Hey All, Today I took my 1 year old for his first training session. It started off really well, and I got the halter on him okay. He wasn't comfortable with it on, but was only mildly annoyed. But then he put his head through the railing of the catch pen, as he took it out, the rail caught the halter on the bridge of his nose. He pulled quite hard to release it, and in doing so, pulled it off his bone and down onto the fleshy part of his nose. As it was quite firm, it squashed his nose a fair bit. I didn't notice this happen, until he started to panic and jump about and throw his head around (he obviously had trouble breathing). Once I noticed, I had to jump on his back to control him, and unlatch the halter. He wasn't a happy chappy at that point. For the rest of the session, I just put the catch rope over his neck (without latching it) and let him walk to his escape route, slowly getting him used to me being near him without trying to reach out to him at all. I offered him food, which he took every now and again. It's back to the drawing board with this boy I think. I guess it's going to take a while to undo the stress this caused him. Sigh. Steve Q.
