A mish-mash of recent events

The most exciting news is that at just on one year old, Tama is already 14hh!! I measured him as accurately as possible with a tape, and he was showing as 14hh or even slightly over.  So I'm pretty excited about that, because it may mean I could realistically ride him one day.

Love this pic.  This is Tama and his big brother Hokey Pokey (2 years old) going on an adventure to watch a pony club ribbon day.

When we got there I went over to the office and tried to do the right thing by paying a ground fee.  "Oh NO..." they said, "you can't have a yearling on Pony Club property!".  I suggested they pop their head outside to see just how calm and sensible he is, but they were adamant.  (I didn't mention that he was also a Kaimanawa from last year's muster!).  Never mind, we stood around and watched for a while and then went home, having achieved what we went there for anyway.  

They were absolutely calm and absolutely well behaved the entire time.  It was a bit of a non-event really, which of course is exactly what you want when training and socialising young horses.

This is Tama trying to convince me to give him the carrot that's in my hand.  He is still struggling a little with the difficult concept of not being allowed to attempt to eat all edible (and sometimes non-edible) substances in his general vicinity.  When he's concentrating he's super polite and tries real hard, but more often than not, he forgets.  That instinct is just really strong, especially at this age.  All I can do is continue to be really consistent, and only ever reward him when he's being polite.  He'll get there.  Eventually.  I hope.  

I have bought a leather bitless bridle from Equigear, and I'm really happy with it so far.  It'll make a great in-hand headcollar for Tama when he goes to shows, but it will also mean that I can start doing some work to start Honey under saddle.

So here are a few photos of Tama posing and looking handsome.  I hope you appreciate them, because it took bloody ages to convince him to stand still and prick his ears.  He was much more interested in finding out what edible crumbs there might be mixed into the driveway gravel.  Sigh.

If I ever get time, I will teach him to do a stand-stay and pose for the camera.  One day.

My husband saw him wearing his bridle, and looking all shiny and gorgeous, and said "he looks like a REAL HORSE now!"   (...as opposed to what, you ask?  Well, as opposed to a shaggy rastafarian swamp monster, like he was only 4 or 5 months ago).

Just look at that lean, angular body - he looks like a catwalk model! Can't wait for him to fill out over the next couple of years.

The hose monster is defeated!

After the biggest battle of Tama's life, we have finally defeated the hose monster.

Many many things  have happened to this baby horse in his short life.  He was herded by helicopters over the wide open Kaimanawa plains, taken off his mother and away from his family band, and put into yards with crowds of other horses.  He was driven all the way from Waiouru to Huntly to Hunua on a cattle truck, with each of the other horses leaving him one after the other until he was the only one left on the truck.  He was all alone, at about 6 months of age, in that big empty rattling truck, until he finally arrived... to a strange place with strange coloured horses and strange tasting food and scary human beings and lots of wire fences that bite when you touch them.

In a matter of weeks he learned to let me touch him all over, put ropes and straps on his head, pick his feet up, lead him around and tie him to a post, preventing his natural flight instinct.  What's more, having never seen a float before, he proceeded to learn in less than 15 minutes to walk up the ramp and into that small metal box and have the ramp shut behind him so he was trapped inside.  And he was perfectly calm about it.

...but the HOSE !!!! Now that was a different story altogether.  Even when it was just lying on the ground gently leaking water he was adamant it was a Very Scary Thing.

During the fourth or fifth lengthy training session, after making very little progress, Tama and I had a bit of a battle.  I picked up the hose; he reared, spun around and tried to push past me. What was interesting about his behaviour during this session though, was that all the while he was rearing and pushing and carrying on, he didn't seem at all scared any more. He was very deliberate in the way he was behaving. He was simply saying "NO", in as clear a manner as he knew how.
 I stayed very calm and insisted that he was polite, and eventually he was lunged in small circles for a long time before having the hose on one more time and then going back to the paddock.

Well what d'you know... next time I got the hose out he kept his 'thinking brain' switched on and I was able to click and reinforce him for the hose wetting his back and shoulder.  Within minutes I extended the duration out and only clicked him for standing still while being hosed, and voila!  He is now standing quietly and eating his dinner while I hose him all over. He may even have realised it's quite nice having a bath on a hot day.

About bloody time!

It is very seldom (actually virtually never) that I would use the word 'dominant' to describe an animal's behaviour - most of the time I believe that label is a cop-out by the trainer, and usually it's applied incorrectly as justification for aversive training methods.  But I'm fairly sure that this hose argument was in fact an attempt to test my leadership, and more specifically, to test whether or not the rearing and pushing would work for him then and in future, as a way to avoid doing something he'd really rather not do!  It seems I passed his test.  Thank god for that.