Posts Tagged ‘hindquarters’

Does your horse have a weak topline?

Some horses just have conformation that promotes a weak topline. Whether your horse is swaybacked or loses his topline when he isn’t in training, a weak topline is never pretty. Luckily, there are three simple ways that you can help any horse build a stronger, better-looking topline.

#1: Build Your Horse’s Topline with Backing

When your horse walks backwards, he has to engage the muscles in his back and hindquarters, especially if he lowers his head while backing. Teaching your horse to back with his head down is a valuable time investment for two reasons:

1. It increases his topline

2. It puts him in a relaxed state because horses relax when their heads are low

At first, your horse may only want to back with his head up high. You may have to spend some time in the beginning teaching him to back with his head down low. Sometimes holding a treat down low can encourage your horse to drop his head.

I sometimes break the exercise into two pieces: dropping the head and backing. To teach my horse to lower his head, I crouch down low and gently tug on the lead rope. Most horses are curious enough to drop their heads and see what I’m doing. I reward that action with a treat. Next, I get teach him to lower his head while I’m standing up, again using a treat as a reward. Finally, I teach him to keep his head low while backing.

This may take several days, as some horses actually don’t know how to engage the correct muscles to back with their head low. At first, one of my horses could only take a step or two backward with his head in the correct position. It took several days before he could engage the correct muscles and back 10 steps or more.

Once your horse has learned to back with his head dropped, back him every day for 100 steps. This exercise will build the muscles in his topline, including his neck, back, and hindquarters. The results are actually surprisingly quick. You should see a difference in 2 weeks or so.

#2: Feed Your Horse on the Ground and Use Ground Toys

If you feed your horse in hanging bucket or manger, this may be contributing to his poor topline. To build a strong topline, horses need to stretch the muscles and ligaments in their topline. Feeding them on the ground will definitely help. In addition, consider using a ground toy that dispenses feed. There are a lot of options on the market, including the Nose-It, the Likit Snak-A-Ball, and the Amazing Graze toy.

These toys all roll around on the ground, which encourages your horse to keep his head down for long periods of time, thus stretching his topline muscles. When these muscles are stretched, they develop mass more easily.

I’ve used all three of the toys mentioned above, plus a few others that are no longer on the market. They work well because the slow dispensing of feed keeps your horse interested for longer than a non-food toy. It also keeps him engaged for longer than his normal hay or grain allotment.

One additional benefit is that having your horse stretch his topline is that this prevents his withers from “getting stuck,” which is the case in a lot of horses that are “built downhill.” They are not actually built that way, but their withers are stuck so they look downhill. Once their withers are released, they will have a more balanced-looking topline.

#3: Feed Raw Coconut Oil

This works well for horses who are fat all over except over their topline. For some reason, the calories from raw coconut oil go to a horse’s topline. Most horses that have this problem of being fat but having no topline have a Shao Yin personality type. These horses can be absolute pudges, yet look swaybacked and ewe-necked. So it’s coconut oil to the rescue. If you have this kind of horse, here are the three resources you need:

• Get raw coconut oil at your health food store or online
• Learn more about Shao Yin and other horse personality types at the Horse Harmony website
• Type your horse’s personality online for free at the Horse Harmony Test website if you are not sure about his type

For those of you out there with topline-challenged horses, I hope these recommendations help. They have certainly helped my two horses who have this issue, even during the winter, when they are not in training. Hope these tips help your horse, too!

Stephanie Yeh is a zen cowgirl obsessed about horses, healing, natural remedies, herbs, magic, MLM, and more. Check out natural horse care tips, ways to fund your horse obsession, natural health products, and more on her blog ( http://zencowgirl.blogspot.com ) and order XanGo mangosteen products on her website ( http://www.mangosteengood.com ).

Author: Stephanie H. Yeh
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
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Leg-yielding is an elementary exercise that should be taught on a circle (although at times it is asked for on a straight line or diagonal). It is used mainly to teach the horse to move away from the rider’s leg pressure. Once the horse is responsive, the objective is complete, and the horse should be moved towards the more beneficial shoulder-in. I believe leg-yielding has become too popular, for two reasons. First, it is required in some first-level dressage tests, so too much emphasis is placed on “schooling” for this movement. Second, it is much easier to produce than shoulder-in.

To perform leg-yielding, the horse is led onto the circle and the rider’s inside leg, used behind the girth, pushes the hindquarters out. It is easy for the horse; he is not required to maintain this bend and can easily let his hindquarters “fall out”. The horse may thus be denied the strength and balance building required in more advanced movements. He can, in fact, perform this exercise with his weight primarily on his forehand, in effect pushing himself thought the movement instead of carrying it.

