C.S. Wilson's Blog, page 20

Tarp Training

I've been carrying around a tarp in my car for some time now.  I think I got the tarp before I got Skeeter, but I don't remember why.  It's not a big tarp, but it's big enough to do some desensitization training.

I don't have a ton of time right now to work with her, so I'm trying to think of things to keep her brain engaged, hence the pool noodles.  During an exceptionally frustrating moment with work yesterday, I said, "screw it, I'm going to go see my horse."  I shut down my computer, and decided we could work on the tarp.

I wasn't sure how she was going to handle it, so I shook it out and made lots of noise with it while I was outside the fence.  When she stopped reacting (took a minute, at most), I went to the fence and started shoving it through.  I wanted to be outside the panels in case she took exception to the tarp and kicked out at it.

She did great as I was feeding it through the fence.  Being the mouthy child she is, she tasted as much as she could.  I flopped part of the tarp over the fence near her head and she bolted, but didn't kick out.  When she settled down, I pushed the whole thing through the fence to see what she'd do.

I thought I video taped the whole first introduction part, but someone doesn't know how to work her phone, apparently.  I finally realized I'd screwed up and was able to get some video.  I'll apologize in advance, there is one section that kind of drags on, but she was doing the advance/retreat thing on her own and I found it interesting to watch her process what was going on.

Toys!

I've been looking for horse toys to keep Skeeter occupied.  Now that she's completely settled into home, she has to be kept busy or she eats things.  I can't be there 24/7 to keep her entertained and my work schedule is going to get crazy for the next four weeks.

Jay and I had a movie day planned for yesterday and stopped by the dollar store to pick up some candy.  Right outside the store were pool noodles, $1.00 each, so I had to pick some up.  I figured I could hang them in her shed like the "car washes" so popular with competitive trail classes.

Photo cred: www.shamrocktranch.com
I figured nosing them around and moving through them might hold her interest for a while.  Since she likes to chew on everything, I even thought she'd keep busy by trying to catch them in her mouth.

Skeeter, being so curious and helpful, wasn't at all afraid of the noodles and kept getting in our way as we tried to tie them to the rafters in her shed.  I finally took one of the noodles and started dragging it along the ground to keep her interest.  She looked like a 900# cat chasing the noodle.  I'm just thankful she didn't try to pounce on the damn thing like a cat, too.  I might have shat myself if that happened.

I only bought three noodles and we hung two of them in her shed. She inspected them, tried them out to see if they'd work for a back scratcher (they don't, much to her displeasure), and then ignored them.


The third, since she was having so much fun trying to eat it, we hung on her panels as a roller.  Trying to tie it up while she was playing with it was a lot like trying to knit with a kitten.  Fun to watch, but not necessarily productive.  Finally, we got it secured and she went to town rolling it.


Tonight, when we go back over, we'll see how the pool noodles fared, but they were cheap enough that even if she destroys them, I won't be too upset.  If they live through the next few days, they will be used in a different training capacity once we get to the "hang crap off the saddle" stage of training.

We'll also tie the tarp to one of the outer panels this evening so she can get used to the sound of it before I start "torturing" her with it.  God willing, she won't eat the tarp once she realizes it won't kill her.

On a slightly different note, I have a question for you: who has used automatic bug foggers/sprays?  The flies are pretty well kept in check by the fly predators, but the other flying critters are not.  I thought I'd mount one of the automatic sprayers in her shed, but want to know if anyone has experience with them. 

Skeeter's Grown-up Clothes

My birthday is in July and I made mention to Jay that I wanted horse stuff.  You know, "grown-up" clothes (nylon halter, not her training rope halter), horse toys (OMG, that horse is so destructive when she's bored!), things like that.  For the first time, I could actually come up with a birthday list.

