Day Four

Today's objective was pretty simple: touch. We can't do anything else until we can touch them. At first, I thought this was best accomplished by going into the pen with him and standing until he relaxed. That worked pretty well, but that's something best done outside of class. I wanted to do something more active. So Christina and I used a form of a squeeze chute, and I was very happy with the results. He (yet unnamed) actually relaxed for the most part, and carried his head much lower than he normally does. We did manage to touch him, but he immediately flipped out when we did. I was happy with this: he's beginning to submit to us. While submitting may be second choice to trust, it is also necessary.

Personally, I need to learn to stand my ground more. I have to learn to be the leader in this relationship and less of a follower. He's looking for some guidance now that his herd is split up, and its up to me and Christina to be his dominants. I worked on that today and it worked out pretty well. He's such a hellion compared to the three little ones, and will take longer to work with.

I can't help but think that we should have gotten these guys in January, and been habituating them to us during the theory portion of the course. That way, we would have been ready to go now that we're in the training part. But oh well, we'll work with what we're given. At this point, I'm forgetting all about the class, the grade, and the requirements. I'm throwing myself into the training of this horse. I can't be focused on myself when I have him. Forget the fact that my semester exam *should* (probably won't) require him to trailerload and such. If he leads, if he accepts my presence, if he stops trembling when I come near, that is my goal.

Seattle's gone and I'd like to think that all the love I had for him and the extra time I gave to him, this horse now needs. He needs it more than anything.