Breaking Betsy

The long hot summer and competing priorities have kept me from working with Betsy.  She'll be three months old in a few days and it's high time that I get the show on the road while I still can.  What I'm talking about is halter breaking her.  She's wild as a March hare and doesn't let us get near her.  When we do try, she runs with reckless abandon with her tail high in the air, kicking her feet.  So much energy!

One person can't corner her, but if there's two of us, we can kind of act like a cutting horse and get her cornered in the corral and catch her.  The other trick I've learned if I'm alone and she's sitting on the ground is to walk nonchalantly by her without making eye contact and then suddenly move to the side and catch her.  I then work the breaking halter on her and pull her to a post under the barn and tie her off.

She struggles and pulls.  The tighter she pulls, the more uncomfortable the halter gets.  Over time, she'll learn that it is futile to pull against an immovable object.  This is not a new thing.  In the Bible in Acts 26:14 it says: 

And when we had all fallen to the ground, I heard a voice saying to me in the Hebrew dialect, ‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me? It is hard for you to kick against the goads.’

Kicking against the goads was a figure of speech that meant that you're only hurting yourself by struggling against a stronger force.  Saul, in that passage, was being told that he was fighting a losing battle by trying to stop the message of Jesus.  Saul relented and trusted and was changed!  We're working on little Betsy in hopes that she gets the message. 

I'll leave her tied up for 30 minutes or so to pull to her little heart's content.  I always keep a close eye on her.  We have a friend that lost a calf doing this when the calf circled the post and choked herself!  After 30 minutes, I'll gently walk up to her, talking in a kind way.  She pulls hard and tries to get away, but it's no use. 

I'll continue talking to her and get a brush and begin to brush her on the neck, sides and belly.  She likes this!  I'm trying to gain her trust, for her to see that I'm not a threat to her.  I was going to bring her a handful of feed to build a positive association with me, but the other animals were around and that wasn't going to work today.  I'll try it at another time when the goats and other cows are out grazing.

The key to this is persistence.  Keep doing this daily and be patient.  Maybe I'll learn something in this process too!  After doing this for a while, I'll advance to untying from the pole and try to lead her.  She'll inevitably pull against me, but we'll keep working at it until she learns that it is easier to just walk along with me than fighting against me.  

Breaking Elsie

Each night we go to the barn and separate Clarabelle from Elsie.   We bring Clarabelle into the barn and little Elsie follows, kicking up her heels, frisky and free.  We do this to separate the calf from the momma cow so WE have milk in the morning.  In past weeks (Elsie is now a month and two weeks old), I was bringing a bucket into the barn and milking at night, too.  Those days are gone.  Elsie is growing and as she grows, her demand for milk has grown.  Now in the evenings, she's taken ALL of the milk.

We feed Clarabelle before turning her out to the pasture.  Elsie stays in the barn behind the gate for the night.  Before we leave and while Clarabelle is eating, we get a little breaking halter out.  Elsie is not fond of it.  We put it around the back of her head and over her nose.

The way it works is that the more she pulls against it, the tighter it pulls around her nose, jaw, and head.  As I said, it is uncomfortable for her.  In the initial few times we did it, she was very dramatic.  She would pull against it and flop down on the ground.  Such drama!

With her head in the breaking halter, we tie the other end to a post in the barn - a strong post that doesn't move.  I read one time that when an elephant is a baby, a trainer will put a chain around its leg and tie it to a post.  The baby elephant tries and tries to break free, but can't.  When the elephant grows up, the chain is around its leg tied to a stake in the ground that could be easily pulled out, but the elephant doesn't even try.  The elephant learned as a baby that it is futile.  That's very sad, if you think about it.

We use a similar philosophy with Elsie and the breaking halter tied to the post.  The idea is that she'll learn after pulling against the post for quite some time, that it is futile.  She must be taught that the post is stronger than she is.  She eventually learns this.  For the time being, she'll pull and pull.

We gently rub her neck and behind her ears, talking to her gently.  Eventually, she doesn't pull as tightly against the post and allows some slack in the rope.  It is more comfortable for her, she learns, if she doesn't pull against it.

What we're trying to achieve, and will eventually get there, is for her to be able to be led on a rope without fighting and pulling against us.  I can identify with Elsie in some sense.  I can be hard headed and stubbornly pull against metaphorical lead ropes in my life on most days!  It is easier to halter break a calf when they are young.  We will keep working with her until she gets it.  I am confident she will.