My lease with Garth was up on Thursday, but his owner needed someone to ride him yesterday. Technically Thursday was my last day, but I liked yesterday better...He was terrible on Thursday, he just wouldn't stop bucking or he'd take off with me. Yesterday was much better. His owner had me try a different saddle with him to se if it would help any. I'm not sure if it did or not, but he was a little better today.
Garth did scare me a little bit yesterday, when I went to get him out of his stall he lunged at me with is ears pinned and tried to bite me.He has never done that to me before. I think it was partially because he had just gotten fed about 10 minutes ago and hadn't finished all of his food. The only thing that could get him out was when I opened a peppermint. I gave it to him once he stood for me without pinning his ears. Food always seems to make him like me more...
When I rode him he was pretty cranky, but he didn't take off with me at all. He was bucking, but not anything too bad. Just little ones while we were cantering. I've been the only one to ride him all week since his other leaser couldn't come, and it just wasn't enough for him. I just let him go and canter around a bunch of times (plenty of breaks in between, though) to just get his energy out. The arena only had one other rider, and she was very nice and gave me some tips on how to keep him from bucking like that. She said he was just on the wrong lead in the back, but his ears were pinned so I think he was just being crabby.
Of course, as soon as he realized I was done riding, he turned into the perfect horse again. My dad took 3 pictures of us after we rode, so here they are:
One of his ticks, funny face.
It's a little hard to see, but I was joking that we should hang a peppermint infront of him to get him to move. I ran back in forth in front of the pen and he trotted to get the peppermint. What that horse will do for food...
Sorry for such a looooooooong post, and if I bored you, sorry again! As far as I know his owner hasn't found another leaser, so I she might need me to help her out with exercising him until then. I feel kind of guilty about thinking this, but I'm a little happy. I'm going to miss him so much when I don't get to ride him again!
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