I’m gonna stand on my rickety little soapbox for a minute here and preface this post with this: regardless of whether you’re a breeder or not and regardless of whether you own a young horse or not, learning how to evaluate a horse’s potential for a future career is a skill that every horseman needs. It will make you look at your horses (and any potential future horses) in a completely different way. If you ever get the chance to attend any kind of sporthorse conformation/young horse evaluation clinic – take it!

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I had so much fun at Marilyn Payne’s Young Event Horse (4 and 5yos under saddle) judging clinic last fall that when I saw a Future Event Horse (yearlings through 3yos judged in hand) clinic being advertised up in Dallas, I jumped on it immediately. Baby Horse might not even be here yet, but two of my favorite things are breeding and eventing, so it’s only natural that anything FEH/YEH is right up my alley.

The clinician was Eileen Pritchard-Bryan, a breeder and well-known eventing/FEH/YEH judge and steward. We started on Saturday morning with a lecture on conformation and what traits you’re looking for in an event horse (vs dressage horse or jumper). There was a whole lot of technical stuff with angles and dots and lines that would take a million years to cover thoroughly, so here are just some of my notes:

• The lumbosacral gap should be no more than 1-2″ behind the point of hip.
• “Pillar of support” – when drawing a straight line down the groove of the forearm, the line should come out ahead of the withers on top (for lightness of forehand) and go through or just behind the heel on bottom (too close to toe: foot injuries, too far behind heel: soft tissue injuries).
• Lower stifle = better gallop and more jumping ability.
• The lower the point of elbow, the better (more clearance from the rib cage for galloping).
• Point of shoulder to point of elbow should be barely less than 90 degrees.
• Neck should be longer than the hind 1/3.
• Back at the knee = deal killer
• Toeing out is better than toeing in

A lot of the sporthorse conformation stuff isn’t new to me, having been around the breeding industry, but there were a few subtleties pertaining specifically to eventing that I found very interesting. I spent a lot of time that evening looking at pics of different eventing and jumper stallions (and pics of Henry, of course).

After the conformation lecture we talked a bit about the FEH classes in particular, proper turnout, tack, apparel, etc. Then the participants went and got their babies and got to practice in-hand presentation. I have some notes about that part too:

• For FEH, the walk is most important because mirrors the quality of the canter. You want lots of swing through the back, groundcover, overstep, and straightness.
• The tack and handler should be subtle. Basic bit and bridle (2yo and 3yo), no full cheeks. Khakis, collared shirt, gloves, appropriate shoes, helmet on handler. Riding attire is ok. Leather halter on yearlings with leather or dark colored lead.
• To reposition horse while standing up for confo: if you need to move a hind leg, take one step forward, if you need to move a front leg, move one step back.
• Always be aware of where the judge is and reposition yourself and the horse in relation as necessary.
• It is very important to move STRAIGHT away on the first and last leg of the triangle (a wiggling horse can sometimes make the horse look like it has a movement defect that it actually doesn’t).
• Practice practice practice at home so the horse learns what to expect. Always be patient and take your time.
• Just like dressage, the judge can only score what they see on that particular day. Given how quickly young horses change, this can lead to a variance in scores depending on the time of year and stage of growth.

I think until you actually do this stuff, it seems fairly simple. You just stand there, then walk, then trot, then stand there again right? Hahahahaha. No. There’s SO much more to it. Presenting horses in hand really WELL is an art form and requires a lot of showmanship, practice, training, and knowledge. Even just a tiny tweak in how a horse is standing or how they hold their head or how straight you can get their body in the trot can make a BIG difference in the impression the horse gives to the judge. I learned a lot of this nuance last summer at Coco when we were practicing our jog-ups, but Eileen had additional useful suggestions, especially when it came to dealing with the short attention spans and sometimes overexuberant behavior of the babies.

In the afternoon we also got to see a 4yo do his YEH dressage test and discuss it as a group, then we chatted a lot about breeding and eventing over wine and then even more over dinner. Eileen and I have similar taste when it comes to bloodlines and stallions, so it was fun to talk to her (and the other clinic participants, of course).

I also heard that there’s a new 4yo FEH class, for those who wish to move at a slower pace with their young horses. The 4yo FEH has an in-hand conformation portion followed by a group under saddle portion (cantering separately). I thought this was a BRILLIANT addition, great for horses that are a bit less mature or just not ready to be jumping courses yet. So the 4yos get to choose between FEH and YEH.

Sunday was shorter, with a “mock show”. Everyone got to apply what they learned the day before and present their horses to Eileen for judging, complete with score sheets. It was fun to stand there and hear her comments about each horse and see what her scores were and why. Definitely gives me A LOT of insight into FEH and will help me decide whether or not I want to pursue those classes with my own horse. And if we DO, now I have an excellent idea of exactly what they’re looking for and how best to prepare Baby Horse for those competitions.

