Post by Calaminty Jane on Aug 2, 2012 8:11:41 GMT -5
Half-Broke Horses
By Kathleen Lindley
When I ventured out on the road solo about five years ago, one of the things I was looking forward to was the opportunity to see about 200 horses a year and the opportunity to start to identify patterns and trends in that population.
Two patterns have become very clear and very consistent over the past five years. The first pattern is that most of my students appear to be, for the most part, middle-aged women returning to horses after decades away while they got their careers and/or families going. These women may have ridden not at all, a little or (rarely) a lot as a kid and now they are realizing a life-long dream to have a horse or horses in their lives. This is my very typical student at a clinic.
The second pattern I have seen over the past five years is the large number of what I would call "half-broke horses" in the general population and at the clinics. By half-broke horse, what I mean is a horse who has a few, many, or gaping gaps in his training, rendering him everything from a little spooky, to pushy on the ground, to totally unusable and dangerous.
Now, I can hear what you're thinking. These two patterns, put together, are not a good thing! But it is a pretty easy thing to see if you look around a bit. It's not hard, today, to find a beginner/intermediate, middle-aged rider with a half-broke horse.
I guess I began to see this quite a few years ago but I didn't quite know what it was. I would see horses and riders at clinics over the years, and sometimes nothing would get better over the years. Sometimes it would. As I watched and learned and did the work with my students and their horses, what I began to see was that if a horse was half-broke and we did not go all the way back to the beginning of the "hole" (missing information) and install it, the horse didn't change. Maybe I could teach the person to avoid the pitfalls of the "hole" or holes, but that didn't seem like that was a good long-term solution. It was like I could help the student make a map of a field full of land mines rather than helping the student remove the land mines for good. I've become a big believer in removing the land mines once one is aware that they are present. I think we'd all agree that it's just safer that way.
A half-broke horse can look like a "high spirited", anxious, "troubled", difficult, "quirky" or obviously poorly trained horse. A half-broke horse may not tie or understand physical restraint. They may not be comfortable with a rider on their back. They may be scared of being blanketed or saddled. They may not be okay with a flag or ropes other objects or stimuli. A lot of times, to recognize a half-broke horse, we have to let go of the horse's age and "story" and look at him like he's a three-year-old colt. If he were a three-year-old colt, would we ride him? Would we consider him safe and well-educated? Would we say he had a thorough and quality foundation? If the answer to any of those questions is "no", then we shouldn't be riding him and he's likely not safe or well-educated.
So how do we end up with a half-broke horse? There are any number of ways, but it's pretty easy to end up with a horse where certain foundation skills were just skipped in the starting process. Not every horse was started very thoroughly or got a lot of experience in those formative months and years in the beginning. Or maybe the horse was started and then turned out for many years and it went a little "feral" again. Maybe it had a good foundation at one time, but it's been handled with inconsistency and lack of skill since. All kinds of stuff can happen that leads to a half-broke horse. The why isn't quite as important as the fact itself and its recognition. Mostly, a half-broke horse is a half-broke horse.
The better I've gotten to know my students, the higher my standard of what constitutes a "broke" horse has become. Most of my students are not professional-quality horse trainers, nor do they want to be. Most of them are not bronc riders, nor do they want to be. Most of them want to be safe, enjoy their horse and learn more as they go along.
It seems to me that the best fix for a half-broke horse is to go back and fill in the holes, to build and then maintain that foundation that got missed or undone somehow. Sometimes this is simple and easy, and other times, it's more complex and challenging. It's always easier to build a foundation before the rest of the building is put on top. But it's possible to put a foundation under an existing building. It's just more complex and the results won't be the same. Same with the horses. Sometimes as we work on that foundation, things are going to come apart more and more, kind of like opening Pandora's Box. Sometimes it gets worse (and sometimes WAY worse) before it gets better. Sometimes it never gets better because the horse can't let go of the trouble that being half-broke has caused him. Other times, we can give the horse some critical information he's been searching for and he's good to go right there and then.
The solution for a half-broke horse, if there is one, is training. If the horse lacks confidence, skill and information, then that's what he needs. Not just any training, but the training that fills in the gaps and all associated "holes". The more a horse knows about how the world works and how he should function within it, the calmer and more confident he's going to be. And I'm not talking about a horse being able to do "tricks" and busy work. I'm talking about a horse understanding the CONCEPTS that he'll be dealing with in the world around him. He must understand restraint. He must understand how to yield to pressure. He must understand how to turn his decision-making over to people. He must understand how to behave, act and move around people.
Looking at the half-broke horse in a global context, good training is a horse's first line of defense against becoming an "unwanted horse". Even a lame but well-trained horse can find a job taking kids, older or timid riders for a spin. But a lame, poorly trained horse has little chance in today's market. How many horses end up at rescues simply because they're poorly trained?
Making sure our horses are comfortable, confident and well-trained is something we, as horsemen, have control over. The knowledge is out there and accessible for the asking. Creating a well-broke horse is hard work, and it's not for everyone. The work is usually tedious, rarely recognized, and sometimes dangerous. But the half-broke horse needs help filling in those gaps. If we have a half-broke horse, we can either fill in those gaps if we know how, learn how if we don't know, or have someone do it for us. But it's got to be done, for the horse's sake, I think.
