Storm Katie saw off my morning appointment as there didn't seem to be much to gain in loading a spooky Arabian into a spooky trailer on an extremely spooky day. It was definitely a day for being indoors with a towel to hand. I have a mantra: "Teach a task before you teach it tied" and this is what I did with Bear today. He wore the big orange towel which I put in different positions, dropped on the floor, and gently 'threw' back on him, and left on him while I got on with other jobs like picking up his feet.
Once I could more or less guarantee that he wasn't frightened of the towel, I did it all over again while he was tied up.
Another session of pony rustling, this time with Julie joining in as the stranger. She hasn't seen him since he came in a fortnight ago and was pretty impressed with the changes in him. The biggest concern his owners have is whether he will revert when he returns home. With repetition and consistency we should be able to minimise the risk of that happening.
Later this afternoon Julie and I went to collect a set of pony bones that had been found on the Forest. It appears that they had been around a very long time as they are bleached white and very clean. I don't think I have a whole pony but I do have the skull and leg bones as well as the pelvis and most of the vertebrae, one scapula and a complete collection of ribs; I'm amazed at how slender the ribs are. I hope the pony they belonged to would appreciate the fact that they will be used to educate horse owners in the future, and to this end I have named the pony Honour.
Incredible that the bones from one large pony will fit in one small washing basket. They're all cleaned and the next step will be to bleach them ready for assembly.
