Update on working with Nellie

I figured I should give an update to last Saturday's work session with Nellie.

I kept her tied up, and she wasn't too happy about it, but she mellowed out, and soon seemed complacent about the situation.  She knew she was there, and that she wasn't moving.  I posted my blog, and talked to some people in my yahoo draft group about the situation.  A friend there suggested that I do that tapping desensitization with the lead rope in my hand, instead of having her tied.  I thought long and hard about it, and decided that maybe I should try that.  I still had some daylight, so I figured I'd go for it.

Nellie was still being a little pushy with me, but not as bad.  I rubbed her and showed her that I loved her.  Then we started the training.  I reached my hand out, and rested it on her neck, and then started tapping.  She jumped back, and drug me back about 10 feet. 

Now this is where different training philosophies come into play.  I can see 2 ways to correct this behavior.  1) when they rear, keep constant pressure and do not let them get any relief from it till they step forward (HANG ON TO THE LEAD ROPE) or 2) give slack and then make the horse work hard afterwards (Give slack when they rear, followed by a nice 5-10 minutes of disengaging the rear end or backing routines).  One way send the message "rearing gets you nothing", and the other sends the message "you can rear, but you're going to get worked hard if you do".  This is how it makes sense in my mind right now.  So ... since I am young, ignorant, and stupid, I went with option 1.  I don't want this horse to think that they get anything by doing this.  I will always be on the end of that line, and that will hopefully discourage it.

So I hung on, and kept extreme pressure on the lead line till she stopped moving and stepped back towards me.  As soon as she was done pulling back, my hand went right back to her neck and tapped again.  Once again she pulled back, but this time only pulled me 5 feet.  I followed that by immediately tapping on her neck again.  After that, she started to calm.  I worked her for 15 minutes on this.  By the end, she was standing calm and not flinching at all.  I was pinching and poking all over the right side of her neck and she was fine.  Surprisingly, on the left side of her neck (where he mane falls), she was not jumpy.  She had no problem with me tapping that side.

I sat there, poking, pinching, and what not, and she was giving me a cocked hoof, and she was licking her lips.  She was relaxed.  I decided to call my wife, and see if we could possibly give the shots.  My wife came out, and within 20 minutes we had the shots given.  I held the line, and my wife just pinched, prodded, and what not.  Nellie would circle, and circle, and my wife would stay right on her.  Then she'd calm down a bit, and we'd praise her.  then my wife would poke and pinch some more, and then insert the needle.  Nellie would then circle another half circle away. and we'd keep at her, until she finally would relax and my wife could finish injecting the vaccine.  We did a strangles vaccine, and that took some doing.  This vaccine is applied with a 6 inch tube that you stick up the nose so that the vaccine can be absorbed by the mucus membranes.  Nellie was not fond of this, but we did eventually get it done.

I have to take a second to brag on my wife here.  The horses are my thing.  My wife is sometimes intimidated by the size of them, and my horse Lily picked up on that and would give her hell.  This REALLY made my wife intimidated.  Well ... when she came out to do the shots, my wife was in Vet Tech mode.  She did everything right.  She was assertive, and confident.  She applied pressure as part of desensitizing, and kept at it, even when Nellie would try to step forward on her.  She would respond to those movements by popping Nellie in the nose and letting her know she was not to crowd her.  She did great.  My wife could be a wonderful horse trainer if she wanted.  She is very good at communicating her will towards animals, and then helping the animal figure it out.  I was very impressed with her.

So ... after the shots were done, I was very excited.  However, Nellie was still a bit pushy, so I decided she was going back to being tied.  I tied her up, and put a full hay bag in front of her with some water.  And she forgot all about her cares as she went to munching on hay.

I checked on her multiple times through the night, and she was fine.  Just standing there.  The next morning I filled the hay bag again, and she was very grateful for that.  I would also take the time to pet her and talk nice to her anytime I was within the vicinity.

That afternoon, I decided to have an official training session with her, to check her attitude.  I grabbed my trusty carrot stick, and the training started.  Nellie was a tad uneasy with the carrot stick at first, especially since this was the first time she had seen me with it.  I rubbed her all over with it though, and she soon realized that it wasn't a scary thing, and that it was just an extension of me.  We then went to work.  The difference in attitude was amazing.  I had 2 ears and both eyes the whole time.  She never crowded me, or tried to rear back.I did some basic tossing of the carrot stick rope all over her for desensitizing, and she relaxed very quickly and was fine with it.  I then led her, and backed her.  She backed surprisingly well.  I then decided to try and lunge her.

You can tell she had some time put on her at one point (the 60 days of training that I was told she had).  I took the lead rope in my right hand, and pointed to the right with it, and clicked.  She started walking right away, and did very nice circles around me, not pulling on the lead line, just doing as big of circles as I had lead line for.  I was impressed.  She remembered the queue for starting the lunge.  She was VERY rusty on stopping though.  I had to really get after her to stop.  That's fine though, we can work with that.  I then took the lead line in my left hand, and pointed left and clicked.  She started walking to the left right away.

It was a great session.  She did so well.  She is a quick learner, and once you get her out of her lead mare/bitchy attitude, she's great.  :)  After this I went and tied her, and brushed her all over.  I also worked with her feet.  I lifted each one 3 times for short intervals.  She was okay with all of them but her rear right foot, but by the 3rd try on that one, she was more at ease with it.  I then applied the hoof pick to each of them and cleaned them out.  She did just fine with this.

