mule training update !

[Stepper]

Well i am able to pet my little mule now. She has made some big progress in just a couple of weeks. She has gone from running to the other end of the pen and tring to find a way to leap over it when i would walk into the pen. To know walking up to me and taking treats out of my hand. And now today she is letting me pet her on her muzzle and jaws. I have a halter on her that i could easly grab hold of. But i am sure she would blow up if i was to do that at this point.

I think with mules you diffinately have to get them to trust you before you can make any progress with them. And if you ever break that trust with them they remember it for along time to come.

 

[lilmissfit]

Great news! I believe that the one thing we all learn from these guys is that patience will eventually get you where you want to be. Remember that with your patience, his trust will soon follow.

 

[sjr725]

Good work Stepper! Mules are just soo different from horses - you can't "buffalo" them into doing anything they're not sure of. You really will need to go slow and steady with this one, just make sure you are firm and in showing gentleness & kindness to her you don't start letting her push you even a little bit - manners first - always! Mules are very smart and will take advantage of any chink in the armor! So, while you're trying to gain trust and be gentle with her you'll still need to teach the rules and be ironclad about them or you'll buy yourself a whole new set of problems.
Just my 2 cents.

 

[sjr725]

Here is a picture of my hubby on his little mule -
http://cattletoday.com/photos/showphoto ... puser=4936

 

[peg4x4]

There is a story on mules in (I think) this months "Western Horseman".. Said they will remember things for a loooong time.

 

[Stepper]

sjr725

That is a nice looking mule ! My little mule had a accident the other morning. She had gotten down on her front knees tring to eat grass underneath the pannels in her pen. And where the gate hinges there is about a 6 inch gap between the gate and the iorn post that it hinges off of. Well she slide her neck right up between the gate and the post.

My wife came in the house at 6:30 a.m. and woke me up and said i needed to get out there that my mule was hurt. I had a halter on her but had never been able to catch her since i put it on here 3 or 4 months ago. But like i had said in earlier post i was making progess in petting her and all.

I had made a 30' lead rope that i had planned on putting on her so that i could catch her to work with her some. But i was planning on putting it on latter on when i had her trusting me a little more.

So on my way out to her pen i grabbed the lead rope out of the back of my truck. Sure enough when i got out there she was laying on her stomach with all four feet underneath her like as if she had laid down that way. But she had managed to get her neck out of the gap in the gate and post. But her head was under the gate which had about a foots clearance between the bottom rail and the ground. She was wore out i dont know how many hours she had been like that.

But i attached the lead rope to her halter and opened the gate. She immediately laid over on her side and strecthed out. I thought for sure she had broken her neck. I told my wife to go call the vet and see if he could come take a look at her.

With in just a few minutes she stood up as started walking a little bit. But was staggering pretty bad. I my wife came back with my cell phone and i told her to not call the vet that there would not be much he could do. And i had her get me a hand full of horse treats. I tried to see if she would eat one. And she sit there and eat horse treats for about 5 minutes and i was able to pet her on the neck and back.

I was hoping to advance to getting her gentle enough to eventually be able to approach her that way. But not under the circumstances that the way things happened. Her neck really swoll up for 2 or 3 days right behind her ears. But the swellin finally came back down.

The vet said he thought that she must have tore a jugular vein and that was blood under the skin and if she had of tore the skin some how she would have bleed to death.

But she seems to be back to normal now. I have not been fooling with her since that happened i thought i would give her a little time to get over that deal before tring to mess with her again.

 

[sjr725]

Stepper I'm so sorry about your accident - they'll get them selves into the darndest fixes. Hoefully she'll be OK - I suspect that even through the trauma of her injury you've made significant progress by being kind to her. Hopefully she'll remember that you "helped" her? We raised Rick's little bay mule out of our own mare here on the place and she was pretty much handled from birth. It's hard to make inroads with one that has not had that kind of handling - they are hard to convince that you are trustworthy, but once you convince them of it they are loyal - hopefully your kind handling of her injury will help to show her that.

 

[brownmule]

im glad your mule is ok i have raised mules for several yrs. one thing i have learned most of the time if a mules gets ina fix hell usually wait for help not thrash around makeing a bad thing a nightmare... yes they are so different than horses a horse would of most likely panicked and ended up breaking it neck ( no disrespect to the fellow equine).. i love horses too!
we had to cut my big Belgian mule out a grape vine w/ a chain saw she got tangled up in a figure 8 front and back when she moved it tighten up opposite leg.. she was about 17 month old still training her... she stood and waited on to come to her rescue giving me that funny mule look like "its a bout time" enjoy your mule...youll have a buddy for life rose