Speaking of destructive due to boredom, when Mom and Bill went to work her the other day, they noticed the trailer door was open and thought I'd done it.  When Jay and I got out there to drop off the hay that night, I noticed the trailer door was open and thought they'd opened it.  Nope.  Miss Skeeter had figured out how to open the latch and swung the door open.  And then she proceeded to eat the padding from the divider.  She made it more than halfway up the divider, which means she had to have self-loaded at least the front half of her body into the trailer.

I was pleasantly surprised yesterday when Jay handed me a bag from his mom.  I honestly thought she was sending me food (his mom is an excellent cook), but when I opened the bag, I found a beautiful new halter and lead rope.

So, of course, we had to put it on immediately.




It is a much fancier halter than any I've owned before.  I've never had one with the hook on the throat latch.  Because she's used to me flipping the strap up over her poll, I undid the buckle and put the halter on the "normal" way.  The throat latch is backward because that's the way it came from the store and I was too excited to get her new halter on to fix it.

She wasn't quite sure of the halter, I'm sure because it feels different and with the brass clasp on the lead rope, it's much heavier than her training halter. 

I undid the throat latch and slipped it off over her head.  Little Missy wasn't so sure about that, but handled it okay.  When I offered to put the halter back on, though, she wasn't interested.  Since we'd already worked on a few things, I didn't push the issue.  Instead, I planned on working with her today.

This evening, after our crazy evening thunderstorm had passed, Jay and I went over armed with pieces of apple.  I took the lead rope off and put the halter on the "normal" way, by flopping the headpiece over her poll, and adjusted it to fit her properly.  Then, I undid the throat latch and slipped it off over her head just like I did last night.  She had time to think about it since last night, and since it hadn't killed her, decided it would be okay if I tried to put it on the "weird" way.

Once I got Jay to stop wandering around (she has to know where both of us are at all times, or she can't focus), she allowed me to slip the halter back on over her head, tuck her ears into it, and latch the throat latch, for which she was rewarded with an apple piece.  I hate bribery, but whatever works.  Off and on, off and on, off and on.

The funny thing is, because it's heavier than her rope halter, she thought that she was "attached" to me by the halter and did some great at liberty work.  Who was I to tell her she wasn't attached?

Not only is the halter a great early birthday present, but it's a great training tool, too.  By the end of this evening, we'd already laid the groundwork for getting her to accept the bridle.

I Am NEVER Going to Get Caught Up!

So, so much stuff has happened with Skeeter and just like my journaling fell off, so did my blog posting.  ARGH!

Here are the highlights of what she's learned since she came home on May 8th:
Haltering
Leadingfirst inside her gentling pen, thenoutside of her gentling pen in the big pen, thenoutside of the big pen, in the big old world

Stand (this is a constant work in progress)GroomingFly spray (mostly, I've only done it while at liberty) letting other people handle her"hooking up" with whoever is in chargePeek-A-Boo with Grandpa BeelStanding tied


short periods of time outside the gentling pen

turn-out 24/7the water hose is fun

no more gentling pen at all - she's graduated! 

In fact, we took down her pen just yesterday.  She's so curious and unafraid that she decided she would "help" us take down her pen.

Whatcha doin' Dad?
Lookin' good, Dad.  Keep up the good work.Tonight, we're bringing in hay.  She'll have to put together everything she's learned while we unload.  She's going to have to stand tied at the trailer while we open the panels, drive the truck in, unload, drive the truck out and reattach the panels.  Tonight is truly going to be a test for her - hopefully, she'll pass with flying colors.

So Very Much, Part I

I swore I was going to keep a daily journal.  But I lied to myself.  I have the first few days in a notebook and that's it.  Kind of like my kids' baby books.

I had to go back and read my last post, it's been so long. Yikes.

In the almost two weeks since I've posted, Miss Skeeter Bang has gotten some more "outside" time.  She learned to be brave about the the cow feeder and the trailer that is out in the big pen .

A mouthful of food always makes a horse braver.We spent some time working on leading on a loose lead, we worked on "whoa" (verbal command first, then a correction), and on "stand".  I've got some video I need to edit of our work before I post it, but she did really, really well.

