5

Yards. Liberty. two sessions 5 and 5 minutes? Didn't look at the time. Remembered to cue the word Down when he put his head down. He's definitely got the head down. Unfortunately he was backing not just rocking back when he put his head down. Have to slow myself down to try and refine it, especially now that he's doing it so well. The cue he doesn't have although I think he's starting to understand.

I worked him then put the halter on and groomed him. When I finished I rugged him. He always makes a face and threatens to nip when I'm doing up the chest strap. I slowed down and scratched around his ears while I did it, well, not actually while I did it but around the time. When I say slow down it's not like I'm rushing putting on his rug but I really did it slowly, watching his face and stopping when he wasn't happy, scratching his ears until he looked soft and then carrying on.

Went and cut some more carrots and then tried the wwylm exercise, again at liberty. This was when he started offering head down when i was trying to get him to walk with me. Head down and reverse so that I couldn't even see him unless i turned around. I was remiss and not careful so that before I knew it he was very sexually excited. Got a little sticky for I wanted to reward him for head down, which seemed to quell the excitement yesterday but I was too late and he was practially on top of me.

The wwylm exercise was more successful when he was on my right, not so much on the left. Toward the end he was getting it and staying with me while I walked. He even took a step back when I did which was nice. Dakota used to do that very well. I don't want to confuse him with too many exercises but think it's nice to work on at least two different things to break things up. When I say he was walking with me, we were only doing a step at a time. And again, sometimes he was overwhelmed and switching off.

The training of me is more important than training Balthazar. So much to watch for, so much to remember, so much to retain so that I can attempt to bring the strands together successfully.

Watched two short videos Peter lent me of Parelli stuff. Confirmed to me that I'm on the right track. It may take a very long time but there will be no coercion, no swatting of a horse's rump with a rope as I saw in one of them. I can see the benefits of body position and communication through the body, the use of the rope to communicate but I am definitely over trying to be alpha horse in the herd which I think is the whole premise. The first video had the horse taking a break from work at a witch's hat. Work the horse and he learns that he can stop if he's at the witches hat. Wouldn't it be nicer that the horse works and gets a nice reward at the end?