I think I wrote in a previous post that poor Percy had been attacked by his lead rope earlier this summer. I had dropped the end of it while putting Rumer's halter on and when he walked off, it followed him, no matter how fast he ran! And because it was long, it also wrapped around his legs and up over his back, etc. Unfortunately this happened twice before I got my act together to clicker desensitize him to the rope around his legs and body.
I've spent a couple sessions doing this and am happy to report that this morning we got proof of success. Again it was a situation where I had gone out to bring the two of them in and I put Percy's halter on first. Rumer was happily reaching for grass under the fence in a corner and rather than ask Percy to squeeze himself in between her and the (electric) fence so I could get her, I just dropped his rope and let him continue grazing while I went after Rumer. At that point, little Miss Kizzy decided to gallop to the barn and went racing past him. He lifted his head and took a couple steps, and found that darn lead rope was following him again. But this time, he just bent his head to the right so he didn't step on it and kept walking. But he really didn't want to go in without Rumer, so he stopped and waited until I caught up to him, picked up the rope and led them in together! Success!
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