After working, I took off her halter and let her be free in the big pen.  She doesn't get to live out there permanently yet, but the time's getting closer.  It must have been hard learning so much, because after only about twenty minutes she was ready to be caught and put back in her room.  We're working on the command, "go to your room".  We'll see if it sticks. :)

A couple of days later, because she did so well, I decided she could have a half hour or so out to graze.  Joke was on me.  I guess because she spent a half hour out on her own without getting eaten, she thought it was safe and she didn't need to go back to her room.

Is this what Uncle Ranger was eating?
Look!  I have Uncle Ranger's ears.
A-ha!  If I hide back here where Mom thinks snakes are, she won't come get me.So ... two hours after I turned her out, it was getting dark and I stooped to bribing her with one of Ranger's favorite candy bars.  I walked up to her with a piece in my hand and let her eat it, then turned and walked ten feet or so.  She quickly figured out the only way she was going to get more of the yumminess was to follow me.  I felt like Alec bribing The Black as I doled out treats on our way back to her room.

I had decided early on not to hand feed treats because, well, she's four, and four year olds are lippy.  I was a bad mommy, because what I *should* have done was walk her down - keep after her until I caught her, no matter how long it took, but I just didn't have the heart.  She had been living in 400 square feet for almost three weeks, she needed some time to be out.  *I* didn't plan the evening accordingly.  I should have just set aside an hour or two to just let her be, then I bet catching her wouldn't have been a problem at all.

Just like parenting, the best laid plans sometimes go awry. To avoid hand-feeding her in the future, I make sure to put her "go to your room" treats in her food bowl.  Since she only gets hay, she's learning that the sound of stuff in her food bowl is a reward for something.

Field Trip: Out of the Pen

Yesterday was a big, big day for Skeeter.  She learned a lot and finally got to step foot outside her pen.

I've been wanting to get her out of her "holding cell" for a few days, but don't want to turn her loose out in the big pen quite yet.  The BLM guidelines say that they can be turned out after they are easily approached and caught, so technically, I could turn her out.  However, there is a whole lot of nothing outside of the big pen and if she got it in her mind to just leave, I could be in trouble.  After yesterday, the big pen is for working and the holding cell is for living: eating, sleeping, etc.  Once she's more comfortable in the big pen, we'll let her loose in it, but that will be a few days yet.

Mom and Bill were down to go to Kyzzer's end of the year band concert and came over to L.E.'s early enough to help me with Skeeter.  Because I want Skeet to be comfortable with multiple people handling her, I asked Bill to halter her while I changed out of my scrubs and into jeans.  From the tack room, where I was changing, I could hear Mom laughing and hoped that Skeeter wasn't giving Bill too bad a time.  Apparently, Mom was laughing at Bill because he was being fumble-fingers trying to figure out the rope halter.  We usually use the flat, nylon halters, but Skeeter's in a rope training halter.  By the time I got changed and out to the pen, Bill had her haltered and was leading her around the holding cell with a big ol' grin on his face.  She was doing so well for him.

He handed her off to me and I lead her out of the holding cell to the big pen.  I wish I could say it went off without a hitch, but that would be a lie.  We got out of her holding cell and her ears went up, then her neck went up, and then she started trying to bob her head away from the halter.  When I put more pressure on the halter the Battle Royale began.  We had about a ten second battle, with her backing up, yanking on the lead rope and dragging me across the pen until she remembered her manners and I remembered to stop being defensive and go on the offensive.  As soon as I got big and started moving her backward, instead of allowing her to drag me, her whole demeanor changed.  While Mom has video of our Battle Royale, she does not have video of me winning.  When I asked her about it today, she muttered something about turning it off in case there was a wreck.

After I "won" and re-established that I make the rules, she lead nicely.

This, I can do.
What do you mean I can't eat the green stuff while we're working? I handed her off to Bill, who took a turn leading her around.