It was a superb and very useful clinic! I would highly recommend something like this to ANY sporthorse breeder, owner, or rider. Totally worth the audit!

Back in the old days, foal watch was something that could span the course of weeks. Sleeping in the barn, getting up every couple hours to check on the mare, obsessing over every little change in her demeanor. Then somebody figured out milk testing and everything got a whole lot easier.

There are “official” milk test kits on the market, like Predict-A-Foal or Chemetrics, but you can accomplish the same general type of testing with plain old pool testing strips – ones that measure pH and calcium. It’s pretty simple really… you collect a little bit of “milk” (which may or may not look like actual milk until foaling. Sadie’s is still more yellow and clear-ish.), dilute it with a specific ratio of distilled water, and then use the strip to test it.

Some people rely solely on the color of the milk to tell how imminent foaling is, but some mares don’t really produce much until right at foaling time, and others may not have true white milk until the very last minute either. Testing the calcium content and the pH of the milk are more accurate indicators than just using color alone.

Beyond getting the ratio of milk to water correct, it’s actually a super simple method of testing. As the mare gets close to foaling, the pH will drop and the ppm of calcium will increase. Once you hit 200ppm of calcium, you’re probably within 24-48 hours… 400-500 usually means you’re imminent (although some mares can have a big spike in calcium a day or so in advance). Using the calcium in conjunction with pH gives you a little bit of a closer window, since pH drops dramatically just before foaling. Once your calcium is high and your pH is low, baby horses are about to happen.

Granted, you don’t want to constantly be testing the milk or you run the risk of depleting the colostrum. As the mare’s udder starts to develop, testing every few days is fine until the numbers start to change, and very little milk is required to test. Although this method of testing works well on most mares, you’ll find one sometimes that doesn’t go by the book. Still though, it typically helps reduce the sleepless nights to just one or two instead of MANY.

So, what does all this mumbo jumbo really mean? It means I get to go audit the FEH/YEH clinic in Dallas this weekend, because Sadie’s still testing low on calcium and high on pH!!! We’re not super close.

Last week Alaine at Spotted Dressage asked one of the most seemingly simple and yet usually complex questions in the equestrian world:

What Do You Feed & Why?

I’m a total nerd about this stuff and find it really interesting, so I couldn’t resist this one. Henry currently gets:

• 6lbs per day of Triple Crown Senior
• 4-6 flakes of coastal hay
• grass or coastal hay in turnout
• 1 flake of alfalfa per day (1/2 am, 1/2 pm)
• free access to salt

I pay bit extra on top of board for premium feed and I buy my own alfalfa, but I’m a huge believer in nutrition and think that high quality feed and hay are absolutely vital to the overall health of my horse. I’m really picky about ingredients and what Henry eats, and more than happy to pay extra to get something good. I definitely won’t feed anything that has some kind of grain by-product as a major ingredient.

Henry used to be on TC Complete but made the switch to TC Senior last fall. He’s getting plenty of forage these days, with lots of hay plus his alfalfa and grass, so I opted for lower starch and lower total NSC. The Senior is still 10% fat, over 1500 calories per pound, and made from high quality ingredients, but has about half as much starch as Complete. Henry isn’t a super hard keeper, per se, but he is a thoroughbred event horse that works 5-6 days a week. He still has energy, although I’ve noticed a decrease in nervous energy since the switch. I don’t know if that can be attributed to lower starch or if he’s just growing up a bit, but so far the Senior is working out really well for him. I like that it’s grain free, and I love that it’s not a dusty pellet.

Coastal hay definitely isn’t my favorite, but it’s really difficult to get anything else around here. Luckily the barn’s hay is at least good quality coastal squares (the rounds tend to be yuckier and can definitely give them a potbelly look), so it works.

Aside from the “what”, I also think the “when” is equally important. The less time he spends standing around with no forage, the better. He gets alfalfa and hay with his TC meals, and has access to hay or grass as much as possible. Really the only time he doesn’t have forage is in the middle of the night, which is when he’s finding a nice fresh pee spot to sleep in anyway.

You’ll also notice Henry’s lack of supplements. That’s because I kind of hate most of them and have a lot of opinions about the supplement industry that probably no one will like. I’ll spare all of us and just not even start down that road. I don’t hate them all; Henry has been on a few different oral supplements in the past (one for his lungs, and magnesium) but nothing has really made enough difference to stick. His feed already has probiotics and vitamins in it, so no need to add any of that, and if I’m going to do a joint supplement I’d much rather do it IM than oral. He does get omeprazole when we travel, but that’s in paste form.

What do your horses get? I’m really interested to hear what other people feed their horses – it’s so interesting to me to see what everyone does and the reasoning behind it. Equine diets are fascinating!

