Long-Reining and Man Bonding, Plus A Happy Sound Daisy

Summer is here again.  Back to work for the fat ponies. Jo is working Lulu daily. Prudence is working Sweet-Pea.....Yes Prudence is a dog, but they like to chase each other, which is more of a work out than us lunging, and a damn sight quicker. I am dividing my time between hacking Daisy and work with Charlie in round(ish) pen.
I devoted one whole session to the headcollar with Charlie.  It took a little while. Same principle as before.  When he came over I tried to put the headcollar on. He refused...I sent him away.  After about half an hour he let me put it on and take it off 3 times with no bother.  We also worked with the hose.....which is obviously a terrifying yellow snake. Once he was ok with that, I turned the water on.  And now water is scary! As is Charlies nature, that escalated into being frightened of a sponge and bucket.  3 days later, he is actually enjoying the bucket and sponge wash down.  Slowly slowly catchy monkey. With him, if he doesn't accept something, you just have to think of another way.  For the record sun-block is now no problem.  We started off with a stick, which he found fascinating, now I can spray my hand and spread it over his muzzle. As long as it doesn't smell of coconut!
And long-reining may have clicked. We had an awesome session yesterday. I don't like using two lunge lines.....they are too long and light.  So I joined two sets of reins together (If anyone has an old redundant set of driving reins....).
To start with he freaked or froze with me behind him, but by half lunging, I slowly moved behind.  I can't tell you how pleased I was when he finally got it. We did several changes of direction and halt to walk.                                        

Go Charlie

man-bonding

view from Daisy

Daisy having fun