I have the best horse!

hissy

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God I love this horse of mine! I was just out in the pasture and picked up an old game he and I used to play when he was younger which is just Tag, he really got into it, and the only difference, besides the fact that he is so :censor::censor::censor::censor::censor::censor::censor: big now, is I play with whiffle bat in my hand, in case he forgets who the Alpha horse is. But we had a merry game around the pasture, and it was a good diversion from this math I have been dealing with. The 13 year old girl next door who has two horses, one 23 year old arabian and one 5 year old appy. She was leaning on the fence, and after I was done interacting with Racer she sighed and said she wished her horses would do that with her. I didn't laugh, but I did think about how she interacts with her horses which is barely if at all, and how she throws that appy into the round pen cold and sticks a saddle on him without any sort of ground work or driving, and then she wonders why she keeps getting thrown? I have tried to tell her gently a few things she needs to do, but she is one who wants a remote control horse without the work. And she wants to start barrel racing the Appy? Yeee Haaw I see her heading for the stars as we speak!
 

dtolle

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Perhaps being just 13 years old, she is a bit immature to understand the true nature of having a "pet" as time onsuming and large as a horse. Seems a bit much for an adult to handle, never mind a young girl. I am sure she wants a "remote control" horse because she doesn't know any better being just barely a teenager.
 

jakenjinx

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tooooo smart for liddle girls
..... My horse is 21 and just started to calm down:tounge2: . Maybe you should suggest to her to lunge him( trot him in the round pen a while) before she puts the saddle on him. Does she trail ride him, or what? Just ring work for a five year old will make em crazy anyway. My horse is wicked cold backed and I could never just "throw a saddle" on him - even today.... gotta go slow and easy. She is young and you know, when your young, you know everything!:tounge2: :tounge2:


BTW - My horse plays fetch w/a stick (if he's in the mood) and plays tug o war w/Teddy! Horses are awesome.......
 
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hissy

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I knew when her parents bought her this horse she was in trouble. She wants a horse just like her steady, swaybacked 23 year old, and Domino is full of spit and vinegar. My heart jumped when he raced around the round pen and leaped over the top of the rails and sailed over the post in the front yard and started galloping around people's yards! If the front neighbor hadn't had a high fence to keep him off the highway, I shudder to think what would happen. He has no room to roam, he is a very small paddock area, and she puts him in the round pen and throws a saddle on him, jumps on and gets bucked off in a matter of minutes. I have tried to help, but the family is not interested so I backed off. I just work with my guy where she can see what we are doing. Today, I put the saddle on Racer and was walking him around the pasture and she asked me why I wasn't riding him. I told her he is only going to be 5 soon and is not ready for someone to just throw a saddle on him and get on him and ride him without proper ground work and warm-up. Then I put him in the round pen and let him just get the kinks out of his legs before I turned him back out to pasture. Maybe she will learn from me and maybe not.
 

dawnt91

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Awww, you guys are making me jealous! I've always wanted a horse, but I've always lived in a large town so it wasn't possible. I consider myself lucky that I'm able to have a relatively large dog as it is...


It sounds like the parents are mostly to blame for this girl's attitude about the horse. What parent in their right mind would buy this kind of horse for such a young child when it's obvious that she's not ready for it? I mean, if the neighbor can tell she's not ready and it's not what she wanted, surely the parents knew too. It's too bad for the horse, he's the one who's really going to suffer in the long run.
 

jakenjinx

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Parents "horse people"? I hate it when the parents just let the kid do "whatever" w/the horse, and then, when something happens it's the :censor::censor::censor::censor::censor::censor::censor: horse's fault!


You are smart to stay out of it... too bad they weren't open to suggestions... Maybe when she gets hurt (hopefully not, but it sounds like it's heading that way), they will listen to you!
 
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hissy

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But is far from it from what I have observed. Racer is my first horse and I have made plenty mistakes along the way, but I have never not respected the fact that he is an animal with huge feelings and we both have bonded and respect each other. It matters a great deal in training when you have that respect issue resolved. Domino has no respect for his owners, and why should he, they do not respect what he is and what he can do. I have done all my own training, and I am constantly amazed at what Racer shows me and more importantly what he teaches me. he has been my greatest teacher.......
 

sunlion

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wow, I am completely horse ignorant.

