What is the name of the anatomy program? It sounds interesting.
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The program is called 3-D Horse Anatomy. It is available from https://biosphera3d.com.
I live in Stanly County, NC, around 30 miles from the nearest major city Charlotte, NC. It took my son HOURS to download this program (it is only available through download on-line). He finally went to a friendās house and they both worked on it. Our on-line hook ups out here are SLOW and Biosphera kept on signing off. It took my son and his friend, another geek, hours to get it all but they finally did and I am SO GLAD my son was here and had the time to do it., because it would have driven me insane trying to get it loaded on my computer.
Once loaded I do NOT have to be on-line to see it since it is all on my computer.
I had been toying with the idea of getting the 3-D Human anatomy program but after the problems with the slowness of our on-line access I am going to wait. If I lived in a major city or near a major university it probably would not be a problem.
I LOVE this program. With the 3-D model that can be rotated and magnified I can end up with a decent idea how it all hangs together inside the horsesā bodies.
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Shannon made it over today.
I rode my HH 15 min.! I balanced, walked, 2-pointed, and I did three sessions of posting each for 20-21 posts. I got tired and had to take a nap.
Otherwise I showed Shannon the C-6 cervical nerve on my 3-D Horse Anatomy computer program. This is an interesting one. It goes down from the 6th cervical vertebrae, branching a few times, to the two big muscles on the bottom of the neck and all the way down to the horseās breast. Shannon said it may be the nerve that riderās get when they neck rein the horses.
I also showed her a few of my new books. She ignored the vet school level big anatomy books while diving into āUnderstanding the Horseās Backā by Sara Wyche who is a British veterinarian and also a dressage rider. I am slowly reading through the two books by Wyche that I have now, and the deeper I get into these books the more impressed I am. It was sort of hard to get used to her idiosyncratic anatomical drawings (and she draws every single drawing in these books.) However her writing is very informative, and as a practicing vet and rider has had to deal with various wonky backs over the years.
Her other book I am currently reading is āThe Anatomy of Ridingā. Most of this one is her pictures, but the text, what little there is of it, is truly excellent.
As usual I am picking out the stuff that could fit in my Forward Seat Riding ala Littauer. There is actually a decent amount that I will be able to use in my riding, training, and my āequine physical therapy through ridingā that I do for 30 minutes a week, if I am lucky.
I am impatiently awaiting my copy of āHorses Muscles in Motionā by her, Sara Wyche.
If she rides like the stuff she writes about, if I still owned a horse I would probably let her ride my horse without any interference from me (unless, of course, the horse went WTF). Normally the thought of letting many show oriented dressage riders up on a horse that I raised, saddle broke and trained myself would be a resounding NO, no way, no how (heavy contact, BTV, excessive spurring or excessive whipping).
Since I no longer own a riding horse this is something I donāt have to worry about. Iād even take lessons from her if she taught even if she is a dressage rider.
Can you tell I am impressed?
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I will have to check out her books!
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I got my riding lesson today with Debbie on MJ.
I had to groom MJ a little bit while Debbie finished something. I got one side done with the New Generation Curry comb and the Haas Schimmel. I had to work hard but the Schimmel got a LOT of dirt out of his coat. Then Debbie took over.
Grooming one side of MJ plus brushing his lower legs and head and combing his mane got me so tired that I completely forgot to put my ice vest on for my lesson. It was a bit cooler and less humid which helped me. I just walked while Debbie got call after call on her phone and while she worked on getting the vet out to check out one horseās doubtful tooth.
In between the calls I told Debbie that I had been studying horse anatomy the past three weeks I had not ridden a horse. I told her about my horse anatomy 3-D program and how I had looked on it at the nerves, looking in vain for a nerve or muscle that directly linked my lower leg aids to the hind legs and how nothing like that existed. The one nerve I got excited about early on, the lateral thoracic nerve that is right under the riderās lower leg when moved back a little, well that nerve only innervates the cutaneous trunci muscle, otherwise know as the fly twitching muscle. She seemed as amazed as I was when I realized that there is no direct nerve or muscle connection, and we got into a conversation of how the leg aids ended up affecting the hind legs through the spinal cord and some of the lower cutaneous inter-costal nerves which attach to the a few segments of the rectus abdominus muscle which links to the pubic bone in the pelvis and the top of the femur (at least it attaches to the head of the femur according to one of my books). Otherwise the nerves under the riderās legs only attach to the brachial plexus right in front of the horseās shoulder, so a lot of the riderās leg and seat aids directly affect the forehand, not the hind quarters.