Overuse of leg-yielding is not beneficial to the horse’s physical development and will only add to his resistance when he is asked to perform movements that require suppleness, bending and collection.

Shoulder-in, on the other hand, benefits the horse in many ways. The correct execution of this movement will increase the flexion of the hind legs, thereby enabling the hindquarters to carry more weight. This, in turn, allows freer more supple movement of the shoulders. It also increases the horse’s ability to collect and extend paces, and will help to improve the canter departs (again, because the movement develops the hindquarters, and lightens the forehand).

When these exercises are analyzed, shoulder-in is clearly more beneficial, from the fundamental physical development of the horse, to eventual progress to higher levels. Leg-yielding should be used minimally, with knowledge and care. I encourage anyone concerned with the correct development of the sport horse to consider this important issue.

Adrienne Neary lives and trains horses in Maine. She founded a company called Wingspan Arts International, which specializes in quality Equine Products and expert Equine Consultations. http://www.wingspanartsintl.com

Author: Adrienne Neary
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So I don’t have a fenced-in area or room for a fenced-in area at my house, so I ride down dirt roads near my house. There is a small farm near my house that has two horses in the front pasture. My horse can usually go by one way without calling them out or stopping, but on the way back, she calls to them then goes up to the fence and won’t turn around to go home. When I ask her to move she usually picks up her front legs and pivots around on her hindquarters. It takes a long time to get her to do what I want her to do and it gets really frustrating.

Shoulder-in is the father of the advanced lateral dressage movements. It does many wonderful things for your horse. Here are just some of them:

1. Shoulder-in is a suppling exercise because it stretches and loosens the muscles and ligaments of the inside shoulder and forearm. During shoulder-in, your horse passes his inside foreleg in front of his outside foreleg. This motion increases his ability to move his forearm gymnastically in other movements.

2. It’s also a straightening exercise because you should always straighten your horse by bringing his forehand in front of his hindquarters. Never try to straighten him by leg yielding his hindquarters out behind his shoulders.

3. Shoulder-in is also a collecting exercise. It increases your horse’s self-carriage because he lowers his inside hip with each step. As a result, his center of gravity shifts back toward his hind legs. His hindquarters carry more weight, and his front end elevates.

What Does Shoulder-In look like?

The horse flexes to the inside, and bends around your inside leg. His forehand comes in 30 degrees off the wall so he’s on three tracks. At this angle his inside hind leg lines up behind his outside foreleg.

Sometimes in competition, the judge likes to see a hoof’s width more than three tracks. But don’t bring the forehand in more than that, or you’ll lose the bend.

What Are the Aids?

If you’re doing left shoulder-in, the aids are:

1. Put your weight on your left seat bone.
2. Keep your left leg on the girth for bend and to ask for engagement of the inside hind leg.
3. Place your right leg behind the girth to prevent the hindquarters from swinging out.
4. Use your left rein to create a +1 flexion at poll.
5. Keep your right rein steady and supporting to prevent too much bend in the neck.
6. Keep both hands low and equidistant from your body as you move them to the left. Move them to the left enough to place the outside front leg in front of the inside hind leg. Use your inside rein as an opening rein. Bring your outside hand very close to the withers, but never let that hand cross over the withers.

What’s the Sequence of Aids?

Always ask for bend before you ask for angle. The formula for the advanced lateral exercises is: Bend + Sideways = Engagement. (It’s NOT Sideways + Bend=Engagement.)

* Make a 10-meter circle (or ride a corner with a 10-meter arc) to bend your horse.
* You’ll know your horse is bending easily when you can soften the contact on the inside rein, and he stays bent by himself. He’ll also feel like he’s “giving” in his rib cage. (i.e. If you’re circling to the right, his rib cage feels like it’s bulging to the left.)
* Once he’s bending nicely, start a second 10-meter circle.
* Interrupt that circle during the first step, and continue down the long side.
* To interrupt the circle, look straight down the long side, and give a squeeze with your inside leg.
* Bring both hands to the inside to place the forehand 30 degrees away from the wall.
* Make sure you do shoulder-in with the same amount of bend and angle in both directions. Don’t ride on three tracks in one direction and on three and a half tracks in the other.

How Can You Tell If You’re Doing a Good Shoulder-in?

