Julie Goodnight On the Road

Back to Business as Usual

2009-11-09T12:52:00.001-07:00

Well, sort of. Gradually my life is getting back to normal. In fact, I even rode my horse yesterday. It was a beautiful Indian Summer day, which can only be appreciated in the high mountains of Colorado after two feet of snow in October. The arena was perfect after the snow melt soaked the footing and then it was fluffed up to a perfect consistency by Rich—like brand new carpet. I love riding in freshly groomed arenas—it’s quite enlightening when you analyze your tracks and try to ride perfect lines.

I have only ridden my horse a few times in the past 10 weeks (when I was at the clinic at C Lazy U) but he was really good. Rich was riding his horse, Diggs, for the first time in about eight weeks; he’s been laid off after having some joint soreness. It’s great to have horses that you can saddle up after a long lay-off and not miss a lick. Temperament, training and a lot of wet saddle blankets account for that.

Dually was not super “in-tune”, at least not the same kind of tune that would come with regular riding. But he did everything I asked him and tried hard, so what more could I ask? It was great to be back in the saddle and we had good fun.

I have been able to spend more time in the office over the past few days, getting some writing done and getting organized. We’re working hard to finalize my clinic tour for next year—the dates and locales are set and most of the details are finalized. The schedule is set on the website and lots of people are taking advantage of our early bird specials and getting big discounts for both riders and spectator tickets.

Hunter continues to get stronger every day and we are certain of a full recovery; now it’s just a matter of time. He requires less and less care from me, but is always happy for me to fix him something to eat—at least six times a day. Moms love doing that.

Enjoy the ride!

Julie

Thank God We're Home Again!

2009-11-04T16:38:00.001-07:00

It’s been a long six weeks. After 38 days of being at the hospital all day, crying, hoping, praying, laughing, crying, being frustrated, crying, and begging, it was good to get home! Of course, he was released (last Wednesday) in the middle of a raging blizzard so we were stuck in Denver, but the next day we drove the 150 miles in 4WD to get home.

As most of you know by now, my son Hunter was in a near-fatal motorcycle accident on September 20^th and suffered a severe traumatic brain injury and extensive facial fractures. Now, six and a half weeks later, it is no less than miraculous how well he is doing. He is living here at home with Rich and I and he is getting stronger every single day. Although it will probably be a long time before Hunter is able to go home and work and drive, we are thrilled with his progress. Right now the big mission is to get Hunter stronger physically—he lost 25 pounds he couldn’t afford to lose while in the hospital and you can only imagine what 6 weeks in bed would do to your stamina. He has only been eating by mouth for a few days now and is still dealing with a lot of pain. In another two weeks he should be free of the stomach tube and the extensive hardware in his mouth (used to rebuild his now-titanium face).

Unfortunately, this current mission does not bode well for my five-pound challenge. I have never bought and fixed such fattening food in such copious amounts in my life. Everything I make is now high-calorie and the highest possible fat content. If I can, I add even more fat than the recipe calls for. And then, of course, if he does not eat it, well… I hate to waste it! Oh boy.

It’s been really hard to get back into a regular routine since we’ve been home. It’s sort of like waking up one day, at the age of 50 (when life starts getting really good), to find you suddenly have a toddler in the house. But please don’t misunderstand me, Hunter is not in any way acting like a toddler mentally, but taking care of a very sick person is quite time consuming! My time is not my own anymore and I find myself scrambling to find time to answer emails, get a run in or take a rare soak in the hot tub. I imagine many of you have had similar experiences. How’d you do it? Any words of wisdom?

In spite of my whining, I feel like things are getting back to normal, slowly but surely for me. I am ready to get back to work, start thinking and writing about horses and maybe even riding one. Who knows, maybe I’ll go clean a few stalls and really get my mind sorted out. Expect more from me now.

Best,

Julie

Days Turn Into Weeks

2009-10-09T17:09:00.001-06:00

It’s hard to believe it has been almost three weeks since my son’s motorcycle accident. I have been at the hospital all day every day and although at times each minute seems like an eternity, at other times I cannot believe it has already been 20 days. My life has turned upside-down and I am looking forward to some sense of normalcy returning. But every time I think of complaining, I think of what Hunter is enduring with stoic bravery.

Hunter had major surgery last Saturday to rebuild his very broken face. It took 10 hours and the results are remarkable. Other than some bruising and swelling and a not-so-pretty scar that goes ear-to-ear, his face looks fantastic. The maxillofacial specialist, Dr. Daniel Esposito, and his team did incredible work. He showed me the post-surgery CT scan and although he face is full of titanium plates and screws, it is beautifully symmetrical. Hunter’s jaw will be wired shut for another week, then rubber bands after that. As long as he still has his jaws wired, he’ll need to stay on a trach, to protect access to his airway.

Although Hunter has struggled all week to climb out of the anesthesia and drug-induced fog he has been in, today he is beginning to see some clear sky. They down-sized his trach today so that he is able to talk around it—although it is hard and very tiring for him. The good news is that he is able to put together words and sentences—no easy feat for a brain-injured patient.

In the next few days, we are hoping that Hunter will be moved from the ICU to the neuro floor. From there, he’ll move on to re-hab and I am hopeful that it will go well. He’s a very strong, brave and determined guy.

Hunter has received many kind cards every day, both from friends that are familiar to us and some that only know us through this blog or the TV show. In all cases, they mean a lot to both Hunter and me and I am very touched by your kindness, your stories and your encouragement. A very kind soul even sent me several books on coping with brain injury and I have been devouring them. Thank you so much.

I yearn to be at home again with my husband and my dogs at my side. I miss the smell of horses and the sweet sound of them chewing on hay. I miss watching them romp and play during their morning turnout and the sound of their beckoning at feed time. I know that day will come soon, when I get to go home. Next week, in fact, when I leave Hunter in the capable hands of my sister, nurse Cathy, while I go home to get my horse and gear and head up to Granby, CO, to teach a clinic—the yoga and riding retreat. If I ever needed yoga, it’s now! I can’t wait to sit on a horse again.

I have managed to get some writing done and work on the promotion for the release of my new saddles by Circle Y which are debuting this month. My newsletter will be out soon—working on these things has been a blessed distraction.

Until next time,

Julie

The Longest Week of My Life

2009-09-30T15:21:00.001-06:00

Shortly after I last wrote in my blog, I got the phone call that every mother dreads and my personal nightmare began. My 22 year old son, Hunter, lost control of his motorcycle at high speed and slammed face first into a retaining wall. Although he had recently promised me he always wore his helmet, this time he didn’t, probably because he was making a short trip and was close to home.

With excellent care on the scene and life-flight to Denver’s St. Anthony Central Hospital, one of the top neuro-trauma centers in the country, miraculously my son survived. He has a massive brain injury and every bone in his face is badly broken, but he has survived and is on the long road to recovery. Other than his head, he has few injuries.

After nine days in a coma, he woke up yesterday and began responding appropriately to questions. He cannot speak yet because there is a tube in his throat (necessary for the facial reconstruction he will have in a few days). Last night I slept soundly for the first time after Hunter mouthed the words “I love you mom,” to me.

Today he is even more awake; beginning to respond to verbal commands to lift two fingers, lift your right leg, etc.; still nodding yes and no appropriately. Today he wrapped his arms around me and gave me a big bear hug and slapped a big fat kiss on my cheek. He’s sleeping more than he is awake right now, but that is to be expected.

It’s amazing how your life can change with one phone call and how different your perspective is once something like this has happened. Before the call, I was stressing about work, the next clinic, how I was going to get every thing done, how I was going to find time to ride my horse. All of that has changed now. I am just focused on the present—not the future—not the past. Hunter is strong and stubborn and a real fighter; I know he is going to be fine.

I have had tremendous support in this ordeal from my family, my incredible friends and the awesome people that work for me (who are also dear friends). For that I am so grateful. I am fine and I will be carrying on as usual soon, making all of my planned trips this fall and through the winter. Sorry to those of you who I had to cancel on last weekend—I’ve never had to do that before but it couldn’t be helped.

If you’d like to do something, you could send a get well card to Hunter (nothing else allowed in ICU), so that I can read them to him and put them up on the wall. Hunter Goodnight, Rm 211, St Anthony Central, 4231 W 16^th Ave, Denver CO 80204.

