Ground work is so important

Hi,

WOW, Groundwork is so important, it seems to always transfer to being under saddle, if you don't believe me.. test the theory, I do all the time. Yesterday and today were days that it got so cold I could only work/play with my horses for short periods of time. I like to make the best of this time that I have with them. Silke has shown steady improvement since I got her, she  however has always had a little issue with being touched for the first time each day, I thought it was me, then I thought it was the lead rope and halter, well, lets put it this way each day has been interesting, until today. she is all of a sudden easy to catch. I think that at night she mentally goes back to the herd and is surprised by me each day. With that in mind, I decided to do something different, when I caught her yesterday I took her straight to a small round pen with grass in it and turned her loose with no halter. I was worried about catching her in the new place so I kept walking up to her touching her and then walking away unless she invited me to stay. It was very interesting to see her reaction, she turned her head sideways and looked at me as if to say, Thank you. she would then look down at the grass and look at me again and I swear she was trying to let me know how happy she was to be on the patch of grass. That was yesterday she was easy to catch too. I then took her to my little obstacle course and proceeded to ask her on to the Tire with sand in it and the step up jump made out of RR ties shaped into a horseshoe with sand in it. She was awesome.

1/11/2011 Today I went to get her and she was waiting for me, she put her head down for the halter and lead, she truly caught me, immediately. It was not about anything more than comfort and discomfort, sometimes I try to read more into her reactions. Yes I am still learning as I go and this horse will teach me more than I had expected. Today I also took her to the little patch of grass and let her go, and left her for a while, and went back to get her and she let me catch her easily again, YAY! (I get excited over the littlest things)  I am still learning how to add pictures I hope it turns out. I played with her on the obstacle course again, I think she likes playing outside the arena too. I decided to go inside and try something I have never done before. I wanted to see if I could get her to stop just by saying whoa and stepping over to block her movement. She took to it like a duck to water. she got it on the first try, I have always just worked on the whoa ,under saddle. This is another way of riding my horse from the ground, and she is getting better and better, I also asked her to do it at liberty in the oval pen, she did awesome, and that was a great place to stop for the day as it was getting really cold. When I first asked her to stop with the whoa, I would ask her just as she was coming toward the wall which helped her to make the right decision, then it was really easy to make the transition to anywhere.
Thanks for listening,
Cheryl & Silke