In which we update Fiddle's status and the gravity is weird

I swear the gravity was especially strange today:

nearly every picture taken (by me or anyone else)

was drastically crooked.

Baby horses are supposed to grow lopsided, but not like this!

"Crooked" seems to be the name of the game, lately.

I've been riding Fiddle on trails until the weather fell apart recently, and noticed that, while she moves comfortably on the flat and on soft terrain, she was distinctly glitchy going downhill, especially on hard ground.

Hmmm.  I know what that means:

back to the vet we go!

lots of chiropractic adjustments to straighten out that which is crooked

We did a fairly extensive lameness check.  Since the vet hospital doesn't have any hills in their parking lot, Dr Dear did flexion tests to isolate the problem area(s).

Results:
There's no problem at all with her left stifle.  So that's good.
She showed mild stiffness in the right stifle--not any worse than she has been for at least a year.  The injury she sustained in January 2016 is pretty stable now. Also good.

Hocks...well.  The hocks were ouchy.  I know what that means, too:

Joint injection$.  $igh.  I'm not surprised, of course.  Fiddle is a big, 16+ year old endurance horse.  It would be surprising if she didn't need support for those hocks. 

So we did that. 

We also did some talking about the future...in which Fiddle is probably done with 50-milers.  She is probably still okay for (carefully chosen) LD rides.  And actually, that's okay.  There's enough screwy stuff happening with AERC right now that staying out of competitions is not going to be a hardship for me.

After hock injections, Fee gets a week off.  Which brings us to today!

Lesson time!

I used the "straighten" and "crop" tools for most of the photos, because I caught myself looking a images and thinking, "ooooh, look: my posture is good in this one!" only to realize that the picture is crooked (and so am I, of course!)

Patty hasn't ridden since March--Ariana has been busy raising the Baby, and Flower has been weirdly lame.  When she hopped on a friend's horse last weekend, she discovered that her brain knew what to do but her body couldn't do it anymore. 

Definitely lesson time.

Dar is a patient schoolmaster--a better choice for the first few lessons than Flower

So, we rode. 

Patty is working hard to move her legs back away from a "chair seat" position

I am trying to keep my shoulders back and my weight centered in the saddle

Leaning forward, sigh

Good leg position--now do it with the foot in the stirrup?

I kept telling Fiddle that Dar is a "baby horse."  She mostly believes me.  (He's 26 this year)

Patty and Dar take a breather, I'm still leaning forward.  But my inside shoulder isn't dropped!

This is so much better

Big improvement!  

When we were done, Patty's mom wanted to ride Dar.

Why, yes, it is a little frustrating that Bev has good posture and good leg position,
despite not riding for several years.

A brief moment of decent winter light in the arena

Since Bev was on Patty's horse, that meant that Patty's butt was available.

Patty is smiling, but she hates my saddle.  I dislike hers, so it makes sense.

It's nice to see these ladies riding together.

Both horses are being careful with their cargo

Winter riding lessons:  good for whatever is making ya crooked.  Thanks, Dory!