For the first time in quite a while, I had a day off today with good weather at the same time. So, after sleeping-in to an appropriate hour, and having a relaxed breakfast while watching the news, I headed out to work a little with my new bronc.

As you will recall, I bought J last month. He’s a grade Missouri Fox Trotter…at least he looks like one…somewhere between 4 and 10 years old, and he is not yet saddle broke. I bought him from a fellow who bought him at auction, so we really don’t know a lot about him. I see him gait around the pasture, so I know he has a natural Fox Trot as well as a more lateral running walk, so it’s likely he has a bit of Walker in him as well.

With all the snow we’ve had this winter, I have only had one other opportunity to do any amount of work with him and it was mostly just to see what he already knows and give me a starting point. It is pretty evident J has had folks work on his hooves and mess around him a bit. He’s friendly and surprisingly trusting, in light of the history I know about him. He has obviously had a lot of longeing, as anytime I give him any room with a lead rope he wants to trot around me in a circle no matter what I’m trying to do with him.

I’m not a big proponent of longeing. There are legitimate purposes for it and, if done properly and for the right reasons, it is useful. However, in my experience, many people longe their horses because they are afraid of them. Some people do it because they just enjoy doing it, others do it to exercise the horse. Very few actually do it as a planned and purposeful part of a horse’s basic training. Consequently, few people actually accomplish any useful thing with it, with regard to helping the horse and the rider come together down the road. Good ground training, in my mind, is essential for a saddle horse, but most of its training will come under the saddle.

So, today I decided to try to make a little progress with J and see how far we could get.

First off, I would have to catch him. I keep my horses in a pasture about a half-acre in size. I haven’t been able to mess with them much over the winter, so they have been a little silly lately about me catching them. I have had fun running them around, watching them buck and fart and play, all the while teaching them that if they don’t come up to me they will run. They think it’s fun at first, but after awhile they begin to get winded and it’s not so much fun. Normally the first one to stop and come to me is my good mare, Lizzy, who is now about 5 months in-foal. Yesterday she finally let me walk up to her and put the halter on her. I brushed her with a curry comb for a while, gave her a treat, then released her.

When I went into the pasture today, there was no running. The first one to come right up to me was J, so he got a treat. He wouldn’t let me halter him at first, so I went on to Lizzy, who stood calmly while I haltered her. She got a treat. Then I brushed her and released her. Next I went on to my mustang,  Jimbo, who wouldn’t be left out of getting a treat. He doesn’t like being caught, but he loves the treats. I started currying him, which he really likes, then slipped the rope over his neck. Once that was done, he started looking for a halter to stick his nose into, so he could get a treat. I brushed him a bit, then released him.

Next, I moved to J, who, by this time was ready for another treat. I curried him for a few minutes, then slipped the rope over his neck. He then let me slip the halter on him. Then he got a treat. My horses learn pretty quickly that putting a halter on in the pasture is a good thing.

J leads quite well, so it is evident he has had some halter training. I took him to the tie rack and tied him off. I have been very pleased that J has shown no pulling-back issues, even when he’s startled. I lifted all his hooves for cleaning and inspection. He’s still a little ticklish about his rear hooves, but offers no real problems. As part of his training, I will lift and clean all his hooves every time I saddle and unsaddle him. It won’t be long before he won’t offer any resistance at all and accepts it calmly. That will be appreciated by my farrier.

Next, I took him into the small arena. As soon as we entered the arena, he became agitated and wanted to trot around me in circles. Like I’ve said, apparently he has been longed a lot and thinks that’s what he’s supposed to do. My lead rope is about 10 feet long, which doesn’t give him much room for longeing. I let him go around a few times one direction, then turned him to go the other. When I let my arms down to my sides, he turned to come to me. I worked with him for several minutes to teach him to stand calmly while I worked around him holding the lead rope. I’m having to help him unlearn what he has been taught before. I want him to stand calmly when I am holding his lead rope. I don’t want him trying to longe every time we head into the arena for training.

Once I got him standing calmly, I started desensitizing him to the lead rope swinging around him. I would swing the tail of it up onto his rump, around his back legs, and up under his stomach, until he learned that when he stands still I stop swinging the rope.

I’m finding J to be a willing and submissive student and he learns quickly. Within a half hour we were ready to begin lessons for the day. My goal for the day was to be able to mount and sit on J’s back. While I expected some reaction from J, since I did a little testing with him before I bought him, I figured he wouldn’t be too much of a challenge to break to the saddle, due to all the handling he had before I bought him.

I saddled him up. He’s been saddled before, so there were no surprises there, even though he gets tensed up and doesn’t like to be cinched. I was a bit brusque and noisy as I saddled him, flopping things around and bumping him here and there, to desensitize him to the saddle and saddling process. He took it well and we had no problems, other than him tensing up. I saddled him with a rear cinch and breast strap. Eventually I’ll start using a crupper and progress to a fully-rigged pack saddle.

