Starting Over

Although family and friends expected me to "get rid" of Daisy, my daughter encouraged me to think the issue over carefully to make the right choice, and not one based on the emotions of the moment.

Lying in bed with an arm in a sling gave me plenty of time to go over the events. The unmistakable conclusion was that I had pushed Daisy beyond her limits and that she is a sweet natured horse who would not benefit from someone romping on her. In such an instance, she could kill herself or them.

It was clear that she must be brought along slowly with true clicker training methods. No more handing her treats, just "because." That had developed a tendency to mug me for more treats. No, she must do what is asked to earn the treat, and to establish confidence and strengthen lines of communication between her and me.

Fair enough, but how would I obtain the education, the "how's and why"s" that I needed? A lifetime with horses, being sensitive to their emotions and training them does not give one all they need to know to do the right things and pursue the most beneficial avenues! There simply is no use trying to re-create the wheel on your own, you might say. So what to do?

Enter GiddyUpFlix! Much like Netflix, they have a large library of DVD's and or a modest subscription fee they will send them to you and you can keep and view them as long as you continue to pay the monthly subscription fee. Such a deal!

. I went for the 3 disks at once, so that I wouldn't get to the end of "Part 1" and have to wait for "Part 2" to arrive. I like to get the global all-in-one picture as well as partaking of the info in bite-sized pieces.

So far the staff at GidduUpFlix has been responsive with custie service and putting disks in the mail.

So I received the first DVD in the mail yesterday. Being on the West Coast is nice because the disks are shipped from Washington state (for the geographically challenged, also on the West coast).

The beginning stage of clicker training is for the horse to learn to touch a target (no not a bullseye, but a Frisbee or foam on a stick or road cone) with its nose. The larger targets are more easily viewed by a horse, as their eyes are up on the top side of their heads and they have to focus by raising or lowering their heads for a sort of "manual" focus.

I used an electric roast carving knife to cut two squares from a foam rubber single bed mattress thingy. They sell these to go in campers and the like so you aren't sleeping on plywood. Ours came out of the motorhome and was pretty well used up.

The two fat pieces of foam rubber were then used as the "bread" and a sturdy 24" dowel was the "filling" for this target "sandwich."

I duct taped the foam pieces together and around the dowel somewhat where the foam left off and dowel stuck out.

Daisy sniffed at the new target but she didn't have any interest in it. I was patient and rewarded every slight try but she just wasn't getting it. Then my daughter, who was watching the proceedings, suggested that I place the treat ON TOP of the target.

See next post for what happened next.