Back out to the barn again today to try and get one of the horses to cooperate. Jeff came with this time. Axel was either feeling cooperative since our last argument or he felt more secure with more people around. Either way he stood fairly nice and I rewarded him with an apple. We did some work standing still. If he moved a hoof, I made him put it back. I turned him loose after awhile and his running around was quite a bit less exciting than usual. So maybe he's finally starting to get the idea.We turned him out and grabbed Cody to do similar work. I did a little lunging with him and then worked on standing still. About this time Cody's pasture mate and owner came in which pretty much removed any attention span Cody might have had. We spent a lot of time facing away from the barn aisle and Cody spent that time vibrating because he was so worried he couldn't look at what was happening. We tried for quite a while to get him to just relax for a second and look at me. I didn't completely win that battle but he had a few moments of licking and chewing so instead of giving him a heart attack we ended the lesson there. It's going to be a long road but it would be worse I'm sure if I couldn't get out there as often as I can. I'm interested to see if Axel is still as calm next time I go out alone.
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