Princely Sum - Up

You will have all been waiting, as I have, for news of Prince and Ruth. A few weeks ago, she contacted me in a bit of a panic because Prince had taken to jumping the fence out of his field in order to go and visit his friend, from whom he had been separated. Luckily this only took him into the track that goes up to the riding school itself. Every cloud has a silver lining, and I encouraged Ruth to see this as an opportunity to see whether he would follow her naturally. As well as going back down to the field, Ruth began to use it as an opportunity to come up from the field and to explore the nooks and crannies of the school, the hay barn and pen, and ultimately, the stable.

I have known for a long time that I could trust her instincts and that providing she didn't just focus on getting a headcollar on him, things would come in their own good time. I received this missive yesterday:

"After a few very worrying weeks about things, Prince and I are now having the best time ever! His field and the one opposite are completely flooded and out of use. He is basically roaming around, ... so there really is nowhere for me to put him.

He will follow me anywhere, day or night, going in and out of gates. He has been in stables, with the door open. He has been in the pen to eat and I have closed the door round but not left him in yet. He will follow me into the school and walk round – we even walked over a low jump a couple of times yesterday. He lets me groom him along his head, neck, back and sides...

He has made lots of friends with both ponies and people around the yard. He will go up to people and kiss them or lick their hands and make them feel special because he has chosen to go to them – what a clever boy! But he has learned to keep his head down and not draw too much attention to himself.

I have started to use the scarf again and decided to make the most of not being stuck in a dark, cold field."

And the next thing I know, I received this video...

Ruth added, "The headcollar is on! And he doesn't seem to mind."

It's weird when the headcollar isn't the issue but is also entirely the issue. Trying to get it on - in particular over each ears - was the point at which Prince showed all the cracks in his trust in people. Ruth has steadily fixed all of those (she is his Repair Shop Kirsten) and although the 'ad-hesive' will be visible for a little while, Ruth will now be able to use tiny brush strokes to match the original pattern.