Thank you so much for your thoughts and prayers,

Julie

FW: Horseshoes and Corkscrews

2009-09-20T19:22:00.001-06:00

I’ve spent the past week in northern California wine country. There were ten of us living together, wining and dining together and riding through the California country side. Our group represented the whole equestrian ball of wax, from sea to shining sea. From the New York City financial district, to the Florida beaches, from the Pennsylvania horse country to the austere red rocks of the four corners to the southern California high life. My dear friend Lucy and I firmly held down the middle of the country, being from the Rocky Mountains of Colorado.

We also represented all walks of horse-life. Some closely aligned with the professional end of the industry, some on the upswing of their competitive riding careers, some who have taken up horses late in life, some in it all their lives. And then there were the blessed husbands who without the undying dedication to their wives, would probably stay back at the lodge and watch football—or skip the riding and go straight to the wine tastings.

In spite of the variances between us and the intimacy we shared for six days, we all got along great and had a fabulous week together—learning about wine and horses, exploring the rugged and adventurous hillsides of Lake County CA, and getting to know each other like only people that live eat, breathe, sleep and ride together 24/7 can.

We came together as a group in stages on the first day, some of us beginning at the San Francisco airport, some met us on the first winery stop (narrated tour of a “bio-dynamic” vineyard in the Sonoma Valley, Benzigers Family Winery http://www.benziger.com/), while others caught up with us at the end of the day at the lodge—some 3 ½ hours north of San Fran. Sitting atop a mountain overlooking Clear Lake (the largest lake in CA) and the Lake County wine country (which also produces copious crops of Bartlett pears and wild rice), the lodge was a comfy and luxurious place to call home over the next six days. Everyone arrived with newly purchased wine from our various tastings along the way and dinner was an excellent affair, as we began to explore the differences and commonalities between us.

The next morning, after a leisurely breakfast, we headed down to the barn which sat two miles below the lodge at the foot of the mountain. It was a little chaotic that first morning as 10 of us sorted through the herd of 15 horses to find the best match for each rider. That first ride around the ranch was a real shake down cruise and we switched horses like musical chairs. After a decadent lunch at the lodge, we hit the road (horses in trailers and the group in the 12 passenger van) for our first half-day’s ride along the levees surrounded by orchards, wet lands and sheep farms. By the end of the ride, most of us were beginning to gel with our horses and some were staking claim on their mounts for the week. I think a couple of the guys would’ve let their horses sleep in their room back at the lodge, if we could’ve gotten them up the steep mountain.

When our first day’s ride ended we all piled into the van and headed to the little village of Upper Lake for a tasting at a wine-room, which represented many of the area vineyards. Not being a huge wine drinker myself, I sort of went along for the ride and tasted whatever the others selected. As would turn out to be the pattern for the whole week, we came back to the lodge for a relaxing evening with a few bottles of wine that someone in our group had selected for dinner. Socializing around the fireplace on the deck, watching the incredible views as the sun set, we relished the day.

Over dinner that night, we took turns going around the table and saying what each person would like to get out of the week. It was interesting that no one mentioned wine tasting or trail riding in their lists of wants. Instead, each rider stated specifics goals and horsemanship skills to master. It was clear to me as I drafted a lengthy list of the “workshops” I wanted to do, that although this was intended as a vacation week, everyone wanted to throw some work in there too, even the dutiful husbands who were supposedly along for the ride.

The next morning, we spent extra time at the lodge in an in-depth discussion about horse behavior and the human relationship. This is always very revealing to people, from the novices to the very experienced, as they ponder horse behavior and reflect on their previous encounters.

Next we headed out for a trail ride, with visions of herd life floating through everyone’s minds as 14 of us road through the CA countryside. After the ride we had a late lunch, sampling some local wines in lieu of a separate stop at a winery—leaving us enough time to head back to the lodge for a much needed cat nap before dinner.

The third day we spent the whole day at a nearby training farm, punching through the lengthy list of things people wanted to work on. I did a round pen demon on a young a wily TN Walker. We did lead-line work and explored various ground handling techniques for relaxing, soothing and restraining horses. After lunch we split into small groups for some private coaching, checking off the list from position improvements to confidence and control to flying lead changes.

After a hard but satisfying day, we headed to another biodynamic winery, Ceago Vinegarden http://www.ceago.com/ for a private tasting, sitting out in an exquisite courtyard overlooking the lavender fields rimming Clear Lake. Over rare cheeses and dried fruits, we sipped a variety of fine wines from an extensive menu. We laughed, toasted and teased, and relished in our successes of the day while drinking in this magnificent setting. This was the pivotal moment of the week when we went from being a group to becoming a family.

The next day, we had a fabulous ride across a 4300 acre ranch and winery, eating lunch out on the trail and riding back to the tasting room of the Six Sigma Ranch, where the owner and his son guided us through various bottles, including some as yet unreleased and coveted Pinot Noirs. As the horses departed in the trailers, we tasted a variety of wines in the shade of the oaks trees, donned in our dirty and sweaty riding clothes.

On the way home in the van that evening, we made a short stop at another winery—one of my favorites-- http://www.steelewines.com/ . Back at the lodge, we cleaned up and reconvened on the magnificent deck in our lounge clothes and talked over the highlights of the day before another lovely dinner. Our fourth day under our belts, with each successive night, we went to bed earlier and awoke later.

The fifth day was our final day of riding and I think we may have all agreed that the fourth day was the best. Both the horses and riders were tired and sore and all were happy to cut the day’s ride short and head in to the village of Upper Lake for a lovely lunch at the Blue Wing Saloon, an historical recreation rife with character. Our final night together was a roller coaster ride with heartfelt celebration, mixed emotions, poignant reminiscing and last minute in-depth conversations. The next morning we all packed our wine, exchanged contact info and hugged and kissed over breakfast as we all headed our separate ways to each corner of the country.

No doubt, we will all stay in touch for some time to come and for sure, we’ll all remember our adventure astride in the CA wine country.

Enjoy the ride,

Julie

Six More Episodes in the Can

2009-09-18T19:13:00.000-06:00

Once again, it’s been a marathon the last couple of weeks, although I’d be a fool to complain about it. The week of September 10^th, we were quite busy filming six new episodes of the TV show—Horse Master. We film at my place once a year and it’s always much easier for me than shoots on the road. Nothing like sleeping in your own bed each night. Plus, having total control over the facility and not having to travel to the location each morning before sun-up and eat every meal in restaurants, makes life much easier.

This shoot was for the first six episodes that will air in 2010, starting in January. This was our 9^th shoot since the show’s inception and I have to say, we have really gotten good at this. When I think back to the chaos of our first shoot, compared to now, it’s easy to see how much we have progressed. The shoots are arduous, at best; filming literally from first light to last light—completing six episodes in three days—working with six different horse and rider combinations to help them accomplish their goals and resolve their issues.

We always celebrate after the end of the shoot at our “wrap party.” This time there was lots of laughter and reminiscing and we always use this time to brainstorm on the titles of the shows and what show we think will turn out to be the best episode of the shoot. We had so much fun decompressing (while having dinner at our favorite Mexican restaurant in town) that a lady actually came over to our table on her way out of the restaurant to tell us how much she enjoyed listening to our laughter.

We unanimously agreed that the best episode, which we titled, “You Can’t Make Me Do That!”, was a mare who adamantly refused to cross a tarp. Not because she was afraid of it (clearly), but because she had been to a week-long trail obstacle clinic where they fought with her all week long and never successfully got her over the tarp. That’s a lot of success on her part that was hard to overcome. She had clearly learned that all she had to do was sull-up and fight and she would never have to step foot on that stinking tarp. So there. You can’t make me do that.

Using the most classic principles of natural horsemanship, I set about to convince the mare that the right thing would be easy and the wrong thing would be hard—her choice. Every time she refused to step up to the tarp (by backing up in a tantrum) I would pull her to the side and work the patooti out of her—hard trot, constantly changing direction until she was huffing and puffing a blue streak. Then I would present her to the tarp and as long as she had forward interest in the tarp, I would let her stand and rest. The instant she was defiant and refused, back to work we went.

