Back/Forth

I go back and forth in my mind about the decision to bring home this colt. Maybe I am over-stressed with Oakley, the colt and our mortgage issues, my brain is full! Its not like the colt costs a lot to have him around, but it is added cost and one more project in our never-ending sea of a busy life. I do have options with him, its not like I have to keep him, I can always work him and sell him next year as a 2yr old.

He is turning out to be quite the project, that I will say! He's a lot "wilder" than I initially realized and basically I have to treat him as a wild horse. He does NOT like to be touched much. He kicked at me twice yesterday when I was close enough to pet his butt.. I actually thought he was enjoying it, I was brushing his butt and he moved his rear closer to me.. Red does the same thing because he wants me to keep scratching it! But not the colt apparently, as he kicked at me.. I quickly realized I needed to start out much much slower.

I previously had thought I would wait to re-halter him until he was 100% approachable, but determined after yesterdays kicking episodes it was much safer for me to have a halter/lead on him when handling him. That way I can control his head at all times and his rearend, so if he swings towards me with his butt, I can get ahold of his face and manually pull him around which means his butt has to go the opposite direction of me.

I spend 15-20 minutes every morning haltering and working with him as well as handling him every afternoon. This AM when I attempted to run my hand down his chest to his front legs, he tried to bite me. I immediately reacted as the "alpha" and let him know that was NOT okay by "biting" back with a pop from the leadrope and "charging" after him to get him to back away from me. He might be half wild and scared by his new experiences, but I am still the boss and I'm not going to "baby" him. The plan is to teach him to respect me and my space in a manner that he understands and that will yield me a respectful horse down the road.

He shows signs of wanting to follow me around, he is just so uneasy with any touch right now, it is going to be a long and slow process! I'm certain that he is biting and kicking out of fear, and not because he is an asshole.

Maybe part of my anxiety about him is my own fear of the "what if". What if I cant get him to accept and trust me, he is the biggest ground work challenge I've had to deal with and a small part is afraid I will fail, so my brain says "you cant fail if you dont try". Bad brain bad brain, that is the wrong way to think so I am attempting to supress those thoughts and move on! because What if I succeed.. What if he turns into a 16H+ easy going, well built, well bred, good looking horse! :)