5th April, 2015 Happy Easter!

This morning we loaded the Tramper and Nettles to be might steeds and part of our Mopley Crew at the Easter Activity Ride. Mopley Riding Club is brilliant at setting up events to suit all ages, abilities and types of pony.

We promised Nettles that there would be hot chicks on his tail.

As this was Nettle's first pony party we wondered how long he would take to settle down but we soon had Imy on board. We were passed by a few people including Hilary on Arabian, Visnia, a horse that I started with her a couple of years ago.

The first hazard for Braydon involved weaving in and out of trees and meanwhile Imy hitched a lift with Barbara.

Time for another change over and Nettle's ribbons are still intact along with his halo.

With Fawley Refinery in the background it was time for another hazard where speed was of the essence. Here's Jenny and her young New Forest pony, Poppy.

Nettles was a little more sedate but Imy had her first trot.

Family reunion and we can watch how it is done. Karen McSween on her New Forest pony show how agile they can be.

One rosette for Imy and one rosette for Braydon equals two rosettes for Nettles.

4th April, 2015 Through the Round Window

I'm never in danger of being typecast but I did wonder if I was on the set of Playschool today. First pony of the day was called Denny but then we had Big Ted and later on we had Little Ted. Just need a Jemima and a Humble!

Denny has recently been started by his owner and she has done a great job with all of the preliminaries. Whilst he loves going riding with his friend, Ted, he struggles to go out alone and has a tendency to stop dead in the middle of the road. I started off by teaching him to short rein, something that could be useful as an alternative when taking him out and about. Then we headed out on the road ourselves.

For the first section on the main road I kept ahead in order to give him someone to follow. Luckily he is completely traffic proof nevertheless the middle of the road is not a good place to start being nappy.

On a much quieter side lane we started work on asking him to go forward on his own, using the reins to move his front feet whenever he got stuck. It often helps to think of the arms and reins as directing the front feet and the legs directing the back.

Back at the farm I went through a groundwork session with handsome cob, Ted, and his loaner, Lucy. Whilst he is a dream under saddle he is inclined to take control on the ground.

A quick lunch stop at the fire station to get the car washed at their Charity Day. How rude that someone said "Make sure you wash under the wheel arches, there's a field under there!"

I don't think that Jim was keen to wash all their fiddly bits - let's hope they just stopped for cake.

One year old Shetland, Ted,  was originally sold through Beaulieu Road Sales yard to a family that didn't know how to handle him. Luckily he found his way to Louise and her daughter Emily who set about re-training him using No Fear, No Force. He's now a pretty friendly chap although he is inclined to nip especially when having his feet handled.

Some of that is due to the fact that he is still entire and, as you can see from the pictures below, accustomed to a lot of roughhousing with his friends. He just doesn't know (yet) that he can't treat people in the same way. Whilst gelding him will solve some of this testosterone driven behaviour, some focussed training will help too.

"Thankyou so much for today we really enjoyed it, I think with your instructions we will be able to slowly carry on with his training, I will keep in touch and maybe see you again when we need to move on to the next step !!" LN

"First training session with Ted after our time with Sarah Weston Logical Horsemanship yesterday, all went well, what a little star we have !!!" LN

3rd April, 2015 Toot Sweets

Off to Toothill this morning to work with two ponies, the first a Connemara that hates having his bridle on. As a result of aural plaques and some rough handling in the past Prince has sought to postpone the bridle being put on for as long as possible by lifting his head as high as he can and flicking his ears away from his handler. There is no doubt that aural plaques cause horses considerable discomfort so even if he is handled sympathetically there is ongoing pain. Accordingly, re-training Prince was not going to be an easy task.

Carefully posting the ear through the gap - it must not touch the leather - I'm standing on a step here.

Click, click, click, treat

The right ear is slightly easier than the left. I always go round to the other side to post it through.

Teaching the owner the position of the hand lengthways down the ear with fingers together as if wearing mittens.

It is going to take enormous patience to finish this job to the point where Prince happily accepts the bridle after all these years. However, it also takes a lot of patience to strip a bridle down every time you want to put it on.

