The lumberjacks and the walkers!

Lesson 3 was a bit of a disaster after the local farmer decided to start chopping trees down in the wood next to my sand school.  We went out into the school and Tequila was immediately on high alert because she could hear the men and tractors and chainsaws.  She was walking around like a giraffe initially and so I decided to lunge her first.  I had been working on our lunging for about a week thank goodness and after the stable door incident I decided that I was being too gentle with her and she was actually taking the piss out of me.

I didn't use the lunge whip to keep her out but as she tried to charge towards me I swept the loops of lunge rein across in front of me and once again the shock on her face had to be seen to be believed.  She calmly turned back to the track and continued on a 20m circle.  Now don't misunderstand me I think that our initial problems were her fear and lack of confidence but now our relationship was developing she was more confident and she knew what she was supposed to do.  Occasionally now she will turn in but most of the time she behaves as she should and lunges very nicely.

So after about 10 minutes of lunging and her seeming to relax I got on.  Although she kept looking towards the woods she was working nicely and was reasonably responsive.  About 30 minutes into our lesson she suddenly became hyper sensitive and on high, high alert and stood looking into the fields and snorting.  As I have said before I am not the worlds bravest rider and my heart was racing.  We all looked to see what she was looking at and then saw two walkers wearing bright red coats with dogs coming across the fields.  I let her stand and look but she was getting more and more excited and Susan told me that the best thing was to keep her moving.  I was scared I don't mind telling you, I felt that at any minutes she was going to bolt as she was on high alert, fight or flight.  I started walking her in small circles making quick successive changes of direction.  I allowed her to look at the walkers but she had to keep moving.

Susan explained to me that by letting her stand and look at the thing that is frightening her I am allowing her to think about making the decision to run away.  If she is still she can concentrate all her attention onto the scary thing and think about it and get more frightened and then she can RUN AWAY!!!!!  By keeping her moving she has to think about me and what I am asking her to do.  She can see the scary thing but she can't think so clearly about running because she is already moving.  I could feel her starting to relax and her head get lower, she stopped holding her breath and breathed normally and eventually she started to walk normally and work properly and swing her back as the tension left her.  I was happy as we had actually worked through one of my demons with her that is her sometimes over developed spookiness.

Laura actually videoed this incident and you can see how it develops.