When we ride our horses there are two nervous systems involving, yours and your horse’s. Your horse has the nervous system of a prey animal. Often times if they are stressed that comes with react first and think later. That reaction in turn sends our nervous system into defense mode. We often make big, rapid movements in our “fight for survival”. Unfortunately, this reinforces the horse’s nervous system reaction about their perceived perilous situation. Alas, the chain react

Trailering becomes hard when horses have been taught to react instead of think, are painful or don’t have a good relationship with humans.

When your horse is having a hard day, you must remain persistently patient. I find humans, in general, are not the most patient creatures. We are into instant gratification. We can get almost anything we want at our fingertips.

Horses at attention to detail. It keeps them alive. When something in their environment changes, they notice. They notice how we move, our position, our mood, etc.

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Hauling young horses for the first time makes me have ulcers. Horses weren’t meant to be in small, confined areas that move them away...

Refuse to fight with your horse. It takes two to fight. The horse won’t quit first, unless you make them think they are going to die. I don’t want my horse ever feeling like it is going to die with me.

We homeschooled our boys. One time I had them write a paper on making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. I gave instructions to write the paper as if they were talking to someone that had never made a sandwich before. We ended up with some interesting outcomes. None of the outcomes resulted in a sandwich because small details were missed like taking the bread out of the bag, knife out of the drawer, and lids off jars.

Yes late. I’ve been riding 😉

Did I ride today in the red flag conditions? Did I teach lessons to those who wanted to haul in? Yes. Horses live in wind. None of them...

Many of the undesirable behaviors we see in horses start with fear, confusion, and pain. In order to truly change a behavior and help our horses we must first recognize that they are not choosing a behavior to intentionally aggravate us. Some behaviors require us to rethink our question and approach. Some behaviors need correction if they are dangerous. In all circumstances we must keep our emotions out of our reaction to a behavior. We must be neutral.

Horses should learn age appropriate skills. We have two yearlings at the house right now. They are babies. They have short attention...

Slow down. Stop rushing with your horse. Frequently I see riders/handlers rushing when their horse makes a mistake. The horse gets off balance, crooked and begins to rush. The rider/handler starts rushing to correct the mistake, contain the mistake, or catch up to the horse. The aids become big and bold. This creates more tension and rushing in the horse. The rider/handler become more tense. A chain reaction has started.

Hands down one of the best exercises I do with the horses is the hill stretch.

Your horse is not it’s diagnosis. Your horse doesn’t read x-rays or test results. Your horse only knows if they feel good or not good.

My 5 C’s that prevent connection between horse and rider. These 5 C’s create defensiveness in the horse and rider.

You can’t fix a bad canter by riding more bad canter. You fix problems in the canter by identifying the issues in the walk and trot. Fix the problems in those gaits to fix the canter. Canter problems are walk and trot issues that have been ignored.

Cold weather… ugh. Not my favorite. When you are dealing with rehab horses, these cold weather swings are HARD. Horses with pathology, just like humans, struggle in the cooler weather. Their compromised joints are stiff. The horses tend to be a little more crankly because they are tight from standing around being cold. They will be more prone to colic.

If you want relaxation in your horse, you must relax first.

It’s cold. It’s miserable. Two days ago we were over 70 degrees. I still worked horses.