Yesterday we returned from our awesome 3-week vacation. I missed the kitties and horses terribly while we were gone. Here's how the kitties greeted us:
It didn't take long for them to want to snuggle and purr in our laps. Ah the love!
I was glad to see the horses trotting up to me from the pasture, which I'm sure is because they are certain it's feeding time even when it's not.
Today I wasn't sure where to start working with the horses. Frankly I couldn't really remember where I had left off; thankfully I keep a handwritten notebook with short notes on our sessions. I decided that the easiest thing to do is to start with super easy tasks to see how much each horse remembered from our last session.
Since I fed the boys breakfast in the round pen, they happily followed me in. Bragi is the most enthusiastic (and pushy) so I let him in and asked Odin to back out, wait his turn. Here's Bragi:
I love his expression and how curious he is; he seems to enjoy connecting with me. I'm pleased to report that for the most part he picked up almost right where we left off: keep your nose to yourself, check; follow me, check; backup, check; friendly game, check; stand still while I walk around, check; move the haunches left to right, check (eventually); go into the barn with me, not so great. He's always been wary of the barn aisle and that is where we left off before vacation. I used approach and retreat with lots of reward when he decided to go with me and stand still in the barn aisle. Rewards include cookies and also a good belly scratch. Then I asked him to back out and let him go about his own business. The photo is of him after the session. I'm in the round pen fiddling with the water bucket and he's still quite engaged, curious about what I'm doing.
Odin seemed a little put out that I worked with Bragi first but came around when I rewarded him for very simple tasks, namely asking him to put his nose in his halter. One of my goals with training these horses is make sure they enjoy their tasks. I think this builds trust and engagement for more complicated requests.
Halter on, Odin and I walked up to the front yard where I let him graze for a bit as a reward. I want him to look forward to leaving the barn and going to the front yard because that's where I do the majority of my riding, which is work for him. After grazing for a bit, we played the squeeze game where I asked him to go through a narrow space, which happened to be between the front porch and my truck. This is a good exercise for getting used to tight situations. Horses are naturally claustrophobic so doing this exercise as part of a warmup is good for unexpected tight situations; both horse and handler know what to do. I also asked him to hang out a bit near his nemesis, the hose bib. He offered to touch it with his nose and got a reward for his effort. Moving on, I asked for turns on the haunches and forehand to see how much he remembered. Odin still likes to go forward for the turn on the haunches exercise so we practice this a lot. He's naturally heavy on his forehand so this exercise is a little more difficult for him since he has to shift his weight to his hindquarters. Odin is growing his winter coat already:
Here's another critter I noticed during pasture patrol:
I call him Mr. Chippy even though he's not a chipmunk but a native Douglas squirrel. He looks like he's getting ready for winter.