How to lunge a horse

If you want to learn how to lunge a horse, don’t use a round yard; your horse will simply run round and round the fence without learning anything. To lunge a horse, start in a twenty foot square yard with a plain headstall and lead rope on your horse. Teach him to walk a circle … Read more

Respect and Desensitisation

I recently watched a video of a trainer trying to handle a horse’s legs. The horse was seven years old and kicked quite badly when anyone  attempted to pick up his hind legs. The trainer was obviously frightened of being kicked, so he flapped a rope around the horse’s legs to ‘desensitise him’. Though the horse kicked … Read more

Give the Flap the Flick

When you ride your horse, many trainers would have you believe that the biggest problems to overcome are plastic bags blowing in the wind, umbrellas suddenly opening and a world covered in plastic tarps. The first thing these trainers do is frighten young horses with plastic bags, flags, tarps, umbrellas and goodness knows what else. … Read more

Whoa Boy, Whoa

When a horse pulls back, the first thing someone does is yell ‘Whoa boy, whoa’. When a horse bucks or takes fright you hear the same thing, ‘Whoa, boy, whoa’. When a horse falls or becomes tangled in a fence, you hear it again, ‘Whoa, whoa, settle down’. You’ve probably heard this a thousand times. … Read more

Teach Your Horse to Enjoy a Head Rub

People often say “but my horse doesn’t like having his head rubbed”. I know this is true in many cases. No horse likes having his head rubbed when he’s first handled. Every horse will be worried when your hand first comes near his head and ears. If a horse doesn’t like having his head rubbed, … Read more

For Horses’ Sake, Keep it Simple

Over the years, I’ve always read everything I could lay my hands on about horses and horse training. Many authors make horse training sound very complicated. Sometimes I can’t make head nor tail of the complicated explanations of how and why horses do certain things. Countless books and articles talk in depth about the anatomy … Read more