Mare Smarts!!!

[KathyZ1@aol.com]

I love my mare because she's smart as a whip and is well aware of that fact, 
thank you very much!!!

She's a little cupcake if you negotiate but the word 'submission' is simply 
not part of her vocabulary!!

So funny a couple of weeks ago to watch a friend of mine get on her who 
insisted on riding with a pelham and 'lots of leg'!  She was going to show 
Bitsy (and me) how she 'should' be ridden...ie: by showing her who's the 
boss!  After warning my friend, I just shook my head, stepped back and 
covered my smile!
Now my friend is a very strong rider but Bitsy, true to form, immediately 
resorted to her old Ms. Hydey Hyde self...bucking, rearing, and backing up at 
about 30 mph not caring about whoops a bit of a dropoff right behind 
her....stopping just close enough to the edge to terrorize her screaming 
errant passenger!!!  
I swear I could hear my little mare chuckle!!

Needless to say, my friend got off and gladly relinguished the reins.

Then when I got on her with her little rubber snaffle and my light cues she 
just melted.......Ms. Jekyll, Phd. emerged and she immediately shot my friend 
an 'ok now THIS is how you ride a horse and btw you can get lost now' look. 
Hilarious.  Even my friend had to laughingly admit that she 'sure has got a 
lot of personality'.

I know this is a generalization, but mares I've met just seem to be really 
smart...(notice I won't say 'smarter'  O :-)  )
Dare I say....they seem to be almost.......mule-ish???
Maybe that's why they're known to take better care of themselves at rides.  
Because they know better?  
Could be.