Oak's First Outing

 We took Oak to my friend/trainer's farm for his first outing. He loaded like a champ and got off the trailer calm and curious. After a rather tense walk through her barn (industrial fans, pig-smells, and new horses) we settled right down in her arena. We let him relax in a roundpen for about 15 minutes. He only called a few times and mostly just chowed down on grass.

Sorry Oak...

During our lesson we worked on playing a "catching game" to have him connect at liberty. We then played with her pool noodle obstacle. This is working towards my goal of taking him to an obstacle challenge in September.

The big take home for this lesson was not to nag him when he was not connected or listening -- because that just makes him want to tune out more. I also really need to work on my connection ability away from home. I find I get very distracted and disconnected during lessons. Basically I fall apart whenever someone is looking at me! I need to practice keeping my own focus. Oak did much better than I did in that regard. I think I just get more nervous now because I am out of the lesson habit. The only solution is more lessons!

After the session, we introduced Oak to my trainer's Belgian Rose and got some really cute photos. Biig draft meet wiitttle draft.

 

Oak's Training Log

5/14/2016
Activities: Trailering, paying attention at liberty, desensitization to new places and objects. Listening to cues in new places.
Location: off-farm lesson
Duration: 4 hours
Observations: He did way better with the entire ordeal than I expected!

5/15/206
Activities: Paying attention at liberty, targeting, playing with the mounting block, treat manners
Location: roundpen
Duration: 20 minutes
Observations: He was very responsive with giving me his full attention at liberty. I started to play with targeting on the mounting block, but he got too pushy so we went back to basic food manners.