A horse breakers secrets....

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floppit
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A horse breakers secrets....

Post by floppit » Wed Oct 14, 2009 8:36 am

Around the people I worked with you can't call yourself a horse breaker for breaking 10 horses or 20, but only when the number has long slipped your mind and only if you were paid each time. I was a horse breaker. There's almost no knowledge I've gained in life since that is more important to me than what I learned then, in fact there's only one exception that springs to mind - the world of peer reviewed journals.

I'm not a horse breaker any more, I don't even ride but I still use daily what I learned, there's nothing else I have that would ever be worth writing down - it's all written better elsewhere, but my little one is asleep, I have some time and I saw this section, temptation is a damnable thing! So here goes....

Ride Right
That would be shouted across the yard, my wage depended on my attention to it - it was shouted when anger or fear was pulling my strings, when my hands had got hard on the reins and my heels were even hidden away to avoid upset or clamped to hard in frustration. My boss would shout 'RIDE RIGHT!'. The way of riding, to hold a horse between heels and hands, is as old as the domestication of horses, it is accumulated knowledge taught and learned through decades of hard work, passed on orally but no less rich for that - it's sadly bastardised in many riding schools. Horses are trained by this accumulated knowledge and the skill of the rider to put it into practice - it is NEVER bested by a fit of temper or through panic. When hands go high cranking the horse's jaw wide open they are not as effective, the horse is not being well trained, the rider is not riding right.

So this is my first secret, the horse is trained by the riders discipline of them self not by their discipline of the horse. I use this secret daily in working with people, I pay my attention to the effectiveness of my own behaviour not theirs.

Reward Effort
Effort is a behaviour in itself, it is the seen part, the material part, of the desire to achieve, that desire to achieve is the single most important thing to have grow in a young horse (people too I think) but while looking for a clean break in pace, a clear spring into canter a ridiculously speeded up trot is all too often ignored! Before the horse has learned to spring forward into canter their daft fast trotting is still an effort to move forward faster, sometimes a rather desperate effort as the rider 'asks' for canter on a corner (there's a reason for that but not important here), on the corner, in a sand school young horses are often afraid to lose their balance - especially with this new lump on their back, those first worried, super fast trots are the horse trying to comply but afraid. If the horse was not trying to comply it wouldn't speed up so clearly, yet any reader here who has spent time around a mix of riders will have seen the whip come out, the heels slap in anger, a shout - an aversive straight after the horse's effort. To miss or worse still punish effort starts a cycle of fear and anger in both horse and rider, yet I can't say I've never done it, never just missed it completely, never been so focused on my perspective I'd forgotten the horse's completely. I have see to meet a rider for any length of time without seeing the same mistake - and I have known some brilliant riders - olympic riders.

My second secret is that a rider must remind themself constantly to see and reward effort, to be aware when they've missed it and take responsibility. I remind myself of this most days with my child.

The Myth 'You Must Always Win'
This is rife, countless horses in a muck sweat and riders beyond tears and temper in exhausted despair, things dragged out to the point of mutual exhaustion and not so much a victory as a foul half defeat. The myth that the horse must never win, that all will be lost if the horse realises it can win, that it will no longer cooperate, that it will fight harder the next day, that the rider MUST, and I mean MUST, win destroys the thinking and reasoning of riders - it turns them into idiots unable to realise what they are doing doesn't work so doing more of it won't work either! While the previous two points are really hard to cure, a lifetime's work with only partial success - this one is easy, all it takes is to know deep down that you don't have to win every battle with a horse, sometimes it's just because the rider has picked the wrong battle, sometimes because the horse if off colour, sometimes because the rider is off colour. The fights between horse and rider aren't 'The Point' they are noise and disruption,'The Point' is to develop the times when both work together. If a rider loses EVERY battle but never forgets to reward each effort, never forgets to discipline their own riding so that they don't upset things by clumsy over reaction - the horse will still 'come right', mind you when the rider does the above battles are more often short lived anyway, and mostly go the rider's way!

My third secret is if something isn't working stop it, do something else then put the horse away while you give more time to thinking WHY it wasn't working. I only wish I could grasp this, or even see it sometimes in arguments with people, it is the easiest thing to learn with a horse, yet it's still the thing I find hardest with people - I mean, to leave conflict alone while I think when things aren't working.