How long do they live? 23 seems quite old, but you make it sound like it's just kind of middle-ish. I know they live longer than smaller housepets, but I didn't realize it was so long.

How does the wiffle bat remind Racer who's the alpha horse? Do you actually have to strike him with it? I imagine it makes a big noise but doesn't hurt very much.

What is "cold backed"?

How many years does it take to train a horse? Not fancy tricks, just for regular riding like most people do.
 
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hissy

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Horses can live a very long time, that is why they are such a huge committment. They are also not the kind of animal that can just thrive out in a pasture with no buddies, or no human contact. They are very social animals herd-bound some of them, and since Racer's buddy had to be sold awhile back, I am his only contact and I try to maintain that bond with him. He was really ill when he was 2 years old, I mean really ill. I finally had to yank he out from under the vet who had mis-diagnosed him and put him into OSU Vet school. 2 weeks, and $2,500 later, he was better, but not well. During the long period of recovery, he and I bonded unbelievably and it is something I had or have never experienced before. It is a life-changing moment. So he and I are connected. He will hopefully live into his 30's and he will always be with me no matter what. I have had several people express high interest and offer me a lot of money to sell him, but that will never happen. I have had him since he was 3 months old, and we have been training together with no outside assistance since that day.

How you train a horse depends on what discipline you want them to do.If you want them just as a trail horse, then you train them to lead, back, go over obstacles, go through water, side pass (which is move from side to side) neck rein, handle a saddle, gosh so many ways to train. I have been bomb-proofing racer from the beginning. Which is just a term to introducing horses to various foreign objects in the hopes that when a rabbit, or squirrel or balloon or plastic bag rushes by them, they don't decide to buck and run. I can halter racer while he is in the pasture, without chasing him until both of us drop. He will follow me freely without a halter wherever I go if I ask him, he stands quiet to be worked on by the vet or farrier, I can drape him in a tarp, blindfold him, wave plastic bags in his face, run a chainsaw near him, do all kinds of crazy things and he stands his ground. His first trail ride was last year and their were 8 horses in the line, he was second in the line at the time the leader decided to go off the path and blaze a new trail. The head horse stepped on a grounded yellow jacket nest! They swarmed, people screamed, horses freaked, some bolted, others reared, people got thrown, and Racer calmly walked with me up still on his back to the top of the hill, where I dismounted to find 3 jackets on his tail and 2 near his rump! Larry the head cowboy, been around horses his entire life was extremely impressed with Racer's calmness and since then has helped me to further racer's training. Racer now drives (pulls a cart) thanks to Larry's instruction. So there are all kinds of ways to train a horse, and I train with firmness and kindness, but if he does something that puts me in danger, I get after him for only 3 seconds with the whiffle bat. It makes a lot of noise, but it does not hurt him. And it just establishes to him that even though he is bigger and he could hurt me, I have the upper hand and he needs to respect me. I do this for my safety as I have been hurt by my other horse before and they can literally kill you in a minute without meaning to, so you just have to always be prepared. One moment, my mind slipped and I got injured severely. It takes a lifetime to train a horse, because you are learning along with him, but to prepare a horse for just a saddle and rider is hard to gauge, because Race is my first horse, and I am no expert. Though other seasoned horse owners are now asking me questions! LOL

I am so green, I don't think I know what cold-backed is, but I will take a stab at what I think it means. I believe it means that taking a horse cold out of a stall and not allowing him to limber up and exercise, and just throwing a saddle on him and jumping on, can cause problems in the end for the horse as well as the rider. After all, all atheletes do warm-ups before they do anything strenuous, and you have to allow the same consideration for the horse.

Gosh I really can talk about Racer, he is my pride and joy, can you tell?
As I said before, we are still learning together, and he has been my greatest teacher.
 

jakenjinx

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post already to go and lost it, so screw it, I'll do an abridged version (ya, like that's possible w/me...:tounge2: ).

