Sigh..

I went to work with my yearling yesterday and I don’t know what happened. She is afraid of the lead rope and halter, like actually shying away like she had been hit with it. She followed me around like a puppy last time I was out, and now she was looking at me like I was an alien. She stood nice and still in her stall, with the lead rope threaded through the loop but not tied, for me to groom her all over and attempt to pick up her feet, but she was really spooky the whole time. And then when it came time to use the fly spray, she was flinching and moving away like I was gonna kill her.

After that, I walked her to the ring for some exercise as I am not working her at all yet, but I am trying to develop her leading manners. She was a cow about it, tossing her head and crowding me, and when I did let her loose.. she trotted out about 20 feet and kicked her back feet toward me. It wasn’t near enough to me for me to be scared, but the message was clear. I forced her to move out and picked up a whip for safety. She trotted around for about 20 minutes, and then stood quiet for me to catch her again. Leading her back she was a goof again, stepping sideways into me as if the world was scaring her to death.

She’s such a different horse. I will head to my coach’s after work for some advice before going back to the barn to work on her manners again.