More teamwork

I tell you what ... having a nice storm system swirling about all week has been so awesome.  I've played with my horses almost every night.  I'm real happy about that.

Last night was teamwork night.  2 horses, one sled, 2 hours of work.

The highlight of the evening was to see that both horses are actually beginning to see that they are workhorses.  Let me explain.  It's one thing for a horse to tolerate a harness and then do what you say, and another for a horse to know that when the harness is on, they are gonna work and actually look forward to it.  Rachel is changing right before my eyes and it's awesome.  I always put her collar on by just sliding it over her head and down her neck.  Up until this week she kind of mildly tolerated it.  This week she is actually pushing her head through.  I just hold the collar up over her nose and she does what she can to get it on.  She knows where it goes and seems to want it on. 

Also, the last few nights, she has surpassed Pam in wanting to pull.  Rachel has been a constant step ahead of Pam the last few nights.  This is different from Monday night when Pam was a step ahead.  I find myself getting after Pam to step up, and then when Pam does do a quick step to get even with Rachel, I have to make sure to hold Rachel back so she doesn't just break into a trot to stay ahead.

Last night the girls seemed very full of energy and so I did lots of trotting with them.  This is good because it let's us work on the "trot up" command I'm trying to ingrain in them.  I was real impressed though.  Both girls seemed to have no problem and I didn't have to get on them about wanting to stop either.  Great progress.

The lowlight is my rein control.  I'm not happy with things and need to do some research and try and get it to where I feel like I have more control on the lines.  I think the biggest issue was that the girls seemed to not keep a constant relationship next to each other while working.  Pam was always falling a step behind and in the process of stepping up, she would get really close to Rachel, or further away than she should.  They have a yoke on, but sometimes they are 4 inches from each other, and other times they're over a foot away from each other.  This makes it a nightmare to try and keep line tension good.  Rachel seems steady as can be so I want to say that Pam is just not falling in line like she should.  I don't know though.  There were many times when I'd try to turn and I'd get the inside line on one horse with good tension, but there wouldn't be any tension on the outside line of the other horse.

I'm going to look more into team line adjustment.  My current line setup up has me using some spreaders on the inside.  The lines have a few holds where you can adjust the check lines.  I don't know how to know when and what to adjust those to.  I'm going to do some research in that and I'll try some things and let y'all know what I find out.

In other news ... I noticed that Pam is doing the head movements I talked about the other night anytime I stop.  I unhooked the overcheck completely and got way too much head movement.  I hooked it back up but gave her some slack in the line, and she would still lower her head till the overcheck was tight and then jerk it back up.  Is it possible that she just likes the feeling of the twisted wire bit being tight?  As of right now, she looks like she is constantly nodding "YES" when we're stopped. 

I think I'm also going to switch out my 2 twisted wire bits with Liverpool straight shaft bits.  These twisted bits came with the team harness and so I thought I'd try them.  They work okay, but I don't feel like I'm getting the response I want.  Maybe switching bits could help with Pam nodding her head too.  Who knows.

Tomorrow I should be going to Paris Texas to be in a parade.  Due to Rachel's hoof still healing up, I'm not bringing my own horse.  I will most likely drive one of my friend Roger's horses on one of his wagons.  He's got beautiful Belgian horses so I'm sure I won't mind at all.  For more information on Roger, check out his website at http://www.oldtimetransport.com/.