The Equestrian Nomad

Month: May 2020

Trailer Loading: Difficult loader?  Ten Steps for Easy Loading the Horse Trailer

May 17, 2020 /

 

A few of my lucky friends have horses who load easily into the horse trailer.  They get right in, stand in the right spot and wait for their human to close the doors then drive on.  My horse is not like that.  My horse, Odin the Mustang, was rounded up from the range and likely driven into a noisy metal stock trailer with a bunch of his terrified herd mates or possibly terrified members of a stranger herd.  Imagine walking with your handler to another clanky metal box and remembering those feelings of terror the last time you were faced with the trailer. It’s easy to understand why he resists getting into the horse trailer.

Domestic horses may also have had an unlucky introduction to trailer loading.  Maybe they were pulled, whipped, or otherwise punished for not getting in right away.  It’s easy to imagine why these horses resist loading.  And humans also have scary or frustrating experiences with trailer loading. No wonder trailer loading is difficult for everyone involved!

How do we leave the property for lessons, clinics, trail riding, being with friends if both horse and handler dread trailer loading?  Make it a fun game for you and your hose to enjoy!  The game has two simple rules: stay safe and have fun (both of you).  What’s this game?  I call it “Good Times in the Horse Trailer” and I try to make it a good time in the horse trailer for Odin.

The steps:

  1. Teach your horse to touch a hand-held target using positive reinforcement. I use a Goodwill lacrosse stick with the head duct taped so that there are no holes in the net.  You can make a safe target on a stick out of a duct-taped water bottle on piece of dowel or broomstick.  You can use a broom.  Whatever you use make sure it’s easy for the horse to see and touch with his nose.  Hold the target in front of him, let him reach his nose to touch it then make a clicking sound (not the go-forward clucking sound) with your tongue and give him a treat.  Repeat until he understands that he gets goodies every time he touches the target and hears the click.  For more resources on positive reinforcement, click here.
  2. Teach your horse to stand on a mat. Steps one and two might take 15 minutes.  Odin figured them out in about 5 minutes but some horses are more distracted and everyone has a different learning rate.  A mat can be an old saddle pad or old towel or old bath mat.  I use brightly colored bath mats and when Odin puts a foot on the mat, he hears the click and receives a treat.  It didn’t take him long to figure out I wanted two feet on the mat and then he was rewarded for staying on the mat for a count of five, ten, long enough for me to walk around him, get something from the tack room.  The mat is his standing spot.
  3. The first two steps are easily taught at liberty. When I want to move these games to the trailer, I use a halter and lead rope mostly to help him focus and not completely abandon the game.  The halter and lead rope are not to pull him in the trailer or punish him in any way.  At this step, simply move your horse’s mat to the trailer, either near it or in it, depending on how comfortable your horse is near the trailer.
  4. Use your hand-held target to move your horse to the mat. Reward him each time he touches the target as you move it closer to the mat.
  5. Show him the mat and ask him to stand on it, then reward. These are fun games that he recognizes and can easily accomplish.  That feels good for both of you.  Success!
  6. Move the mat closer to where you ultimately want the horse to stand. If the mat is in the trailer and the trailer rattles, you may have to reinforce him for standing on that one spot for a while.  If your horse is in the trailer and wants to leave, let him back out nicely, then ask him to target and stand on his mat again.  Giving him a bit of choice in the matter builds his confidence and trust in you.
  7. Keep using the target, mat and rewards to the place where you want your horse to stand patiently.
  8. Once you reach that place, repeatedly ask him to target. I transition from the hand-held target to targeting a flag or handkerchief hanging where his nose goes. Reward for standing nice with you and continuing to play the target game.
  9. Reward him for standing on his mat while you move along his body to close the divider or butt bar.
  10. Close the door and show him the hand-held target from the outside of the trailer. You stand on the outside of the trailer and let him touch the target with his nose 5-10 times.  My horse gets more distracted at this point and ideally I’d like him to touch it 10 times but I’ll let it go if he no longer wants to play that game and instead licks and chews as a sign of release.  Then I open the door, open the divider and stand with him and target again for a moment or two until I’m comfortable that he’ll stay with me for as long as I ask and then I’ll back him out and let him graze before we go ride or go back to his paddock.