I also talked with her about the equine fascia, how it covers everything inside the horseās skin, how it has muscle and nerve fibers in it and how easily it can be injured. I told her after I had learned a little about the fascia that I realized that people who do the Come to Jesus (CTJ) ādisciplineā with a whip are abusing the horse AND directly injuring the fascia, causing problems for the horseās underlying muscles. We discussed how Debbieās CTJ moments rarely involves any physical contact with the horse and that the horses are not scared of her, they just respect her more than any other human being around them. Debbie does not need to physically abuse the horses to get their respect.
But that was all the discussion I could get in between all the phone calls. My riding was OK (it could have been better if I had remembered to put the ice vest on), MJ was not weirded out at all, he just was not quite as responsive as usual. Contact with the bradoon was fine but he was a little tiny bit leery of contact with just the curb bit so I backed off on it. He extended his walk after a while and I got one really GOOD walk in (striding forth fearlessly). We did the slow walk too but the heat was affecting the accuracy and timing of my leg aids so it was not as good as usual. Otherwise Debbie had me do quite a few of the āriderās push-upsā to get my leg longer and my heels down, which is one thing that the Home Horse does not help me with when I keep my feet on the platform.
I rode MJ back to the barn since I was so tired, hey I had ridden more than 35 minutes! When we got MJ to the wash stall I noticed my ice vest still on the bench, up until then I had not noticed that I was not wearing it, I just felt a bit warmer than usual. I do not think that my back muscles enjoy the ice vest which may explain why I forgot it today since it was not quite as hot.
At least I got to ride a real live horse today!
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Glad you got to ride!
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My grandsons visited us this weekend so Shannon did not come out today.
Yesterday I introduced my grandsons to the 3-D Horse Anatomy computer program. I did check with my DIL about if it was all right for the youngest one, at 5 years old, to see it.
My youngest grandson right now is getting interested in anatomy, as well as the planets in our Solar System thanks to You Tube videos. Yeah, he is interested in SCIENCE!
My oldest grandson told me that at 13 years old his favorite course is SCIENCE! He is also getting interested in engineering (remember the videos of the engineer trying to keep squirrels from the bird seed with the squirrel Fat Gus? He really liked those videos.)
Yeah!!! I am partial to science and engineering concentrations in school.
They played around with the program a while with no icks or yucks, my youngest one wanted to see the horseās digestive system more than the other systems though we went through the others a little bit. They both liked the skeleton and muscles too.
I could have ridden my HH this weekend but I have been feeling so very tired after my lesson on Wednesday so I am giving myself some time off of it. Next week I am determined to remember to put my ice vest on, then I will be able to do more on the horse and hopefully not feel exhausted for days afterwards.
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So glad you had a good visit with your grandsons! It is very cool that they are interested in science too.
Have a good lesson and donāt forget the ice vest!
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I had my lesson today. I remembered to wear my ice vest. I only lasted 21 minutes until my bladder forced me to run to the porta-john. At least that is near the riding ring.
I could have gotten back on, but I think that the sun was getting to me. Of course if I had not done the posting trot three times I could have probably made it a full 30 minutes.
I got to talk with Debbie during my ride about the horse anatomy stuff I have been studying. I told her about reading a book by a British vet, a very, very good bookāuntil the author got on about āoverloading the forehandā and the need to sit back and the importance of getting the riderās weight back.
The past few weeks I have been looking a lot at anatomical drawings. I am getting a good idea about it all hangs together. And you know something? The horseās forehand is BUILT TO BEAR WEIGHT, with many muscles suspending the horseās body from the shoulder blades and forearms of the horse. The horseās thorax is within a sling of MANY muscles from to top of the shoulder to the bottom of the humerus, and the shoulder joint is very good at absorbing shocks. On the other hand the horseās back is NOT built to carry extra weight, and the further back the rider sits the weaker the support is for the horseās spine.