Once she realized we really were in control and that no means no (so much temptation with all that green stuff she saw Uncle Ranger eating), we had to work on stay out of my space.  It didn't take long for her to realize that she had to stay an arm's length away from me while turning toward me (left).

See? I can be a good girl.
We checked out the water tank from the outside of the holding pen.  I hadn't topped off the tank yet, so I put the hose in the tank and turned on the water.  I'll be darned if that mare didn't trace the water flow from the spigot, down the hose to the tank, and back three or four times.  It was like she was discovering where it came from.  You could almost hear her thinking: this handle goes up, it makes a funny noise, and I can trace it down this white snake, into the metal pond.



That mare, she's a smart one!

Smart enough that when I wanted to take her back through the gate to the holding cell, just for practice going in and out of the gate, she knew she didn't want to go back in there.  We didn't quite have a Battle Royale, but we did have a discussion.  I took my time with her and she'd eek up to the threshold of the gate and then refuse.  If she refused and acted like she was going to pull back, she got in trouble, so she'd just stop.

But I like it out here!
Bill got another lead rope and started swinging it around behind her. She flinched and looked at him, all four legs still firmly planted.

Mom got the "flag" out to flag her in.  Nope.  Not scared of the flag anymore.  She flinches and then looks at you like, "what?" when you try to flag her. 

Only one thing left to try.

Bribery.

I had Bill hold her while I went and got a flake of hay.  I walked past her with the flake, into her pen, and put it on her food.  She watched me very carefully the whole time.  When I took the lead rope back from Bill she followed me into the pen like we had done it a million times.

After she had a bite or two, we went back out of the gate and back in.  Then we walked back out and did some circles in the big pen, then back in the pen.  She's got this gate thing down now.

I'm a pro!
Remember the destroyed hay bag?  And how I said she needed toys?  Well, Mom and Bill brought her a couple of toys: an old sturdy juice jug filled with water that she can kick or toss around and a rope dog toy to play with.  Of course, Bill had to torture her with the dog toy.

Ok, I'll play along for Grandpa Beel.
I told her to have some dignity and not allow him to do that shit, otherwise they'd stick her in antlers or an elf hat come Christmas time, but she didn't listen.  Of course not, why would she listen to Mom?  What do I know?

Digger was with us all afternoon and wanted to spend time with her, so he got out the brush and curry comb and gave her a mini spa day.  He might be her new favorite human.  I brush her quickly, like we're getting ready for a ride.  I guess years of saddling lots of horses in a very short period of time has made my grooming a bit matter-of-fact.  If Skeeter had been a cat, she would have been purring with Digger.  He took his time and just enjoyed being with her.

I like my brother, Mom.I thought we were done.  After all, Skeeter had a really big day.  We did a lot and she had a lot of new experiences.  But as we were getting ready to leave, Mom remembered she had her weight tape in her vest, so back into the holding cell I went.  Mom called out a warning that the fluttering tape might be an issue.  Skeeter and I just laughed at her, as Skeeter stood like an old seasoned horse through the whole thing.

According to the tape, Skeeter is 14.3hh (I had eyeballed her at 14.2hh, so close) and 902# (again, I had guessed 900#).  I'd better start doing yoga or something so I'll be flexible enough to mount her from the ground if I ever have to.

(We did actually get a better measurement once she squared up)We must have tired her out, because when I went over to feed this morning, it was obvious that she had slept hard last night.

A Bored, Hungry Horse ...

... can be very destructive.

Jay and I had Sunday planned out perfectly.  In our heads anyway.  And then the day fell apart and the timing didn't work out the way we had planned it.  It happens.

Wait, let me rewind a second.  On Saturday, I dug out Estes' feed bag and put a couple of flakes in it for Skeeter.  There's just so much waste feeding straight of the ground.  I don't want to make a feed bunker while she's in the little pen, because the plan is to move her out of it soon.  So, Saturday, I put most of her food on the ground and threw a flake or so in the feed bag, hoping to keep her from getting bored.  Once she figured out the feed bag, she was super happy.

