Dogs, horses, and rats. Birds, goldfish, cats. Dolphins, raccoons, and elephants. What animals can’t we train? In this section you’ll find lots of great training stories and tips. You will also get to meet many of the wonderful animals that I get to train. I hope that you’ll enjoy reading about my adventures (and misadventures) and that these articles and tales can provide you with insight that will help you with your own animals.
One of my goals this year is to introduce Chewie to a variety of enrichment toys. In our post from Week 19, I wrote about teaching Chewie to use a puzzle ball toy. She quickly learned how to push the ball to get hay pellets to come out of the ball. Earlier this summer, I […]
Where has the time gone? I can’t believe Chewie and I have now had six months together. I spent a bit of time this week reflecting on what we’ve accomplished during the last six months, as well as looking forward and thinking about some of our goals for the future. Since February, I’ve been blogging […]
Earlier this summer, I started working on teaching Chewie how to take a bath. My goal is for Chewie to be happy and relaxed when she takes a bath. Right now, we are just practicing sponge baths. Also, we do these training sessions with Chewie loose at liberty in her pasture. She can walk away […]
Chewie and I have been working a lot lately on picking up her feet. We are working on two aspects of hoof care: Better communication. I cue Chewie to pick up her foot by running my hand down the back of her leg. Then, I wait for her to shift her weight and begin lifting […]
I’ve started working on teaching Chewie how to take a bath! Here in Texas, our daily highs are around 100 F. Even this morning, when I arrived at the barn at 7:30 am, the temperature was already 80 F. The hot weather should make our training easier, as a bit of cool water on the […]
Recently, Chewie and I have been playing with a rainbow exercise mat. I like to set up sessions in which Chewie can investigate and explore new objects on her own terms. I call these exploration sessions. My goal is to create an environment in which Chewie will want to interact with the objects we use […]
