This series is supported by Equestly.
Older horses who are solid equine citizens are the equivalent of a middle-aged 9 to 5-er. In terms of the human world, these are the horses who pay their taxes on time, they work when they’re supposed to, are home for dinner, and take the kids to soccer practice.
A young horse is more like a rebellious teenager combined with a toddler going through the terrible twos. Sometimes there’s more dinner on the walls than in their stomachs, there are random tantrums in the supermarket aisle for reasons unknown to the rest of us, and they may say, “God, mom, whatever” more than we’d all like.
Unfortunately for Diego Farje, at only four years-old, his horse EQ Scorpio, owned by Equestly, is still working on learning how to become a solid citizen. Diego hoofed it down to Wellington, Florida for the off-season to fill in the holes in Scorpio’s foundation and give the young horse a little more life experience.
EQ Scorpio and Diego Farje. Photo credit to Carlos Hernandez
His hope was that by filling the holes in Scorpio’s foundation, a lot of the reactivity the young Argentinian Warmblood feels at shows will be reduced before the 2024 season kicks off. “We train a lot and sometimes we do so well at home but then we go to a competition and it looks like we haven’t ridden in two years, you know? At shows, we’re dealing with more pressure, we get more tense, it’s a new environment. So the goal is that you’re riding at the show just as good as you are at home because the horse thinks that it’s just another training session.”
Diego decided to build Scorpio’s foundation by breaking down the sport of eventing completely. As a matter of fact, he didn’t do any horse trials this winter, but instead focused on show jumping and dressage as individual pieces of the puzzle. “I’m separating the disciplines right now so I can look into them a little bit deeper,” Diego said. “It’s good for a young horse to get a taste of the different disciplines and deal with different situations, different environments.”
Scorpio is not only learning how to be a good eventer under saddle, but he’s learning how to be a solid citizen on the ground, too. “We had a Canadian cowboy that came to teach us ground work, which was really helpful for me. There’s a lot of stuff that I need to deal with with Scorpio, as he’s so sensitive.”
Most notably, Scorpio was deeply prejudiced against trailers after his long trip from Argentina to the States. He was notoriously difficult to handle on the ground for barn staff, and was originally hard to catch in the pasture. While Diego has been hard at work on these issues, learning a new perspective on groundwork from this Canadian cowboy really sealed the deal for this pair. “Within a week or so, I was standing in the middle of a circle and Scorpio was lunging around me. All I had to do was move the lunge line to follow his motion.”
EQ Scorpio and Diego Farje. Photo credit to Carlos Hernandez
Not only did the groundwork improve Scorpio’s obedience and sense of feel, it also improved his mindset about discovering new things. “The groundwork exercises we did were really nice because they helped build Scorpio’s curiosity about new things,” said Diego. “Instead of, “Oh my god, what is THAT?!” Now it’s more, “Oh that’s interesting, what is that?”
Developing Scorpio’s sense of curiosity has paid off in dividends when it came to loading into the trailer. “He’s started loading by himself. I’m standing outside and he’s inside, looking around, so calm. He goes into trailers super easy now.”
Still, teaching Scorpio to be a solid equine citizen isn’t all sunshine and roses. Diego’s winter base was only a 20-minute hack from Wellington International, which is under construction. Diego was able to hack to the show and just flat around, simply to desensitize Scorpio to new and busy environments, which has come with its challenges. “It’s 10 times the number of horses we’re used to in a 10 times smaller place. At one point we were walking by a ring and someone crashed into a jump and Scorpio reacted as though the world was falling down, so we had to work through that,” Diego said.
Getting to the show was a trial in and of itself, as our highway rider hits the roads once again. Diego has to hack the reactive and sensitive Scorpio through construction to get to the show. Diego says the key to getting through the tough area of their hack is to stay calm and try to keep Scorpio’s focus.
EQ Scorpio and Diego Farje. Photo credit to Carlos Hernandez
“I try to move him around and try to pretend that we’re doing a groundwork exercise. A little bit of moving the shoulders, not making him face the construction and not kicking or anything, but just using enough pressure for him to know I’m here. I’m here with him. And ask him to try to focus on me,” Diego said. “Even if he gives me just 40 percent of his focus, then we can try to deal with what’s happening around us. But at least he’s not 100 percent focused on the construction.”
“Once he gives me a good feeling and tells me that he’s relaxed and thinking, ‘Okay, I know something is happening over there, but nothing is gonna happen to me.’ That’s where I can release, and move on like nothing is happening.”
After the construction, Scorpio and Diego faced a triple threat of crossing a road, a brightly dressed crossing guard waving his arms to stop traffic, and several tractors covered with a flapping tarp. “Everyone’s waiting for you to cross and then the horse gets a little bit upset. I try to be patient and stay really connected and just keep going,” Diego said.
EQ Scorpio and Diego Farje. Photo credit to Carlos Hernandez
Nothing brings my heart rate up more than struggling with a young horse in front of a crowd. Diego says it’s important to remember that you’re dealing with a young horse when you find yourself in tough situations like this. “A young horse needs to follow you, they need to focus on you. But it’s harder for them than it is for an older horse, because everything is still so new. They don’t know how to react to situations like an older horse does. With a young horse, you need to always make sure that you are there for them.”
When I asked Diego how he expects all of his hard work to translate to returning to his home base in Pennsylvania, he said he thinks the young horse will do well. After all of their training on how to handle new and busy environments, Scorpio is “way calmer than he was before.”
For more stories about Diego as he teaches his young Argentinian Warmblood to be an eventer, check out our Equestly Stories Column.