Up to the end of the withers the ribs have joints that attach to the sternum, the breast bone. The first eight ribs are so attached. After the back end of the withers the ribs are attached to the sternum only with bands of cartilage and there are no joints attaching the ribs to the sternum. The rib cage is suspended from the shoulder blade for the first eight ribs (serratus ventralis muscle). Those first eight ribs do actively support the spine and back, going further back there is less and less support of the horseās spine from the rest of the body until the spine gets to where it joins the pelvic bone at the end of the lumbar vertebrae.
Then we talked about kissing spines. She said that when she was younger she never heard about killing spines. I told her I thought it was described back then by the term ācold backā, a horse with a cold back would buck. Some were rideable after the initial bucks when their back muscles warmed up and could be used for riding and fox hunting.
I remember when the Spanish Riding School did their American tour in 1964. I was not able to go see them but it was reported, with pictures, in the D.C. newspapers. A dressage frenzy swept the hunt seat world in the USA, all of a sudden many riders decided that they wanted to be able to do the fancier stuff they saw the SRS horses do, and all of a sudden many hunt seat riding teachers started insisting that without dressage and collection people were not really riding their horses (just being a passenger I guess.)
Kissing spines were first pointed out in the early 1960s (from what I read on-line), around the time that riding in the USA changed due to the SRS exhibitions. While saddle-seat and western riding, using their saddles with longer panels, stayed pretty much the same hunt seat changed drastically. Both hunt seat saddles and modern dressage saddles concentrate the riderās weight on a smaller area on the horsesā backs, on the 12th to 18th vertebrae, exactly where kissing spines occur, and with riding dressage and using seat aids a lot more the ridersā weight stayed right there every minute of the ride. Add a lot more sitting trot and the horsesā backs started suffering more than they used to. (In contrast I am trying to keep my weight on the 10th to 14th vertebrae.)
Debbie told me now that she is older she finds herself riding horses in what she calls the ālittle old ladies forward seatā. I think that her seat is now educated enough that she can FEEL that the horses want her weight forward. I have noticed with her lesson horses that I ride, most of them elderly horses with elderly aches and pains, will refuse to move forward freely if I sit back in the saddle (they suck back with every stride), until I get up into 2-point or move my seat as far forward as I can in the saddle, only then can I get really good movement.
But anyway, she told me that MJ looked so much happier today with me riding him than he did yesterday when he was ridden in gymkhana games. She has told me that over the months Iāve ridden him, the longer Iāve ridden him more he seems to prefer my riding to that of her other non-jumping students.
I did not do that much other than the posting trots today, just some turns in place, some regular and more extended trots, and just walking around. Debbie had to correct my lower leg at the start. I guess not doing my HH on Sunday left me a weaker rider all around.
At least today I got to ride a real live HORSE!!!
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I am so glad you got to ride! Very interesting all you are learning about anatomy. Thanks for sharing!
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Shannon came by today and I got up on my HH. For 5 minutes I had my feet on the platform and my balance was pretty good. Then, as an experiment, I moved the saddle back around 2" to see if I could have better balance when I used the stirrups. I was too far back, so I moved the saddle forward so it was about 1" back from where I have it for no stirrup work and I managed to stay pretty centered F to B. I posted and 2-pointed both ways and having my saddle back a little really helped me keep my F-B balance. Once I corrected having too much weight on my right foot I stayed pretty balanced from side to side when I used the stirrups. I lasted 12 minutes today until I got too tired.
While I collapsed Shannon rode the HH. She LIKES riding the HH, working on her balance and exercising her thigh muscles. She told me that if a person has an area 4 feet by 4 feet inside their house or barn that it would be wonderful for a rider to have one available to practice on (her house is too small and crowded.) She also moved the HH to see if it was harming my floor, and she said that she saw no signs of it harming my flooring. Using the flattened cardboard box it came in under it is enough to protect my flooring.
Then she played with my 3-D Horse Anatomy program, rotating the horse so she could see its belly like it was lying on its back with its feet in the air. It can help to get a new perspective of horse anatomy, and it is fun to be able to do this.
I am studying anatomy now to try to become a better, less irritating rider for the horses, and I thank you all for patiently reading my anatomical meanderings. So far I see no reason to abandon my Forward Seat and I see lots of reasons not to sit further back in the saddle. MJ is responding favorably to my more forward seat, moving freely under me while looking more cheerful, according to Debbie, than he does under other riders.
