Getting On

There is a local state park where I live that uses volunteers to patrol the park. The volunteers serve in a variety of different capacities from docents to mounted patrol. I thought it would be fun to volunteer to be a member of the mounted patrol so I asked them what the requirements were.

They gave me a list of requirements that ranged from being able to ride your horse at a walk, trot, and canter to being able to administer first aid. But one of the requirements that surprised me was that they wanted to see the volunteer mount their horse from level ground without assistance. I thought that this should be fairly obvious and I asked the ranger who administered the test about that. His reply shocked me. It turns out that it is the single most stringent requirement and disqualifies nearly 80% of all applicants. I thought he was exaggerating but he showed me the paper work, and sure enough, his statistics were correct.

Being able to get on your horse without assistance from another person or a mounting block is really a skill that every rider should have if they are intent on riding on a trail. If you cannot do it, then I highly recommend it, at least as a long term goal. The following are some ways to help you reach that goal:

1. Join a gym. (and go)
Horse back riding is a physical skill. It requires practice, and fitness. Get fit, get flexible, and develop the arm strength that it requires to start getting on your horse.

2. If you cannot afford a gym, then consider the following exercises:
-Find a fence like the ones seen all over stables and climb over it. Do it for about 20 repetitions and it will definitely help you develop the flexibility and the strength.
-Every time you go out to see your horse in the pasture, if the fence is strong enough, do not go through it, or through the gate. Go over it. Force yourself. It is just another chance to use all those muscles that you would use to mount your horse.
-Grab a bale of hay, and toss it over a log or a jump. Then step over the jump and toss it back. Do this 20 times a day.

3. If, in the end, you have done all these exercises and you find that you are simply too short or your horse is too tall, (take note when you buy your next horse) then consider stirrup extenders that can be purchased to help you mount your horse.

Personally, I would be afraid to ride my horse on the trail if I could not easily mount and dismount. And of course, now that I have been preaching exercise, I suppose I better get my lazy carcass out there and do it too.

Catching the Uncatchable Horse

An interesting thing about training horses and being online is that I get a lot of questions about various topics. Ok, well that might not be so interesting, but what really is interesting is that when I get a question from someone out in cyberspace, it almost always coincides with an issue that I am currently working on with a horse. A few weeks ago I was commissioned to rehabilitate a horse that had a severe bucking problem. I did not advertise it online, but out of the blue, I got someone asking about a bucking problem with their horse. When people send me their horses for training, I try to keep a running blog of their day to day activities so that the owner can follow their progress. Well it turns out that these blogs are getting fairly popular. To some extent, more popular than my main blog "The Enlightened Horseman" which you are reading now. (To check out these side blogs, look at the links on the left hand side of this page.)

Last week, I was commissioned to help a client who had adopted a Wild Mustang. The mustang was in his pasture and would not allow himself to be caught. Right at about the same time, someone in Cyberspace asked for my input regarding catching a horse that had, over time, become uncatchable. So again, I put out a quick side blog on the subject. But I think it is important that I really go over this issue in greater detail because I believe that many people have this same problem. Furthermore, it is common for horses to develop this problem over time. So I thought it might be a good idea to cover how to catch horses, and more importantly, how to avoid creating an uncatchable horse.

First of all, let us list some items regarding the psychology of the uncatchable horse.

1. The horse is a prey animal. He is always on the look out for predators, and his survival depends on his ability to avoid being caught. Thus, he is very good at it.

2. We are predators, our survival depends on our ability to stalk and hunt prey. We are out of practice, thus we are not very good at it. But what we are good at doing is looking like we are stalking and hunting. So we tend to stalk the horse. We creep quietly to him, thinking that we are making him feel less nervous. But in fact, we are alerting him to our intentions by our stalking behavior and making him even more nervous.

3. Horses have a feeling that when we do catch them, we are going to do something unpleasant to them. We are going to put a halter on them, we are going to hurt them, we are going to eat them, we are going to put saddles on them and tighten the cinch, and ride them hard, etc. And they are almost always right. So don't do that. Just stop it. Walk up, pet them, give them a treat, and walk away. Catch and release. Don't catch and torture. I know, you may not think of it as torture, but remember that a horse who works in the arena for an hour travels about 5 miles in that arena. I remember a lesson from a trainer from the Spanish Riding School who said:

"The horse in the Arena runs 5 miles in an hour of training. All you riders, how many miles have you run today? 1? 2? or none? And yet you expect him to do all this with weight on his back and be happy about it?" Needless to say, I was very embarrassed. And I still don't get my lazy butt out to run 5 miles a day, but I am sensitive to the fact that every time I catch my horse, I don't want her to think that it always means a 5 mile forced march with a pack on her back. I also watch my diet and try to keep my weight down below 20% of the horse's weight. That is of course, weight including my saddle. So for a 1000 pound horse, if my saddle weighs 30 pounds, (and many western saddles weigh more than that) I cannot permit myself to weigh more than 170 pounds. Which sucks because I hover at around 175 pounds (And I love my Mango Sorbet). So I ride a lighter saddle and back away from the buffet. As for catching and releasing; for a horse that is hard to catch, you should catch and release 5 times more than you catch and ride. For the horse that is easy to catch, you should catch and release at least 2 times for every time you catch and ride. This will definitely make him easier to catch and will not create a problem that will be difficult to fix later.

4. Always have the halter in hand and visible when you go out to catch your horse. You do not want to creep up on him, you do not want to trick him, you do not want to surprise him. If you are going out there to catch and release, bring the halter and lead rope with you. Catch him, halter him, lead him a couple of steps, give him a treat, and then remove the halter and let him go.

5. Spend time teaching the horse to be caught and face you when you go out there to catch him. This lesson requires time. Spend as much time on this skill as you might on any other riding skill. After all, you can't ride him unless you can catch him.

You can look on the blog on the link on the side titled "Side Blogs by Request." for details about catching the uncatchable horse. By the way, the horse in the videos is now easily caught in a round pen after 4 hourse of training over two days. He will now remain in the round pen where he is easy to catch for a few weeks before he is released into the pasture. He started out as a completely wild mustang and after 4 hours of training, he can be haltered, petted and groomed. No picking up of feet yet. That will come on Friday.