Can anyone help?

[Christine]

Hi all,

I feel kind of in a Catch22 situation. 

We have 2 horses and 2 newcomer ponies. One Pony is still pretty untrained.
So I need to get him used to a halter, being lead ect.  I think best would be to work with him on his own. 

But how do I get him into another field if I can't lead him?
If I call or lure with treats I suppose all of them want to come...

I haven't started yet - thought probably someone has experience or a good theory.

Thanks for your thoughts!!! 

   

[Courting the Horse]

Well, first, do you really have to work with him on his own?  Could you do a little bit and see what happens with the other fella there.  

Could you have an area within the field that the guys are already in, taped off with low electric fence that doesn't have to be on.  Put two bowls down with a few nibbles or something.  They can be close to each other if you like but on different sides of the fence.  Then you do your little bit of training with the guy inside when he is finished.

We have done this a quite a lot and it is always very calm, no fuss and no one really knows that they have been tricked..well, I'm sure they do but they don't get upset about it.  

The other things we did with Pollyanne when she got here was to leave her alone for two weeks. making no attempt to put her collar on. Then I brought Hazel out of the field to trim her hooves.  Chris offered the collar to Pollyanne who obviously wanted to follow.  he put it on without any fuss and brought her up to Hazel on the lead rope.  She had been previously "uncatchable".  There was no training really, there was just a very calm choice....that was her sorted.  But this may not be where you are with your little fella...

Hope you get on well with him......

[BerginEquine]

Hi Christine,

I can understand your dilemma, but I am inclined to agree with "courting the horse" that starting work with young horses with a buddy can be beneficial. Cordoning off a small section of the field can be helpful but if the other horses move away it can induce significant stress, I would suggest staying within the group for foundation training and then gradually moving away. In a recent PhD (as yet unpublished - viva upcoming) it was proposed that starting together reduces stress. The ideal scenario would be having your two youngsters together and working with them however there is no problem with doing them in groups. I used to do halter training with yearlings with 3 in the field and they just all took their turn. Sure the others were interested but we just got on with it.

I am a great believer in incremental training and taking time to do it right... Rushing never solves anything and changes should be introduced gradually.

I would recommend reading these articles on the principles of training from the Australian Equine Behavior Centre, I worked using their methods over there and have found them useful tools in my "tool box" (http://www.aebc.com.au/articles). If you would like more specific help let me know.

[Courting the Horse]

That sounds like good advice Brendán.  I do find that neither of our horses get stressed with a tape between them as long as they are not too far apart and they can see each other.  This is crucial.  I find that the minute one goes out of sight of the other that they get quite upset and so we never do this..and is not necessary in our situation anyway. 

It could be a good idea to introduce the idea of having a taped off area gradually...just feeding one inside, one outside and doing no training, then next day do a minute of training etc.  Christine can be very vigilant to see if any stress is caused and if only a tiny bit extra is done each day it should remain quite relaxed.  Also, could you do a tiny bit with the guy outside as well so he doesn't feel left out and doesn't loose interest - this way he might not wander off as Brendan mentions.  I hadn't thought of that one.  In our situation Pollyanne is always a bit relieved if Hazel keeps her distance to a certain degree and isn't hanging over the fence wondering what is going on.  But these two guys might be different to our two. 

This had been hugely helpful to us and certainly seems to be the least stressful solution...so far.   

All the best with it

[Christine]

Thanks Maria and Brendán, 

your advice is very helpful. Thanks for the interesting Link Brendán!

Sorry Maria, I should have explained a bit more... We have the ponies now together with the horses. The plan was to have the halter training done before we do this but the snow was quicker... and we wanted the ponies to be able to use the shelter in this cold weather...

As long as we had them in a separate field we could work easily with each of them. But in the new situation there is still a bit of tension in the group. They are only together for 1  1/2 weeks now, which is the reason I haven't done anything with Leeroy since. Hector (13, shire-x) is very attached to us and is quite jealous, he does not see the point why those newcomers should get any attention let alone any treats...

When we got the ponies Leeroy (2 1/2) had a halter on so I thought that he is fairly ok with it, but he was not... so I "stepped back".
I am all fond of the incremental training - so far I had the halter in my hand while giving him treats, sitting next to him while he was grazing having the halter on the ground between us giving treats from time to time above the halter.... BUT neither Leeroy nor myself feel too comfy if a huge horse is towering over us trying to get all the treats and snapping at the little one... 
It might actually be a good idea to lead Hector into another next-door field and see how I get on with only the remaining 3.

Maria, I am inclined to teach the young ones to be happy alone with a human. Even outside of sight of the others. With Sam I have achieved that already. But with only two the one left will feel lonely... Still I think it is a good idea to get them used to it - probably you+your husband can work with one each so they both have human company and get them gradually used to the idea to not see the other team? Always staying in the horses comfort zones.

Seeing how our big ones get stressed when they are being lead out of sight of each other I want to prevent such drama for the ponies. You never know when it will be necessary... I think it will be good for their self-confidence as well. 

Brendàn, what is the experts point of view on that one?

Thanks again!!!

[Christine]

ups just read my last message again.... oi 

Maria,
sorry, of course that idea of tackling the "separation anxiety" in the horses is what we will do eventually with the big ones.... The reason why I came to the conclusion that it might be worthwhile to work on it is that Claire ones almost had to go to a Vet-clinic for treatment of a colic. That would have been hell for both of them just because of the separation alone....     So my enthusiasm that you probably should train it was rather a transfered insight that we should do it - no offence meant!   


 

[Courting the Horse]

Haha, no offence taken!
I never thought of that about trying to get them used to being seperated.  I know ours would both get very upset at being seperated.  So it would be something interesting to think about. 

Have you managed to do anything with the little guys?  I'll be really interested to see how you get on.

[Christine]

YAY!!!!   


Well I do go for little walks with Sam. He is very good and we manage quite well with him grazing when I tell him it is ok and he comes along again when I say so. I never pull the rope or anything but I stand my ground and the first time he got into a tantrum... nevertheless he didn't have the chance to graze anymore and when he finally decided to come along he got a nice treat. So he learned quite quickly that it is a good idea to come with me and that there will be another chance for a bite of grass.    I have my arms in a certain position when I want to walk and have them down when he can graze... so it takes a bit of concentration on my part but it helps us a great deal. 

With Leeroy I get the noseband on now. He is still a bit nervous and it would be much too early to put the neck strap around..... so baby steps!!!  If he never had any experience of the halter I suppose it would be much easier, but he seems to have negative associations with it... I choose to take it as a compliment that he thinks halter means being brought to another home....  Isn't the human mind a great thing for imagination??? LOL 

[Christine]

Hi all,

a little update.

Leeroy got comfy with getting the halter fully on. He is even eager for it!!! HURRAY!!
But the few times I tried to lead him (within or away from the herd) got me a "Nope" response. So a couple of days ago the 2 ponies got out of the winter-paddock and stood on our lawn. I took Sam first hoping Leeroy would follow which he didn't. So I came back for Leeroy who stood there calmly while I approached and put the halter on. For that alone I was over the moon!! But what happened next was beyond my imagination. He walked nicely with me as if we trained it for weeks and weeks!!! 
   I can't tell you how happy I was!!
Then next time I tried in the paddock....    again - "ah, no I don't want to walk with you", Sam starting to nibble at Leeroy and me, Hector coming over to see if he could get a treat....

So the high-fly feeling got a bit of a damper - but still good to know that in an "emergency" he knows what I want him to do and is happy to do so.

I guess the bottom line is that he wanted to get back to the herd. What do you think of it? Any ideas how to tackle the problem?

Best wishes
Christine