This message is from: Rovena Kessinger <ro_k...@yahoo.com>
Hi everybody. I hope I am posting to this list the right way. I have a four year old fjord gelding that I got from a horse rescue. He was left there after two owners "gave up" on him. I have had him for about two months. He has had minimal training, and I don't think any of it stuck. I am new to horses. I learned about clicker-training last year with a problem dog, and that worked so well, it gave me confidence to try it on a new species. It's going really well. He was VERY pushy and domineering at first, and I was rather stupid and probably put myself in danger, I realize now that I know more, but it turned out OK, and he has made a huge amount of progress. So, now that I know better, and he is better, it's all good. He is incredibly smart, and not scared of anything. I have a mule that I do CT with too. The reason that I picked those two out of all the horses was that they always came to the gate to greet me when I got there, and the one left in the field always watched me as I worked with the other one, obviously wanting to be in on it. So I couldn't leave either behind. The mule is 12. He is much more well-trained than the fjord, but also a lot more suspicious and spooky. So they both need a lot of work. Somebody told me that mules and fjords are a lot alike, so it made sense what happened with those two. I thought those two made the other horses seem like sheep in comparison. Anyway, I found this list, and thought it would be interesting to see what other people are doing with their fjords. My immediate issue with mine is his hooves. I want to keep him barefoot, and I think from what I read that is how most fjords are. A farrier came just to trim, but my horse wouldn't let the guy get near him. So I am trying to desensitize him to having his feet handled. I can touch all of them now, but haven't picked them up yet. I'm sure we'll get there, but after that, I don't know a good barefoot trimmer in my area. He obviously needs something done, so I was going to let the farrier just trim him, despite the fact he doesn't seem to now anything special about barefoot trimming. I am in northern Wisconsin (Rhinelander). If anybody knows a good trimmer near me, especially for a fjord and any special needs they may have, I would appreciate if you let me know. Thanks, Ro Important FjordHorse List Links: Subscription Management: http://tinyurl.com/5msa7e FH-L Archives: http://tinyurl.com/rcepw FH_L Shirts: http://tinyurl.com/8yky94l