I discuss all this horse anatomy stuff with both Debbie and Shannon, and they are understanding my rationale about the way I ride now. I figure that the better I move with the horse, the less I trigger old resistances and the less I block the actions of its muscles, the happier the horse will be carrying me. So far this seems to be working well for me, MJ is not cussing me out.
I showed Shannon my latest book, āEquine Structural IntegrationāMyofascial Release Manualā by Jim Pascucci. He is trained in the human Rolfing techniques and has adapted them to horses and dogs. This book is sort of a slow read for me but quite interesting. Shannon liked looking through this book, looking at the pictures and reading passages in it. I will have to read it thoroughly several times before I will feel confident enough to try his methods.
It took me three days to recover from my lesson, the heat affected me worse than I thought it did even though I did not ride the full 30 minutes. I am not getting fitter for riding this summer, I am desperately trying to maintain the riding fitness I already have. If I did not have my Home Horse I would be losing most of my riding fitness, with it I seem to be maintaining what little riding fitness I have. The Home Horse has been a blessing for me during this really hot summer as in I can get in a saddle and exercise my riding muscles in the comfort of air conditioning instead of melting into a puddle of protoplasm every ride.
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I had my lesson with Debbie on MJ today. It was not quite as hot but I was not the only one forgetting things this morning, I forgot to bring my ice vest with me to the ring (Sam kindly brought it out for me) and Debbie forgot to put on MJās Incrediwear Hoof Socks on him (we put them up over MJās knee, it makes a positive difference.
The stable was FULL of people today. I got to walk around in the main ring full of Samās students while another lady finished her private lesson in the other ring. When they exited there was still one lady in the ring with me riding this GORGEOUS small refined TB mare. I liked this mare, so much that if I was looking to buy a horse I might buy her even though she is not an Arabian mare. So while I rode MJ I kept looking at the mare, who was moving adequately but not up to the promise of her conformation. I rode over to Debbie and asked permission to suggest something to the mareās rider. Debbie asked what I wanted to say, I told her I thought that if the lady moved her hands apart the mare would do better, and Debbie yelled at the rider, at the other end of the ring, to move her hands apart enough so that her mare could see her hands.
The mare immediately improved subtly, her neck started to stretch out as she confidently reached for contact, her stride started to stretch out, and the mare and her rider started looking happier about everything. This is a pretty mare but her minor sucking back from contact detracted from her beauty, when her rider widened her hands the mare finally looked as totally gorgeous as I thought she would.
My riding was adequate today. MJ was not as happy with his knees as usual (minor limping before he warmed up), and when I asked him to extend some he made a half-hearted effort and essentially told me that was all I was going to get. Doing the turns in place I could feel a tiny flinch in his left knee, but he did the turns in place fine. He MISSED having those hoof socks on, Debbie puts them up to cover his knees and has to keep on pulling them up again through the lesson. Of course I am the only one riding him who uses these hoof socks (and BOT exercise sheet, the BOT and Fenwick āhatsā, the double bridle with titanium bits, the Micklem bridle, basically everything I can think of to make him more comfortable for my ride, he is almost 30 years old after all.)
I lasted the full 30 minutes and could have gone longer but MJ made sure to tell me when his 30 minutes was up (everybody else rides him for an hour.) He had been ridden by other people yesterday and done well for his riders so I could forgive him for not being quite as good as he can be since we forgot his hoof socks. He did not tell Debbie to take the exercise sheet off even though it got warmer during our ride so it must have helped him overcome his knee discomfort somewhat. MJ LIKES his far infra-red radiation therapy gear!
In the heat I am not keeping contact with just the curb bit, I am afraid that my hands might not be good enough to give MJ a good experience. It still seems to help having the curb bit in his mouth even when I have no tension on the curb reins, he is a little more relaxed with his head and neck when reaching out for contact and his whole body moves more freely.
I did the posting trot a few times today. It took me a little bit to get him to let me post on the proper diagonal going to the right as his knees did not feel as comfortable as usual when we use the hoof socks over his knees.
