Week 5

Week 5 was vastly similar to the previous weeks and she is settling in comfortably to this established, comfortable routine in her new life here in the Territory. I have lost track of the amount of times she has neighed out to me now, for she neighs out to me nearly everyday. Something that still takes be my surprise and never ceases to make me smile. She always gets a soft ‘Hi Fiora!’ back in response, and I love watching her watching me from her pen. Her eyes full of life and curiosity, often accomplished by a lick of the lips and flick of the ears. A beautiful little wild flower she truly is. She walks up to me for her breakfast now, and whenever something scares her, she noticeably calms down when she see’s me. I have quickly become her safe spot and for that I’m truly blessed. My other family members she is yet to trust and she often finds ways to freak out over the littlest things when they are around, but when she see’s me – she stops, and she thinks, and then she’s okay. She still scrambles a lot, but once she locates me she’s okay. She see’s my mum quite often when she waters her tree which is quite close to her pen, still not too comfortable with her presence but has gone from freaking out at the simple hose squirting water at the tree to standing still and watching intently. She has also noticeably accepted the loud pigs, dogs, and all the other crazy noises that go on around here.

A big milestone this week was when she finally allowed me to braid her mane for the first time! I have been waiting to do this ever since she arrived, with her big thick long mane in this hot weather, it was a must do. After making sure she felt comfortable with allowing me to touch her mane, the next day was all about braiding, and she also allowed me to apply fly cream to her face – with a fly mask still out of the comfort zone, I could feel her relief with her mane braided and temporary relief from the flies. From there, the rest of the week was about desensitisation and working on her simple groundwork skills. She’s also decided that whilst scary at first, low pressure water from the hose is tasty! After she realised that when the water skims her it wasn’t going to eat her, she happily stood over the sprinkling water from the hose, sticking her tongue out like the sweetheart that she is. She is doing amazing and is right on track, soon, she will be ready to progress further into her training and I’m enjoying every second of these early weeks.

Until next time,

JJ & Fiora

If you’d like to follow along with our journey you can find us on Facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/warhorsehorsemanship

Or on Instagram at; https://www.instagram.com/warhorsehorsemanship/

Week 4 with Fiora was made up of some big milestones. As she is starting to really understand me, she is beginning to open up and I slowly see the trust seeping in. I watch her eyes as she studies me, observe her body language as she replies to my questions, and whilst she still has quite severe flight reactions, her eyes search for me in the midst of it, as if to say “you’re here, am I okay?”. Its a huge change for a what used to be a recently wild Brumby to travel half way across Australia and end up here in the Northern Territory, a long way from home, now deciding to open her heart up to me. She has really put everything into what I’ve asked of her these past fours weeks and to say I’m proud of her is an understatement.

On Wednesday as I was bringing her breakfast, she neighed out to me for the first time. I stopped in my tracks, peering over at Fiora who was intently standing at the gate of her pen, watching me and her breakfast with perked ears. Not quite believing that she had just neighed for the first time, I peered at the other horses – all heads were down eating. It was Fiora! A beautiful soft neigh, as if she was still unsure about the whole greeting humans thing, but she did it. And she did it again on Friday, as I was closing the gate to a paddock. Building on this new found confidence built from our relationship, she continued to show me that she is really learning to relax around me! Instead of staying far away from me at feeding time and only eating when I go away, she hesitatingly comes up to the fence now, allowing me to stand by her whilst she eats. Alert and ready to flee if need be, and I make sure to keep very still, but to feel comfortable enough around me to allow my presence at feeding time is huge. On top of that, she also allowed me to put her new nylon halter on for the first time! After a mini freak out of the strange white fluff, she soon calmed down and accepted it happily. She is starting to accept me, as a friend...a partner.

She is coming along in leaps and bounds. With a horse as flighty and reactive as she is, she will naturally take longer than your more relaxed brumby. Its extremely important to not rush these early stages, as a blank canvas & recently wild Brumby, a wrong move in these crucial times could distaste her interest in humans entirely, or rushing her could put herself in danger. She still has moments where she gets lost in her own world, and in these weeks of building our relationship I’ve been able to understand more into what makes her tick, and what she is able to overcome quickly. Slowly, these panic attacks of hers are slowly fading and will continue to with time and patience.

You cant walk without crawling - I’m so excited to see where this beautiful filly will go.

