Re: teaching a horse to be sure-footed

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From: Lucy Chaplin Trumbull 
Email: elsie@calweb.com

>...but when there is no leg pressure she thinks she can go 
> anywhere she wants. 

Provo, our gelding, actually settles down quicker if I offer
lots of leg pressure. Without it, he tends to be nervous and
not very surefooted about where we're going. He'll tend to
take matters into his own hands (invariably, in the opposite 
direction to the one he's supposed to be going in).  

He is a lot happier on single-track. No choice as to where to go, 
except forwards.

As a result, we begin each ride with lots of serpentines and
circles, etc. It limbers him up and seems to relax him. Like
he realises there *is* someone in charge up there, so he
doesn't have to keep such an eye open, as he might if he
was on his own.

> I'm concerned about this on the trail. I can't have her 
> wandering on a narrow path.

Does she wander on a narrow path, though? Or are you just
assuming she will?

I also have a six year old greenie. She will more or less go in the 
direction she's pointed, weaving her way along the trail (particularly
when she wasn't shod), until suggested otherwise. 

This does mean (and this was an interesting eye-opener for me, 
not having thought about it before) that when the trail does a switchback, 
she won't necessarily follow it (I found this out as we crashed through 
some low bushes <g>).

> How do you teach a horse to be 
> sure-footed on the trails? I have access to fire road trails as well 
> as steep, hilly, and narrow trails.

The greenie, Mouse, got a lot more surefooted from spending
most of the wet Spring in my friend's paddock - lots of rocks,
up and downs, downed tree limbs, a small creek, etc. That
really was a good education for her.

-- 
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Lucy Chaplin Trumbull - elsie@calweb.com
Repotted english person in Sacramento, CA 
http://www.calweb.com/~elsie

with Mouse and Provo
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