Indy--Partner of Anna

This is 'Jet Star's Allusion' (aka Indy) a 5 y.o. TWH whom I purchased in Feb. and started clicker training in June. My original intent with the clicker was to teach him to do the RW. I knew he could RW from a chance encounter once are twice but I couldn't get him to do it on cue and I thought the clicker would give me the precision of "YES" when he accidently did it. It worked wonderfully and we've moved on to more fun stuff.

These are the only two pictures I've got so far and they could be much better! (As you can see, we need to work on the facial expression while 'parked-out'.)

He also does other things via clicker training (say 'yes' & 'no', lie down, fetch and will touch ANYTHING ).

I am involved in a mounted search and rescue group and the horses have to be de-sensitized to just about everything (noise/visual) you can think of. Our certification class is the last two weekends in Sept. and hopefully I will get some pics. We are working on gun-fire right now and doing great!

I know most of you are having great success with the clicker and so this post is mostly intended to inspire the newer people to c/t or those still lurking and thinking about if they want to try it.

This past weekend Indy (my horse) graduated from mounted police training school!! Woooo Hooooo!!!

We have been using the clicker for the past 4 months and it has brought a different level to my training that has given my horse such confidence in me that we were able to complete the obstacle course in about 5 min. without a single refusal. (We were not allowed to dismount for any reason).

We were the second 'team' in the arena and he had not seen the set up before. I did not use the clicker during the course but instead used my "click-no-treat" word of a sharp "good" to let him know it was O.K. and to proceed through or 'accept' the obstacle.

The obstacle course consisted of:

Walking through a solid smoke-screen of burning hay while someone pitched fire-crackers under his hooves,

riding into and then backing out of a NARROW L-shaped set of panels, riding over/through a tarp, over a large teeter-totter,

across a wooden bridge, pushing a 72 inch "crowd" ball around with his chest,

walking past and standing in front of a police car with lights, sirens and horns going off, walking into and pushing over a 'wall' of stacked 55-gallon plastic drums filled with golf balls, going through the center of a row of sparking, spitting, hissing flares, backing and side-passing through some cones and having a shotgun being fired at random the whole time about 20 feet away!

There was a visible difference in Indy's attitude compared with the non-clicker trained horses...so much so that afterwards 75% of the people quizzed me about c/t and how it is used, including the Sheriffs giving the school (and these guys are old school cowboys). I passed out about 15 sheets with info on Alaxandra's book and where to get clickers, etc.

Thanks to all of you who offered advice on my post a few weeks back about getting him to accept gunfire. The most I did was pop a few balloons in front of him and under him at liberty and then from his back, givint a c/t for standing still. Although he did flinch everytime the shotgun went off while on the course, he didn't give it any other notice. Heck, I flinched everytime it went off...It was REALLY LOUD!

A few non-c/t related things I learned from this police school that I thought to share:

1) If you are on horseback in a very public place (like a parade, patrol, etc.) DON'T let stranger pet your horse on the head. Some people think it is a hoot to nonchalantly slip the headstall over your horses ears and then flap a hat in their face as you scramble to gain control.

2) Don't let a stranger feed you horse. It is also popular to taint carrot, apples, etc and give them to horses to make them sick. The Lieutenant giving the school has trained his horse to not accept ANY food from the hand because he knows of a few that have died from poisoned carrots.

3) Teach your horse to ride with a neck-rope or an emergency stop cue...See #1 :)

Thanks for letting me share,
Anna (one proud Mom) and Indy the Graduate!!

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