From trainer Jay Westerbur:
Week #2 with #dakotashowdownteamonyx
We did all of the basic stuff from last week: getting him to reach out and touch, letting me touch his neck and shoulders, letting me approach him to touch.
But we also added something new! Now before anyone goes on a tangent about treat training/Positive Reinforcement, I will say this:
- No, he does NOT mug me for treats. He knows when my hands are empty and if he doesn’t I show him and he will check it out but not be rude.
- Yes, I WILL be using Pressure and Release as well! It doesn’t have to be 100% one or the other, the two CAN work together!
Now that that’s over (sorry for the non-horse people lmao). As you can see we are working on getting him to put his nose in the “halter”. He picked up on this super quickly!
I first started with holding the Noseband since he was intimidated of me holding the headstall part (not surprising, he’s a very curious but cautious boy). And once he got more confident that I wasn’t trying to trap him, I moved onto holding the headstall part and letting him maneuver his nose in. It frustrated him a couple times because it would move which would lead to him not being able to put his nose in, so he would walk away for a second and then come back to try again!
(I asked him to do it without treat rewards and he still did it btw).
