Day one of issues from the ground: saddling

So, I know I've mentioned this before but I just now got around to working this one out with Memphis. This one required time and patience. Lots of time and lots and lots of patience. Since it took so much time, I only worked on saddling. I'll be back out on Weds to work ont he mounting.

I showed up at the barn and gathered all my materials:

Memphis
Lunge line
Lunge whip
Saddle
Saddle pad
Bridle
Riding crop
Mounting block

I started with just basic groundwork just to make sure he knew it was time to work. Just a halter, lead rope, and the riding crop on my wrist for back up to commands. We worked on walking next to me, woah, back, and moving away from pressure on the sides. I then switched over to some basic lunging, making sure he followed me asking for him to go forward in each direction and backing up the forward command. Then I made sure he remembered Woah.

Now the fun part! I grabbed the pad and we started to REALLY work. I held the lunge line in my left hand and the pad in my right. I lifted the pad up and the second he moved away, I dropped the pad, and he was immediately sent out to work. He had to move his feet, no walking, I wanted a rack, runwalk, or canter.

We did this over and over. Pad tries to go on, he moves, he gets worked. Pad tries to go on, he moves, he gets worked. He started to REALLY sweat so I decided to work him a little closer than keep sending him out. This was his funny AH HA moment. I worked him in a tight circle with pretty much me at his shoulder, his head slightly turned towards me and the pad in my right hand. I would lift, he would move and I would lift, he would move and we would go around and a around.

This was NOT pretty. The first few times the pad touched him and he would rear back acting like it was a cattle prod or something. THen the pad was allowed to start touching him and then I could stick it on and I release all aids and relaxed. I moved off his shoulder some, dropped the lunge line to give his head freedom, and waited.

I removed and replaced the pad about 5 times, turned it around on his back, and slid it all over and he didn't move at all. So we moved towards the saddle going on his back.

HOT DOG! The big horse didn't flinch at all for the saddle going on. Let me cinch him up and let me walk him around. I took it off and redid it and he still stood like he'd done it ten billion times before.

Even better? I walked him over to the mounting block, stood up on it, and put some weight in the saddle: HE DIDN'T MOVE AT ALL!!!!

I stopped it here. He did what I asked him to do. When he allowed me to saddle him all the work for him stopped. He didn't have to do anything more. I'm going to redo this on Weds with the hopes of getting into the saddle and him not moving around. If so, I have no issues sending him out to work.

And that was working with my big dumb horse today :) I'll update on Thursday or Friday!