it hasn't worked.
Next is the come over here game. After a while she will smile and motion with her hands for me to come to her. That is really nice cause when I get there she gives me a nice face rub or scratches my neck or ears. Boy oh boy do I like to get my ears scratched! I mean she gets right inside and digs! WOW what a good thing that is because I can't get down there where the deep itching is and she is so good at it!
She is getting very good at these two games. The other day my human called me in from the front pasture. Then she gave me the signal to back up and I did. She left me standing there and went to go get Gypsy. Now I watched and knew I should wait for her to get back and play the come here game but she was getting so far away. I figured she was out of range and I could follow her now. I started to take a step and she hollered my name. When I looked up at her she had her ears back and shaking her finger at me. Well, I know what the next increase in pressure feels like so I stepped right back! Wow, I sure didn't know that she was so good from that far away. My respect for her just went up a couple of notches. When she got back and closed the gate she walked over to pet Gypsy. I wanted to go to her and get my pets too but I know now she is a lot stronger than I thought. Right after she pet Gypsy she turned to me and finally played the come to me game and I was so happy to go get my pets and she did the ear scratching too! That was worth waiting for.
The next game is kind of weird. She sends me around her in a circle and I have to keep going until she asks me to face up. Sometimes she sends me over a log that I have to jump. The first few times I was pretty scared. I didn't think I could jump it. As it turns out it is the same as jumping the ditch. Pretty cool!
When we go to the other horse place we play these natural horsemanship games at the play-days. We use them to negotiate lots of different obstacles. Another thing that I enjoy is when my human and I play the games I don't have to wear a saddle or a bit. She rides me bareback with just the halter and lead rope. That makes it more comfortable for me.
There are some other games but I'm running out of room on this paper. I guess I do like all this game playing with my human.
Great letter Kelly. Say, I like the sound of these games. Would you write again sometime and tell us more? I certainly want to hear more and I'm sure others would too.
Until next time,
Charlie Horse : - )