As you practice, these steps go quickly and you may be able to skip steps.  Sometimes you have to repeat steps.  Sometimes Odin wants to leave before I’m ready.  I let him leave and ask again, repeat until he waits for me to initiate backing out.

Keep in mind that depending on your previous experience or your horse’s previous experience you both may need to be reassured that this is a fun, safe game and worth practicing!  Take as much time as you need in each step. It’s also important to remember that learning for both of you is not linear and sometimes it’ll feel like you have to go all the way back to step one.  I’ve had this happen when I’ve mistakenly tried to rush Odin and just get on with it darn it!  When will I learn that impatience does not pay? Not soon enough I’m afraid as I’m still learning that lesson. Thankfully horses are forgiving if we are generally kind.  Now I take as much time as necessary in each step and attempt to give Odin good feelings about getting and being in the horse trailer.  When he feels good about it, I feel good about it and those are games worth practicing.

Resources for the Do-it-Yourself Horse Owner

May 3, 2020 /

Sometimes I love self-discovery.  Sometimes I just want the answers.

Self-discovery is easier if you have a straightforward horse that gives you consistent answers when you ask similar questions.  However, when the answer is consistently "No!" and you've run out of tools in your toolbox where do you turn if you aren't consistently paying a professional?

Eventually I will run out of tools in my toolbox and have to consult with a professional when it comes to certain aspects of riding.  I am perfectly capable of riding on a trail without professional help, at least with Odin the Mustang.  That same exercise simply was not true for my late Thoroughbred, Beege.  He had more things to be afraid of than I could possibly address.  Sometimes the goblins were the same thing day after day, month after month.  He had too many other issues, likely related to arthritis and a gut slowly going bad, for me to move beyond simple target training and sometimes he preferred to worry than engage. Eventually, maybe after the Stay Home Stay Healthy order is lifted, Odin and I will take riding lessons so that we both understand body control in order to safely navigate jumps or ride patterns or try mounted archery.  I can teach him basic steering but there will be a point when the maneuvers are more advanced.

In the meantime, my favorite resources are:

1) Alexandra Kurland, The Clicker Center: My favorite tools are her book The Click that Teaches and her podcast, Equiosity. The book offers a step-by-step approach to positive reinforcement with a lot of photos.  I have been able to move fairly quickly through the book with Odin the Mustang and started target training baby mustang, Bragi the Mustang.

2) Stacy Westfall: She wants to teach all of us to train our own horses. Mostly I listen to her two podcasts, the one on Horse Radio Network and her own.

3) Shawna Corrin Karrasch: She also has a monthly, podcast on Horse Radio Network that teaches the listener how to use positive reinforcement, step-by-step.  The podcast format has an introduction and then a "laboratory" portion where you can listen and train your horse at the same time that Shawna is working with one of her horses.

4) Mary K Kitzmiller Horsemanship: Another monthly podcast host on Horse Radio Network, she answer listener questions, sometimes live during the show.  I called in one time and received great feedback on helping Odin the Mustang load in the trailer when I was about to move him from one location to another.  Mary is able to explain when and why to use positive reinforcement and when you might need to apply pressure and release training.

5) Horse Radio Network: if you are a fan of all horses all the time podcasts, this network has at least a dozen shows that are educational and entertaining.  Show topics range from specific disciplines to horse care and nutrition to marketing and entertainment.  I never would have entertained the idea, much less adopted two mustangs, if I hadn't listened to hundreds of their podcasts.

These are all my go-to resources for where I am right now in the training process.  Eventually I hope to use my books on arena exercises and be able to describe those successes when I get there.

Odin the Mustang: Trailer Training

May 2, 2020 /

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It's raining.

Governor Inslee extended the Stay Home Stay Health until the end of May.  Nowhere to go, don't want to make mud by riding in the pasture, I am finally forced to face my trailer demon.