Afterwards in the barn that pretty TB mareās rider thanked me for my suggestion about moving her hands apart, it must have made a difference in how her mare feels to her. Such a pretty, pretty mare!
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Im glad you had a good lesson! The TB mare sounds nice. I get to see some pretty horses but every so often I see one that I think WOW!
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Love your kindness and thoughtfulness for the horse!
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Today Shannon came over.
I lasted a full 17 minutes today. As usual I started with my feet flat on the platform balancing, āwalkingā, both āleadsā of a ācanterā, 2-pointing and posting (20 posts).
After around 8 minutes I picked up the stirrups. Balancing was sort of hard at first. I did another 20 posts again with the stirrups, and I was TIRED after that. Shannon kept her eye on my balance and I am getting better at it even though my brain insists that I am way off to one side. It was HARD to get my butt out of the saddle when I did the 2-point using the stirrups.
I then got off and collapsed. Shannon ārodeā for several minutes and also got tired.
I showed Shannon one of my new horse anatomy books, āHorse AnatomyāA Pictorial Approach to Equine Structureā by Peter Goody, 2nd edition, published in 2000, with more pictures than his earlier editions. This is a VERY GOOD book on horse anatomy, the drawings are excellent, and he labels just about everything in the pictures. He also has several drawings showing where people can palpate some parts of some of the bones through the horseās skin. In 135 pages he packs in a LOT of pictures and a lot of useful information. I recommend this book over many of the more modern horse anatomy books I have bought lately, the pictures are not in color but the drawings are good with a lot of detail.
Shannon dove into this book and spent so much time looking at it that she did not do the Horse Anatomy computer program at all today. She really liked this book over all the other anatomy books Iāve shown her. I am really enjoying showing her the horse anatomy books and discussing things with her.
She remarked that like me she is changing her riding style some to reflect what she has learned in the anatomy books. She will be changing more than I have, Forward Seat seems to consider what the horses go through while being ridden more than a lot of the other schools of horsemanship, Caprilli LISTENED to the horses during the years he spent developing Forward Riding. Shannonās background is mostly the relaxed Western trail riding sort of riding (NOT modern Western Pleasure.) Between finding true balance on the Home Horse and looking at and reading the anatomy books she is now able to clarify what she does on horseback and now understands better why her horses react like they do when ridden.
Maybe sometime during the next 12 months I will be able to make if a full 30 minutes on the Home Horse, but I am not holding my breath. I get SO TIRED riding the Home Horse!
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Sounds like a workout! Thanks for the info on the anatomy book!
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I sort of had a lesson today.
Sort of because Debbie had to do an emergency get water trough for the steers upright and refilled, it had been empty for a while (dry inside, the ground was pretty dry.) Debbie is always looking for stuff that is not right at her stable.
MJ was OFF today. He started off stiff and not wanting to move much though he was kind enough to walk me around even though he was leaning to being lame at the walk. I mostly just walked around, then a horde of college students doing their lesson came into the ring just as Debbie finished and came back into the ring. We were plodding around at the walk while the other riders were seriously warming their assigned lesson horses up for the lesson.
I did a lot of 2-point today. Poor MJ, he moved like he felt his age today.
MJ had āno reasonā to be so stiff. He did not have to do lessons the day before, Debbie remembered to put his hoof socks on, but he ātold usā that he was just too stiff and sore to give me a good ride. I finally got him to extend his walking stride a little bit twice.
Debbie wanted to see him trot. The first trot I told her he was lame, not horribly lame but lame all the same. The same, well it was worse, going in the other direction. It was getting hotter every minute, the warm-ups were getting faster, and I quit with MJās full approval when I got to 30 minutes.
This week a book I had bought on-line finally came. This book was definitely worth waiting for. It is titled āIs Your Horse 100%?ā with the subtitle āOr Is he Stuck Out of Shape?āResolve Painful Limitations in the Equine Body with Conformation Balancing and Fascia Fitnessā by Margret Henkels. It is about the method she uses to get the horsesā fascia working properly, mostly by laying the hand flat on the tight place for fifteen minutes (she does have some other methods). I donāt know if I could remain standing still or squatting for 15 minutes, but I am finding this book fascinating. I showed it to Debbieās daughter Sam, who runs the stableās 4-H show program (hunt seat classes) and she immediately became interested in it since one of her friends is starting to work with horse fascia. I told Sam when I got the money I was going to buy the stable a copy because it seemed to me that they could use it. She agreed and said she would read it, try it, and tell me about it. The book is profusely illustrated showing the author working on horses and the horsesā reactions to her methods. It looks very promising and might help riders solve some of the āproblemsā that they just canāt seem to get the horses to improve. (I say āproblemsā because most of the problems seem to come from previous handling, bad riding, badly fitting tack or injuries.)
