Yesterday I decided to introduce the flag to Aspire. She took one look at it and bolted, snorting and spooking. I just did what I've been doing with the stick and string, walking away from her and rhythmically raising and lowering the flag in a relaxed arc. When she relaxed I slowed down and when she offered to get a little closer and look curious I stopped. It only took a matter of minutes before I think she identified the pattern between the stick-string and the flag. The only right answer is to stop moving your feet and to look at me. Pretty soon she wanted to smell the flag and let me rub her all over with it. I made the mistake of accidentally letting the flag fall over to her other side and she caught sight of it on her off side and shot straight toward me sideways. I dropped the flag and moved back and away in an arc toward her hindquarters bringing her nose to me and her hinds away. Oops. I began over again rubbing her all over with the flag and eventually built up to swinging the flag toward her and away. After accomplishing this on both sides I began adding some noise to it, which bothered her a little but every time she relaxed, made a change, or offered to connect to me I stopped what I was doing and rewarded that effort on her part.
I really believe that that is what makes her different from other RBE horses that haven't had any relationship built with them. In my colt starting class right now there are a lot of students with extreme RBE horses, some like Aspire and some much more extreme. It is apparent that none of these horses have very much trust in their human, no rapport or relationship has been developed, and in class there is no emphasis on building one. It's all about the end goal of having horses hold still and tolerating the flag or bag or saddle but not about the horse wanting it, wanting to be with the human, seeking out comfort and safety in their human leader. Aspire was just like many of these horses when she first came to Dillon and her tendency and nature is to revert back to that when afraid. However, because I've spent so much time valuing her emotional health and our relationship I think she finds it easier to become LB and trust that I won't hurt her and that I can provide those things she needs most - safety, comfort, and play. In example of this, my flagging exercise was really bothering the other two fillies and they began running and bucking around in the pens. They took off and Aspire wanted to go with them. She reared up and flung herself backward and then kicked toward me. I let go of the rope (I'm not going to try and hang onto that mess on a 12' line!) and she ran off to the corner of the pen to be with her friends. Instead of getting mad I thought "how interesting" and took a moment to evaluate why she'd rather be with them than me. As I was thinking about the situation Aspire looked over at me and made a decision. She decided that rather than be with her friends she'd come back to me! She walked straight back to me and put her head down against my side and took a deep breath! This moment was so rewarding! I've been stimulating her with the flag, doing something scary, her friends are tearing around the pens, and she'd still rather come back to me and continue playing. Any other horse would have been glad to be free of their human, the flag, the pressure, and be with other horses.
I can't say enough how important this relationship is with the horse. If the horse wants to be with you and understands that you're benevolent leader than everything else becomes so much easier. Even with a challenging horse. Some days I really wish I could have Aspire in the colt start but I don't think that this class is the right environment to nurture a relationship with her. The horse I am using, Rosie, is so much simpler and confident that I can maintain rapport with her and keep up with class requirements at the same time. I simply couldn't do both with an emotional horse like Aspire. I wish that the class format was more focused on this than on just getting horses further today than yesterday with the bend on a circle or the flag regardless of how the horse feels. I feel bad for these RBE horses in class that are so confused and afraid and for the students because they're not learning strategies to handle horses like these. The students don't get why a longer rope might be a good idea or how to identify what's broken and isolate, separate, and recombine anything.
Anyway back to my day with Aspire yesterday... I ended the day by sitting on the fence and flagging her with a lot of snap and noise to the flag. She wasn't sure about it in the beginning but she really is looking to me for comfort. Her first response a lot of the time is to move her feet and leave but you can see her trying to think and then she'll decide on her own to come back and wants to just rest with me. I am surprised at how fast I can progress with her given her nature. I'm very cautious of overloading her or pushing it and really try to read her each day I come out to play to see how she felt about me the day before. And everyday she's always greeting me at the gate and offering to put her head in the halter for me. :) So rewarding!
My goals for the next couple weeks for her are to continue flagging and introduce the bag on a rope, more girthing simulations, the needle simulation on her neck, spraying her with a squirt bottle, and de-worming simulations with apple sauce. Also trailer loading so I can move her to a nice big pasture with Rosie! :)
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