More Ground Work

Baby Diamond has come so far since she came to us in December it’s just amazing! I love every minute of the transformation from a baby horse that would spook at her own shadow and try to suckle my mare to a young horse that has ground manners, can lead, load, bathe, and pick up her feet. She no longer thinks cars are going to eat her, and can calmly walk down the road in hand just like Big Sister Sugar. She no longer fights the saddle, and bit, she stands calmly to get tacked up.
All this is wonderful, but in light of the accident with TX and Acacia spooking at the blackberry vine, we thought we’d take the three girls in the arena and do some ground work with them, just see how steady they really are...
After we let them run around and get their rolling done and bucking over with, we pulled out the tarp. Tarps are not Diamond’s favorite item, but she will now walk by the tarped boat in the parking lot without trying to run away from it, or crawl in my lap, so I was very curious to see how she’d handle one being put on her.


She was the first to go, so it was still nicely folded up and quite small so it only took a moment to get it over her back. However, when we unfolded it and it made all the crinkling noise, she was not a happy camper! Once she discovered she wasn’t going to be able to get away from it, she stood there like a good little girl and let me rub it all over her body, over her head, under her belly... everywhere. While she didn’t look too impressed with Hubby and me for subjecting her to this, she didn’t try to rear or bolt. We secured it under her halter and led her around the arena, and over the bridge, and finally asked her to walk on the tarp, which she did after a little coaxing...
We did the same with Acacia who again tolerated it, but wasn’t overly joyed about the situation.
And Sugar, who could have cared less, marched right over the bunched up tarp like it was a hill of grass, and proudly wore her superwoman tarp cape around the arena and over the bridge (grudgingly over the bridge!! LOL)