She had a wonderful afternoon.  Her attitude was different, and it was fun working her.  As a reward, she got turned back in with the other horses and the round bale.  I think Rachael enjoyed having Nellie away from them.  :)  Those two just seem to hate each other.

So ... that's that.  Good things are happening.  Just gotta make sure I find the time to keep going. 

Nellie in Time Out!

Today was the first good day we've had in quite a while.  Probably near 60 degrees outside, and despite a bit of mud, it's very pleasant.  Today was the day for shots and coggins for all 3 horses, and for Rachael to get her shoes re-set.  I figured things would go pretty good, and since Nellie is still new to me, I figured it might be interesting to see how she responds.

She haltered fine, and tied up good.  Now, Nellie has a problem with being tied.  She thinks that it is her right to side pass over the top of you while tied.  She has no respect, and slowly I've gotten her to give heed to me.  She also is used to being able to rear back and escape whatever is holding her.  I saw this behavior when I was first trying to get her in the trailer, and so I only use a rope halter on her, and my lead rope has one of those "clinton anderson" latches with the twisty part.  Nellie was awesome for me while I groomed her up.  Cockleburrs in her ears, no problem.  brushing her anywhere, go right ahead.  Then came time for the shot.  She lost it.  She tried to side pass over my wife, and was met with my first.  This led to a discovery.  Rubbing on this horse, she is just fine.  But if you tap your finger on her neck, she goes nuts.  I literally watched her temperament get hotter and hotter as I just sat and did this to her. 

This is difficult for me, because as I've been taught, I need to just keep doing that till she relaxes and realizes that it's no problem.  It's a part of basic desensitizing.  Well ... Nellie got hotter, and hotter and hotter!  I was barely tapping on her neck.  She was trying to run me over, and then reached the point where she was full on rearing back and trying desperately to escape.  I kept going and going, and she got worse and worse.  At this point, I nearly got pawed when she reared back one time, so I turned the taps into half tap half rubs and got her to stand still.  I started tapping again, and she got all worked up again.  (Note:  by tap, I mean, barley touching her neck with your finger over and over and over.)

So ... I left her tied, and decided that we were not going to be able to do anything with her today.  She's way too worked up, and I don't want to make "getting shots" a tramatic experience.  I decided I'd leave her tied and let her get used to being tied up.

We turned our attention to Pam, and I tell ya ... the occasional spookiness Pam shows, is made up by how sweet and mellow she is when are brushing her.  She relaxed completely, and didn't even flinch for her shots.  Our Vet recommended we vaccinate for strangles this spring, and so we even did that for the first time.  This is applied through a long tube in the nose.  I thought for sure we'd get some bad behavior, but nope.  Pam stood there and was a dream.  Love that horse.

All the time this was going on, Rachael was getting her new shoes on.  Now, my farrier found out that in his haste this morning, he grabbed size 6 nails, instead of 8's from his dark shed.  This meant he ran out of nails.  Rather than have him drive 45 minutes home, I drove over to a friends a few miles away and borrowed some from him.

Well ... while I was gone, I got a call from the wife.  Nellie just broke the rope on her lead, and is running wild.  "Ok ... I'll be back quick.  Shut the gate and I'll take care of it in a minute".  2 minutes later ... RING.  "Nellie ran up and down the pen, and got Pam all worked up and excited, and Pam ran right through the fence.  Now they are both running around like crazy."  Anyone who has horses may understand why the next words out of my mouth were cuss words.  In my mind, there is nothing worse than HAVING to fix a fence.  Yes, it's easy, but I have other stuff to do instead of worrying about that.

I got home, and Amanda and my farrier had gotten things ok.  Pam was back in her stall, and my farrier had caught Nellie.  Come to find out, she didn't break the rope ... her "clinton anderson approved" latch had just popped open when she reared back on it.  Just my luck.  Maybe I should just stick with bull snaps.  Anyway ... I walked over to Nellie, and she was already pissy at being tied up.  And like a good parent, the punishment came swift.  "That's it young lady ... you are in time out!"

The farrier finisehd up Rachael, and Rachael got her shots.  The entire time we just hear the sounds of Nellie pawing the trailer, and moving side to side over and over.  We payed no attention to her.  After that, I fixed the fence, and cleaned everything up.  I walked over to Nellie with a brush, and brushed on her some.  Then she tried to side pass over me again.  So ... She got hit, and I decided that this horse is in an indefinite time out.  I took a water container over and put it near her head where she can reach it.  Tonight I'll hang a hay bag for her.  She can stay there till she drops this attitude and realizes that I am the boss!

Don't you hate when you have to be the mean parent?!?  That's my day today.  Nellie is going to make a very sweet and fun horse to work.  I really like her.  We just need to reinforce in her mind that when it comes to human interaction, she is NOT the lead mare.  I AM!

Oh ... and one more thing ... Oliver Jetton is the best draft farrier in North Texas!!  (as far as I'm concerned).  He's 60 years old and watching him do the work is awesome!  The horse stays calm and relaxed the entire time.  I'm so glad he's my farrier!