SUNLION - cold backed is kinda just what hissy said - you put their saddle on and tighten the cinch (like a belt that holds the saddle on) too quick and too tight. My horse will litterally rip the crossties off the wall and run backwards about a million miles an hour
(yikes! get outa the way)..... so we go sllllooowwww....
and wiffle bats are a good defensive strategy for a pushy horse - doesn't hurt too much, but puts the fear o God into em...:tounge2:


My horse Dude was very badly abused when I got him as a 7 year old. He was beaten, tied down and had dogs sicked on him, his teeth were knocked out... he was a mess physically and mentally. Now he is just the best boy. He loves me and I looooveee him - my sweetest boy.


He is now 21 and retired (thinks he's 2, though
- what a personality! ) We have gone through thousands of dollars and thousands of hours of training with the right people to finally get him to trust me.

I also learned that you cannot - under any circumstances, MAKE a horse DO ANYTHING. That saying "you can lead a horse to water..... IS SO TRUE. You have to convince them that it's just easier - and they are llllaaaazzzyyyy by nature, so training in my experience equals PATIENCE - and trust. Sure, you get mad and haul off an smack them, but soon after you realize that maybe the horse was telling you I hurt somewhere, or I'm scared, and you feel like a jackass
and your hand hurts more than the horse does.

Of course, I've had my fights w/my horse, and usually I would end up crying my eyes out or going backwards in training. I learned it's not worth fighting with them - they outweigh us...
so you out smart them. I have had so much fun and learned so much from Dude and the people I was with at my barn for 6 years. I took clinics and lessons with some of the best riders in the region and in the country, and learned something from each and every one of them. Sometimes I miss it (not too much though - all good things.,.... bla bla you know the deal):tounge2: The best part of leaving there was beating my instructor on her horse in our last show - we laughed our asses off, told her she's gonna put herself outa business if she kept the good training up....:tounge2:

He's now retired, living high off the hog (the hog would be me:tounge2: ) in my backyard with Tracey's (AKA Sammy & Mikko) horse TED TED! He's an appalooser (tee hee, I made a funny)20 and retired too, and they both are big blobs of horse....
We trail ride about once a week. There favorite thing to do is EAT.

FEED US - DON'T RIDE US - LET US EAT GRASS - DON'T RIDE US - BRUSH US - DON'T RIDE US... WE ARE FAT AND HAPPY:martian:
Wicked abridged, eh?
:tounge2:
 
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hissy

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Be happy to share his Baby Book with you! And Janet, kudos for saving Dude, what a good person you are. Dude is lucky to have ya! Here are some pics of Racer, the last one is just part of bombproofing I was talking about, it is a helium filled balloon he was playing with.



 

debby

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You have such beautiful horses....makes me remember back when I was a teenager, we had 3 horses.
 
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hissy

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He is part Pryor Mountain Mustang, QH and Arabian. He is registered in the Cross Mustang Registry and he has been to two shows where he placed, first in halter, second in trail in hand, then another first in yearling and a third in trail in hand. He is wonderful, but then I am very predjudiced about him. I would love to see a picture of Dude, he sounds like a gentle soul.
 

sunlion

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Ooh, he's lovely!

What is he eating (looks like some kind of rubber thing?) and why is he wearing a vine? It's cute, but I don't picture horses as being whimsical . . .
 
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hissy

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You made me giggle, that rubber thing is his tongue! Goofy Gus had just been invited into the grape orchard to snack on the leftover goodies, he got a vine stuck in his hair as he was feasting. And he is very whimsical, he is really a clown in a horse suit!
 

sunlion

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You're kidding! His tongue is HUGE! Yeah, I know other things are huge too, but I've never seen a horse with his tongue hanging out his mouth like that. He must have enjoyed those grapes!
 
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hissy

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He weighs in at over 2,000 pds, so I hope his tongue is huge! I know his appetite is.
Also, since he is a gelding, he isn't HUGE anymore in places that used to matter, if you catch my drift!
 
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