Stephen Gowling Sure sounds like you're making progress! I am using 'the code' to try to get my horse's attention when he gets scared.

He is very nervous and afraid of outside. He can hear the color blue and see grasshoppers blink, let alone the fact that 'The Terrible Nothing' lives just outside of his pen. lol

We do have our good times though. If I can get the video to work, this is him 'smiling'. I don't know for real what he is doing but it makes me laugh.

https://youtube.com/shorts/u9-UKiuE7dk?feature=share

Stephen Gowling Not much experience with mares. This is my 2nd horse after a 30 yr. rest period of raising kids. But I get the puzzling about how to handle situations. My horse pins his ears sometimes when I ask for something and my inexperience is undecided ... do I wait it out or address that I noticed he was cussing at me lol. But my guy is 6 and not a baby. So I'm thinking it needs addressed but how harsh because he also suffers from multiple personality disorder and schizophrenia :/ But taking advice from me is taking advice from someone has no idea what I'm talking about! But what I am trying is to be the cranky lead mare. If she would flick a tail, then I flick an arm or a flag. But I do try to match the energy of the horse. Like if the horse's response was swift and hard, my answer would be also. If it was half-hearted, then so was my answer. But like I said I am here because I have no idea what I am doing. I enjoy the updates :)

Great work :) I too was hoping to upload videos and see other's videos, then read Mr. Boatwright's comments. I think seeing other situations, other horse's reactions, and how people handle it with Mr. Boatwright's comments of this was good, try that, your horse is thinking that. It would be a lot of different situations to learn from - what worked and what didn't. Looks like your first riding session went well. So glad for you!

Hello, your girl is very lovely. I too have a Playgun bred horse. I've only had him for 9 months. My 'retirement' horse - but he is anything but a grandma horse lol. I saw where your horse's anxiety was less when you didn't use the crossties and I'm over going mmmm-hmm. I too thought Mr. Boatwright's colt starting series was a good starter place for us. If look up Mabel/Mable in his search bar, you will see him working with a Playgun bred mare. 

Thank you for trying to help with this. I'm sorry but I confused Mabel with Magnolia. Mabel is more like what I'm dealing with. :)