Tolerance vs Acceptance

Horses have to deal with a multitude of foolish things people ask of them. Wearing tack, getting clipped, or standing still for the vet or farrier. If a horse merely tolerates something, eventually that tolerance will run out. Maybe your horse is fine with clipping, until you get to his flanks. He will stand for the farrier, except he won't let him hold his hind feet. If you find yourself caveating your horse's behavior with buts, excepts, and unless's... you might have a horse who is just tolerating your crap (there are exceptions to every rule of course, but bear with me).

Spicy tolerated getting on the trailer. If it seemed clear that we were just loading and not going anywhere, he'd get on in a couple of tries. When the truck was running, it took anywhere from twenty minutes to over an hour. He always eventually got on but it's awful when you're trying to leave somewhere and everyone is loaded except you and your horse has grown roots at the bottom of the ramp.

Ya, I guess I'll wear dis boot

I tabled the loading issue while I went back to square one, deciding that was higher level work we weren't quite ready for yet. I worked on the ground, sending him through tiny chutes made of barrels and teaching him to back up on verbal cues. The trailer was far from my mind, until someone got hurt.

Another horse at my farm, who also wasn't a fan of the trailer, got badly injured and had to go to the clinic. But the injury combined with his already existing trepidation about loading meant no amount of crack cookies or brooms could entice him on. She did finally end up getting him to the clinic, but the experience jolted me enough that I realized I really needed a horse that loaded reliably in case of an emergency.

A few weeks ago, after our regular ground work session, I filled my pockets to bulging with cookies, and went back to the trailer. It had been over five weeks since he so much as seen it. He ground tied while I opened the doors which I thought was suspicious, as even the sight of the trailer usually made him hyperventilate. His head at my shoulder, I led him on, a giant loop of slack in the lead line.

He hesitated for a moment on the ramp, but I closed the slack and he followed me the rest of the way. Spicy stood there, with all the doors open and bars down, and he was calm. He placidly backed off the trailer and I tried it again. The second time he didn't even hesitate.  We had a repeat the following weekend, and the weekend after that. Suddenly I no longer had a loading issue.

While I was shoving all the cookies into his face, I considered the change in him. I hadn't slowly reintroduced the trailer; in fact I seemed to have fixed the loading issue without involving the trailer at all. The difference was he had accepted to being led by me, wherever I may go.