October 17, 2017

Connor and the New Trailer

Connor has been in a step up before, his breeder has one, but it's been at least six or seven years since he'd been in one.  With a couple of trips coming up later this week, I wanted to make sure he was cool with the new trailer.

I needn't have worried...

"Wow this is pretty great!"
One thing I learned with the KieferBuilt is that this chicken of a horse takes his cues from me.  If I walked into the KB like I meant it, so did he - and he went right in.  If I walked up to it tentatively, so did he - and he wouldn't go in.

"Well played, horse, well played."

With the Shadow, we walked up to it casually to check it out and sniff it all over, then I hopped into it like I meant it, and he hopped right in with me.

I'm not one to haul with the windows down, but for getting him comfortable with the trailer, it was great.

When he got in the first time, he learned the trailer is an amazing place where the cookies never end, and we repeated that a whole bunch of times (although maybe with fewer cookies).  He never even hesitated even though it's a decent sized step for his stubby legs.


Slant loads, especially one horse slants with big doors that latch open on the outside, require a whole different safety protocol than the two horse straight with escape doors did.  When I have two people later this week, we're going to work on self loading, which is pretty much a necessity now.  But for just getting him comfortable in it tonight, I didn't mind getting in with him.

By myself, I worked on teaching him we only go off of it head first, since he can so easily turn around in this, and reinforcing our already-installed "stay where I put you" command ("Wait") and our "you're good to get off the trailer now" command ("Okay!").

Which we did...
...over...

...and over...

...and over...

.
..until he was incredibly bored.

Fit-wise, I could not be happier.  He had so much room back there, much more than I thought he would from visualizing it in my head. 

So much room for activities!



All in all, super happy with how he handled it and how he fits in it, and I can't wait for our first real haul on Friday!

23 comments:

  1. I love how roomy it is for him and that you are able to turn him around to exit! :)

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    1. Me too! Makes me feel a lot better about having a step up knowing he doesn't have to back off.

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  2. Yay, looks like a perfect fit! Now I can't wait to see what sort of organizational heaven you turn the tack room into 😀

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    1. Oh girrrrrrrrrrl that's happening :D Going to be a multi-phase process, but the first phase should be completed later this week!

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  3. He has a ton of room in there- I bet he loves it.

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    1. I really hope so. I don't want to force him into a trailer he doesn't like. But he does have a lot more room and he also won't have the chest bar on his neck anymore either.

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  4. I've never seen a one horse slant! Very cool! It looks incredibly roomy and he definitely seems happy back there!

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    1. I hadn't either but I really like it! He does seem happy. The real test will be his first hauls later this week.

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  5. So glad you found this! Seems like a great addition for you guys.

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  6. He looks like he likes his new digs!

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    1. I think so! He's never objected to any kind of trailer though, I think he's easy to please.

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  7. Super cool trailer! It looks like a great fit, and it sounds like (at least so far) it has the Connor seal of approval...

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    1. Definitely! Although he's super easy to please when it comes to trailers, though!

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  8. That really is a cool trailer!

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    1. It really is, I keep waiting to find something I hate about it because it still seems so weird to me, but so far, so good.

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  9. Could he be any cuter? So glad that the trailer is the right fit for you guys. Happy hauling!

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  10. That looks PERFECT. lol he is so cute.

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    1. Find me a reason to use it and come see you! Trail rides....?

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  11. "So much room for activities!" ROFLMAO I say this ALL THE TIME. Hahahahaha

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    1. Lol! I just kept thinking that as I saw how much room he had back there!!

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