Fun with Tarps

It's been a while since I posted much in the way of photos so here are some taken when I was reintroducing Maggie to dragging something around.

She's pretty bored with it, as you can see but it's a valuable tool. Tarps or things that "blow" in the wind can really spook a horse and land a rider a visit to the hospital. I will usually start out with a rope just dragging. I will switch hands, and therefore the horse will need to "switch eyes" ** make sure you have worked on this from the ground before you try it from the saddle..please!) I will also have soemone else drag the tarp, husband, or husband on his horse and we will follow the tarp along. In both dragging and chasing, we start at a walk and work up into a canter. To progress, we eventually add a towel to the rope, then a bag of some kind of plastic , something that makes noise and then progress from there depending on how the horse has handled it. I should mention that I didn't just jump on and start dragging noisy things around. I introduced her to all of this long before , from the ground , as part of her groundwork. Noisy plastic bags and tarps, and even bubble wrap was all part of her ground work. Maggie seems to be a pretty brave girl and doesn't get too worried about noises so this process has gone quite fast in comparison to what I have experienced with other colts.