And then Sunday came around and the day didn't go as planned, so I never made it back to Skeeter to put more hay in the feed bag.  She got fed in the morning, but I was planning on going back to put a flake or so in the bag to keep her entertained.  Didn't happen.  In fact, we got so behind schedule that I had L.E. throw her a couple of flakes because I didn't want to go driving into L.E.'s yard at ten o'clock at night.

I didn't think anything about the feed bag. I just figured if it was empty, she'd leave it alone.  Especially since she had hay to eat.

I.
Was.
WRONG!


Those are the pieces I picked up.  I'm still finding smaller, bite-sized pieces in her pen.  I tell you what, when she does something, she does it up right.

Looks like she'll be getting some toys to keep her entertained.

Introducing the Halter

Wednesday was a short day at work for me, and Mom just happened to be in town, so I thought it was a good day to introduce Skeeter to the halter.  I had put the lead over her neck and the noseband over her nose, but hadn't actually tied the halter on.

I took Ranger over to Estes' pen (I think I'll always call it that!) to graze, so Skeeter could focus on us.  The joke was on me - she had buddied up a bit too much to Ranger and spent fifteen minutes pacing and calling for him.  It was a good thing he went home yesterday - she was getting far too buddy sour.

Once she calmed down a bit, we started working with the halter.  I put it on and took it off three times, going through the process the same way each time.  That wasn't really intentional, to do it the same way each time, but it was muscle memory.  I didn't realize that I had a haltering routine, not really, until I started paying attention with her.

Luckily, it's the same routine everyone in my family uses.  The rope over the neck lets them know they're "caught".  Okay, it lets Ranger know he's caught.  Skeeter doesn't know "caught" yet.





In fact, she doesn't really enjoy pressure on the halter at all, so we'll be working on that.  I'd love to get her out of her pen and work her, but I can't until she can lead properly.

This afternoon, we tried giving to pressure and she'll give by turning her head right or left.  She got that figured out pretty quickly.  However, if I try to move her forward with pressure (or as Bill says, "dragging her by her face"), she immediately braces up and starts back pedaling like she did in the video.

Yeah.  Gotta get past that.

She also doesn't really appreciate the halter for more than just a few seconds at a time.  She did a great job on Wednesday, but she figures that her job is to stand there and look pretty for a few seconds and then we'll take the halter off.  Fair enough, that's what we did on Wednesday.

So tonight, she gets to sleep with her halter on.  Guess who has four hooves and is not excited about that?  I gave some thought to leaving a short lead rope on, but got a little overprotective when I saw her step through a loop.  All I could imagine were catastrophes.  Good Lord, I wasn't this over protective with my two-legged kids.

Scary Chairs

I was interested to see how much of yesterday's short lesson Skeeter remembered when I went to feed this morning.

She did such a good job!  I had to tell her "Get back!" and get big for just a second and then she remembered and stepped away from the gate so I could come in with the hay.  She kept a polite distance from me and the hay until I told her it was okay to eat.

Jay  and I planned on just hanging out with Ranger and Skeeter today until his mom and sister came over to meet them, so we took along some camp chairs.  Jay set them up in the part of the shed that's outside of Skeeter's pen.  She was curious about them, but not very scared, so I folded one up and put it against the rail to see how she would react.


I'm astounded at the smarts this horse has.  She's very solid minded and able to reason things through.

In fact, I'm at a loss with her right now - I thought we'd be at least a week away from doing half of what we're doing.  Back to the drawing board to figure out where to go from here.  (But in a good way.)

Today is Jay's birthday and we celebrated by having a Meet Skeeter Day, so we invited our families out to L.E.'s house.  I forgot to get pictures of Jay's family and almost forgot to get pictures of Nebalee's, but I managed to snap a few.



