Once again I congratulate Monty on his dually halter. It has been difficult for me to trim my little shetland's hooves since I damaged my back last June. Although he picks his hooves up backwards well he has been quite naughty about bringing his hooves forward. Pulling back and rearing backwards with his front hooves and just standing on me and kicking with his back hooves as soon as they are taken forwards. Each time I have tried to trim his very hard little hooves over the past 6 months we have lhad a battle and I have come off the worst for it as he has re-kindled my severe back pain. So yesterday I decided that he was going to learn to be good even if it took us all day. I wanted him to learn to allow all his hooves to go forwards, to rest his front hooves on a block for me and to allow me to sit in one of my grandchildrens little chairs to trim all his hooves. Soo .. the dually went on and the training began. Initially he was quite naughty again but each time he was disciplined fairly severely with the dually - I did manage to keep my adrenalin down although I was tempted to 'lose it' with him. It took two hours but by the end of the session he willingly rested his front hooves on the block for me to trim. He stood quietly and allowed me to sit on my little chair while I trimmed his front hooves and also brought his back hooves forwards and backwards for me trim as I sat on the chair. Great result - my back is fine to-day and he has learnt a huge lesson. This lesson would not have been possible without the dually so thanks again Monty!
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Maggie that is fantastic news! Don't they look cute in the little red dually! I have one that JUST fits our 8.5hh mini on the tightest of all 3 straps! Our little boy had a habbit of walking in front of myself and my 7 year old daughter when being led so the dually has been an invaluable asset to our equipment to bring that into line. He leads beautifully even with a normal halter now. It is great you managed to keep your adrenalin down too. I think it is a good thing when we can recognise that it may be going up and put a halt on that...well done!
Thanks for your response,Janelle. It is interesting how these little horses respond to the dually too. Mine was also a bit naughty being led but the dually has fixed that. He is very good with the children and excellent to lead now and really listens to my commands but I doubt if he has ever been ridden independently. I have taught him to single line lunge just with the rope halter or dually and my next challenge is to train him double line lunge with his bridle on ready for my grandson to start riding him independently. It will be good to experiment with the double line lunging on him before I progress to using it on Tricka. I am currently making a special round yard for him where I will put lots of sawdust!! I have had the area flattened so now I just need to finish the post and rail fence and get the sawdust.
Sounds great maggie! I also am going to use my mini to practice my long lining before i try it on buster, they are nice sized guinea pigs hey! My mini was a champion show pony before we bought him and a stud stallion so he never had any lunging experience. I will have to start from scratch to get him lungeing...any tips to get him started with that?? I have started him under saddle which was a breeze. I did join up with him before and after putting on the saddle and i had spent some time prior to that just tying him up for a brush and sitting the saddle pad and saddle there to let him get the feel of it which he was fine with. But now i am in the same position as you, i want my daughter to be able to ride him independently so i need to do some long lining with dually then with the bit.
I totally envy you getting a round yard with sawdust footing! I have small acreage so i have to use my roundyard for food aswell :-( One day we plan to buy a bigger property so i can have it all set up just right! Good on you, i hope you have many enjoyable hours in your new yard!
This is my first experience with a little one. You have done better than me as I could not get join up and ceased trying as it was too upsetting for my shetland. He just couldn't understand what I was doing. It was hard to train him to circle on the lunge. We started with a small circle
- just out of the kick range - and I had to be very forceful with shaking the end of the lunge rope to get him to move out and around. It took sometime as initially he would just go about one round and stop. When we finally had it mastered on a small circle at walk I then asked him to move out onto a larger circle and after that asked for trot, then back to walk, trot etc and finally into a canter. It all took some time and a number of lessons but he is good now. I just laugh when they canter - it is so cute. He was very quiet when I purchased him. Only used as a lead pony but was used to having a saddle on him. He was gelded late so he is inclined to be a bit bossy but also very loving and excellent around the children so I am lucky that way and I am hoping I can train him. Good luck with yours - he sounds beautiful. My round yard is not much - a mini only 12 metres in diameter. I had hoped for a larger pad but the guy only flattened that area and I couldn't afford the extra money to go larger again. It is on a fairly steep slope so it has been a hassle to stop it washing with the heavy storms we have had - I have had to scoop up quite a bit of it a couple of times from down the hill!! Now I have agapanthas growing around it so they should help. I am looking forward to having it finished but I still have a lot of hard work ahead of me.