This seemed like a good plan, but an hour into it, with the sunlight fading, I was beginning to wonder if I could out last her. Meanwhile, my film crew were saying silent prayers as they stood and watched. But staying the course almost always pays with horses, unless the course is flawed to begin with. At an hour and 22 minutes, the mare finally relented and walked calmly over the tarp. Then she did it 6-8 more times without hesitation. As is typical, once she made up her mind, she was perfectly willing to walk over the tarp. I put the owner back on her and she marched obediently over the tarp several more times.

The next morning during practice (we always give the riders time off-camera to practice what they have learned before we wrap the show), the mare put up a fight again, but only for about 10 minutes. When it was time to film the wrap-up, she refused the tarp once, did a few minutes of hard stuff, then marched over it like a trooper.

She was a tough nut to crack, but in the end, she agreed that the fight was not worth it. We had five other great episodes in this shoot, including two shot with Dale Myler—one of the world’s foremost experts on bits. A young dressage prospect and a very frustrated western horse made dramatic progress by making them more comfortable in their mouths so that they could think and learn. It’s amazing the turn-around you can make in horses with small but meaningful changes.

It was one of our most successful shoots ever and I am so thankful to my incredible crew and all the horses and riders that joined us. After a hard week of filming, I jumped a plane to San Francisco for a week of riding with newfound friends in California’s premier wine country. More about that next time.

Enjoy the ride,

Julie

Good Medicine

2009-09-03T11:09:00.001-06:00

On many occasions, I have written about the high-test, high-maintenance qualities of my horse Dually. He’s about as cool a horse as I’d hope to ever own and he’s my 4^th “horse of a lifetime”—the third one, my old Morgan mare is enjoying semi-retirement down the road at a friend’s barn. I’ve been lucky that way in my life, but then again I’ve had a lot of horses in the last 50 years, so undoubtedly, a few of them have been great horses. Have you been blessed yet with your horse of a lifetime?

Dually is a purebred quarter horse, bred for cow work (Peppy San Badger/Doc O’lena) with a very kind, willing and sensitive temperament and keen mentality. Most of the time he is extremely calm and mellow but he is actually very “hot-blooded.” By definition, a hot blooded horse is one that is highly sensitive to environmental stimuli. That’s ALL stimuli: touch, sounds, movement, weather, odors, even a slight shift in your body language.

Have you ever had the joy of riding a horse that is so sensitive that all you have to do is just think about a cue and the horse picks it up? Often sensitive horses tend to be forward horses as well. Lazy horses tend to be insensitive and require a lot more pressure to motivate them, although this is a generality. For the sensitive forward horse, you just think canter; don’t even think about using your legs. These horses can be a real joy to ride, but can also be a bad combination for a novice rider whose cues are inexact.

But with that sensitivity and willing temperament, there is a price to pay. Many of these horses, Dually included, are hard keepers, easy colickers, prone to ulcers with sensitive digestive tracts. Dually was a fit but thin 6 year old when I bought him three years ago and has been a very hard keeper ever since, eating buckets of expensive grain, not great for his high-test personality but a must to try and keep weight on. He rarely finished his grain and never his hay. He had frequent bouts of what I fondly referred to as “the vapors.” Off feed, laying down, depressed, but not exactly colicking. A hit of banamine or a trailer ride always snapped him out of it, but still it was always a concern, and seemed to happen most when I was out of town.

Enter Proviable, a probiotic powder made by Nutramax Labs to promote hind-gut health; new on the market this spring. I think I had one of the very first bottles off the shelf, and I started Dually on it right away, along with the Proviable paste as a booster for the first few days. Within a week, I noticed a difference in Dually’s appetite and he began to polish off his grain at the same time the other horses did, practically licking his pan. Within two months Dually was gaining so much weight I cut his grain ration in half. He now looks more like the stocky QH he is bred to be instead of skinny and lanky and he is maintaining his weight on a normal grain ration.

Dually has been on Proviable for six months now and in that time he’s had only one minor bout of the vapors while he was with me at a clinic earlier this summer. Since then I have taken to boosting him with Proviable paste when we are on the road and his stress level might be greater and he hasn’t had a problem since. I can’t for sure attribute all these great changes in my high-maintenance horse to Proviable, but it seems that for a horse like mine, Proviable is a god-send.

Have you or do you have a hard-keeping horse like Dually? I recently gave some Proviable paste to a woman I met with a barrel racing TB who reminded me a lot of Dually. I am eager to hear how he does. Nutramax also came to our rescue with Proviable for dogs for Rich’s lab puppy who was instantly cured of her long-term and serious diarrhea which had not responded to any other standard treatment. But I’ll save that story for another time.

Enjoy the ride!

Julie

For training tips from Julie, visit the Training Library at http://juliegoodnight.com/q&a.php and check out her online store--full of training tools and DVDs-- at http://juliegoodnight.com/products.html

Asking for More

2009-08-26T14:02:00.001-06:00

What are your expectations of your horse? Do you expect him to be lazy and have to be cued repeatedly until spanked every time you ask him to trot? Do you expect him to stand still on a totally loose rein when you mount? Do you expect him to go around the arena star-gazing and hollowed out in his neck and back? Do you expect him to stand patiently and wait when you ask?

One thing I know about horses is that they will give you no more than you ask for. A good horse will give you no less than what you ask for, but he has to be motivated to give you more. Depending on your horse’s temperament, he may try really hard all the time—almost to a fault (this is my horse Dually) or he may only try harder under threat of major penalty.

You may think it is best to have the former—the try-hard superstar horse, but in actuality people get in far less trouble with the horses that don’t try too hard. For many people, a horse that questions you every now and then, “are you sure you want to do that?”, is not a bad thing. I learned some time ago to be very careful who I let sit on Dually because if you over-cue him, say, to canter, you’d better hang onto your hat because he will be in the next county before you can blink.

But in spite of Dually’s try-hard die-hard attitude in life, sometimes I don’t ask enough of him and, as Terry Wegener said to me recently, I am just too nice to him. But gosh Terry, he tries so hard…. But the more I ask of him the more he gives me and the more I get after him, the harder he tries and the harder he tries, the better he performs. It’s a shame I don’t have the time in my schedule to show him but I sure have a blast riding him.

Our Horse Master episode called Private Lesson is about a lovely woman in her 60s that has ridden all of her life, so she’s pretty good. But she’s never had formal lessons of any kind (I cannot imagine that!). Her horse is a bit lazy, although compliant—a great horse for her. This episode is about how to ask for more from her horse—for him to round his frame and engage his hocks a little and hold himself in the requested frame.

For the most part, we all need to ask more from our horses, at times. More obedience, more responsiveness, more focus and effort when they are working. For those try-hard horses, we have to be careful not to over-tax them emotionally and physically—although these Ferrari-type horses are awesome, they are high-maintenance machines that break down frequently. But the average horse only tries as hard as your leadership and authority demands and will only rise to your level of expectation.

What kind of horse do you have, try hard or not so hard? Are your expectations (not in your dreams but in what you expect to happen each time you ride) too high or too low?

Enjoy the ride,

Julie

Clinic Marathon

2009-08-24T11:30:00.001-06:00

After two weeks on the road and nine days of clinics, I am glad to be home from a busy and successful trip. We started the marathon with Rich and I at a ranch horse clinic/competition here in the Colorado high-country at Old Cowtown (replica old west town/resort) http://oldcowtown.net/ where we rode with two of my favorite trainers, Mike Majors (AQHA Versatility world champion) and Blue Allen (reined cowhorse world champion), both of Colorado. Rich and I had a fantastic time, and along with having good friends and good horses there, wining and dining and dancing the night away, it was a perfect weekend.

One day at home before we had to repack, retool and leave again, this time headed for the northeast, where we covered the great state of Massachusetts literally from one end to the other. Starting in Easthampton MA with a two-day ranch horse clinic at Heritage Farm, we had a great time with fifteen riders studying four different phases of versatility ranch horse competition: reining, trail, cowhorse and cutting. The horses and riders ranged from experienced to novice, making it a challenge to teach, but with the help of Rich and David Raucher (one of the owners of Heritage Farm) everyone worked cows at some level.

Next we headed to the far western end of the state for a horsemanship clinic at Berkshire Equestrian Center, http://berkshireequestriancenter.com/ which is one of the nicest clinic facilities I have worked out of. The clinic was excellent—all the horses were great and the riders had a great time learning and improving. In addition to the lovely equestrian facility, they also have a distinguished country inn with quaint and luxurious accommodations and exquisite breakfast. I’ll be doing more clinics there next year and we are thinking about some riding and yoga retreats there for the future. Let me know if that’s something that would interest you.

