round penning

I had a good session with Skye today. He willingly followed me around the pen. I worked primarily on sending him in various directions. It is always a pain when you have to try to drag a horse behind you. But if you can send him, it is so much better. In fact, the exercise necessitates that he go forward, yield his hindquarters and then move his shoulders over and change directions. He has the concept down now so we will keep improving. I worked with So Grand and Moon today too. So Grand got in the pen and bowed his neck real pretty like and snorted all over the place. He is an 11yr old stallion. I had him moving out pretty good. I got some good inside turns from him. My goal was to get the forward movement and get him to change directions to the inside consistently. When I was getting that from him I started to try to draw him to me. He didn't, however, he was keeping his eyes on me and I started to get him to YH as I walked around. I didn't work him like I did Moon yesterday. When I was getting this pretty consistently I took him back to the stall and brushed him out. Then I got Moon. He came up to me in the stall and led him out to the pen. However, when we got there he did not want to go in. So we had to try a different tact. I treated it as though he wouldn't go in a trailer. So any little step forward I rewarded. Then when I got him to the door I backed him off and worked him in the aisle then brought him back to the door. Finally, he went in with me. I just took the time to walk him around and have him follow me on the lead without putting alot of pressure on him. Then I just kept changing directions on him walking in arcs. Then I was getting some YH from him. I used the time to desensitize him to the lead rope being all over him. And then went back to leading him around. He really worked hard yesterday and I wanted today to be a time when he would think it was not too bad hanging out with me. Then when we went back to his stall he didn't want to go there. I did brush him a bunch and he did good. Tomorrow we will see what we have.