Groundwork with Daisy and Shasta!!

Last evening (Monday) I went to Sharon and I had in my mind I will do the chores (clean up piles, give water, etc) first before I do anything with the horses but I had also decided I am not riding :) So I did all those things first then I got Daisy out of her corral and took her into the corral that is like a circle which is perfect for lunging and other groundwork. I lunged her first. Well you remember how she used to pull like nothing else. Well she didn't pull at all. She was nice and soft at both a walk and a trot...she was rounded on the circle too (I think that is how you say it). It was very nice to see. She didn't pull either. I got her to do transitions from a walk to a trot then from a trot to a walk. I didn't want to ruin it by making her go into a canter because I didn't know if she would pull then or not but I didn't want to start with the canter and then wish I hadn't. I will work with her on that another night. Anyway when we were finished with lunging I wanted her to move her hindquarters. Now she knows how to do this because we have done it before but we never really worked with her front end so much if ever. I don't really remember. So first I got her to do that. She did really good..I just had to tap the air and she moved. She did really well with that too. Since she did so good with that I figured lets try the front end. Daisy was like ok we can do this. She did a very good job with that as well. I was impressed. Once she moved her front end quite nicely I let her go eat grass while I did Shasta!

Now Shasta I didn't lunge quite as long due to the fact that she just doesn't need it. She was very rounded on the circle and did such a good job of listening to me. So I figured we could work on her moving her hindquarters and her front end as well.  She understood me asking her to move her hindquarters and did quite well with that but when it came to asking her to move her forquarters she didn't quite get it...so I backed her up so that her one front leg was in front of the other one and then asked her to step across...once she did that a couple of times both ways I then asked her with her standing square. She did it perfectly so I stopped working with her and praised her quite a bit for her hard work.

I then got Daisy while Shasta ate grass. I groomed and loved on Daisy and put her away then got Shasta and groomed and loved on her too :) Overall it was a good evening and quite relaxing for me ;)