Since the first ranch horse clinic at Heritage Farm filled so quickly and without any promotion, we scheduled a second clinic—this would have to be Monday-Tuesday to accommodate my schedule. In spite of the tough days, this clinic filled too, showing the interest in the northeast for this type of training. With another 16 riders we worked again through the phase of this competition. Everyone left the clinic knowing what skills they must develop and the challenges they must face to train for these demanding and varied disciplines. As with most things, it always boils down to fundamentals—stop straight, move off the leg, have good body control over your horse. If you have good body control of your horse, you can master these disciplines quickly; and if your horse is cowy, you’ll really succeed in this particular sport.

After six days in a row of teaching clinics, Rich and I headed to the south coast of MA and caught a late ferry to Martha’s Vineyard for some much needed R&R. We spent three days relaxing with friends and enjoying the island life. This was Rich’s first trip to the northeast and he got to see quite a lot of it! We had a glorious day out on a fishing boat with our friends, followed by a lovely get together with cast members from the Horse Master shows we filmed there. Rich and I played tourist for half a day then we had a lovely picnic dinner on the beach with friends, eating fresh lobster and quahog clams. As our hosts predicted, the beach went from a total zoo to empty at about 5:00 and we had the beach to ourselves all evening until the dark and cold ushered us in.

On our final day on the island, we had fun at the county fair eating fantastic fair food and watching the draft horse pull. It was a little cool and blustery for the beach, as hurricane Bill approached. As we were ending our trip, the island was gearing up for the arrival of President Obama and his family. Regardless of politics, residents seemed excited to have the president visit and there were lots of signs of anticipation from merchants, residents and visitors alike.

It was a long journey home yesterday—17 hours of travel including ferry, car, plane, and train, leaving us both pretty exhausted. As I’ve said, one of my favorite parts of travelling is the coming home and we relished the day to hang out and rest at home. It is very fall-like today, here in the “heart of the Rockies”. We’ve already had a couple of nights in the 30s this month and the summer has been fairly cool and wet. A little dusting of snow today on the high peaks is a message to enjoy what’s left of summer (and to begin looking forward to ski season!).

Enjoy the ride,

Julie

Five Pound Challenge Update

2009-08-06T12:21:00.001-06:00

It was May 12^th that I first opened the 5 Pound Challenge up to everyone and quite a few of you signed on board. It all started with my friends Lucy and Cheryl and I, then Rich, Heidi and Brenda jumped on board and many of my friends and readers as well. We’ve all had mixed results but everyone has been successful on some level. The challenge just gave us all a reason to work a little harder.

My first five pounds, which we gave ourselves a month to lose, was pretty easy and I am very pleased that I have managed to keep that weight off. However, the second five pounds has been a bigger challenge. Actually, I’ve lost it and gained it back a dozen times but now I am holding steady at just two pounds to go for my second five pounds. Rich takes the prize and has reached the 10# mark already, but is barely hovering on that line. He’s much more self-disciplined than I am when it comes to food, but I am more religious about working out.

I was inspired by the second five pound challenge to increase my workout routine. I’ve been walking 2.6 miles every day for some time but in the last couple months I started running the 2.6 miles one day, then doing another 2.6 mile hill climb the next (we fondly refer to this as “Butt Hill”, it’s a 600 feet altitude gain in 1.3 miles, ending at 8500’ above sea level), then I run downhill. I also added a half hour evening workout three days/week (10 minute dance workouts—I love them!). While the increase in exercise hasn’t helped me lose much more weight yet, I am definitely getting fitter and I see the results in the mirror and the way my jeans fit, so I am pretty happy with that. If I can just find the right amount of exercise that would let me eat whatever I wanted (within reason), I’d be happy. Anyone found that magic formula yet?

So that’s how I am doing, how about you? Many of you have asked me about the five pound challenge over the past weeks, so now you know the scoop on me. I’d like to know how YOU are doing—those of you that joined on-- back from your honeymoon, or getting more summer exercise or staying disciplined at parties or not trying to lose weight but just get in better shape. What tricks have you found work for you and what pitfalls have you been unable to avoid?

I have to say, I feel pretty good for just turning 50. Yes, I’d like to shed a few more pounds and you can always be in better shape, but I am happy where I am and I hope you are too. But losing weight (if you need to) and getting in better shape makes us all feel better about ourselves and gives us a goal to strive for. I hope you agree!

Julie

The Great Escape

2009-08-03T10:32:00.001-06:00

This is the episode that is airing this week on Horse Master—it’s about a horse that learned to run off every time his owner longed him. It is one that stands out in my memories for many reasons. Not the least of which that this was a case of a horse that learned bad behavior, not because he was a bad or even naughty horse, but because he was simply lacking training and leadership.

Cosmo was a youngish (I think he was four) warm blood of some sort—I believe he was an Anglo-Trakehner (that part of my memory is not so keen), What struck me about him right away was that he looked like a very kind, calm and willing horse, but he acted like a total jerk. Generally a horse’s “look” (facial structure and body type) will give a pretty good indication of what he’s like; and although Cosmo was very naughty—terrible ground manners and would jerk the rope out of your hands and run off when he didn’t want to do something—he definitely did not have the look of a “bad” tempered horse.

The other interesting part of this particular horse puzzle was that his owner, Erika, was very experienced, very competent and a seasoned show competitor and fox hunter. This gal knows how to handle horses—she should’ve known better (and did). Why then, had she let Cosmo learn to be such a brat? Erika knew she had spoiled Cosmo and was an incredibly good sport on the show. All she really needed to do was step up to the plate and take control of this horse—set some rules and boundaries, punish him when he is wrong, praise him when he is good and give him consistent leadership.

In Erika’s case, she had raised Cosmo from a baby and although her other adult horses were expected to have good manners and be obedient, somehow she never got in that mode with Cosmo and he learned how to call all the shots. It wasn’t so bad when he was a little baby, but a 4 years old and 110#, not so cute. Once Erika took control, Cosmo responded beautifully—an ideal candidate for the TV show. A perfect case of the human needing to change, not the horse. Have you ever made a change in yourself or the way you handle a horse that gave you immediate results? I see it in my clinics all the time and love to see it!

It reminds me of all the hundreds of emails I have gotten from people that say they bought a nicely trained horse, only to find out a month later that the horse was seemingly not trained at all, when what has really happened is that the horse had come untrained through poor handling. People are always quick to blame the seller—he must have drugged the horse, he ripped me off, etc. But the truth is, horses thrive off leadership and authority and if you are not the leader, then he is. Few horses will voluntarily lope around the arena with you on their back, unless they have reason to believe in your authority. The good news is that if you really did go out and buy a nicely trained horse—he’s still trained—you just need to change you.

Do you know someone that is ruining a good horse from lack of authority, control or leadership? Some horses are more easily ruined than others and some require constant maintenance in this department, while others happily look up to your authority. But any horse can be messed up with poor handling. Have you ever taken a horse like this and turned him around? It’s very satisfying work!

Enjoy the ride,

Julie

The Cows are Out!

2009-07-30T12:32:00.001-06:00

After several hard day’s work at the ranch horse clinic last weekend, we gave the horses a couple days off. Rich is riding in a cutting this weekend here at the Chaffee County Fair, so Tuesday afternoon, I asked Melissa to bring the cows in from the pasture so he could work some cows that evening after work. She scoured the pasture with two different horses, combing the trees where the cows like to hide from the bugs and sun, to no avail. Four of our five heifers were gone.

We found the weak spot in the fence where they had escaped and followed their tracks for a while. I spent three hours on the four wheeler combing the property to the south where the tracks were but gave up right before dark and was chased inside by a scary thunderstorm. Not knowing how long they had been out made it tough to predict where we should look for them and darkness defeated further search; it was even too late to make phone calls.

The next morning I called our brand inspector bright and early, figuring that someone had probably spotted them, turned them into a pen and called the brand inspector. Sure enough, they were in a big center-pivot hay field about a half mile north from us. I met the farmer out on the road and he pointed out the gates and corral set up for gathering cattle, but the cows were nowhere in sight. They were hidden up in the trees, relaxing and chewing cud after enjoying the all-night, all-u-can-eat alfalfa buffet.

