Turns out you can teach an old horse new
tricks after all. That is, you can teach your sassy retired 16-year-old
Saddlebred mare to jump over a fallen tree limb.
It’s been about a year and one month since
Bella hit the show ring for the last time. Since then we’ve been learning new
things just for fun, and I appreciate that she lets me learn with her. We’ve
learned galloping through fields is a great activity when we’re feeling extra energetic.
We’ve learned ground poles and other obstacles are not so scary in the ring,
and we can walk, trot, and canter over them. We’ve learned how to hack around
the farm and not spin around at every single new sight. Today we learned not to
be scared a fallen tree limb on a trail path.
And today I learned Bella wants to take on
cross country as a second career.
Last weekend Andrew dug out all sorts of
poles for Bella to do ring work with. He made a zig-zag path to walk through
with “scary” obstacles (a small, fake cow used for roping practice and a tire)
outside the path. Bella not only had to stay within the path, but walk past
obstacles on the sideline. We walked, then trotted, into an octagon shaped by poles
and went around an obstacle in the middle. We also managed walking and trotting
over three ground poles surrounded by other poles and obstacles.
The lesson seemed to prove helpful today. After
pattern practice for tomorrow’s intercollegiate show, Andrew suggested I trail
ride Bella around the farm. We set out with Andrew following on foot and went
by the pond, down a fence line, through some trees and a field. Bella calmly
went past places she had formally tried to turn around in. As we came to the
trail path that leads to the very back field, we noticed something new — a
fallen tree limb.
This is where plans changed. Bella wanted
nothing to do with the fallen limb. She wouldn’t even stand and look at it. She
only wanted to turn around and go the opposite direction. The funny thing was,
all it took was Andrew stepping over the fallen limb. Then Bella followed like
she hadn’t just tried to turn and run.
And here is where our fun began. After Bella stepped
over the fallen limb just fine from both directions, I wondered if she would
trot over it too. Well, Bella didn’t just trot over it. She jumped it. And then
we went over it at a trot again. Then a canter. Then Bella decided she wanted
to be a cross country horse. She tried to take off like she had never taken off
in her life. With her ears pricked forward, she was ready to run faster than
she ever had before. It took me a few seconds before I could rein her back in.
We walked back to the barn after that. Bella
kept her head held high, proud and feeling full of herself. Andrew and I cleaned
her off before turning her out to go harass some poor soul of a horse. I’m
forever grateful Bella still lets me learn with her in retirement. She doesn’t
make everything easy, but she takes care of me and teaches me new things with every
ride.
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