Rusty and I have a slightly different reaction to plastic bags than many horses. We believe in doing our part to pick up litter and keep our environment clean. Even if the litter came from my bag of apple cores. Oops.
A New Treat Bag!
I am so excited. I’ve been wanting a new treat pouch. The old one is very nice. It’s the right color and tries it’s hardest, but, it’s just not big enough. When we ride I cram it full of treats and then it can’t close anymore. We’re fine at a walk but if we trot or canter treats start flying everywhere. It’s a little awkward not to mention annoying.
I had been pondering whether or not they sold fanny packs at walmart when we stumbled upon a dog accessory stand at a local festival. All their packs were hand sown in their own personal sweat shop in their basement, according to them 
😉 I really liked that they were locally (Rapid City) made by what was very literally a mom and pop company. They aren’t advertised as such but they are set up for clicker training with all the required compartments and a clip for the clicker. There were also packs for the dogs to carry and much larger and smaller fanny pack type options as well as every other type of carrier I could imagine and certainly can’t remember.
It is intended for riding but I couldn’t wait that long to try it out. After a quick customization it was ready to go and I wore it out to trim Harvey today. It goes plenty big enough to fit around me. The clips are sturdy but plastic and should break if I ever hang up on a saddle horn. The bag is big enough to fit plenty of treats and zips securely shut. It makes it a little less handy to get to treats but that’s the point. They wont escape as easily either. It worked nicely for ground work and I can’t wait for a chance to ride to try it out for real.
They have a facebook page https://www.facebook.com/SuttersMillPacksAndBags/ and a website http://suttersmill.us/
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- Nice but not quite right
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- That’s better
Just For Fun
Working Double
While Tanna was working with Amarillo, Armadillo in my head while I’m trying to write it differently 😉 , I was playing with Harvey. I didn’t remember him being quite this worried about it all. Maybe having Amarillo there at the same time upped his nervousness. We spent almost the whole time working on standing calmly.
Amarillo learned to kick the ball, got blanketed and saddled, and we stood quietly. I felt like nothing was being accomplished but really it’s a big thing. Running a horse until they stand still only gives them more energy for next time. Rewarding stillness and calm builds a happy place for them, teaches them that training is just alright, no need to be all up and worried.
I also worked a little on getting him to let me stand next to him, by his back. He was quicker to let me on his left side than his right. It never ceases to amaze me that people can be riding a horse but unable to stand on it’s right side. This whole left side tradition gets to the point of complete ridiculousness sometimes. I let him circle and circle then, in a combination of + and -R I stopped offered him a release and a treat. I am quite happy mixing my quadrants.
It was a good work session. It was fun to watch Tanna and Amarillo while they worked and to get them both used to working with another horse. My favorite part though was long after we finished working and they were out to pasture. I put Coyote away after his daily yard grazing and Harvey came running over to say hi. He and Coyote both got a treat and I walked back to the house. Coyote left to the other horses. Harvey came galloping down the fence after me calling. I stopped and clicked him just for wanting to visit. Then I taught him to target his forehead to my hand. I held it up and clicked when his forelock brushed my palm. Then as he began to place his head firmly against my hand. But then, alas, I was out of treats. I held my hands up and told him all done. He followed me down the fence awhile longer calling. I can’t wait to get to work with him again.
A Little Ride
Just for the fun of it, and because I have my GoPro now so why not, Here’s some video from a ride Rusty and I took out across the pasture the other day. I’m a little disappointed that you can’t tell how big the hills are. Everything just looks round. There was a storm building to the west and I turned the volume down to less than half but the wind noise is still deafening. It was a beautiful day for a ride and the strong breeze kept it cool. There’s nothing like a nice canter across big open pastures.
Musically Inclined
So, I’ve been teaching Rusty to play the piano. I had some lessons as a kid but I’m a little… Rusty at it!! Haha, it’s rude to laugh at your own jokes. So anyway. I got a cheap little key board at the local rummage sale and we wasted no time putting it to use. I was assured by a friend who’s horse is much more skilled at playing than I will ever be that the slobber that clicker training incurs wasn’t a problem for them. And she was right, it hasn’t been a problem for us either.
This is our second go at it and with time we will build in some length and try to cut out his attempts at biting the keyboard. I left in the ending to show him trying to mug me and looking for other ways to get treats. He figured it out though and went back to playing.
A Ride At Fort Rob
We just got back from a grand adventure. For the first time in forever we loaded up the horses and hauled them over to Fort Robinson for the weekend! My parents drove clear out and joined us, then we all joined a group of Morgan people, kind of, kind of joined, not kind of Morgan people, and rode all weekend.
I say kind of joined because we camped up at Soldier Creek while they all stayed is cabins down at the fort proper. Although there were as many people as I’ve ever seen up there, including local friends that we were surprised and delighted to see, we got our preferred camping spot, nicely secluded and nice big corrals for our horses.
