What's missing?

If you've done everything you know and still have the same problem, what's missing?

Recently, a woman called in to ask about her horse not loading on the trailer. She'd done everything from food rewards, natural and mechanical techniques, pressure and release, and more. Eventually, she did succeed, but immediately after traveling, she failed to load and return home.

She deduced it wasn't a trailer loading issue but a trailer traveling issue and began a program to solve that problem. She even rode in the back with her horse down a country road. Still... the horse wouldn't load to come home and she ended up calling the vet to sedate the horse at the end of a long, helpless day. I feel for her.

So what's the missing piece? It's possible she could refine nuances of her feel and timing, but the real problem isn't her. And it's not traveling, and it's not loading. The real problem is trailer reloading.

At my clinics, there is almost always one or two horses that don’t want to load up and go home at the end of the weekend. I joke about how they loved my class so much, but the reality is they are struggling to see the point of re-entering that death-rattle cage on wheels.

The horse is not afraid of loading—she's afraid of the memory of being taken away from what she currently knows.

The protocol now is to help the horse load, then immediately unload and reload again and again and again. When the loading is easy, it's time to change it up. Move the trailer ten feet. Then do it all over. Leave her in and move around the block, return home and unload, then immediately attempt to reload. It’s the reload practice that will fail at first and ultimately give her the results that last once the horse understands.

The horse must understand that the discomfort of being taken somewhere is safe, and the leadership to reload must be safe too. In the end, she'll be a true-blue partner.

A student of the horse must always seek to understand the missing pieces and set up programs to solve the challenges. But sometimes it's hard to see—that’s what we are here for.

Take advantage of the opportunity here to learn more, dive deeper, and jump to the next level of your own journey.

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