I've
not started the actual tracking, although I did order the scentbag and
it's ready for use. From my reading, size of property isn't a huge deal
(to begin with, anyway,) because you start with laying really short
"trails," 30cms on the first one, for example. You
can bury the bag in arena sand, so for the first trails I plan to use
the arena. You start with straight lines, then add curves as you add
distance.
Horses
take a longer time to switch from visual tracking to scent than dogs,
so I think you have to spend the time to help them with that. My sense
is that the scent exploration work I do on the tarps to start with helps
them switch. At first horses don't know they can find treats inside
things. They will seek out the visual treats. Once they switch to using
their noses, they will knock over cones, open bags, shake water bottles
to dump out pellets. It allows them to control the environment, problem
solve, and have fun.
With
Lily, I would take her out on little trails and let her lead the way. I
have a "your turn/my turn" signal, and with Lily (who is naturally
cautious), it helped her a lot with learning to be curious and brave.
Eason
has a lot of levels of anxiety, so we are doing tarp exploration at the
edge of orange zones right now. She's ready to move into a new spot,
one that was a definite red zone before.
If
you're interested, here's a video of a sequence I did to get her more
comfortable with being in new places with a lot of activity going on.
The arena and round pen were red zones for her when she first got to the
farm. The pasture was a green zone, which is why I started there. I
then moved to the part of the arena that was closer to the barn (edge of
orange zone), and then moved up to the scarier parts (used to be red
zone). When we got access to the round pen (red zone), it had become an
orange zone and she was able to relax there, so the clip is a few days
ago. I've had her just over two weeks, so the change has happened in the
space of two weeks.
The
scent exploration has made a huge difference to Eason's levels of
anxiety and I plan to start tracking with her for fun, but I don't have
any practical experience with it yet.
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