Email received 7.4.15: "We've been making good progress with prince and his clicker training. Kym has taken him out and has been putting bridle on without undoing it all using clicker training and seems to be working very well." EB

Next it was time to see whether Harley would enjoy working with agility type obstacles. He is thirty now and his owner is keen to keep him amused in his old age. He's a pretty wary person (Kym is the only person that can catch him) but he seems happy to have something interesting to do. He has been taught to touch things for clickered treats and this seems to be a good introduction to most obstacles - however he is not happy with anything that is held by a human that bears any resemblance to a stick, hence the feather duster is on the floor.

Kym was amazed when he consented to go over the tarpaulin. She had thought he wouldn't go over it in a month of Sundays but once he was convinced that it was dead he was happy to walk over it in any direction.

We had a rather envious looking audience.

"Thank you for the report and photos. It was really lovely to work with you again and am still slightly shocked that Harley walked over the tarpaulin." KBI

Then back off to the fields where we took Jack and Nettles out to blow their cobwebs away. Jack looks a bit like a pillow fight at the moment. Nettles has a special assignment on Sunday so he needed to get some energy out of his system.

2nd April, 2015, Brunettes, Redheads, and Blondes

Tracey had her first ride out on Bella this morning. Thanks to Jodie's work she has seen Bella's progress and guauged how she reacts to things and so all went without a hitch.

Although we didn't go very far, Bella was pretty tired when we got back - mentally more than physically I suspect. Tracey has very deliberately lost a stone in weight in order to make Bella's life easier.

Theoden sets across the field to find his lunch...

Petra powers across too...

But what's this? That's not Bella...

No, she's asking for a lift...

and finally decides she can just about trot over. 

This afternoon I went off to meet, assess, and start work with Ruby an eleven year old Norwegian Fjord pony. She is absolutely beautiful and has a lovely nature. She was born in Holland and spent many years as a broodmare. Her new owner wants her brought back into work and will hopefully be bringing her down to me in a couple of weeks. Another trainer has washed his hands of her and so it was with some trepidation that I began to work with her but I could find nothing untoward. In fact she was very responsive and seemed to enjoy our session. Let's hope it stays that way when she stays our way.

Getting the touch right - a deep flat touch resulted in a calm, relaxed pony.

Checking that she doesn't just take the bit and leave. 

Email received 7.4.15:
"I have been doing the in hand ground work with her in the school and also when leading in and out of the field. We walk for five, stop, back up and turn in different directions. Today as I felt we had more confidence with each other we went alone for a walk in hand along Clarendon lane and passed a few cars and a group of cyclists. She did have a few spooks but I talked to her reassured her in a quiet voice with a rub and kept her feet moving she licked and chewed and lowered her head and began to relax. When we turned to come back to yard she did quicken the pace and tried to push on in front but I asked her gently to back up as you taught me and she responded well.  Also she now greets me at the gate and is standing ready and waiting at five on the dot to come in." CG

1st April, 2015 Each to His Own

It's been seven years since I last worked with Tigga and that was at the demo I did at the RDA in Wilton. The clicker work that I did that day was to address his fear of clipping and to interrupt his pattern of rearing and striking out with his front feet. Over the last three days his owner has taken all of that out of the box again and managed to get most of his body clipped leaving just his legs, the front of his face and his ears to be clipped. These are his absolute no go areas and I knew I was going to have my work cut out to get them done at all. I had some limited success, managing to get his front legs clipped and his owner taking over from me. Once again the rub, clip, rub technique, coupled with clicker, seemed to do some good and he stopped rearing.

It has been suggested that a twitch be used on this pony. I can't think of anything more likely to reinforce everything he thinks he knows about humans and being clipped. It has been used on him in the past for emergency medical treatment and now he won't allow a twitch anywhere near him. It needs to be understood that a twitch is not some innocuous, magical way of sending a horse to sleep - it works by causing immense pain in the first place which then induces endorphins. In my opinion it is unethical to be using for anything other than genuine emergencies.

More work with Crystal this afternoon. She is now taking food from the hand so we can use clicker training to move things forward and to encourage her to present her front end rather than her bottom. Clever Tracey spotted the fact that she really wasn't all that bothered about pony nuts and why didn't we just use grass instead.

Starting lead work using just the scarf around her neck.

The nursery ward is next door to Crystal's stable and happily Tracey was allowed a go with one of the lambs.