I will show Shannon this book also, and I plan on buying one for Shannonās stable too.
The fascia could be the missing key to solving a lot of riding problems that often arise from the fascia essentially going into spasm and becoming hard and stiff instead of soft and moving easily. Since I get put up on a lot of elderly horses or horses that desperately need good, sane and humane riding I am glad to see that there may be another solution for these horses other than months and months of humane riding for 30 minutes a week. I am not a miracle worker and some of the horses Iāve ridden could benefit from a miracle.
Lesson horses are so patient and so forgiving with us humans. I just try to make their lives and work easier on them.
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I used to undergo myofascial release treatments ā they are intense, not at all like undergoing a massage, for instance. I can understand how something similar for horses could be helpful.
I took a couple clinics with Doris Kay Halstead (both my horse and I participated), and have found the techniques I learned useful ā my horses clearly enjoy and benefit from the sessions. One of her books is āRelease the Potential.ā
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Poor MJ! Bless the lesson horses!
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Shannon came by today. I was hoping to improve my time on my HH this weekend, but I just could not go longer than I did last week, 17 minutes.
I did 2 sets of āpostingā, one with my feet flat on the platform, the other with my feet in the stirrups, both for 20 posts in a row, with occasional short bursts of posting when I felt strong enough.
Shannon said I kept my side-to-side balance fine mostly, both with my feet flat on the platform and with my feet in the stirrups. I started off a little bit both times, but once I corrected myself I stayed balanced. Front-to-back balance was fine with my feet flat, using the stirrups I tended to go forward but not quite as much as before (going down a mild slope versus feeling like I am galloping down a steep slope.)
I donāt know if I will ever get to doing 30 minutes on the Home Horse. Well I probably could if I just sat still on it, but that gets super boring and my body wants to MOVE!
I recently bought the book āIs Your Horse 100%?ā by Margaret Henkels. It is about her method of dealing with bad places in the fascia. Iāve read a bit in it, I had hoped that I would be able to do it on my own but I do not think I can stand in one place for the 15 minutes of laying my hand on the bad place (I sway in the breeze, get really dizzy, etcā¦) BUT it looks like most riders could do her method.
So I showed this book to Debbieās daughter Sam who runs her show program and to Shannon, offering to buy them a copy if they thought they could use it. Both of them wanted their own copy so I ordered them today. Sam has a friend who has started fascia work on horses so was sort of familiar with the concepts. She also liked the idea that even her teenage 4-H students could do this with their own horse.
Shannon looked at the book thoroughly, each page, each picture, and wants it too. I think that this book may have an āanswerā for many of the NQR horses people have. It is not an instant miracle, she writes that it takes her around 6 months to get the horsesā fascia RIGHT, spending 15 minutes on each bad place over the months, and to get the horse rebalanced.
This book is $25.00 and may save riders thousands of dollars in expensive vet visits, tests and imaging, not to forget the costs of all the different therapies.
Shannon particularly remarked on how she liked the expression on the horsesā faces while going through this laying on the hands therapy, calming down and even showing some enjoyment. She also liked that several different horses were shown reacting to the therapy instead of just one horse.
I liked this book immediately, I just wish I could reliably stand on my own two feet without canes so I could do it. However I wanted the reactions of riding teachers to it before I recommended it here. Both ladies liked what they saw in this book.
I told Shannon that I wanted regular reports. Both of her mares could use this work, and both mares are different (one is a TWH, the other an Arab-Welsh) so she should be able to come up with a good report on how this method works on two horses with different breeding, ways of moving, and physical problems.
I donāt think this method required any special equipment, human super strength, specialized expensive training, or a lot of ready wealth to pay for expensive diagnosis and treatment. Normal horse people should be able to do this (and I really wish I was physically normal.)
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