We brought Coyote and Rusty, for Rusty’s first time camping out and riding in trees and hills, and we borrowed a friends wonderful little mare. Little is a terrible misnomer, she is huge. A wonderful big half draft mare who was perfect in every way.
We went on a nice ride Friday after we got there. We hadn’t gotten going until much later than we had hoped. There was a last minute call that a bull was out and in a neighbors corrals. Would we please come get him?? Then Saturday morning the Morgan people showed up at our doorstep, saving us from having to go looking for them. Coyote was off just a little though and Rusty was NOT ready for a large group of horses in big hills so we said hi but weren’t going to ride with them. Just visit and see the pretty horses.
My wonderful parents offered to stay behind and watch children so I could go ride on the one non Morgan we had along. She behaved beautifully in the big scary hills and kept up with all the zippy little horses to the end.
We got in lots of riding, by ourselves that was the only ride we joined the big group for, spent lots of time playing in the creek, and cooked plenty of marshmallows over the fire. It was fun to watch Rury’s confidence and abilities build and improve over the weekend. By the last day he was striding confidently out in the lead. It was a fun weekend and we were sad to see it come to an end. Hopefully we’ll get to do it again next year!
Harvey, 3rd go, 3rd Video
The third and final video from this session. We worked on haltering. If you notice the peanut gallery in the background and all the banging and clanking and climbing around she was doing. He was totally unconcerned. That didn’t bother him near as much as the thought of getting touched by a halter.
His whole demeanor changed. His head went up, he wanted nothing to do with it. When he was dropped off the lady was horrified that I wasn’t going to leave a halter on him and he does know how to wear and behave in a halter but I don’t want that sort of “good” behavior. The people who accept this sort of haltering are the same ones who want advice on how to get their horse to let them catch it in the pasture, how to get their horses head down so they can bridle it, what to do about their horse always having its nose stuck in the air while they’re riding, oh well, a tie down will fix the problem.
I want him to come willingly, drop his head and put his nose in the halter himself. No fear, no stress, knowing what we do together wont hurt him. It will probably even be fun!
Watching the video, and at the time even, there are a few things I would change. I followed him backwards a couple of times while he tried to evade the halter. I don’t like that. I should have just stayed put and let him leave then welcome him back enthusiastically.
There were things liked too. His mat training was going well. He did let me put the halter on in the end. Not the good haltering I would like but once on we ignored it completely and did fun stuff. We let the haltering be a good experience then took it off again. When I have time, as if that will ever happen, I want to halter him then bring him out to graze, build some good associations. He’ll be haltering himself in no time!
Harvey, 3rd Go. 2nd Video
In our second video from the same work session as the last one we worked on mat training and standing quietly. Good manners in other words. I am making an extra effort on these two, because they are not mine, to make sure they are well behaved. I don’t mind mine a little rotten.
I am not being as adamant as I probably should be about both his front feet being on the mat. I’m accepting a foot or even just standing quietly. There has been lots of discussion lately about teaching it as a default behavior and I think it will be a goal here for me.
Harvey is leading wonderfully. He glues himself to my right shoulder and stays there. Most of the time. I’m not taking credit for teaching him to lead, it seems to be one of the things he came with. I will take credit for helping him want to do so when loose though.
Harvey, 3rd Go. 1st Video
I got the video, videos really, I took a series of short ones, edited! I was going to put the good parts from each one into one video but decided they were nicely broke up into their own little topics and I would leave them that way. I mostly just cut them up shorter trying to get whole chunks instead of pieces.
My favorite part I missed getting on film! Again. I went out to the corrals and called the horses. Harvey, who had just gotten worked the day before came running. He was the first one through the gate, which made for easier sorting, and wanted to work some more.
His eagerness and enthusiasm made me think back to my days of using the round pen. By the second or third day of working them the horses didn’t want to be caught. They might be settling down in the pen and willing to do what was asked but they didn’t want to go in there and work more.
In this first video we were working on targeting the ball again. This is my version of desensitizing. It’s still mostly theory. Just because it worked with Rusty doesn’t mean it will work with other horses. Instead of coming at him with anything I am going to let him explore and play with scary things. We’ve already done plastic bags when I take them their regular servings of husks off the sweet corn. Now I’m letting him bounce the ball around under his stomach, which he is totally unbothered by. Next we’ll bring out the tarp and let him play.
In the video you can see some hard core mugging as I let him search for the answer while learning some food manners. He is learning that the food only comes when he does certain things and trying to figure out just exactly what those things are. When it gets to hard and he starts to get really frustrated I move around a little to move him around to help him find the right answer.
You can see towards the end where I go to stroke his neck and he jerks away. This is another one of his many conditioned aversives, he does not like to be touched. Sometimes people who don’t want to use food as a reward ask why they couldn’t just pet them, give scratches, instead. With him that would be more punishment than reward and certainly wouldn’t get you anywhere. He also doesn’t appear to have been worked much, if at all from his right side. Before we started doing any official work he would let me touch him from his left side but took off if I even got on his right side. Now he’ll put up with petting on the left and let me touch him on the right. We’re getting better!