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Re: [RC] I don't want BLIND obedience from a horse... - rides2farTo which the judge replied: "If I'm riding, and there's a mountail lion in the vicinity, I WANT my horse to tell me about it!" I raised and trained a mare when I was a teen. Rode her on trails for 3 years and then sold her. The people who bought her were show people and took her to a show and entered a Trail Class that weekend since she was, after all, a "trail horse". They called me and said that though she didn't win, she'd been the crowd's favorite. First, there was a gate with a loop over the post for a latch they were to open and close. I had no idea how to teach a horse to sidepass, but Banner had, on her own learned to open loop gates with her lip and I'd had to change my latches on my own stretched barbed wire gate. The kid at the show kept trying to get Banner to get up close enough for the kid to reach the latch and Banner had finally had enough. She took her lip, opened the latch, then gave the gate a shove with her nose and walked through. After going through she took her head and gave it a shove closed since that's how she and I had gone through my neighbor's gate for years. After that she was supposed to cross a "bridge" made of 4x4's with short boards nailed between them to simulate a bridge. Banner had crossed many bridges in her life but completely refused this one. The kid left the ring. The next "trained trail horse" tried to cross the bridge and the boards broke under its weight. The people said several onlookers told them after the class that if they really had to ride on the trail they'd take Banner over the winner any day. :-) Angie ________________________________________________________________ The best thing to hit the Internet in years - Juno SpeedBand! Surf the Web up to FIVE TIMES FASTER! Only $14.95/ month - visit www.juno.com to sign up today! ============================================================ I don't think you have to join a gym or buy frilly outfits to get some fitness. A decent set of shoes and a 15 minute dismount here and there will help. ~ Jon K. Linderman, Ph.D., FACSM, Assistant Professor of Health and Sport Science, University of Dayton ridecamp.net information: http://www.endurance.net/ridecamp/ ============================================================
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