I hate trailer loading because Odin doesn't like it.  Odin doesn't like probably because he can sense that trailering is a giant hole in my horsemanship tool box.  I am simply not confident with it as I did not grow up with trailering.  When I grew up we rode to trails over hill, over dale, through empty pastures and down two-lane roads with no traffic then into the forest.  I was that lucky.

As an adult, I've mostly boarded my horses at places with riding arenas and access to at least short trails.  I've shown a little and paid for the trailer ride to shows.  I simply did not have to deal with trailering.  I had people for that.  How posh.  Ha.

When I re-embarked on the horsemanship journey almost 5 years ago I wanted to learn how to teach my horse(s) how to do x, y, and z.  In grad school I learned that in order to teach, you had to know your subject inside and out. Horses are more forgiving than undergrad students but I learned to avoid making many mistakes and to refer to an expert on a subject if I didn't know it.

When I first got Odin the Mustang I boarded him at a stable and spent a good month of training on trailer loading.  He would load with my trainer because she is confident about trailering.  I gained some tools for my tool box but then it was up to me to practice, do my homework.  Horses know when you're faking confidence but how to move forward when you a) have the goal in mind, b) have a few tools, and c) need to exude confidence?

The answers are: a) practice what you know, b) forgive yourself if you make a mistake and go back to what you know, and c) practice until you're bored.

What do I know?  Positive reinforcement.  As I've said before, my favorite resource is Alexandra Kurland's book, The Click that Teaches.  She has a short section on trailer loading, which I avoided reading until this morning.  Luckily I practiced a lot of exercises that lead up to trailer loading: targeting, standing on a mat, and leading.  She points out that trailer loading is just an exercise in leading.  She also points out that many people and horses are afraid of trailer loading because of previous bad experiences.  Her exercises make it easy, make us all feel confident.

What to do?  Put a familiar target and a familiar mat in the trailer.  I put the orange and yellow flag for a target and the red mat in the place where Odin would stand.  I put a blue mat near the entrance to the trailer.  We hadn't worked on that mat yet but this would be a good place to start.

First, we practiced putting on the fly mask because buzzing flies aren't going to help if we're annoyed and distracted.  Then we practiced fly spray, which he views as acid touching his precious skin.  Both of these were at liberty because Odin loves positive reinforcement.  I doubt he would go near the trailer without the halter and lead rope at this stage and the point isn't to drag him into the trailer.  The point of the halter and leadrope is just so he doesn't go back to eating grass because he'd prefer to ignore me and the trailer.

I also need to mention that Randy was weed-whacking nearby with the gas powered weed whacker for extra distraction, which is good for knowing how to proceed when the environment is a little busy.  It's good practice for having your horse's attention when you're in an unfamiliar location and asking him to load.

Halter on, he snorted all the way to the blue mat that was in front of the trailer door.  Snorting is a sign of being over threshold, which is not the goal but he kept walking forward.  He was telling me he didn't like it but he recognized the stand-on-mat exercise and was interested.  Then he stopped so I brought the mat to him and we began that exercise: stand on mat with two feet, click and treat.  He's good at that game, even with weed-whacking nearby, which is a very good sign.

The mat kept moving closer to the trailer until finally it was easier to put the mat in the trailer.  We spent a lot of time with two feet in the trailer then back out.  Repeat.  Then he put all 4 feet in without my asking and stood there.  Great!  Click, treat, back out.  Take a break.  He grazed while I futzed around in the garden.

Generally I can get Odin in the trailer but staying in there is another issue for him.   Front feet in, pause, click and treat.  Repeat.  Four feet in, pause, click and treat.  Repeat.  Ok, now go touch the target at the front of the trailer.  Pause, click and treat.  Repeat a couple times then we are done for the day. If I'm bored with the game it probably means that I am confident enough.

These are fun games to play while it's raining to build and reinforce confidence.  I'm hoping that by the time the Stay Home Stay Health order is lifted both Odin and I feel very confident about trailering.  Half the challenge is loading.  The other half is staying in there so we will practice the how-long-can-I-stand-here game when we get to that point.

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