Ground Control

A few weeks ago, I arrived at the barn, looking forward to a ride. But when I took my horse’s blanket off, I was shocked to see three lumps on her back, and even more shocked when I ran my hands over them and poor Fire just about jumped out of her skin. I knew immediately that I couldn’t ride, but I couldn’t for the life of me figure out what the lumps were or how they got there. Were they bug bites? Irritation from the saddle? An allergic reaction to something? I didn’t know, so I gave her the day off, hoping that things would be better the next day.

They were not. And not wanting to give her too much time off and lose all of the progress we were making, I decided to lunge her. I admit that lunging is not my favourite activity. I much prefer to be on Fire’s back than on the ground with her, which is likely responsible for her less-than-ideal ground manners. So here I was, my hand being forced, and about to embark on what would end up being a full week of groundwork and lunging.

I usually avoid lunging without some sort of equipment to help encourage the horse to work properly and allow me to have more control. Enter the Waldhausen Lunging Aid. It helps to encourage a forward-downward stretch and I find it also ensures that my lunging session doesn’t turn into a circus performance. Fire has often gone in side-reins, so she is used to having some contact on the lunge, but she did have a few protests about this one. She had some explosions and shared various “opinions,” likely in part due to how many months had