More training gets results

I have been working with Megan twice a day for about 3 weeks now. The outcome has been consistently getting better and I am even getting some respect back from her since our indecent last weekend. As you may know by now, we got another horse last weekend. Her name was target but she had no idea what it was because everyone called her baby. We are thinking of calling her Fiona from the movie Shrek.

Last Saturday we received Fiona and put her in with Megan and everything was fine. Megan took her so far in that she adopted her as her own baby. Within 24 hours we found out the real meaning of "Heard-bound" and how severe it can be.  Here is Megan leading Fiona into the corral.
We were supposed to have Megan picked up here at the house by a trainer and take her to a clinic about a mile away. The trainer "Sheri" shows up and we proceed to taking Megan out of the corral and load her into the trailer. She was having nothing to do with me or anyone else at this time. She was kicking and biting at me, she was throwing her head and even reared up a little. This action blew us away because we had never seen it coming from Megan, at the time and Sheri took Megan and tried to get control. Megan acted even worse and reared, throwing her head even more and in turn broke a snap on the lead rope setting her free to do as she pleased. The lead-rope snap flew back and hit Sheri in the head just above one of her eyes causing a flood of blood.

The chase begins. All Megan wanted to do was get back with her baby, so she found her way around the house (not going into the road or running off) and started calling Fiona again. I made way through the barn getting Fiona haltered and under control, opened some of the fencing and persuaded Megan to come back into the pasture. What a day it had been so far!

Loading up. We decided to take baby Fiona with us in order to keep Megan calm, we got a rope on Megan again and they both loaded perfectly into the trailer without incident and off to class we went.

The adrenaline flows again! We got Megan and Fiona to the trainers where Megan was put into the arena and Fiona was put in a stall. Megan was still pretty high strung and showed that she was irritated, she wanted nothing to do with anyone or anything new and wanted Fiona and to get home, we all knew that was not going to happen any time soon and she started making even a bigger fool of herself. Sheri ran Megan in circles for quite a while, wearing her down so we could have some control and respect from her. Shari then put a lariat around Megan's head and a loop over her nose bringing out the very worst from the horse. The fireworks went off and for some time, Megan was rearing up, kicking, snorting and striking the air while trying to get at Shari. Megan kept rearing up more and more then she went past the point of no return and fell backwards. She was not injured and shook it all off and kept right on going. This went on for about an hour or more until Megan was willing to accept a halter and be lead around the arena. Finally she was calm and orderly while showing respect and took direction from Sheri the rest of the afternoon.

The aftermath. Every day since the arena incident I have been working with Megan and she has been getting slightly better with every training session (1-2 hours twice per day) she has been showing respect, listening, learning and getting used to being out of the same pasture as Fiona. Tomorrow we will be taking Fiona for a walk around the other side of the barn to where Megan will not be able to see her. It will be interesting to see what happens, I am expecting some fireworks, just not as bad as last time.

Wish us luck and watch for updates!