My Introduction to True Natural Horsemanship Part 2

In part one I told you about purchasing Scottie, and how great everything was in the beginning. Until one day it seemed, that everything just fell apart. There I was in my field, watching my horse run around with his custom made bridle dragging beneath him. Of course that scared the pants off of him. In an effort to 'get away' from the evil reins that were trying to eat him, he thought it would be a good idea to jump over the fence into the neighbor's pasture. That didn't go so well for him. He had not ever jumped 4.5 feet, and proceeded to crash through the fence, my neighbor's fence. Oh boy. Now I was really freaking out.

Scottie came out of that with only a scrape on his inner thigh. Thank God.




When I finally stopped crying, I realized I desperately needed help. So my quest for a trainer began. We went through a few trainers before we found the right match for us. All were some sort of natural horsemanship trainer, but we found that a few styles were too harsh, and there were also a few that were just not enough. We ended up working with Page Turner, a certified Frank Bell trainer. Page seemed to think that a series of events caused Scottie's mental meltdown. It probably began with the fact that he had never left home, or his mother before. He was rarely used, and now here I was riding him 3-4 days every week. Add to that the fact his previous owner had him in a rope halter, and I did not.

Apparently another big mistake I was making was letting him decide what gate to be in on the trails. Initially I couldn't understand why that was a big deal. If it was safe and my previous horse picked up a trot, well then, we trotted. No biggee, right? Wrong. At least for Scottie. Over time, to him, this meant he had control. After all, he was making decisions. These seemingly little subtleties had completely changed my new horse.

Page and I decided to start from the beginning. We pretended as if he had never been broken. I will tell you the next part of the story tomorrow.

Loretta

p.s. Interested in Scottie's version of this story? Watch for it in future posts!

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Astro learns to pass scary trail exit

Yesterday, my friend Sean and I had a quite a nice ride. Very sunny, blue sky day in Northern VA. I rode my 4 yr old pony, Astro. (When I find my camera cable I will post pics of him.)

There is a trailhead that has large amounts of sticks lining the sides. In addition there are several boulders, and the passage through them is quite narrow. There is also a yellow gate where county vehicles pass. Astro has always shied away from this area. I kept meaning to hand walk him down there, but hadn't yet gotten around to it. Yesterday, Astro walked right through it like he'd done it hundreds of times. YEAH!

Have you checked out my twitter page?

http://www.twitter.com/naturalhorseman

My Introduction to True Natural Horsemanship

Three years ago, Scottie the big chestnut came into my life. I had just put down my long time partner and best friend, Shadow. I needed another draft in my life, and of course my other horse needed a new friend too.

I visited and rode Scottie, then known as Elton, several times before making the decision to purchase him. Trained by one of the O'Connor's trainers as a 3yr old, & currently 6years old, he was a steal at $2K, custom bridle for that big head, included.

We came home and Scottie quickly asserted himself as leader of the 2 horse herd. Everything was going along very smoothly. We went out on the trails several days a week. Scottie appeared to be adjusting to me and his new home quite well.

Now, before I go into what happened next, you need to know a little background on Scottie in order for it to make sense. He was born and raised on the farm where I purchased him. His mother, a registered Irish Draught, still lived on the farm with him. She was purchased in Ireland and the owner did not know she was in foal, to what appears to be a Belgian. (one look at Scottie and that's not hard to see.) Scottie was professionally broken at three, but still very green. He was not ridden regularly. Occasionally he was hacked on trails and hilltopped at the local hunts. He seemed to be a horse that you could leave alone, and come back to with no problems. Terrific! When I tried him out for the first time, I noticed he had on a strange halter. It was made of skinny rope. I had never seen one before.

This was the beginning of what I thought were my troubles, but turned out to be the best thing I could have ever learned.

Loretta's horses