The Saga of the Evil Lead Line Continues...

I'm continuing my dragging lead line work with Rusty. He continues to crack me up every time we do this.

These pictures are from last weekend - I'm just getting around to downloading them now. We had had alot of rain, so there were some nice big puddles in the arena. I actually don't mind when there is water in there, as it is a good exercise to work a horse through it. It isn't good for cantering, but that's ok. I still can't ride Rusty anyways, so it didn't make a big difference for us.

I started walking him along the rail with the lead line dragging - I have to move him on gently with a lunge whip, or otherwise he just stands there looking at me and looking at the evil lead line. As we walked toward the huge puddle, I was wondering what he would do... I was expecting him to cut into the middle of the ring to avoid the water. I was totally wrong - he saw safety in a little island in the corner of the ring....

I couldn't stop laughing at him - he walked up on to the sand and then looked back at me as if to say "now what do I do?"

I encouraged him to walk on, but he just stood there. He started to realize that there was a little bit of grass back there, so eating seemed to be a good idea.I let him graze for about 5 or so minutes then decided it was time to get back to work... I had to wade out into the puddle and smack him gently on the butt with the lunge whip to get him to leave his little oasis. I finally got him moving and we did a few laps around the ring - every time he stepped on the lead line, he would stop and try to figure out which foot to lift to get himself free. This is huge progress, as normally he backs up and panics.


Stepping through the puddles actually cleaned his legs and hooves of the nasty crusted on mud from his paddock. My leadline didn't fare as well, but I knew that going in - it is an old one. I just rinsed it after I was done and most of the sand came right out.
After one more trip through the big puddle, I let him stop and have a break. Richard likes picking him clover and grass. It took Rusty about 3 minutes to step over that close to the fence to get his treat with the evil lead line following him. I think he is actually stepping on it with his front hoof, but with no freak outs! I think we are making some progress with this little problem!