Progressive Desensitisation (will hire for right price ;) )

[Tots N Dots]

I do believe in progressive desensitisation in a controlled environment where horses are concerned, when I 1st got Pickle he hadnt seen traffic at all so I started by driving my car around the field, then with a car and trailer, if I drive in the field now Pickle sticks his head inside the vehicle (even while being revved and the horn pressed) to see who is inside as we have blacked out windows, he also seems to have taken a fancy to chewing the head rests :eek:
So we moved onto the next stage MOTORBIKES! :D ;)
My 7 year old volunteered for the job, as he is the most horse aware biker I know (well within a 140 mile radius anyway ;) )
http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c34/totsndots/Pickle/Feb07%20onwards/picklebike.jpg
as you can tell from this rubbish video its quite noisy :D and niether horse batted an eye :D
http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c34/totsndots/Pickle/Feb07%20onwards/th_PickleBike.jpg (http://s24.photobucket.com/albums/c34/totsndots/Pickle/Feb07%20onwards/?action=view&current=PickleBike.flv)
(no animals or children were put at risk or harmed in the making of this film and there was plenty of adult supervision)

[raingodz]

they just don't seem to care!

[eml]

Absolutely great video, could certainly make use of motorbiking child...could I swap for tractor?:D :D

We are 'lucky' enough to have one of our fields bordered by a busy road, uphill so lorries have to change gear, and we use this for youngsters, first loose then ridden. Makes them so much safer when we do have to venture out

[Sammii]

Aww wow that's fantastic! :D
Ours [in the field] would probably react the same...however get one of them when I'm on one, and all hell is let loose! :o

[Tots N Dots]

Absolutely great video, could certainly make use of motorbiking child...could I swap for tractor?:D :D

umm tractors? well our local farmer harrowed our field on a warm day with his door open, I got a phonecall to come and remove Pickle for a while as he kept trying to climb in while it was moving :rolleyes:

I do agree I know he will act differently when under saddle, but it would be nice to be able to get to the stage of riding him in the paddock with my little boy on his bike in there :D

I am lucky that I know quite a few people with motorbikes, so he will be quite good with them, I once walked in the field with full leathers and a helmet on to see how he would react, he just tried to give me sloppy kisses through the visor bit :rolleyes:

yet he is really scared of wet flappy cardboard ;)

if anyone is local and their horse has a real problem feel free to shout and we will gladly visit.
I will add that I did go in the field with the bike first and went up to the horses with it and revved it loudly to see their reaction, didnt really want Josh squished in a stampeed lol :D

[Lot1983]

I have a lovely bomb proof horse, although we had our first ever slow motion spook last night... at a pile of branches, 8ft away from the outside of the school, that we had already trotted past several times AND stopped to look at... my horse is clearly strange (although I think he thought it was a nice new XC Jump, next to a 10ft hedge... god he is very strange...):D

Great pics by the way, maybe you could start a business out sourcing your son to people with nervous horses!