Thanks for following our adventure,

JJ & Fiora

If you’d like to follow along with our journey you can find us on Facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/warhorsehorsemanship

Or on Instagram at; https://www.instagram.com/warhorsehorsemanship/

Week 3 with Fiora went by in a blur. She continued building on the knowledge that she had of me, and I of her. This week was still primarily about taking it slow and allowing for her to really get to know me. I’m a huge believer of taking it slow, going at the horses pace but more importantly building that bond and trust without any tack, before introducing anything further. Its the same as a relationship with a person, you get to know them with the basics, such as ‘whats your name?’ ‘what do you like to do?” etc, before furthering your relationship. It would be rude to rush into a relationship if you didn’t even know the person, and the same goes for horses. There’s no future in rushing training or forcing them to be with you.

Learning to communicate through liberty horsemanship, whilst can take longer because you reallyhave to listen to your horse, has to be one of the most rewarding feelings once they finally ‘click’. The big milestone for her this week was on Wednesday, when she had her first liberty join-up. Deciding to take a step further from the usual just looking at me, she decided to go all the way and fully join up. She was sitting comfortably at my hip, mimicking my body movements and paces. A beautiful moment, where she chose to be with me, preferring me as her safe space over the corner of her pen. She certainly got a lot of praise for that, and the rest of the week was just about touching up her keeping her head with me and learning to face me whichever direction I may go, building that foundation for her liberty work to come in the future.

Thank you for following along,

JJ & Fiora

If you’d like to follow along with our journey you can find us on Facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/warhorsehorsemanship

Or on Instagram at; https://www.instagram.com/warhorsehorsemanship/

Week 1 with VBA Fiora was purely about letting her settle in from her travels from halfway across Australia. She learned about her new hot environment, the farm animals, the noisy working dogs, the buzzing cars and all the other horses that wanted to see the ‘new kid’ on the block. She especially bonded with a couple of my NT Brumbies, it's like they were comforting her because they too used to be in her situation, her ‘support crew’ definitely eased the transition for her. Her pen is located in a position where she can see me 24/7 whether I’m feeding, training horses so forth, and in the first week the most I did apart from filling her water, giving her hay, hard feed, etc was talk to her softly, watch her from a distance as to not make her uncomfortable, and offer a closed hand for her to sniff if she worked up the courage. This fascinated her, that I was asking nothing of her although she saw me constantly, and on Wednesday I noticed how she began to contently watch me work with other horses in the arena. As if she was trying to figure me out. Her first official milestone, where she started to come out of her shell and not shut the outside world out.

It took some time to find hay and hard feed that she liked, and for the first couple of days she only nibbled everything I offered her. Thankfully, as she began to settle in, she quickly learned that she is a sucker for molasses and since then, she eats everything offered to her and a stable feeding routine has been produced.

Week 2 quickly creeped up onto us; the starting point where we would officially start working together. Still making sure to not ask too much of her, it was all about building up the knowledge we already had of each other. Quickly, she showed me that hundreds of years of natural flight instincts that kept her alive in the wild are still deeply engraved into her. It could be the slight change of breath, shifting my body too quickly, the moving of a gate, the flapping of a chickens wings, the sound of pouring water, so on, that sets her off. I watch her, wide eyes, flaring nostrils, stiff body, as she tries to come to terms with this new life and what is expected of her now. But I’ve also watched as the bravery in her tries to overcome these natural instincts. she regains herself, watches me, then slowly, hesitantly comes up to my back, her nostrils flaring on the back of my neck. Sometimes, this flare of bravery will give herself a fright and she’ll back off, processing the sudden boldness. Other times, she’s allowed me to carefully stroke her. It's so important to praise every little attempt in the right direction, and from that I’ve noticed her confidence slowly building in our relationship this week. 

Thank you for following along,

JJ and Fiora

If you’d like to follow our journey you can find us on Facebook at;

https://www.facebook.com/warhorsehorsemanship

Or on Instagram at: https://www.instagram.com/warhorsehorsemanship/

Due to personal reasons, VBA Fiora's original trainer had to withdraw from the Challenge. 

We are delighted however that JJ Bracey has offered to continue with VBA Fiora's training and show case their progress together throughout the remainder of the Challenge and at the finals at EQUITANA next year. 

VBA Fiora has made the journey from Upper Caboolture to the Northern Territory to be with JJ .

We are looking forward to JJ's updates from next week.