Loading a slant load - solo

["guest@endurance.net" <guest@endurance.net>]

Diane Nelson safehavn@fast.net
We have found a fairly effective method to load one or more
horses, either solo or with help.  I bought a 30' lunge rope
without a chain.  Feed the clip end through the open stall
window back to the door.  You should have enough length of
line to have the remainder reach back along the outside of the
trailer so that you can clip the inside section to the halter,
then pull/guide with the outer section.  The horse will have
the benefit of your guidance at the rear along with the
tension at the head.  Most horses hop right on with this system.
Once your horse is used to it, you will find that they hop on
with the lead rope over the neck and no additional line will
be necessary.

This also works in reverse.  We usually tug gently on the tail
to guide the rear horse out.  The forward stalled horse may be
able to turn around and be led off.  Sometimes, though, a 
larger horse will need to be backed off.  The lunge line
provides some control and prevents the spin and leave syndrome.

Caution:  wear gloves!  Even the cotton lunge ropes can leave
nasty rope burns.

One thing with the slants - it's really crowded in the stall
and you can get yourself in trouble really quickly with no
way out.  We have a 7" wide trailer so it's *real* tight.  Our
next trailer will be 8' wide with 42"+ stalls if we do a slant
option.

Diane in Allentown, PA