Joe: Part 2

It took almost no time at all to get the saddle on Joe as he flew through most everything I threw at him. He is extremely willing to do almost anything I ask of him, as long as it doesn't take too much of his precious energy. If it involves moving fast or thinking quick it takes him a little while to catch on, but once he does catch on there are no more problems. The only recurring problem that I've found with Joe is one that he has no control over. As a colt he got somthing jabbed in his right eye and now has extremely limited vision on his right side. Now when he is running counter-clockwise in the roundpen or out in the pasture he has to constantly turn his head to the right so he can see....and the rest of his body follows. As you would expect this made any steering at more than a walk difficult until I earned his complete trust. To get him to trust me I did a lot of work in the roundpen before I ever took him out. By doing a lot of turns into the fence and making him trust me instead of his bad eye I slowly started to gain his trust. After 2 or 3 days of nothing but flexing/turning into and away from the fence on his bad side I started to feel that he was ready. When I did take him out of the roundpen it couldnt have come more naturally for him. Then when i took him on the trail it was even more natural, the only thing that i could find to try to scare him was a horribly monstruous refrigirator that lives deep in the woods and is extremely territorial. Other than that he couldnt have done anybetter. Sadly when the owner came to pick him up a couple of days later I was stuck in bed with the flu and didnt get a chance to show off everything Joe could do. Remember I REALLY dont mind if you leave comments or email me at thebartjr@gmail.com!! Thanks

Joe: Part One

Somewhere about mid-way through January I was given the chance to work a horse for one of my local riding buddies, Jerry. I had already worked one horse for him, Jack, and now I was to be given the chance to work another, Joe. Since Jack and Joe came from the same local halter stud I pretty much knew what to expect... a slow moving, scared of nothing, good weekend trail horse. As with all the other horses I have started/worked with, on the first day I put him through his paces just to see what he might already know. I can honestly say that I wasn't exactly surprised that I could do just about anything I wanted to to try to scare him and he just wouldnt budge. Some might say "Oh thats just wonderful, less work for me," and in a lot of ways it is a good thing, but... if he is afraid of nothing, then how do I get him to do anything!!! Normally, using traditional natural horsemanship techniques you use the horses natural fears to first sensitize the horse to get it to move its feet and do what you want, and then desensitize the horse to the scary object. With Joe, I have to rely almost completely on his willingness to please by doing what I suggest... its that or find a cannon to try to sensitize him.