By Kathleen Lindley
When I ventured out on the road solo about five years ago, one of the things I was looking forward to was the opportunity to see about 200 horses a year and the opportunity to start to identify patterns and trends in that population.
Two patterns have become very clear and very consistent over the past five years. The first pattern is that most of my students appear to be, for the most part, middle-aged women returning to horses after decades away while they got their careers and/or families going. These women may have ridden not at all, a little or (rarely) a lot as a kid and now they are realizing a life-long dream to have a horse or horses in their lives. This is my very typical student at a clinic.
The second pattern I have seen over the past five years is the large number of what I would call "half-broke horses" in the general population and at the clinics. By half-broke horse, what I mean is a horse who has a few, many, or gaping gaps in his training, rendering him everything from a little spooky, to pushy on the ground, to totally unusable and dangerous.
Now, I can hear what you're thinking. These two patterns, put together, are not a good thing! But it is a pretty easy thing to see if you look around a bit. It's not hard, today, to find a beginner/intermediate, middle-aged rider with a half-broke horse.
I guess I began to see this quite a few years ago but I didn't quite know what it was. I would see horses and riders at clinics over the years, and sometimes nothing would get better over the years. Sometimes it would. As I watched and learned and did the work with my students and their horses, what I began to see was that if a horse was half-broke and we did not go all the way back to the beginning of the "hole" (missing information) and install it, the horse didn't change. Maybe I could teach the person to avoid the pitfalls of the "hole" or holes, but that didn't seem like that was a good long-term solution. It was like I could help the student make a map of a field full of land mines rather than helping the student remove the land mines for good. I've become a big believer in removing the land mines once one is aware that they are present. I think we'd all agree that it's just safer that way.
A half-broke horse can look like a "high spirited", anxious, "troubled", difficult, "quirky" or obviously poorly trained horse. A half-broke horse may not tie or understand physical restraint. They may not be comfortable with a rider on their back. They may be scared of being blanketed or saddled. They may not be okay with a flag or ropes other objects or stimuli. A lot of times, to recognize a half-broke horse, we have to let go of the horse's age and "story" and look at him like he's a three-year-old colt. If he were a three-year-old colt, would we ride him? Would we consider him safe and well-educated? Would we say he had a thorough and quality foundation? If the answer to any of those questions is "no", then we shouldn't be riding him and he's likely not safe or well-educated.
So how do we end up with a half-broke horse? There are any number of ways, but it's pretty easy to end up with a horse where certain foundation skills were just skipped in the starting process. Not every horse was started very thoroughly or got a lot of experience in those formative months and years in the beginning. Or maybe the horse was started and then turned out for many years and it went a little "feral" again. Maybe it had a good foundation at one time, but it's been handled with inconsistency and lack of skill since. All kinds of stuff can happen that leads to a half-broke horse. The why isn't quite as important as the fact itself and its recognition. Mostly, a half-broke horse is a half-broke horse.
The better I've gotten to know my students, the higher my standard of what constitutes a "broke" horse has become. Most of my students are not professional-quality horse trainers, nor do they want to be. Most of them are not bronc riders, nor do they want to be. Most of them want to be safe, enjoy their horse and learn more as they go along.
It seems to me that the best fix for a half-broke horse is to go back and fill in the holes, to build and then maintain that foundation that got missed or undone somehow. Sometimes this is simple and easy, and other times, it's more complex and challenging. It's always easier to build a foundation before the rest of the building is put on top. But it's possible to put a foundation under an existing building. It's just more complex and the results won't be the same. Same with the horses. Sometimes as we work on that foundation, things are going to come apart more and more, kind of like opening Pandora's Box. Sometimes it gets worse (and sometimes WAY worse) before it gets better. Sometimes it never gets better because the horse can't let go of the trouble that being half-broke has caused him. Other times, we can give the horse some critical information he's been searching for and he's good to go right there and then.
The solution for a half-broke horse, if there is one, is training. If the horse lacks confidence, skill and information, then that's what he needs. Not just any training, but the training that fills in the gaps and all associated "holes". The more a horse knows about how the world works and how he should function within it, the calmer and more confident he's going to be. And I'm not talking about a horse being able to do "tricks" and busy work. I'm talking about a horse understanding the CONCEPTS that he'll be dealing with in the world around him. He must understand restraint. He must understand how to yield to pressure. He must understand how to turn his decision-making over to people. He must understand how to behave, act and move around people.
Looking at the half-broke horse in a global context, good training is a horse's first line of defense against becoming an "unwanted horse". Even a lame but well-trained horse can find a job taking kids, older or timid riders for a spin. But a lame, poorly trained horse has little chance in today's market. How many horses end up at rescues simply because they're poorly trained?
Making sure our horses are comfortable, confident and well-trained is something we, as horsemen, have control over. The knowledge is out there and accessible for the asking. Creating a well-broke horse is hard work, and it's not for everyone. The work is usually tedious, rarely recognized, and sometimes dangerous. But the half-broke horse needs help filling in those gaps. If we have a half-broke horse, we can either fill in those gaps if we know how, learn how if we don't know, or have someone do it for us. But it's got to be done, for the horse's sake, I think.