We’re very excited to welcome Theo to the JSS family! He’s a 7 year old warmblood, somewhere north of 17hh, stunning gray with quite the presence. He was sired by Sempatico and his dam was a stunning jumper. Theo hasn’t done a whole lot to be honest. He leads, though he can be a bit pushy. He’s had routine vet and farrier care, but it sounds like he can be a bit of a jerk with his hind end. He doesn’t trailer, lunge or cross-tie and he hasn’t been backed at all. I’m not gonna lie, that’s definitely my type of horse and I’m beyond excited for the challenge.
The trailer ride was terrifying. Took a bit of coaxing to get him on then as soon as we began to close the divider he panics, turns himself around backwards and tries to scoot under. We quickly got out of the back and let him calm down. Once we got moving he settled right down. As we arrived at the barn he was surprisingly quiet, no injuries on the trailer, a little bit of calling for the other horses but he was honestly really good.
We started with ground work- asking him to respect our space and move when we ask, picking up feet, etc. Whelp, I got kicked. I went flying across the aisle. We took it a lot slower after that. He was definitely a little more nervous being inside the barn. After several days of picking his feet up and holding them up for as long as we wanted he realized it wasn’t that bad. Now he’s a total gentleman. We’ll see if that lasts when the farrier is there to give him a trim.
Lunging took a hot second to figure out. Once he realized he was attached to me in the middle he accepted it pretty quickly. Adding tack was even less of an issue. First outside after a lunging session, then we started tacking up inside. Zero issues there. What a good man!
This was a lot to process for his first week in a new place and for being asked to have a job for the first time ever. He is taking everything in stride (hehe, horse puns…) so we even went as far as to start putting some weight on him in the saddle. All I can say is this guy is going to be a LOT of fun!