Then, back into the arena we went. Again, we had to work a little bit to remind him that we weren’t there to longe. Once that was done, I began to flop things on him, such as the end of my lead rope again, teaching that things flopping on him don’t hurt and aren’t dangerous. I just kept flopping the tail of the lead up on his back and rump and up under his belly until he stopped reacting, then I stopped. It didn’t take long before he was standing calmly while I flopped the lead rope all over him.

Next, I worked on teaching him to give to the halter, by putting side pressure on his nose with the lead and pulling his head around to the left side. I would put a little pressure, and when he gave a little, so did I.  Within a few minutes I had him responding to light pressure on the lead rope to turn his head around to the side. We did this on both sides.

Then I would snug up the lead on the left side and place my left hand, with a grip on the lead rope, up on his neck, just ahead of the saddle, as if I were about to mount. I would have him turn his head toward me submissively, then I would put weight on the saddle with my right hand, gripping the saddle horn or opposite pommel swell, and pulling my weight off the ground, my body weight against his side. The first few times we did this J reacted, spinning around and hopping a bit. I hung on, moving with him until he stopped moving, then I released. Within a few minutes I was able to hang on the side of the saddle while he stood calmly. We did that on both sides.

The next step was to actually put a foot in the stirrup and put weight on it. This step is a little tricky, especially without an assistant, since the trainer is in an unbalanced position with one foot in the stirrup, holding the lead rope with the left hand and the saddle horn with the right, so you don’t want to rush this. Make sure you do enough of the previous step to be fairly sure the horse isn’t going to explode while you have one foot in the stirrup. I would have preferred to have had an assistant hold the horse’s head and lead him around for me while I hung on the side, but I didn’t have one available. An assistant in this phase can help things progress a little quicker.

I asked J for his head, bringing his nose around to the left. I repeatedly asked for his nose until he did so willingly and softly. If he pulled or resisted, I continued to ask until he gave his nose to me. Then I placed my left foot in the stirrup, my left hand with the lead rope snugged-up on his neck, grabbed a handful of mane, then, grabbing the saddle horn with my right hand, lifted myself up into the stirrup, leaning across the saddle. At this precarious point, I started patting him on the right side with my right hand, keeping a snug lead rope with my left. As he agitated and moved, I hung on, pulling his head around, until he stopped, then slid from the saddle. I did this on both sides, until J calmly let me rise in the stirrup, pat and rub all around on the off-side, flop the stirrup, mess with the rear cinch, and generally do all manner of irritating things. I spoke softly and soothingly all the while, as I did this.

The next phase was to teach him that this was a normal and not a worrisome thing. I walked him around the arena and at irregular intervals would suddenly stop him and quickly put my foot in the stirrup and rise up, pat him a little on the off side, move stuff around, then drop to the ground. Once he would allow this without reaction, I decided we were ready to attempt the goal of the training.

Before getting to the punch-line however, I’ll talk a little about our training to lead. I like my horses to walk beside me with their nose even with my shoulder and arm. I try to train all my horses this way, because it irritates me to have to haul on the lead rope to keep an enthusiastic youngster horse in check. As I walked J around the arena, I noticed J had a tendency to want to get out ahead of me, especially while walking toward his home pasture, where is buddies were munching grass. I remedied this by turning abruptly away from him and walking the opposite direction. As I led him, each time his head got past my shoulder, I would abruptly turn and walk the other way. He soon learned that we didn’t turn if he kept his head behind my shoulder. The time we spent leading around the pasture between mounting exercises was quite valuable today. By the time we were done, he was staying right where I want him. This training is important to me, as it keeps horses from stepping on little feet when kids are leading them.

Now, for the grand finale of the training session. Actually, it was quite anticlimactic. When I felt like J was ready, I asked for his head. When he gave it softly, I grabbed the lead and a handful of mane in my left hand, put my left foot in the stirrup, grabbed the horn with my right hand. I then lofted myself into the stirrup and swung my right leg over onto the other side. I was sitting in the saddle. J tensed-up just a bit, then relaxed. It felt really good. I immediately dismounted, sliding to the ground while J stood calmly. We did that several more times, including dismounting on the off-side (right side). I repeated the earlier exercise of walking around the arena, then stopping abruptly and mounting and dismounting. By the time we finished, J was non-reactive to my mounting antics. Mission accomplished!

I was pleased and excited at the progress we made today. I decided not to push him any further. That was enough for me. I’ll let him rest and assimilate all that we did today and we’ll try it again tomorrow, if the weather holds, or Monday.

My goal for the next session will be breaking J to the ring snaffle bit, teaching him basic commands and how to respond to bit pressure. We’ll also work a little more on mounting and dismounting. I’m looking forward to it.