I talked to a nice woman last night who's interested in cocoa. She's coming this morning to see him. She sounds like a rider with a lot of experience -- some of it saddle seat, so she is used to Morgans. I plan to work him as usual, in the ring first, and then, if her riding experience seems to support a larger adventure, out of the ring on a very short "trail ride."
PS Not a match made in heaven, I'm afraid. Her understanding of this horse is rather different from mine. He had a lovely time with her, going out of the ring for the first time with somebody on his back. (She is a very skilled rider.) We walked down to the Mel's Meadow and then back again -- a route that cocoa knows very well. Her observations of his physical condition were, I think, wide of the mark. For instance, she said she thought he was blind because he kept running into the corners of the ring and rubbing his mouth on stuff. Coco is a very physical guy -- he loves his rubs anywhere and everywhere. It was one of the first things that I noticed about both the horses. In fact the same is true of the woman who found them originally. She said they were so hungry for contact with anyone and anything that it was sad. But of course you got me thinking. I was watching cocoa all day today and I still just don't think he's blind. He reacts all kinds of things that he sees. He is the first one see if you're in the woods, the first one to see me come home, the first one to notice any changes to the house. I'm just not seeing it.
ReplyDeleteIt does raise the question for me what cocoa's limits are physically. Not only Coco -- Meg and Rocket and Ed should probably be evaluated. Meg and Rocket because we want to use them for endurance trail riding and Ed because he has health issues and we don't want to put him in a family or home that will be demanding more of him than he can handle. I want to get a good sense of what he can do before advertising him. So, just to make sure that everything is as it should be, I made an appointment with a sports medicine horse doctor to come out in early November. It's a veterinarian that I trust to avoid a common trap and the horse world -- over diagnosing.
I can't remember if I blogged about the time that I had a vet come out to look at Dante when he colicked. Next thing I know she's recommending more than $1000 worth of medication for an illness that he had a few symptoms for. This despite the fact that those same symptoms are all explained by what we are eating gnocchi has -- dorsal colon scarring. I got the impression that the diagnosis had more to do with the need to beef up the budget that had to do with the actual condition of the horse. Some veterinarian practices' diagnoses, I believe, correlate more highly with the cost of the treatment than they do with the horse's symptoms, know what I mean?
But this vet who's coming out to do the evaluation has already proved that he deals with what he sees in front of him and doesn't go looking for mystery disease.
I did write cocoa yesterday myself for the very first time. He glides along like a merry-go-round horse. When he trots, you can just sit the trot. It's so smooth, posting is unnecessary.
But even if he does still have some physical challenges relative to his past, I believe that he can make improvements. I've seen it happen to him already. I do not believe he has hit the ceiling yet.
I keep saying this, but it does bear repeating: I believe in this horse.
darn speech recognition software -- I see all kinds of speakos up there in that comment. Apparently there's no way to go back and fix them so you will have to just figure out.but here's a clue: it gets pronouns wrong a lot.
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