There was a lot of commotion with a lot of people around, but it didn't seem to bother her one bit.  In fact, she laid down for a quick scratch at one point.  (And of course, got ooohhed and aaaahhed over.)


I know she's itchy from shedding out - she's been using the support beam in her pen to scratch on, so I said, "what the hell?" and went to get the shed blade.  She pretty much thought that was the best business in the world.  Nothing bothered her as I was using the blade on her - she let me do both sides, her back, her belly, and the tops of both front legs.  Not a flinch.

Ashinator and her boyfriend hung out with Nebalee's family and Skeeter for a while and left, so it was just Jay and me sitting in the scary chairs for a bit.  I went and got Ranger from Estes' pen, where he'd been grazing and for the first time, I heard Skeeter's voice.  She didn't say a word when I moved Ranger out of the pen, but boy did she want to talk when he came back home.  Not one peep from her since she was unloaded from  the trailer and not a peep when I took Ranger away, but she was awfully glad to see him when he came back and gave him the full run-down of her day.  Like a typical guy, he humored her and went promptly to sleep standing in the sun.

I decided that since she was so good with the shedding blade, that I needed to do her mane, too.  She didn't care.  I got about half of her mane and her forelock combed out without any problems (from the horse, that is.  I had problems with that much loose hair!) and she looked beautiful.  With the weather coming in, I'm sure it'll be back to a tangled mess tomorrow, but she looked purdy for her visitors.

Ranger roused himself from his grass coma to let us know when my friend Jen and her family showed up.


His job done, he went back to his grass coma, while Skeeter soaked up all the attention again.


I can't begin to tell you how happy I am with her and how smart she is.  She's just so ... right.  Now I really hope I don't screw her up!

Table Manners

Skeeter got her first lesson today.

She's going to learn her table manners.  I had planned for yesterday and today to be a settling in day, and we'd start "work" tomorrow.  Last evening, when I went to check on her, I pushed a couple of flakes through her fence and noticed that she dove right in before I was even done.

It occurred to me that I might have a pushy eater at that point.  I let it be, but made a mental note.

This morning when I went over to feed, I threw the bale over the fence into the outer pen (Ranger's pen), which startled her, but she came immediately back to investigate.  I'm actually pleased with that.  She didn't spook hard or for long - she just jumped a bit, spun and moved about three strides before she realized that whatever thumped out of the sky didn't eat her and she turned to check it out.

I moved the bale to Ranger's preferred eating spot, split it into two and carried her half to her pen.  She met me at the gate.  Now, a lot of people would be pleased about this, but now I know her motivation.  She thought I was just her hay bitch.

Boy did she have another think coming.

She learned pretty quickly that the hay bitch has rules and that she will not be allowed to eat until *I* say so.  It took a couple of "ugly noises" and a pop on the nose for her to get the point, but when she backed off, she stayed a respectable distance until I stepped away from her hay pile and released the pressure.  Even then, she asked for permission to eat.

I know that for the past three and a half years she's been at Canon City that there haven't been any "human herd" rules, only "horse herd" rules.  The inmates drive the truck into the pens, use the pitchfork to dump hay into piles around the pen, and drive out.  She just doesn't know that there are rules for dinner time other than those set by the other horses, without other horses in the pen, she thought it would be okay to just dive in.

She's a smart girl, though, she'll get the rules sorted out in no time.  But, boy, was it a throw back to having young kids.  Set the rule and enforce, enforce, enforce.  It will be interesting to see how much of her first lesson in manners stuck when I go feed tomorrow.  I don't expect her to get it right away, but I know she'll pick up on it fast.

Tomorrow is Meet Skeeter Day - Nebalee and her family are coming over and my friend Jen is bringing her kids over.

Also, here's a super cute picture of the meeting between Ranger and Skeeter, just for an "awww" moment.


(She looks a lot taller than Ranger, but he's standing in a hole.  She's really only about two inches taller at the withers.)