OK - maybe there's not that many secrets, at least the 3 above have been the most precious and useful to me.
"Whatever it is, it spits and it goes 'WAAARGHHHHHHHH' - that's probably enough to suggest you shouldn't argue with it." Mousy.

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Re: A horse breakers secrets....

Post by charlou » Fri Oct 16, 2009 4:49 am

Ah, this has been up for a few days, and I've only just come across it ...


A very interesting read, floppit, and I agree that the things we learn and the skills we develop from our interests and daily activities can be and very often are reflected in a more general way in our world view and how we perform in life ... Nurture, in it's broadest sense, being the primary motivator ... ;)
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Re: A horse breakers secrets....

Post by FBM » Fri Oct 16, 2009 5:34 am

I've spend many hours since childhood on the back of horses, but never developed any appreciable riding skill. It's always been a mystery to me, even though I can get trained horses to go where I want. There's always more struggle than cooperation, and I know it's due to my lack of skill, not the horses'. Thanks for the insights, floppit!
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Re: A horse breakers secrets....

Post by floppit » Fri Oct 16, 2009 7:16 am

I never became a brilliant rider, I wasn't endowed with much talent, nor amazing balance or confidence - I seriously lost my bottle a couple of times which took a lot of work and desire to get over. Where I was really lucky was in not having money, in turn that meant to do it at all I had to pull all the stops out and was always in the position where my 'teachers' were free to criticise VERY openly. After 7 yrs of riding about 5 horses a day for a job, horses that changed week by week and that were only there because owners could not do the job themselves, I got to a passable professional standard pretty much by discipline and willingness to work 80 hr weeks of hard labour. I was also very lucky to work in a fantastic yard for an extremely talented boss who attracted horses from the top riders in the country. At my peak I could break almost any horse, between me and my boss we broke EVERY horse sent regardless of their previous sins. I also regularly rode competition stallions - not bad for a back street kid that started out legging it to hold the rag bone pony while the scrappers bought their paper.

I was very good on the ground though, standing on my own feet and using just my head I actually mustered something approaching talent. Below is a horse I bought very cheap because her owners wanted her in our yard, she's 3 yrs old and loose schooling. I had her so 'sweet' that she loved it and would start to jump the moment the fences were put up - I'm the only one in the school with her and I was taking the photo!
Image

This is less impressive - me riding the same horse at 4 in her first X country:
Image

It is without doubt the thing I'm most proud of.
"Whatever it is, it spits and it goes 'WAAARGHHHHHHHH' - that's probably enough to suggest you shouldn't argue with it." Mousy.

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Re: A horse breakers secrets....

Post by charlou » Fri Oct 16, 2009 8:57 am

Wow, great pics, floppit - your riding skill looks pretty darn good. I admire anyone who can handle just about any horse they come into contact with. :cheers:
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Re: A horse breakers secrets....

Post by Sisifo » Fri Oct 16, 2009 9:45 am

Beautiful pics, and an even more motivating story. I have almost zero experience with horses (only in romerías http://files.publico.es/resources/archi ... andedn.jpg) I've been more in camelback than horseback, but horses have something that make you feel good (camels have something that makes you want a shower). I'm jealous of your skill and experiences.
And of you too, Charlou, having the opportunity of riding daily...

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Re: A horse breakers secrets....

Post by floppit » Fri Oct 16, 2009 1:32 pm

Charlou wrote:Wow, great pics, floppit - your riding skill looks pretty darn good. I admire anyone who can handle just about any horse they come into contact with. :cheers:
I was passable a a pro horse breaker but not really over poles compare that picture to this one:
http://www.daniellefarnsworth.co.uk/ima ... _page1.jpg You can see she almost defies gravity where as my weight hangs over the horse's shoulders. On the upside I don't snatch the bit and the horse is well trained for a 4 yr old facing her first solid fences. I wasn't all bad just not any kind of supremo!
"Whatever it is, it spits and it goes 'WAAARGHHHHHHHH' - that's probably enough to suggest you shouldn't argue with it." Mousy.