There is no doubt that having a lot of regular lessons (a lot for me anyway) over the past few months has really helped me connect some dots with my riding and especially my confidence. Amazing how consistency and repetition work, eh? At the little jumper show this past weekend there was another person who has made tremendous strides with her own riding in the past 6 months or so. We got to talking about it and our general consensus was “Finding the right trainer and dedicating yourself to regular instruction makes all the difference.”.  I thought she hit the two key things right on the head. Right trainer + consistency = improvement.

Granted, there are a couple other trainers I ride with on occasion (one of which I’ll be riding with again this summer when Trainer is busy having a kid) but over time I’ve gotten incredibly particular about who I’ll ride with. I’d rather have no lessons than ride with someone I don’t trust, or who doesn’t understand my horse or me, or who has no idea what I’m ultimately working toward. To me that seems pointless. I think as an eventer it’s especially important that the person at least have a good understanding of the sport and it’s demands, even if they don’t specialize in it. Let’s be honest, riding with a strictly hunter trainer would ultimately be pretty pointless for me, just as riding with an event trainer would likely be pretty pointless for a hunter rider. They might have a few helpful tips but overall the nuance isn’t there and it just doesn’t mesh.

Because I’m really particular, I don’t enter a clinic unless I know a lot about the person and how they teach, and know that their style would be complimentary to my regular instruction. Just because you’re famous or have an impressive resume doesn’t mean you’re the right fit for me and my horse. Not to mention that clinics are really expensive… I could literally have EIGHT lessons with my trainer for the cost of the average clinic. And I still walk away from her lessons having learned something every single time, plus she knows me and my horse and what we need to work on in every phase, and how it all ties together. I trust her to give me honest feedback and I especially trust her to keep me safe. There’s not a lot of appeal for me to spend a lot of money to ride with someone else at this point, although sometimes clinics are fun.

Granted, I also see the appeal of spicing it up every now and then and getting a different set of eyeballs on you. Sometimes that can help lead to big breakthroughs. But again, I’m really picky about which eyeballs. I want everyone I work with to at least be fairly like-minded and have a similar style. Otherwise I’ll end up with so many different opinions that it comes down to a “way too many cooks in the kitchen” situation and I won’t make any progress. Been there. Done that. For me it was worse than no lessons at all.

I know that dedicating myself to one person’s program and showing up as often as possible makes a big difference for me. It’s not always convenient (ok it’s rarely convenient these days, it’s a freaking 4 hour drive round trip) but I kinda feel like either you really want to get better and will put forth the effort to do so, or you don’t and won’t. Hopping constantly back and forth from one trainer to another, or doing what’s most convenient, or just meeting up with someone for coaching at shows doesn’t work for me. It’s important that the person I ride with regularly also sees me at shows, so they know how everything translates for me when I’m in the ring. That’s how I build and improve.

I’m curious about what everyone else’s approach is to training, trainers, and lessons. Do you prefer to stick with just one person, or a few people with a similar style? Or would you rather get as many different eyes on you as possible? Is being in a regular lesson program important to you or do you just take them as you can get them? Do you think it’s vital that the person you ride with have experience with your specific discipline? How important is The Right Trainer to you?

I felt so “on it” about Baby Horse’s name. I had it narrowed down before he was even conceived, and it didn’t take me very long into Sadie’s gestation before I settled on Magic Word – barn name Presto. It had to be an M name because we had fully intended to take this foal RPSI, Sadie’s registry of birth. For them, foal names follow the first letter of the sire’s name. Mighty Magic = M.

But then a few weeks ago Michelle and I started brainstorming about some other things, and I got some news about Sadie’s registration status (great news! which I will share whenever it’s all final). For several different reasons, it would really be tremendously easier if we did sBs for registration instead. I don’t mind this at all, because the sBs folks were so incredibly gracious to us on our Belgium visit a couple years ago. They’re super nice, and while sBs is a small registry, they’ve managed to produce a lot of good horses.

Plus their brand looks like the Budweiser symbol, which greatly amuses me for some reason. This is a Budweiser Warmblood, y’all.

All was well and good with that until Michelle reminded me that their naming convention is different – they do a certain letter every year. This year it’s L. So close to M, but not. You know what doesn’t start with L? MAGIC WORD.

Well shit.

So I’ve spent the past week trying to figure out a decent L name with little success. Karen threw out Like Magic, which is the only one I like so far. And it still works with Presto. I’ve googled magic terms, harry potter spells and characters, french words, you name it. No luck. You’re killing me, sBs.

I mean, I could just put Le in front of Magic Word for registration purposes and be done with it (and just drop the Le for showing) but that seems kinda Lame (bonus points for L-word). Anybody got ideas for L names that have something to do with magic in some way? I suddenly feel so unprepared.