* The quality of the shoulder-in really comes down to BEND.
* You know your horse is bending if his hindquarters are in exactly the same position (i.e.parallel to the wall) in shoulder-in as they are when you’re just riding straight down the track.
* If his hindquarters swing out at an angle to the wall, you’re just doing a leg yield in a shoulder-in position.

Are you sick and tired of complicated and confusing training techniques?
Are you frustrated by negative emotions like fear and lack of confidence?
Would you like to be trained by a Three Time Olympic Coach?
Learn how by going to: http://www.janesavoie.com/ or http://www.dressagementor.com

Author: Jane Savoie
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A horse’s tail is its prized possession. It’s used for comfort, to swish flies from itself and other horses, and it’s used for balance and communication. Trainers can use the horse’s tail to see if it is frightened, excited, or uncomfortable. In the show ring, a clean flowing tail can really catch the judge’s eye.

So how do you get the perfect tail? Well, first of all, it needs to be clean, and keeping a tail clean – especially a white one – is a big topic. Here, we’re going to talk about how you can clip and trim the tail to help your horse look and feel its best.

What kinds of tail trims are there?

What type of look you go for depends on your horse’s breed and what kind of work it will do. Some breeds, like Arabians, are usually shown with a natural, long, free flowing tail. Dressage horses will have a tail closely trimmed at the top to accentuate the hindquarters. Show ring hunters will need a tail that can be easily braided. Polo ponies and driving horses need close trimmed tails that can be easily tied up short to protect them from getting tangled up in traces or the polo mallets. Even horses that don’t show will benefit from a tidy tail to help keep it clean and keep it from getting matted and tangled.

Once you decide on the look you want, you get started with trimming the tail, and that will help you choose which tools you need in your horse grooming supplies.

Trimming the base of the tail

The base, or top of the tail is the most conspicuous part. If you are going to braid the tail you will need long, smooth hairs that will lie flat in a plait or braid. You will need to protect the tail from rubbing with a bandage or tail guard if your horse has the habit of scratching its tail on doors or fence posts. Fortunately for you, though, you don’t need to do a lot of trimming. That said, after you plait the tail, you may find that some hairs keep sticking out. Trimming these away with a good set of hand trimmers will make for a perfect show ring braid.

If you want a natural tail, again you won’t need to do much. The real work is for those that want a ‘pulled’ tail – that means keeping the hairs at the top of the tail very short for a close, neat finish. Traditionally, this used to be done by pulling out the long hairs, but many horse owners don’t like to do this. There’s no doubt that the horse’s tail is more sensitive than its mane, so pulling the tail is more uncomfortable for the horse than pulling the mane. And with some practice, you can get a better look with hand trimmers than you can get with a pulling comb.

Why? Well the problem comes as the hairs grow out. A newly pulled tail looks great, neat, tidy, and it really shows off the horse’s quarters and can accentuate its movement. But as the hairs grow out, they get prickly, and yet they aren’t long enough to grasp them to pull. That means you have an unsightly ‘bristle’ period until the hairs are long enough to get a grip on them. This isn’t a problem with hand trimmers!

With hand trimmers or clippers, you can choose how short you want the hairs to go. You can use wide clipper attachments to get slightly longer hairs, which are easy to get to lie flat, this is best for the top of the tail. Choose a closer trim for the sides of the tail, to clip the hairs away and really show off your horse’s quarters. Use a tail bandage and some baby oil or conditioner regularly, and you will get a smooth, professional finish. Keeping a good set of hand clippers and attachments in your horse grooming supplies means you will have a perfect finish every day.

Trimming the end of the tail

The end of the tail will also need trimming. For horses that aren’t showing, keeping the tail trimmed back to at least halfway up the cannon bone will help to keep it clean and prevent tangles and mattes. Horses that show with a natural tail may just need a little tidying up now and again for a good shape. Working horses might just need the tail shorted a little so it can be easily tied up. Show horses like hunters and dressage horses though, need a perfectly even, or ‘banged’ tail.

Getting a perfectly level tail takes two people – that’s because you need to try to simulate where the tail will be when the horse is moving. One person needs to hold the tail up just a little, so that it hangs where it would be when the horse naturally raises its tail when it moves. The best way to do this is to put your arm under the dock and simply rest the tail over. Then the second person can start trimming. Most people will choose to cut the tail at about midway up the cannon bone. However, if you are trying to make your horse’s legs look longer or shorter, you may want to cut lower or higher, or you may want to cut to match socks or stockings for a more even look. Either way, don’t use scissors.