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Re: A horse breakers secrets....

Post by Animavore » Fri Oct 16, 2009 1:34 pm

I was never on a horse in my life.
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Re: A horse breakers secrets....

Post by floppit » Fri Oct 16, 2009 1:46 pm

Animavore, I thought in Ireland everybody rides? (Joke!). Irish horse and horsemen are excellent though, the dealers are even better at their job. Every time my boss would go to Ireland he'd swear not to buy a horse, in Blighty he was immune to the hardest of nagsmen's sales pitches but as he crossed the Irish sea something would happen, something I suspect involved whiskey or beer!

The last time I remember him making a trip he came back rather sheepish and admitting he did (again) buy a horse. He wouldn't tell us much about it except that it could jump, really jump - still, he was a long way off proud. Eventually delivery day arrived and my boss told me I might be a little surprised. The horse was called 'Squirrel' and watching him descend the horse box ramp was somewhat jaw dropping. Squirrel was HUGE, I mean HUGE, 18h 3" - sort of makes your average Police horse look like a beach donkey! No wonder the bloody thing could jump, you'd never get him round a course but he could jump! Squirrel stayed with us for some time - years! Eventually he found his match but I can't remember who it was that took Squirrel off our hands. He was thankfully a good soul, somewhat merciful as you'd need a parachute falling off him!

As far as I know my old boss has never since travelled to Ireland without leaving his plastic behind!
"Whatever it is, it spits and it goes 'WAAARGHHHHHHHH' - that's probably enough to suggest you shouldn't argue with it." Mousy.

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Re: A horse breakers secrets....

Post by Animavore » Fri Oct 16, 2009 1:49 pm

There's loads of horse clubs around here. I just don't like them. They freak me out.
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Re: A horse breakers secrets....

Post by tattuchu » Fri Oct 16, 2009 1:57 pm

Ah, cool. My sis, before her accident, was into training horses. She was going through this Parelli training course. Seemed to be pretty effective. When I'm not at work, I'll have to read through your original post properly.
I love horses. We had a couple when I was very young, and ever since I've been a "horse person." At the farm where my sis kept her Quarterhorse, there was a magnificent Percheron. I wanted him so bad :cry: It broke my heart every time I saw him because he was neglected. His beautiful white coat (with sliver-grey accents) was always dirty. Nobody ever cleaned or brushed him. So I would, and I also gave him apples. He was very skittish, though, poor thing. This enormous brilliantly strong animal was actually afraid of people :( I have a feeling he had been abused, or at least mistreated. It was a shame. f I had the money, I would have bought him and cared for him myself. But, alas, I did not :( :(
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Re: A horse breakers secrets....

Post by floppit » Fri Oct 16, 2009 2:23 pm

Did you have to mention percherons? This thread is going to be fatal! A Percheron:
Image Ok - it's a big one but it helps with the story!

When we had stallions at stud we used to get 2 percheron mares every summer to an Irish Draught stallion (no idea why - not exactly a sublime mix!). Mary and Jane were inseparable, literally, inseparable. You put them in a field and they'd walk straight through the fencing, they took a jaunt round the local golf course which was the last time they were turned out during their stay. You couldn't stable them apart either or one or the other would simply walk straight through the door - they didn't even bonk alone, both had to go into the covering pen and as they came into season at the same time we had one hell of a job with the stallion!

The only thing we could get to work was to shoehorn them both into the same stable - it looked ridiculous and there was certainly no room to clean them, for that they returned (together) to the covering pen which was fenced with railway sleepers. Every year Mary and Jane would arrive, travelled loose together in a super large wagon, led by their very elderly gentleman owner - of course after the first year they had foals at foot but luckily the yard had moved and we had a double sized foaling box which all 4 would inhabit during their stay. We never did find out how the hell the old man managed.



Separating mares from foals for the former to be covered is chaotic at the best of times, separating 2 percheron mares from 2 half bred percheron foals in a stable nowhere near large enough is not a job I would ever want to have to do again!
"Whatever it is, it spits and it goes 'WAAARGHHHHHHHH' - that's probably enough to suggest you shouldn't argue with it." Mousy.

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