The Warm-Up: Part II - Warm-Up Exercises for the Older/Arthritic Horse

In Part I we met C.D. who is an older, slightly arthritic horse. He needs a long, loose rein for the first ten minutes of his warm-up and after that he’s willing to listen to his rider.

However, he still has days when he’d rather not bend, thank you very much!

A friend of mine who is now his regular rider was away for a week and asked me to keep him going in her absence.  One day I didn’t have time to tack him up and ride him, so I put on his bridle and took him down to the arena for some short-reining.

An Exercise on the Ground

I’m no expert at this. What I know about short-reining comes from the fantastic book  “Horse Training in Hand” by Ellen Schuthof Lesmeister, available from amazon.com.

She explains (and illustrates in great photos) how to ask the horse to bend while you walk next to him, holding the regular reins. It is a wonderful way to encourage the horse to work long and low without you on his back, and loosens him up before you get in the saddle. (There is also way more valuable information in this book on what you can accomplish through long-reining and other work in hand.)

I short-reined C.D on both reins, working him in walk on circles and figures of eight. It didn’t take him long to become soft in my hand, and I rewarded him by finishing for the day.  When my friend rode him two days later, she was amazed at how supple C.D. was.

Short-Reining Before Mounting

After a week of being ridden, C.D. became a little resistant again. So my friend decided to short-rein him before her ride. It was her first time doing this, but she’d read the book and watched me. She soon felt comfortable with it and so did C.D., so she trotted him for a few half-circles, too. (This is a great fitness exercise!)

C.D. was now supple. The question was, would he remain so under saddle?

He was so supple and obedient that she only needed to ride for fifteen minutes to achieve what it normally takes twice that time to accomplish! She was thrilled, and C.D. was relaxed and happy. End of session and lots of pats.

Another Use for Short-Reining

Short-reining is really useful if you have a horse which can’t be ridden but is still able to work.

As an example, I used this method to exercise Cruz Bay when he had a sarcoid on his girth area, but was otherwise perfectly healthy.