I headed back home to get the stock trailer and a horse. I had planned to take Dodger instead of Dually. Dodger, with more than a decade of hunting cows on a huge Texas ranch, is much better at bashing timber and thrashing through the brush hunting for cows. Dually prefers to think of himself as a show horse—leave the bugs and stumps and rocks to his hardier blue-collar cousins—the real ranch horses. But, as luck would have it, Dodger had just been turned out to belly deep pasture for his periodic opportunity to gorge himself and I didn’t want to take the time to wade through the irrigated pasture to catch him. So Dually it was!

Saddled and loaded up in the trailer, we headed for the hay field. I positioned the truck strategically to help me herd the cows in the pen, should I be so lucky as to find them and be able to drive them across the field. As luck would have it, the cows were just wandering out of the trees and into the hay field. Now that they were found, all that remained was to get them into the pen and loaded into the trailer for the quick trip home.

I hopped on Dually and turned toward the four cows, who were several hundred yards away. They took one look at Dually and me and put their heads up and high-tailed it in the other direction—to the farthest end of the narrow 80 acre field. Taking a very wide berth, I rode toward the trees where they headed and finally caught up with them, pressed up against the far fence. But as I went to gather them up and start pushing them back to the pen, I saw that one of the heifers had gone through the fence and was on the other side in another pasture. Great.

With no way to enter that pasture from where I was, the only way I could think to get her back was to drive the other cows away so she would jump it. Conveniently, that worked and before I knew it, I had all four cows headed down the fence line, marching away from me in order. Unfortunately I couldn’t keep them on the fence without ending up back in the trees, where they are much harder to line out, so we headed out across the hay field in a straight line toward the pen.

Dually shined at being a real ranch horse and kept those cows marching perfectly straight. In no time at all, we had all four cows in the pen and with Dually guarding the open gate to keep the cows in, I backed the trailer up to the alley. With Dually’s help, we coaxed, pushed and prodded the cows into the trailer and in less than an hour from saddling, we were headed home, with the escaped convicts in tow.

It’s amazing how cow horses figure out exactly what you are trying to accomplish with the cows and then take responsibility for it. Although I think Dually still prefers fluffed up arena footing over timber bashing, he was proud of himself for a job well done, and so was I. Taking a great ride and working cows was not on my agenda that morning, but I sure am glad I had the excuse to do it. And I am thankful it was a beautiful cool summer morning and not a raging blizzard—that might not have been as much fun.

Enjoy the ride!

Julie

Weekend Getaway

2009-07-27T16:42:00.001-06:00

I have never been so glad to get back in my own bed, after spending three long nights at what Rich and I both agreed was a hotel we would never stay in again, no matter what the price. And sadly, it wasn’t cheap—over $100 a night! I’ve stayed at better hotels at half the price. But in spite of our pitiful accommodations, we had a great weekend of riding, training and socializing with friends at a Versatility Ranch Horse clinic in Granby, Colorado.

Rich and I took our horses, Diggs and Dually, up to Granby Thursday night—it’s a beautiful three hour drive through the middle of the Rockies. We stalled at a private barn across the street from the clinic site so that our horses could have a real stall with a roof over their heads to ward off either rain or sun (we had both) and a soft place to lay down after a long day’s work. They were very comfy there and our friends that hosted us watched over them like they were their own. Horse people are just like that, you know?

There were 15 of us in the clinic (half full) and we split into three groups and rotated through three clinicians—any one of whom would have been great to spend the whole weekend with. Joe Wolter, http://www.joewolter.com/about.php renowned ranch horse clinician; Terry Wegener—an icon in Colorado amongst performance horse trainers; and Merritt Linke, an outstanding ranch roping clinician and the man that coached me through my first steer stop a couple years ago.

We started the first morning with Joe for ranch cutting for half a day. With a small group of five riders, it seemed like a private lesson—especially given that all five of us were already good friends and we knew each other’s horses. We had a blast, learned a lot and our horses progressed. What more could you ask? Dually cut well the first go-around, which was a surprise since he was very fresh on cows—but in the second and third rounds his freshness eeked out. The more he is in front of cows, the more he wants to eat their lunch. On the third round he fell down on me in an over-zealous moment, but both of us were unscathed in the fall and he cut well after the incident. Just to be safe, and remembering the previous back injury that he had from an over-strenuous move, which I nursed for 9 months, I let him rest that afternoon while I audited the intermediate cutters and watched Rich rope.

On Saturday, our group moved on to Terry’s clinic on working ranch horse, which is a combination of several disciplines: reining, boxing (similar to cutting) and working cowhorse—with a single cow in the arena, the rider takes the cow down the long fence (at speed) then turns him once in each direction, then brings the cow off the fence and makes the cow circle in each direction. In some VRH competitions you have to rope and stop the cow, instead of circling; in some competitions you have a choice of roping or circling. Again, we had a blast and learned a lot and Dually smoked a couple cows. It’s the speed work he really loves—and he is built like a speed machine.

Saturday afternoon it was the rider’s choice and Dually and I spent some more time with Terry—got a private lesson in fact, working on refining our reining maneuvers. Terry rode Dually quite a bit and had a blast doing so and it was very fun for me to see my horse being ridden. Dually’s a highly sensitive and forward moving horse, so he’s not a horse you could put anyone on, so I’ve really not seen him under saddle except from on top of his back. So I got some good training, as did my horse, and I came home with a notebook full of new exercises I am going to work on with my horse. I guess that’s why you go to clinics!

On Sunday, there was a full VRH competition, but since there was not an open division, I could not enter. Which is fine, since I really just like to go out and have fun on my horse. Instead, I enjoyed sitting with the judge (Terry Wegener) and hearing his comments and scores for each horse. Rich did well on his horse but had a couple off-pattern mistakes that cost him dearly (that’s where the patience and persistence comes in). With a three hour drive home, we didn’t stick around for the awards but instead made it home in time to soak in the hot tub, order a pizza and watch our favorite line-up on HBO (we love True Blood). A fitting end to a great weekend.

There’s a lot of interest in ranch horse competition these days—all over the country. It’s been very popular in Colorado for some time, but the rest of the country is just now discovering the fun and challenge of VRH. Rich and I are headed to Massachusetts in a couple weeks where we’ll give two VRH clinics (plus a horsemanship clinic). In the VRH clinics, we will go over the four riding classes: ranch cutting, working ranch horse, ranch trail and ranch riding (kinda like a simple dressage test), and review the rules, the class procedures and work on building skills.

One of the greatest things about VRH is that you have so many different things to work on, with the two cow classes being the most challenging and the most difficult to train for. Most people don’t have the capability to work cattle at home, so you have to go somewhere for lessons or go to some cowhorse clinics (either cutting or working cow or both), and put all the components together. Even just going to a reined cowhorse show or a cutting to watch will help you learn something about the complicated disciplines.

And by the way, for those of you just getting into VRH, you should know that along with the fun and the challenge, comes the need for a great deal of patience. You can’t just get this stuff figured out in a weekend—it takes a long time for a horse and rider to hone all the skills needed for this event, but you’ll certainly have fun along the journey. If you start with a trained and experienced horse, it goes a lot quicker (and can be a lot more fun). If you’re both trying to figure out all this stuff together, it’ll take some time and persistence. But that’s true of all disciplines, isn’t it?

Enjoy the ride,

Julie

Jumping Right Into It-Teaching a Horse to Jump with Confidence

2009-07-22T14:55:00.001-06:00

This week’s episode of Horse Master is about training a horse to jump. Not that you could possibly explain how to train a horse for such a complicated activity in a half-hour TV show, but, as usual, I kept it simple. Just two things to know: low and slow.

Ashley and her OTTB (off-the-track-Thoroughbred) were both ready for this—Ashley has ridden Hunters before and is a pretty good rider, certainly good enough to start a horse over fences and she knows how to ride over jumps. And although I would’ve liked to see her horse working a little better on the flat first-- less inverted, better transitions—her gelding was steady, relaxed, willing and in control. There’s no way in the 30 minute show I can cover everything that needs addressing with the horse and the rider, so I usually try to focus on one subject, which in this case was leaving Ashley with a plan to introduce her horse to jumping over the next six months.

