Day 3 - Dave Ellis

GREAT ride on Z in the morning moving cows up and down hills! Wow.

Then, watched Dave and his horse from Craig Cameron in the small round pen with the full bridle (spade bit bridle, bosalito).

Then, rode Loretta. Apparently, she doesn't get ridden much and she needed some good warming up. She bucked some and had a hard time going slower than a trot. After about 45 mins of getting to know each other, rode her over the hills and to the play yard. She wouldn't put her feet on bridges, obstacles. Interesting.

Moved cattle with Loretta, Dave's Thoroughbred. She was great at chasing cattle down and was able to get some good stops with her. She bucked some while we chased cattle, but otherwise she was a blast!

Rode out with Loretta and the others. Skooch, the big bowl cantering... I didn't understand what Dave was after here and so I just rode Loretta the best I could up and down in the bowl. We cantered a lot, trotted more. He was looking for her to relax and settle into efficiency in her gait, but honestly, I felt like that could have taken hours. She was bounding up the hill and I tried to get her softly cantering up the hill.

Came back, saddled Tina, prepped her, then in the round pen with her. Had a great warm-up where Dave had me push her hind out on the circle for a few strides, then send her forward straight again. We did this all with focus and porcupine game followed by driving game. This was a cool exercise.

Then Matt put a ride on her. I'll post video asap. She had some moments of bursting forward and a little bucking, but nothing too energetic. It was good to see how she behaved. Her lateral flexion was soft and nice. Dave was in the middle on his horse Dan and Tina sought comfort there a few times. Then they rode the circle together at all gaits.

Tied Tina off and then rode Z back to the bowl for more. I wanted Z to feel the downhill and uphill and find efficiency. I was also darn tired though and getting a sore bum for 3 days straight in the saddle all day.

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2 kinds of bits - active and signal. Spade is signal. Hackamores, cradle, curb, snaffle are all active.

Snaffle and natural hack are direct pull.