Free Horse Training Tips As I visit and lurk on the message boards, I see some questions come up again and again. Here are some pages with advice how to handle these common horse training problems. If you computer gives you and ActiveX warning, it is because of the YouTube videos embedded in this page. Lope/Canter Training Recognizing the signal is the most important part of clean lope transitions, whether you are asking for a trot-lope or a walk-lope transition. As soon as I am sure that she recognizes my seat and leg aids from the turnback to the outside, I up the ante and start doing turnbacks to the inside. Doing the turnbacks to the inside involves changing my aids from turnback to lope, which will "explain" the difference to Wendy. ... More (5 pages)... Laterals and Flexing Now that we know what we have to work on to keep our horses straight, we'll teach him to bend. You'll learn to use your legs in a more knowledgeable manner. You'll learn to separate your hands. Your horse will learn to recognize different leg cues. Your horse will learn to give his nose and balance his body. Teach the step sequence first... I try to get an inside eye, Then an inside cheek, ...More (3 pages)... Riding Skills for Working Moms We would all like to be better riders, but finding the time for lessons can be hard. The tips on this page are meant to improve your riding, by explaining simple little details that you may not learn in a lesson. They are meant to improve your coordination, your muscle strength and your feel. These instructions all work on practice-makes-perfect. You won't need someone telling you whether or not you are doing them correctly, the constant repetition will improve your overall skill. ...More (6 pages)... How a horse thinks Daily life for a horse among horses consist in keeping their place in the pecking order. This is a fact of life 1,000s of years old and is part of every horses character. If he is the top horse on the pecking order, he will get the best grass, the most water, the best shelter. In short survival depends on being as high up on the pecking order as they can be. You, the human, aren't exempt from his attempt to put things in order around him. You are either higher on the order or you are not. No in betweens at all. I like to have a 51-49% partnership with my horses. I don't like to be too ruff, or be mean, but in case I get challenged, I am very quick to remind them, which one of us has the 51%. ...More (3 pages)... Teach your horse to lunge First you gotta teach him to go around you. Pressure and release is the A and O of horse training, and it works here too. Get a set of signals, keep them consistent, and be quiet when your horse does what he is supposed to do. I raise both my lunge arm and my whip arm as my signal for go ...More... The Dropped Shoulder That is a very common problem. A problem that all horses will exhibit, each and every one of them, during the early stages of training. And if you can use your legs very strongly, balance with your seat and use your back very effectively, it is a problem that is easily solved. Some horses just gain experience and stop doing it, and some have to be corrected by training. If you aren't as strong as the average horse trainer, or if your horse is a little more than what you can handle sometimes, try these two methods. I teach it to my students, and have had good luck with it. ...More... A better way to mount Aah sheesh, what else? Just grab the saddle and get one leg on each side and your butt in the middle. That's the purpose of the exercise. How hard can it be? But as you may have figured out already, nothing with horses is as easy as it seems and every action will have a reaction. So here is how to do it right, just in case something happens or your horse develops a bad habit. ...More... A better way to tie your horse I happened to run across this little piece of information purely by accident. ... And in the process of getting lazy, and just doing it any ole way, we started just daisy chaining the halter rope. You don't have to feed the entire rope thru every time, just a tiny loop, and it comes loose by simply pulling on the tail. I never actually thought it would stop a horse is he were very determined to pull away. But most of our horses are pretty well trained, so for a couple of years, we used the daisy chain and never had a horse test it. ...More... Common Sense Equipment Owning horses tends to eat a hole in your checkbook easy enough. Here are a few pieces of equipment that are cheap to own or make, while being good quality . I use the same saddle on almost all my horses. Naturally not all my horses have the same back, so I use a Mattress Saver Pad from Wally World to round out the difference. ...More... Need help with your own horse? Lets get together over the internet. Modern technology is wonderful and has eliminated the need to trailer your horse to expensive lessons. Individual Online Lessons are now possible!! - You can email me 2-3 minute video clips, - I respond with my own instruction videos, drills, and horsemanship instruction. - Ride by ride support using email and phone. Six weeks of Ride by Ride instruction for $50.00 (the price of one traditional lesson). All you need is a horse, a place to ride, a video camera, and internet access. No trailering, no scheduling, no belittling instructors. For more info click here. To start your individual lessons, email me and let's get started. Contact Info Julia Slater POBox 302, Dighton, KS 67839 Cell: 620.295.0241 Email: julia@slaterhorsetraining.com
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