In this episode, we showed a progression from simple trotting poles to poles and low cavaletti to canter poles to “pile o’ poles” combinations. The whole key to training good jumpers is to take it slow and keep it low to build a solid foundation. The quickest way to ruin a horse is to just start jumping him. I hear this all the time.

People say something like, “Oh, we started jumping and he’s doing great—you should see him jump—he loves it!” Well, all horses know how to jump and do it quite well—it’s part of the flight response. Just like all horses know how to do flying lead changes—doesn’t mean they know the cue to do it under saddle. Because jumping is a natural behavior for horses and not too challenging to their athletic prowess and because most horses are obedient and willing, if you point them at a jump and say giddy-up, they’ll go over it.

This initial willingness can devolve into mistrust, fear and bad behavior. They willingly go over more and more jumps until one day they have a bad jump—which all jumpers do on occasion—then, if they’ve been rushed into jumping, their courage is totally shattered. And their trust in you is damaged too because they were doing what you asked and got hurt (or scared); therefore you betrayed him. Then the horse starts running at the jumps or running around them, bucking when he lands or just flat-out refusing to jump. Have you ever seen a horse that discouraged by jumping?

On the other hand, when a solid foundation of ground poles, cavaletti, and very low jumps is built into the horse’s training, over an extended period, he learns that poles will move and fall down, may sometimes get tangled in his legs, or trip him, that jumps look different from different directions, etc., so that when that time comes and he has a bad jump, his confidence is not totally blown. Height comes easily to horses; a solid foundation of control, cadence and balance comes low and slow.

I grew up riding jumping horses and I loved it dearly. The only thing that comes close to the thrill of jumping is doing cow work. Whenever I am around it, like on this week’s episode of Horse Master, I get the bug to do it again. But alas, I have one really nice horse in my barn that I don’t get to ride enough, and he’s definitely not a jumper. But I bet we could do it….

Enjoy the ride!

Julie

Horse Master Episodes for July and August 2009

2009-07-18T12:32:00.002-06:00

Watch Horse Master with Julie Goodnight Episodes on RFD-TV This July and August -- Then Access FREE Online Extras with Youtube, Facebook and More

Horse Buyer and Bit Problems Needed for our September, 2009 Horse Master Shoot in CO--Get Julie's help and advice as you buy your perfect horse

Summer’s an excellent time to review episodes of Horse Master with Julie Goodnight, especially those shot at Camelot Farms in South Carolina’s “low country.” At this location, Goodnight demonstrates exactly what to do for some all-too-common problems, such as keeping attention whil longeing, controlling head tossing and maintaining collection. First, watch what happens when a rebellious young horse thinks he’s in charge of the longe line, yanks it out of his owner’s hands and takes off. Goodnight shows the owner how to calmly assert her authority on the ground and build a productive relationship going forward. Next up, a Quarter Horse mare tosses her head and rides through the bit, and you may be surprised at Goodnight’s smart solution of a milder bit and softer hands. Another mystery you’ll discover is why it’s so difficult to maintain collection when it’s one of the most natural movements a horse can do. Find out Goodnight’s method that focuses on the horse’s innate instincts.

Horse Master’s RFD-TV episodes air every Wednesday at 5:30 p.m. EST (with encores airing Thursday and Saturday nights) on Direct TV channel 345, Dish Network channel 231 as well as cable outlets. See the expanded schedule below.

Free online extras:
Find out more about each episode and read FREE articles that accompany and supplement each topic at http://juliegoodnight.com (click on the Horse Master link at the top left). Goodnight’s online Training Library also contains questions answered by a pro and is free to read. If you want even more training tips and advice –and chances to win Goodnight’s DVDs and gear –join her fan club on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2357009854&ref=t and sign up for her free monthly newsletter at http://juliegoodnight.com/emailsignup.php (each newsletter edition contains at least two new training articles). Goodnight also writes about key horse keeping and training topics on her blog http://juliegoodnightontheroad.blogspot.com/and announces all through Twitter at http://twitter.com/juliegoodnight. It’s all free to you and will help you form the perfect relationship with your horse.

Schedule of RFD-TV’s Horse Master with Julie Goodnight July & August 2009
July 15, 16, 18
“Private Lesson”: The Horse Master helps an advanced rider learn to collect and ask her horse for more.
July 22, 23, 25
“Jump Into It”: The Horse Master builds confidence in a young jumper.
July 29, 20, August 1
“New Directions”: The Horse Master teaches a Rocky Mountain gaited horse to turn on the haunches.
August 5, 6, 8
“The Great Escape”: The Horse Master helps a horse owner stay in charge while longeing.
August 12, 13, 15
“Rescue and Rehab”: The Horse Master helps a once-starved horse get back in shape.
August 19, 20, 22
“A Bit Too Much”: The Horse Master changes a horse’s bit to stop head tossing, and helps the rider relax.
August 26, 27, 29
“Private Lesson”: The Horse Master helps an advanced rider learn to collect and ask her horse for more.

Be a Cast Member on Horse Master with Julie Goodnight: Bitting issues:
For the September, 2009 shoot to be held in Salida, Colorado, Goodnight will break from the usual form and work specifically with horses with bit issues. She's looking for riders with horses that have control problems under saddle for either a lack of training or poor training or riding. For example, they may toss their heads, root on the reins, throw their heads up or take hold of the bit and run off. Also, Goodnight’s looking for high-level dressage or reining horses that won’t round up into a collected frame and that resist any pressure from the rider's hands or that gape open the mouth. Dale Myler, of Myler Bits®, will be joining Goodnight as guest host. By switching bits and learning to ride with new tack, the training team will help solve aggravating problems.

Horse Shopping?
In addition, Goodnight’s planning a horse-buying series and will help a potential buyer through the selection process. To qualify for this incredible opportunity, you should be an adult intermediate to advanced rider who is looking for a reliable pleasure mount in the $10,000 price range. Perhaps a previous experience made you lose your confidence and realize how valuable a well-trained and bomb-proof horse is. So now you’re looking for a horse that you can take lessons and go to clinics on, possibly learn a new discipline, maybe even do some low-key showing at some point. But primarily you will use this horse to pleasure and trail ride. If you're interested in being our horse buyer, please apply using the application at http://www.horsemaster.juliegoodnight.com/apply.html, and also e-mail Julie Goodnight and tell her why you'd be the perfect horse buyer: horsemaster@juliegoodnight.com

Celebrating Half a Century/ 5-Pound Challenge Update

2009-07-17T16:38:00.002-06:00

Well, I am officially 50 years old now and really, I don’t feel a day over 49. Actually, I feel pretty good and although I have never put a lot of stock in numbers, I have to admit, the half a century mark is a little intimidating. How much time do I really have left? Is half my life gone? But then again, I could get hit by a bus tomorrow (though there aren't a lot of buses in Salida). So I guess I’ll just go on with my life as normal, with extra consideration to the fact that this second half of the century could be more important.

Fun and Memories

Most of my family, from near and far, were here over the weekend to help me celebrate my birthday and we enjoyed a splendid four days of playing, cooking, eating, drinking, laughing and talking story. My son and his three cousins were here and it was really nice to see them all together—two girls and two boys—from both ends of the country, ranging in age from 14 to 22. One day we drove up to the top of Monarch Mountain for an exquisite view from the continental divide and the next day we drove over one of the highest mountain passes in CO, Independence Pass (the picture here of the one lane road), and had a marvelous lunch in Aspen while my brother tore up Snowmass Mountain on his downhill bike.

On Sunday, my crew and a few of my oldest friends had a BD party for me and although I am not normally big on celebrating BDs (and they were all well warned of this and a little worried about how much they should/would do), I have to say, it will go down as one of my fondest memories in the first half-century of my life.

With contributions of photos and video from friends all over the country, Heidi was able to put together an incredible slide show of my life, starting with me riding ponies—through the evolution of my career. It came with a beautiful book of all the photos so I can pick it up and look at it anytime I want. Thankfully I can scratch that photo album forever off my to-do list.

After a fabulous shish kabob dinner, we watched a video montage that was so incredibly funny that it left me literally rolling on the floor, grabbing my gut, my face soaking wet with tears of laughter. My neck and abs were sore the next day from all the belly laughs!

