18 July 2005
despooking motorbikes, 1
Well, it's raining here, that fine soft misty Cumbrian rain that makes you wet even though it doesn't appear much. The weather forecaster promised us a "damp sandwich" of a day - dry start, wet middle, dry end!
For various reasons that i won't bore you with I've decided to drive out this evening or afternoon, so this morning has been the first of the motorbike despooking sessions with the two Fell ponies.
If anyone else needs scary noises for despooking purposes, go here: http://freesound.iua.upf.edu/index.php
You have to sign up to get downloads, but it's free. I got six or seven different and really scary motorbike sounds (some I didn't have a codec for, but most played fine.) I shoved them into a sound editor (in this case Goldwave, but Sound Recorder would have worked too) and pushed up the volume as high as it would go, then copied and pasted the sequence so I had all the noises in one track, in turn, two or three times over. It made a big file but it gave me about 8 minutes of sheer hell on wheels! Then I copied it to CD using Windows XP's "Copy to Audio CD" command in Windows Explorer. Tested it on the boombox - a sequence of really NASTY loud noises resulted. Perfect.
Well, being dopey this morning I forgot to take the boombox out to the stable at feeding time!
Anyway, I left the mucking out till quite late and the ponies had eaten their first slice of hay by the time I went out so they heard me and started whickering. While they were asking for food, I plugged in the boombox on the socket in the empty stable and I turned the CD motorbike track on at half volume.
Both ponies were surprised, but they weren't seriously frightened. Mr T stood rigid for a moment and then began to circle his box at a walk. After thinking about it, Ruby did the same. (The two boxes are side by side inside a stone cow byre, with chest height partitions so they can see each other.) I went in to them and produced Polo mints from my pocket, and the two impostors instantly forgot the noises, turned to me and began competing for treats. So each time the next noise started up, and they were still, I fed them a mint saying "NICE motorbikes". Mr T was still nervous - you could tell by the way he couldn't quite remember how to nibble a mint; he was "all thumbs"; but he was relaxed enough to think about it and to take it from me. Ruby was more interested in chasing him off so she could have all the treats!
We got to the end of the mints, and into Fell to Fell argument about who deserved the treats more, well before we got to the end of the track, so then I brought them each a tiny bit of feed, and pushed the volume up a notch while they ate from their bowls. They were relatively quiet even when they'd finished the feed -- and the horrible noises were still going on. So I fetched them some hay and began tidying the beds and went on with my normal routines. Mr T was still pricking his ears every now and again towards the boombox location, but by then Ruby wasn't really all that bothered!
Tonight I'll go through the feeding routine by playing the bike track as I come to the stable with the feed, and it can play through again while they eat. I'll keep using the phrase "NICE motorbikes" as the cue to accompany relaxation - whether reinforced by mints or feed... There was a distinct improvement in the anxiety levels just in the one session, so I'm hoping to make a permanent dent in them over time. Just am not sure how long it will take.... loose in stable first, then tied outdoors, then standing in harness, maybe walking about on long reins in harness, then in carriage in yard, then (maybe - if it seems necessary) going down the road. Each time starting with moderate volume and turning it up as they settle.
I can only say that so far (fingers crossed) I'm satisfied with the results of Step One.