A breakthrough

 For the last few days I have been working on trailer loading Rally. We had made good progress on the bridge, where I could just send her over it, both directions, so it was time to step things up. 

What I did was open up a panel of my round pen and back the trailer in there, which created a safe area for me to be able to get out of the way, as well as containing Rally if she decided to turn tail and leave. 

The 1st day, after working the obstacles, and taking her to the trailer, she only pawed at the trailer floor, the looked at me.  I read her as saying she wanted to try but it was so far out of her comfort zone, that was all she could give me on that day. She had 3 big evasions where she was leaving, which earned her a lot of work; I stood still and sent her around me in half circles with lots of rapid changes of direction. Eventually she thought better of leaving, but pawing the trailer was all we could do that day. 

The next day I turned her loose in the pen and brought Patsy in. Patsy, of course did all the obstacles and loaded in the traoler like an ole broke horse; what a good mind on that filly!

Sorry about the poor photo, but you can see that Rally was watching. I put Patsy back in the herd and left Rally in the pen for a while, watching her from a distance. She eventually went up to the trailer and finished off the grain in there but didn't go in.

Day 3, it was time to get serious. I started out by a walk through the obstacles, she has the bridge down pat and is learning to walk through the L without knocking the poles. Then I longed her in short circles at the trailer, and let her rest at the trailer door. Pretty soon she was hunting the trailer; when that happened, she got a break, then I would ask for her to put a foot in. She consistently put her right foot in, so I called it for the day. There is only so much she can take before she shuts down, and this was a good building block place to stop. 

Yesterday, no longeing, just a walk through the obstacles and an ask to load. She did the one foot load, then gave me attitude so she got worked in the half circles again. We went through that several times, with two half hearted attempts to flee, then at the trailer, she started to paw with her left front as well as the right front. Hallelulia! She was now thinking with both sides of her brain. 

It wasn't long before this happened:

Her feet make  me twitchy.... soon we will fix them.

The interesting thing is that this didn't happen until I stepped in the trailer. She wasn't going in until I did too. 

I was so pleased with her, this was a huge moment of trust for her. I even had a few happy tears if truth be told. She got lots of love and praise, and actually just stood there for quite a few minutes, checking out the walls looking behind her, and eating the handfuls of grain I offered her, before quietly backing out. 

Today we built on that, same routine and this time  the pawing with both feet, followed by wanting to put weight on her leg, and again once I stepped in she did too with both feet. I encouraged her to step in a little further, which she did getting her hind feet right to the trailer- in essence, she was three quarters loaded. 

Still nervous about committing with her back feet but she did raise a hind and touch her toe to the edge of the trailer, twice. She also backed quietly out and reloaded by following me right in. Some more quiet time in there and that was enough for today. 

Good girl, Rally.