Thank you to all the people that contributed photos and videos to the project and thanks especially to Heidi, the glue that tied it all together; to Cheryl and Lucy for their extraordinary acting and commentary in the video; to Steve for finding all those outtakes from the show (I’ll remember that Stevey); and to Brenda, for sneaking around to find all my old photos (and to Horse & Rider who conveniently wrote me a few weeks ago to ask if I had any childhood photos of me on a horse, causing me to dig through boxes of old photos). It was a wonderful and fitting present for a 50^th BD and it left me and my family with the distinct feeling that I am fortunate to have such wonderful people in my life.

Back to the 5-Pound Challenge

Although my friend Cheryl believes in celebrating your “birthday month”. A week of celebrating was plenty for me. As great as it was, I am ready to get back to work and get some riding in too. And I definitely have to get back to my second five pound challenge! I guess I am lucky that I have managed to keep off the first five pounds I lost, but I’ve made little headway on the second five pounds. I have continued to work out daily and have added a few miles to my walk/run but that just keeps me status quo. I need a little boost. Any ideas?

It’s time for an update on everyone else 5# challenge! How are you coming?? Does summer make it harder or easier to lose weight? What about you feather weights that are just trying to get more fit—how’s that coming? Rich is well into winning his second 5# challenge and he may be at the lowest weight since I’ve known him. Dang it. It’s a lot easier to do the challenge with a spouse or partner who is willing to eat well with you! How hard would it be to lose weight if you were surrounded by people that ate all the wrong things?

Enjoy the ride!

Julie

Home from the Oregon Horse Master Shoot

2009-07-16T12:19:00.003-06:00

In the whirlwind of the past three weeks, I have been scrambling from one thing to the next, starting with a clinic in CO, followed by a shoot in OR for Horse Master, then July 4^th weekend with my dad and finally home. I spent a few days scrambling to get caught up after 10 days on the road and get ready for our family reunion, which was four days of eating, drinking and celebrating. I have to say that my five-pound challenge is not going well, but I’m happy that I’ve managed to keep the first five pounds off that I had lost.

The Horse Master shoot was outside Portland, Oregon, at an extraordinary dressage barn called Tanz-Pherde (means dancing horses) http://www.tanz-pferde.com/ . We filmed in or near their new outdoor arena and were surrounded by incredible trees and forest—beautiful back drops in 360 degrees—perfect for a shoot. Plus we had use of the luxurious air-conditioned lounge hanging over the indoor arena to rest and wolf down meals at as we watched gorgeous dressage horses go through their paces. Best of all, the people at Tanz-Pherde were so helpful and generous and we thank them from the bottom of our hearts.

We filmed six episodes (and several commercials) in three days, our normal shoot schedule. These six episodes will be the last shows to run this year; our next shoot will be in September for the first shows of 2010. Incredibly, all six episodes were great, with the horses showing dramatic behavior changes and the riders understanding what they needed to do to in order to carry on. With six really good episodes “in the can” I think all of the crew would agree that one episode that really stood out was Lux and Clare and the dramatic change made in this horse.

Clare has become an outstanding rider, due to the crazy bucking temper tantrums Lux would throw when he didn’t want to work. Lux is a huge warmblood who hates to move forward and doesn’t mind fighting about it. But, as I’ve said before, the great thing about big lazy horses is that they can only buck so hard before they get lazy and quit. The key to riding horses that buck in a refusal to move forward is to ride them forward through the bucks and only let them stop when they are relaxed in the back and moving freely forward (without any pedaling from the rider). Once they figure out that bucking buys them more work and relaxing gets them less work, they’ll never buck again; at least not with you. Clare was doing an exceptional job of riding Lux through his temper tantrums and it looked as if she knew his every move. She rode well through his bucking and rearing antics, calmly and confidently, keeping her cool and not provoking Lux at all. But, in spite of all this, riding was not really what this horse’s problem was—it was far more fundamental than that.

Lux’s sordid history includes winning championships in the hunter ring as a five year old, when Clare was only ten; although he was already displaying some naughty behavior then, it wasn’t until he broke his hind leg that his behavior spiraled down. With a long recovery period, Lux went totally sound within a year, but he had become very spooky, fractious and aggressive behavior—no resemblance of the former rock star that he was. Thousands of dollars were spent on vets exams, acupuncture, chiropractic, calming supplements, new saddles, therapeutic pads, bits, shoeing and three years later, the trainers were still stumped at what they could do to resolve Lux’s fractiousness. Now a mature 16 year old, Clare sees that her beloved horse is not getting better so she pulls him out of training, thinking it’s time for a break and she turns him out to pasture in a large herd, which Lux immediately takes over as Alpha. Now, a year and a half later, six years after Lux’s injury, Clare is ready to try again to resolve his behavior and she has studied natural horsemanship and is certain that’s the answer. And she was right.

It only took a fifteen minute session in the round pen before Lux was hooked on and following me around the pen like a puppy. Of course, that was after he had jumped out once, bucked, kicked, snorted and tossed his head in defiant gestures. He was very determined to not acknowledge my presence—head up and looking outside the pen, but being fat and out of shape got the better of him and his head started dropping. Soon he was giving me great head bobs in a deliberate gesture of submission. Again, once lazy horses figure out the path of least resistance, they take it.

I showed Clare how to correct his ground manners and develop a larger perimeter of space around her so that the big Lug, uh, Lux isn’t walking all over her. Clare turned out to be an exceptional student and absorbed what happened as I round-penned the horse and made the necessary changes in her handling of Lux. My assistant trainer, T Cody, did a little more ground work with Lux and watched carefully as Clare work him to make sure Lux maintained his subordinate demeanor and respected his boundaries.

The next day Lux was still a changed horse-- respecting Clare’s authority, keeping his focus on her at all times and keeping his head down and relaxed. With a great sense of accomplishment, we wrapped-up Clare’s episode and as I was leaving the round pen to go change into clothes for the next show, I told Clare she should take advantage of the work we’d done in that round pen over last 24 hours and saddle him up and see how he rides. When I came out 10 minutes later, Clare was cantering figure 8s in the round pen, doing beautiful flying lead changes with each turn as her mother shouted with glee into her cell phone, sharing the success with Clare’s dad.

I’ve had one update from Clare, in the past three weeks and she asked an astute question and immediately put the answer to work on Lux with great success. I think Clare will do great things with this horse and I hope she’ll keep my posted on their success. It takes two to maintain this kind of change in a horse—both the horse and the handler/rider need to change their ways. With horses, it always boils down to the human stepping up to the plate and showing some leadership—either you are the boss of them, or they are the boss of you—that’s the way it works in a horse herd. Horses are much happier when there is a competent leader in charge, so that they can relax and not have to think. Have you seen this kind of change in a horse?

Sometimes you just have to break the cycle that you are in and make fundamental changes. Lux’s problem was not one that could be resolved through more training under saddle and changing his tack. It was far more fundamental than that and the answer was authoritative groundwork and establishing rules, boundaries and expectations. Remember these words Clare, “This is your Captain speaking!”

I promise to write more tomorrow.

Julie

Patches the Pony-Dealing with the Death of an Equine Friend

2009-06-24T11:09:00.001-06:00

This morning we said good-bye to an old friend. It was an absolutely beautiful morning and my friend and neighbor Cheryl got up early in anticipation of the vet’s arrival at 7:00 am. When I arrived at her place 6:30, Cheryl had Patches nicely groomed and was walking her out in the field to let Patches nibble on her favorite morsels.

As we wandered through the field, going wherever Patches led us, we chatted about the hundreds of kids Patches had taught to ride when Cheryl had her riding lesson business. We watched as Patches bit off, chewed up and spit out the grass as she nibbled while we walked. We listened and remarked at the squeaking sound of her gums rubbing together, hopelessly trying to masticate the forage.

At nearly 40 years old, Patches’ grinding teeth were long gone and Cheryl was past the point of keeping her going on Senior feed and bran mashes, which she had recently been turning up her nose at. Cheryl tried any and all foods and strategies she could think of to keep the pony eating and healthy for as long as possible. The little pony would like some for a bit, then go on a hunger strike, then like something for a while again, then stop eating again. It was getting difficult to see the pony slowly starving to death though she thought she was eating with the rest of the herd. Patches had such a precious place at Cheryl's farm--she was allowed to roam most anywhere on the property and was often the first greeter when you pulled down the driveway. The pony was the topic of discussion many times--was it time? Was she healthy? Cheryl worried and wanted to make sure she was doing the right thing--whether that was making a choice to let go or trying some new feeding ritual and recipe.

