To give mare and baby some time outside, I need to lead them out of the barn and to the paddock...(maybe 40 feet total). What is the safest way to lead the baby? I had my husband lead the mare, took a lead rope and wrapped it behind the foals butt and sort of gave her a 'bear hug'. I thought she would follow the mare better, but seemed too nervous about the new experience to keep her eye on mom. Any suggestions? She has a halter...but even at the smallest setting, it is really too big to keep on her just yet.
Shelley - I have to lead my pair about 700 feet to their small pasture. I have the same halter problem and I punched a couple of extra holes in the strap so I could at least get it to hit her across the nose at the right spot. You can still put two of her in it! You are right using the rope behind her rear...actually closer to her hocks in their curvy leg spot. I hold the leadrope right a the halter with one hand and I use my other hand to hold the doubled up rope where it comes back in front of her chest. I stand on the side of her like you would a horse and start by putting pressure (pulling forward) on the halter like you would lead a trained horse. Of course, this made her pull away and then I pulled forward on the butt rope causing her to move forward. Sometimes she just struggled and I would have to pull harder on the butt rope until she moved away from the pressure. As soon as she started moving forward, I would release the pressure on the butt rope while keeping the pressure on the halter. Obvisouly this takes a lot of time and I felt like I needed another set of hands. I found in the beginning that if I had another person walk behind Catcher, she seemed to move forward better. We are on about day 5 of this and this AM she walked to the pasture with out the butt rope and just on the lead. I am sure the familiarity of the trip has more to do with the success than her actually having mastered the lesson, but the trip in and out has become a great training tool.
We got this idea from a Monty Robets book. Make a figure eight shaped soft cotton rope, one loop of the figure eigth goes over the foals neck, and the other acts as a but rope. You hold the place where the ropes cross like a suit case handel. This way you can use the but rope portion to incorge the foal from behind and the loop around the neck to keep the foal from running off. If you adjust them so they fit fairly snug, they stay on really well. You can still put the halter on and use the lead rope to cue her but you don't have to put any strain on their sensitive little necks if they decide they would rather not listen to the way you telling them to go. Our colts all get to wear the fique eight handle untill they are verry reliable about reponding to light halter cues. This is also a great way to move foals in a pinch. We were tring to move some mares on foals off summer pasture and got out their with one less halter that we had colts, so one baby was loded in to the trailer using just the fiqure eight.
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