Christmas Eve! And a glorious 70 degree day! We went to Mom Searl's for our Christmas celebration and had a good time. We managed to get back with just enough time to do a little bit of lunging, especially since the weather wasn't freezing! So we did.
Dan went first. I put the equiband on him, the upside down bell boot on the right front, and the lunge cavesson. All in baby, all in. Ha! We started with our pillar walks and then some leg yields. He didn't want to leg yield to the left as well. He was overbending at the neck to get at cookies and not wanting to step over as well. But he did do it better later on.
I had set up some raised ground poles for trotting and we walked over those. It was a little awkward but he did it. So then I really wanted him to trot over them a few times. Not more than a handful, but maybe two or three times. But I can't lunge him... so I unhooked him from the line and tried to trot him through it by guiding him. It kind of worked and I clicked and gave him a cookie. And then we tried again. And then once he got the treat for it a second time, I think he realized what the goal was. So I walked him to the end and then stopped him. Then I walked to the other side and clucked and he trotted through and came for the cookie! We did it about two or three times and he was starting to get the hang of it! He's so smart! Or so food motivated. ;)
We quit after that because I didn't want to overdo it with the equiband and he's hard because... there's only so much you can do with him at liberty because you can't lunge him or long line him. I need to teach him some other tricks but also didn't have anything else set up in the arena. And was hesitant to make him sidepass the pole yet. Although I guess I could have had him straddle the pole. Oh well, it was still a good work out! Better than nothing. Plus I think he had fun. I think he likes having a job and using his brain and I know he loves getting cookies! And we got butt foam so he did work decently! (Or it was that hot!)
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