Post by kafee on Dec 8, 2012 19:36:06 GMT 1
We couldn't have asked for much better weather for the IH workshop with my ponies today. Thank you very much to Sarah and Jenny for coming all the way to Sussex, we all had a lovely day.
I bought 2 large colt foals at the Beauleiu Road New Forest sale on the 29th November. I'd organised an IH handling workshop with Sarah Weston and Jenny instructing, for the 8th December so IH people could come and meet and handle them. Both foals turned out to be very friendly and relaxed, and I was able to walk up and give them a good scratch behind the ears and run my hands all over them with little introduction right from the start.
Sunny, the light bay, has been completely relaxed with me in his pen, however, when someone else came in to help me spread some straw, he immediately took himself as far away from us as he could. Excaliber, the darker bay, has been more wary about being handled.
We started at the beginning with Sarah's patent feather duster, which both were a bit concerned about to begin with, but once they discovered it was for giving them a good rub, they relaxed, enjoyed it and went back to eating hay.
And then we moved onto the latest retro trend for 1980's scarves.
The scarves were carefully introduced by advance and retreat, rubbed on the withers and over the rest of the body once the foal was happy about. It was moved up the neck, and then gradually introduced to their faces, until it could be wrapped around the nose. Each step was repeated at least 3 times, before moving onto the next step. Excaliber found this process much harder to cope with than Sunny, and alonerawnut and maryanne who were working with him with Jenny, had to take things very slowly and carefully.
Sunny was much more relaxed
so marychick and Sophie were able to move a lot faster, and put the headcollar on before lunch. Using advance and retreat the opened out headcollar was introduced and laid across the back, then carefully moved up the neck in 2" steps, until the head strap could be done up on the 'right' hole, then swung round and the nose band laid across the nose, before doing it up. Note the running foot, back right!
After lunch we went to the field to work with my older ponies. Sky can be awkward to catch, so everyone practised advance and retreat to get him to catch the human instead. Once we'd caught him, we took him and Tor out, and learnt how to ask pony to pick up a foot by squeezing the tendon instead of hauling on the feathers like I've always done. Tor caught on very quickly, particulary when he was allowed to eat while doing it! Sky is still quite shy about strangers and prefered them to be in front of him, so posed a few questions to those trying to pick his feet up. I'm afraid I didn't take my camera to the field.
After lunch we had another session with the foals. maryanne and laonerawnut worked on putting the headcollar on Excaliber, while marychick and Sophie put the headcollar back on Sunny, did some more desensitsation, and picked up his feet.
I bought 2 large colt foals at the Beauleiu Road New Forest sale on the 29th November. I'd organised an IH handling workshop with Sarah Weston and Jenny instructing, for the 8th December so IH people could come and meet and handle them. Both foals turned out to be very friendly and relaxed, and I was able to walk up and give them a good scratch behind the ears and run my hands all over them with little introduction right from the start.
Sunny, the light bay, has been completely relaxed with me in his pen, however, when someone else came in to help me spread some straw, he immediately took himself as far away from us as he could. Excaliber, the darker bay, has been more wary about being handled.
We started at the beginning with Sarah's patent feather duster, which both were a bit concerned about to begin with, but once they discovered it was for giving them a good rub, they relaxed, enjoyed it and went back to eating hay.
And then we moved onto the latest retro trend for 1980's scarves.
The scarves were carefully introduced by advance and retreat, rubbed on the withers and over the rest of the body once the foal was happy about. It was moved up the neck, and then gradually introduced to their faces, until it could be wrapped around the nose. Each step was repeated at least 3 times, before moving onto the next step. Excaliber found this process much harder to cope with than Sunny, and alonerawnut and maryanne who were working with him with Jenny, had to take things very slowly and carefully.
Sunny was much more relaxed
so marychick and Sophie were able to move a lot faster, and put the headcollar on before lunch. Using advance and retreat the opened out headcollar was introduced and laid across the back, then carefully moved up the neck in 2" steps, until the head strap could be done up on the 'right' hole, then swung round and the nose band laid across the nose, before doing it up. Note the running foot, back right!
After lunch we went to the field to work with my older ponies. Sky can be awkward to catch, so everyone practised advance and retreat to get him to catch the human instead. Once we'd caught him, we took him and Tor out, and learnt how to ask pony to pick up a foot by squeezing the tendon instead of hauling on the feathers like I've always done. Tor caught on very quickly, particulary when he was allowed to eat while doing it! Sky is still quite shy about strangers and prefered them to be in front of him, so posed a few questions to those trying to pick his feet up. I'm afraid I didn't take my camera to the field.
After lunch we had another session with the foals. maryanne and laonerawnut worked on putting the headcollar on Excaliber, while marychick and Sophie put the headcollar back on Sunny, did some more desensitsation, and picked up his feet.
