Back to Training!

I'm excited I finally got off of my exhausted, lazy rear and went out to work with Chrome after work. I fed him, brushed him, fly sprayed him, brought him out of the pasture and tied him to the fence post. He was bewildered at first because I’ve only ever tied him to trees, but it only took him a minute to figure out he couldn’t follow me. Poor guy was so confused.

First I worked on lifting his hooves (well resting his rear hooves). He did very well and held them up for as long as I would wait and sometimes didn’t even put them down between clicks lol. He resisted a little on his left rear, but I think it was the unfamiliar fence and hill causing the problem. He just likes to dance around sometimes. I also asked him to move his haunches over several times which he did well and his shoulders once. It was a little iffy, but we’ve never worked on it so I was happy.

Then I untied him and worked on his lateral flexion. He did his good side perfectly, but really wasn’t doing too well to the right. He would flex but not very far. I was tickling for the cue. Then I remembered that he's supposed to be learning it with the rope! That cleared things up for him a bit and he did well. He still doesn’t flex very far to the right, but what can I expect after so long without working on it? This would be so much easier to teach from on his back lol. I’ll keep working on it and get him loosened up.

Then I worked on backing with halter pressure since I’ve only really done it with my hand on his chest. He did really well backing until I released pressure, sometimes as many as ten steps. Once he even flexed vertically and I gave him a jackpot. I want to get him loose doing it instead of bracing. He needs to learn to give his head. I completely forgot to ask for head lowering. I need to work both on his crest cue and his rope cue. When he’s good at that again I want to ask him to do it while walking and eventually backing.

That’s all I worked on since it’s been a while. I didn’t want to over do it. All in all he did fantastic! It’s like we never stopped working except for the stiffness. :D