Spicy's January Favorites

Spicy's favorite this month is probably that he's enjoying doing work again, and my favorite is he eagerly waits at the fence for me. We're both enjoying speaking each other's language better. Besides having a mommy who listens and doesn't create stress in his fragile life, he has a couple other favorites this month!

Will stare dramatically into the middle distance for cookies

Standlees Cookie Cubes
I've tried a bunch of different treats for Spicy. Among them are soft peppermints (which would definitely make "Megan's January Favorites"), carrots, Flix horse treats, Carrot Crunchers, Hilton Herballs, and Stud Muffins. Most of these he won't deign to take into his mouth. This has been a foreign concept to me; Runkle would literally pick through garbage for forgotten donuts and Indy was perpetually a 4 on the body scale and could pack away his weight in whatever I gave him if he had the chance.

Literally my plan

My BO picked up the Standlees cookies during one feed run. They are basically alfalfa cubes soaked in apple juice. There's no added sugar and they fit in perfectly with our 'forage first' diet. Plus, they are like horse crack. Spicy will do anything for them including get on the trailer. Since my current training tactic is trying a bit more carrot than stick I'm glad I found something he will consistently turn himself inside out over.

The Expanding Library
The extent of my 'natural horsemanship' knowledge was garnered when I was about sixteen. I boarded at a barn with a round pen and spent time working with the horses in it. Most of them had been trained and broke in it, so they already knew how it worked once they got in. I'd like to apply more NH-style tactics to Spicy, but we don't have a roundpen and turns out the piddling of things I learned when I was sixteen quickly ran out. I don't know what I'd like my horse training philosophy to be yet, so I'm doing what any ammie does and buying a ton of books.

While searching 'natural horsemanship without a round pen', Richard Maxwell's name came up. I dug into his bio a bit and he seemed like a natural jump for me. Classically trained, he worked for the British Cavalry and became a student of Monty Roberts' later in life. I got three books by him: Unlock Your Horse's Talent, Maximize Your Horsemanship and Understanding Your Horse. I bought them all used so I think I spent about $20 total. They are great reads absolutely packed with information and tips. I like Unlock and Maximize the most, and immediately started following the program with really great results.

Oh, would you like to talk about learning theory?
Cause we got that.

Mud
Spicy's perennial favorite is the mud. He is so filthy, constantly. I especially love it when I pull up to the barn to find him rolling. It's nice not having a horse with any white though!! Chrome is lovely but a mud brown horse is so much easier to appear clean without a lot of effort. I saved myself a little by getting him a blanket with a neck, but every couple of weeks it gets warm enough for them to be outside naked and spends a lot of time grinding dirty down to his skin. Thanks, Spicy! Love you too, man.

It helps when the mud freezes.