Baker training session 32 - first bath!

So, I know it's been a while.  Partly, I have been super busy with all the extra care that Baker needs (as well as a few other sick and injured horses - when it rains it pours :/ ), and partly I didn't want to do anything too stressful with him too soon.  Baker has been doing phenomenally with his stall rest!  I have been turning him out in a stall sized pen on the grass, three times a day, for up to an hour or so each time.  He gets quite upset the longer he is in the pen, and hollers at me, or whoever, to come and take him back to his stall.  He is so relaxed in his stall, and under his fan.  It is definitely his happy place!  This will be very helpful when he goes to overnight competitions and has to stay in a stall.  Some horses that live outside 24/7, like all mine do, get very anxious and upset when they have to stay in a stall for a night or two at a show.  Horses don't like changes in their routine, and they don't like confinement, especially if they are not used to it.  I have been blessed that Butch really enjoys being in a stall at shows, despite the fact that he stays outside 24/7 at home.  From the way things are going with Baker, he will be the same way.

I think most folks in my situation, would have a hard time dealing with the stall portion of their horse's recovery.  But Baker has been quite the opposite.  Now that I am starting to turn him out in the round pen, he is getting rowdy out there.  Under the vet's orders, I am supposed to bring him back to a stall if he starts running around.  Well, that first day, he was quiet for a little bit, but then he started running around, so I brought him in.  About an hour later, I tried putting him out in the round pen again.  Same thing.  He was quiet for a little bit, but then started running around, so I brought him back in.  I tried again about an hour after that.  Same thing again.  But, I started to notice that he was hollering at me while he was running around, and as soon as I came up to the gate, he would run over to greet me so that I could "rescue" him.  So, I started thinking - if I keep bringing him in to his stall when he runs around, he is actually being rewarded for doing something he is not supposed to do.  So, I had to come up with a different strategy.  I have a rope tied on the side of the round pen for whenever we need to tie a horse that is up there.  The next time he tried running around, instead of bringing him back to his stall, I took him over to the rope and snapped it on his halter.  I set a timer for 10 minutes, and Baker was in his first "time out"!  When the timer went off, I turned him loose, and lo and behold, he was much quieter after that.  Right now, I am only putting him in the round pen when I am around to keep an eye on him.  He was out the entire day today.  I did have to tie him up about 6 times (several were in a row), but he is definitely starting to get the idea.  He is starting to get a little resistant when we walk towards the tie, and I think he is putting two and two together.

Today, things at the farm were a little less crazy than they have been recently, so I decided to try a training session with Baker to see how he handled it.  He has been very hot and sweaty lately, even when he is standing in his stall under the fan.  So, I thought this would be a great opportunity to try giving him a bath with the hose and spray nozzle.  If you have been keeping up with things, I gave him a sponge bath not too long ago.  I went with sponging then, because it was low key, and because he was still with Fiona, and it would have taken a couple of helpers to get them both to the wash pit where the hose is.  However, now that he is all alone, I can just walk him to the wash pit all on my own.  Leading him was very easy today.  He has definitely improved a lot in that area, since I have to lead him in and out several times a day.  He walked right on to the mats (he's been walking over them anyway, on his way in and out each day), and I attached him to the lunge line run through the ring on the tree.  The set up at my wash pit is pretty much the same as it is where I had been tying him in his field, except that it has mats.  Since this was his first time being sprayed down, I didn't want to tie him stationary to the tree, I wanted him to have some leeway, in case he panicked.  I had already prepped the area so that I wouldn't have to leave him once we got there.  I had the hose drawn out and the water turned on, I had a scraper and a towel handy as well.  I turned the water on, keeping it pointed away from him, and on the shower setting, so that he could get used to the noise first.  He startled a little, and moved a little, but not too bad.  Then I started by spraying his front lower leg closest to me.  Just like I have done in the past, if he moved, I kept the water on him, but as soon as he stood still, I moved the water off of him.  It really only took doing that about 3-5 times before he was standing still and relaxed.  I was fully prepared to not really get to bathe him completely today, but he was so good for everything, that I was able to spray down his entire body except for his face!  The main reason I wait until a horse is good and hot and sweaty before desensitizing them to water, is because they almost always relax as soon as they realize how good it feels.  Baker was no exception.  He was slightly wiggly at first, but once I was about half way through, he was standing with his head down and his eyes closed, enjoying every minute.  He stood perfectly still while I scraped him off too.

Once I was done bathing him, I didn't want to put him back in the dusty round pen right away.  Anytime a horse is wet, as soon as you turn them out, the first thing they will do is roll.  They roll to get dirt on their bodies to absorb the wetness and help themselves dry faster.  But, that just undoes all the effort you put in to cleaning them.  So, if you want to avoid them rolling, for the most part (some horses will roll anyway), then you need to keep them tied until they dry, preferably under a fan.  Well, the best place for me to tie Baker under a fan, where I could still work with him on things like flyspray and feet picking (which he was fabulous for, by the way), is in the crosstie area.  Well, Baker had never been in the crossties.  Until today :) .  I decided to give it a shot and see how he would do.  He has been so good with all the times I have tied him, and all the places I have tied him, so I decided not to ease into it, and just tied him right up like any other horse. He has always

Baker's first time in crossties!

demonstrated that he is willing to give to pressure, which is key for tying, and this time was no exception either.  He was a little nervous at first, because he was in a new area of the farm, but once I turned the fan on, he calmed down pretty quickly.  I proceeded to pick out his feet and flyspray him while crosstied, and he didn't move a muscle.  I walked away from him to do little odd jobs a few times, to test how he would react if I wasn't there.  He got a little worried, but he didn't panic, and he stayed tied.  By the end, he was standing there like he had been doing this all his short life!  He was probably in the crossties for about 15-20 minutes total.  I didn't want to leave him much longer than that in case he got bored and tried something foolish.  Once he was mostly dry, I took him back to the round pen.  He seemed more relaxed than usual for the rest of the afternoon.  I think he had really been missing our one on one time.  I think he has been very lonely since his surgery.  I had previously thought that working with him, even if it wasn't physically demanding, would be too stressful for him right now, but now I think that he is happier when we are working on something together.  I think it breaks up the boredom for him.  And, the egotistical person in me, likes to think that he enjoys my company and enjoys the work we do together.  Who knows, but I will definitely be trying to work with him more often now!