Why not use scissors? Unless your horse has a very thin tail, there’s no way to get a perfect finish. It will take more than one cut, and that means edges and uneven ends. If you have a lot to cut off, you can start with scissors, but finish with hand trimmers. Holding the trimmers upside down, you can cut along the bottom of the tail. Unlike scissors, good, sharp clipper blades won’t push the hairs away, but will catch them and trim them evenly for a perfect flat finish. It takes a little practice, but the results are worth it.

Choosing a trimmer for tails

If you are going to be trimming your horse’s tail regularly, you should consider having a good set of horse trimmers in your horse grooming supplies. It will make keeping a ‘pulled’ and banged tail tidy easier for you and more comfortable for your horse. If you are going to be braiding your horse’s tail for shows, a good set of cordless trimmers will be essential for tidying up stray hairs – not just on your horse’s tail but for any last minute show ring touch ups. Here’s some options form the major suppliers:

Wahl horse clippers. The Wahl Bravura is a versatile hand clipper that can be used for manes and tails and more sensitive, precision areas. It can be used both with the cord and cordless, so you can take it with you to shows, and it’s quiet but powerful. It comes with a set of four attachments for clipping different areas. It’s a great choice if you can have only one set of trimmers in your horse grooming supplies.

Oster horse clippers. The Oster Powermax is a coat clipper, rather than a trimmer, but it’s a great value choice if you need one clipper that can do everything. The two-speed operation can get through thick coats, and the slower speed lets you do more sensitive work. You won’t get the precisions finish of a specially designed trimmer, but if you can only afford one set of clippers this one is more versatile than most. It will certainly make a good job of tail trimming, and it comes with a selection of attachments.

Andis horse clippers. The Andis Freedom Trimmer is a great cordless choice. It’s lightweight, lasts for an hour when fully charged, and runs quiet. You get a good choice of blades with the Freedom trimmer, so you can use these trimmers for careful work on fine hairs, then switch to more robust blades for the mane and tail.

Always choose clippers and trimmers from one of the main horse grooming suppliers. This way, you will get a warranty, you can be sure your clippers are safe to use, and getting replacement parts and blades will be easy. For trimming a perfect tail, you need to be sure your blades are sharp. If the coarse hairs of the tail get caught in dull blades, not only will you get uneven edges and broken hairs, but you risk pulling out hairs and hurting your horse. Invest in a few sets of blades, so you always have a sharp set in your horse grooming supplies, and you have spares when you need to send them away for sharpening. With a good set of trimmers and sharp blades, you can keep your horse’s tail looking neat and healthy every day.

This is the second in a series of five articles on horse grooming. This article is an easy to read, well written guide to grooming your horse’s tail. Not only does it provide specific guidance but also makes recommendations on the right horse grooming supplies to use to get the job done right in the shortest time.

Author: Marcus Koll
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You’ve probably heard lots of discussion about whether or not to work your dressage horse “deep.” There are a variety of opinions on the matter. Some riders warm up and cool down their horses “long and low” to stretch and loosen the muscles. Others always school in a balance and frame appropriate to the level at which they are working; they never stretch their horses. Many trainers school in a deep frame only during the movements when the horse habitually comes above the bit. Still others do all of their work “extremely deep” with the horse’s nose almost on his chest; they bring him up only when they are getting ready to compete.

So what should you do with your dressage horse? Use benign antagonism to help you decide.

Let’s say you’re riding a “dirt sucker.” This horse leans so heavily on the forehand that you feel like you’re somersaulting around the arena. With a horse like this, it’s best to ride him more “up.” That’s because his version of long and low is not a good one. Yes, his head and neck stretch down and out. But my concern is with his hindquarters. If his hind legs are trailing out behind his body, and he’s pushing himself heavily onto his forehand, he’s not in good balance. By shortening the reins and riding him a little more up, you can clear the way for his hind legs to come more underneath his body so he can carry himself better.

On the other hand, your dressage horse might be a “stargazer,” who goes around so inverted that you can almost look at him eyeball to eyeball. He travels with a short neck, a low back and his head and neck up in the air. To retrain and strengthen his topline muscles, put this horse in the opposite shape from the one he adopts on his own. Send his hind legs further underneath his body so that his back is up and his head and neck are low. Use a “connecting half halt” to change his shape (For more information on “connecting half halts”, see Train with Jane–Volume 2–Connection). Then, after giving the “connecting half halt”, allow the reins to get a bit longer so he can seek the contact forward and down.

Author: Jane Savoie
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Lots of people are confused by the difference between the dressage terms shoulder-in, shoulder-fore, and first position. They all have a place as far as straightening your dressage horse. That’s because we always straighten the horse by bringing the forehand in front of the hindquarters. Never straighten the horse by pushing his hindquarters over behind his shoulders.

