Monday - October 3, 2011

It has been a while since I blogged anything. Have all kinds of excuses but that is all they are, excuses. I have been spending some time with the horses when I water them but for the most part the round pen has stayed empty. Took care of that today though, I filled that sucker up. LOL I brought Star, Sweetie, Julie, and Snippy in this afternoon. I am going to take Star on a trail ride Saturday and I thought I would work on her ground manners. She has a few issues while being handled from the ground but does great once I am in the saddle. Basically I did a few yielding exercises to get her mind on me and then worked on her standing still for me to get on. We will keep working on this and even throw in mount from the trailer, a hay rack, and a mounting block. Might even work with throwing her in the grader ditch for mounting.

Sweetie has finally decided I am not some evil monster for taking her to that Amish trainer. I think she is thinking it WAS a stupid idea on my part and I would have a tendency to agree with her. She is coming up to me and waiting to be haltered. I think she enjoyed the grooming and brushing session. We worked on disengaging  the hindquarters and moving the forequarters.  We also worked on leading past. She was a little nervous when I slapped the saddle pad on her back but she settled down and didn't fight it.

Snippy is a problem child right now. She is very ear shy. So ear shy in fact that she doesn't like to have a hand touch her head or even get close to her head. She gets almost violent when you touch her ears. I am going to have to get this issue resolved before we can go on to something else. My normal method of dealing with this type of thing is to just rub the spot that bothers them until they relax and accept it. So far that isn't working for Snippy and her ears. Guess I will have to do a little research on see what else I can find to do to her. I like this filly but horses are too cheap to mess with a problem child.

I save Julie for last. I really like this Red Roan filly. She has an even temperament and just seems to want to please. I haltered her and combed and brushed her. We worked on disengaging the hindquarters and moving the forequarters. I have an appointment for Julie and hopefully Sweetie with Casey Warren in early December. Casey has started horses for me before and I really like the way he handles them. They come home ready to ride.