Let’s talk first talk about the dressage term first position. To make your dressage horse straight, always ride him in first position.

First position teaches him “baby engagement” (bending of the joints) of his inside hind leg. If you don’t ride your dressage horse in first position (especially when his hollow side is on the inside), he’ll open the joints of his inside hind leg and place his hindquarters to the inside. As a result, he won’t carry as much weight on his inside hind leg, and it won’t get stronger.

Also, if you don’t make it a habit to ride in first position at the walk and trot, the first time you’ll really see and feel that your horse is crooked is during the canter. Your horse will put his hindquarters to the inside because you haven’t taught him the mechanics of bending the joints of his hind legs.

To differentiate between these three dressage terms, think of them in this way:

Shoulder-in is a straightening exercise. Bring your horse’s shoulders to the inside at a 30-degree angle to the track. At 30 degrees, his outside foreleg is in the same track as his inside hind leg.
Shoulder-fore is also a straightening exercise. Displace your horse’s shoulders to the inside at a 15-degree angle to the track so that each leg is traveling on it’s own track.
Think of first position as “the thought of” a shoulder-in. Use a very subtle version of shoulder-in aids to get first position. First position is not an exercise like shoulder-in and shoulder-fore. It’s simply the way you want to ride your straight horse.

Because first position is so subtle, ask a ground person to help you learn this feeling. To do this, ride toward someone who is standing at the end of the long side. If you’re in first position, she won’t be able to see your horse’s outside hind foot. That’s because it’s hidden behind the outside front leg. But she should be able to see half of a hoof’s width of the inside hind leg stepping to the inside of the inside foreleg.

When you’re first learning to ride your dressage horse in first position, you’ll probably override the angle and do shoulder-in or shoulder-fore. So it’s helpful to have a ground person or mirror so you can develop a feel for the subtlety of this position. Once you can identify this feeling, your horse will feel odd and unbalanced to you when he’s crooked.

Author: Jane Savoie
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The systematic way to train a dressage horse to do a walk pirouette is to start with turn on the haunches.

A turn on the haunches is a 180-degree turn done at the walk. Your horse bends in the direction of the turn. His forehand moves around his haunches until he’s facing the opposite direction. His outside hind foot and his forefeet move around his inside hind foot, which forms a pivot.

Your horse must maintain the regular rhythm of his walk. His pivot leg gets picked up and put down each time, slightly ahead of where it was before.
Turn on the haunches engages the hindquarters and encourages bending of the joints of the hind legs. The end result is that your horse’s body feels more packaged.
Turn on the haunches is an introductory movement for the walk pirouette. It differs from a pirouette because it’s done from a shortened medium walk while a pirouette is done from a collected walk. Also in the turn on the haunches, your horse’s hind feet make a small circle, (about the size of a dinner plate). In a walk pirouette, your horse’s inside hind leg should be picked up and put down almost on the same spot.

The aids to train your dressage horse to do a turn on the haunches to the left are:

Seat:
Put your weight on your left (inside) seat bone.

Left leg (inside leg):
Place your left leg on the girth to promote bending and engagement of your horse’s inside hind leg.

Right leg (outside leg):
Place your right leg behind the girth to help bend your horse around your inside leg and to prevent his hindquarters from swinging out.

Left rein:
Turn your wrist to ask for +1 flexion.

Right rein:
Use your right rein as a siderein to limit the amount of bend you get in the neck.

Both hands:
Move both hands in the direction of the turn to move the forehand around the hindquarters. Keep your hands side-by-side and equidistant from your body. Think of your left rein as an opening rein and bring your right rein closer to your horse’s neck. Imagine that your hands are like the second hand on a clock sweeping around the face of the clock.

The sequence of aids are:

1. Prepare for the turn by using a “stilled seat” to shorten your dressage horse’s medium walk.

2. Bend your horse to the inside.

3. Set him up for the turn by riding in a slight shoulder-fore position.

4. Bring both hands in the direction you want his body to turn to guide his forehand around his hindquarters.

Since the two most important ingredients to train a dressage horse to do a correct turn on the haunches are rhythm and bend, preserve these qualities by introducing it on a circle.

Do haunches-in on a 10-meter circle.
As long as your horse keeps his rhythm, bend, and desire to go forward, decrease the size of the circle while you’re still in haunches-in gradually.
Make the circle only as small as you can while keeping the rhythm, bend, and forward desire.

Author: Jane Savoie
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