Patches was a lucky pony. Even though she worked for a living over several decades as a lesson pony, she was loved by many children and most certainly her photo adorns many refrigerators and scrap books. She was also fortunate to have an owner that gave her a comfortable retirement and one who could afford the expensive feed required to keep an old horse going.

An issue that I’ve seen coming for some time revolves around the incredible strides we humans have made to keep old horses alive long past the time they lose their teeth and would naturally die. Is this all the extra treatment for the horses or the humans? Sometimes I drive past pastures and see an old horse, nothing but a bag of bones, and wonder when and if someone will turn the owner into the animal control for neglect, even though his herd mates are fat, happy and healthy and chances are good the horse is just old, not neglected. Just because we have the ability to keep old horses alive longer, does that mean we have to? And what if the owner cannot afford the $100+ a month it would cost to sustain an aging horse, what then? Is that considered neglect to let nature take its course? Just questions to throw at the moon....

When I was a kid, the life span of a horse was considered to be 25 years and many didn’t make it that far. But now it is common to see horses in their 30s and even 40s. Don’t get me wrong, I think the advancement in health care and nutrition that has led to this longer life span is a wonderful thing and many of these horses remain useful for many more years than they would’ve back then. But I also think it is okay to let horses go when they get too old to chew grass or hay.

We have the option of humanely ending a horse’s life when it is time, but sometimes that decision is a tough one to make--whether it is age, sickness or lameness that prompts the question. Have you struggled with this decision before? When do you know it’s time?

Cheryl made the right decision to let Patches go before she got so weak she couldn’t stand or before some crises forced an emergency call to the vet in the middle of the night and a stressful euthanization. Cheryl wanted a calm and dignified death for Patches and that she got.

Cheryl said her good-byes at the barn and as the vet and I walked Patches toward her final resting place, she picked up her head and actually started trotting. Maybe she was ready to go or perhaps she was just excited to be headed toward a new place on the farm.

Patches went quickly and quietly with hardly a twitch. She was ready to go and did not fight it a bit. We laid her to rest wrapped in a warm blanket and laying in a deep bed of shavings, with a bag of carrots sprinkled on top to keep her busy on her way to horse heaven.

We’ll miss you Patches, but we know that you are in a better place.

Julie

Police Horse Update

2009-06-23T14:49:00.003-06:00

Thanks in part to all the comments they have received from many of you and others in Hawaii and beyond, the Honolulu Police Department has indicated that the horses will all be kept together and will most likely be sent to the retirement home on the Big Island. It is not official yet, since they still have to work through all the bureaucratic channels, but they have made statements that indicate that is what will happen. When we get an official word, we’ll be sure to let you know. Here's the original post and your many comments: http://juliegoodnightontheroad.blogspot.com/2009/06/police-horses-face-uncertain-future.html

On a sad note, someone tweeted to me last week that the Boston Mounted Police unit was disbanded and the horses were sent to the NYPD to go on patrol there. I am sorry for those officers that lost their partners and whose hard work had to end so abruptly. But I am glad the horses will continue their police work as long as they are able.

Hopefully the NYPD Mounted Unit is strong and not being threatened by budget cuts. If any of you have more information than the “word of mouth” info I’ve gotten on Honolulu, Boston and NYPD, be sure to let me know.

Thanks for all your support of horses and our law enforcement officers.

Julie

Photo: Sgt Deborah Wilson has headed up the Honolulu unit the past 10 years and who now is working to care for the horses and insure their future.

The Great Escape

2009-06-22T13:08:00.001-06:00

This week starts all-new episodes of Horse Master, which were filmed at a beautiful location in the South Carolina “Low Country,” where they filmed Forest Gump. Although we were filming in April, in keeping with all of our shoots so far, it was unseasonably cold and windy, so my illusions of evening walks on the beach unfortunately never became a reality.

This first episode is about a lovely young warmblood—I think he was Anglo-Trakhener—who had learned the dirty habit of ripping his nose away and running off whenever he wanted. Fortunately most horses never figure out that if they can get their body positioned directly away from you that there is absolutely nothing you can do to stop them, but “Cosmo” had figured this out. Have you ever had a horse that did this?

When a horse learns this trick, you’ve got a big problem and there’s absolutely nothing you can do to unlearn it—he’ll know this trick forever. But you can dissuade him by making him very uncomfortable when he attempts to get into position, but sometimes this takes a considerable amount of pressure—more pressure than many people are with able or willing to dish out. Depending on how much he has been rewarded for this bad behavior in the past and how often he has experienced success with this tactic, it may take a little pressure or a lot, but you always have to find the amount of pressure that motivates a horse to change. This is a very fundamental concept in training horses—or any animals (including people) for that matter.

Some of you may remember the trailer loading episode that aired recently. That horse had also learned this dirty trick (unbeknownst to us until we started filming). I had to put a chain on his nose to get better control of him and since this problem wasn’t directly related to trailer loading, I did a little schooling off-camera so that we could go on with the trailer loading. Once he realized he was not going to be able to get away from me, and that it would be very unpleasant for him if he tried, he totally gave it up and in short order he was walking right in the trailer.

In “The Great Escape,” which is airing for the first time this week, Cosmo turned and ran off when the owner longed him, simply because he didn’t want to do that and didn’t think he had to do anything he didn’t want to. As a 4 y/o, he was just being started under saddle and hadn’t really learned a work ethic yet (an important argument for not waiting TOO long to start a horse). On top of that, raised by his owners, he was quite spoiled and thought he pretty much ruled the roost. This is one reason why I probably wouldn’t buy a horse that had been raised by amateurs—chances are, they’ve been spoiled. And while I can certainly un-spoil them (pretty quickly actually), I’d prefer a horse that has been taught good manners from the beginning (or not handled at all) and a horse that has not LEARNED and had success with bad behaviors.

The funny thing is that Erika, Cosmo’s owner, is actually a good and very accomplished rider and her other horses are well-mannered and respectful of her (but she did not raise them). But for some reason, she had abdicated her authority to Cosmo and he was taking full advantage of her. Not because he is a mean or wicked horse—quite the opposite in fact—but because when there is a void of leadership, the horse will always take over.

I think Erika turned a new leaf with Cosmo after our two days together. All she needed to do was step up to the plate and show some leadership to the horse and he instantly responded.

Horses are amazing that way—if we can change the person, the horse almost always responds. Have you ever seen someone (or experienced for yourself) a situation where the human is abdicating authority to the horse? Usually a little assertiveness training is in order, and a better understanding of how horses view leadership and how dominance is created. Sometimes our human brain is our worst enemy. But if you can get the human to act like a leader, there are usually instant results. Some people come by leadership and authority naturally, others have to work it. Where do you fall into that picture?

As for the dirty trick of ripping the nose away and running off, the main prevention is to be proactive and not let him turn his nose to begin with. In fact, I’d make a horse with this habit always carry his nose slightly turned toward me, whether I was leading or longeing or doing anything else. Of course, going back and doing some groundwork with Cosmo and teaching him good ground manners would be a good start. Erika left the shoot with a copy of my video on ground manners, Lead Line Leadership, and I know she and Cosmo are on the right track now.

Enjoy the ride!

Julie

The Gaited Horse Craze

2009-06-19T11:34:00.001-06:00

Well, I am about to take the plunge and buy my first gaited horse. It’s not for me personally, but a horse for my sales program. I am strictly a regularly-gaited type horse person although I totally get the current popularity to this type of horse. For myself, I prefer the trot and canter and the athleticism that those gaits bring. But I totally get the appeal of gaited horses.

Between the influence of the Baby Boomer generation (born between 1946 and 1964) on the horse industry and the number of new riders coming into the sport (most of whom are in that age bracket), it’s no wonder the gaited horses have gotten so popular. It’s sort of like pushing the ‘easy button’. Have you tried a gaited horse? Are you sold on them or do you miss the trot?

I’ve always had a lot of requests for gaited horses in my horse sales program and the only reason I haven’t bought one before now is that it is very hard to find mature, well-trained, seasoned horses of that type that are for sale. There’s lots of youngsters on the market and the older gaited horses I found don’t meet my high standards for very broke, mannered horses. It’s getting increasingly harder to find good quarter horses in that category too, but they are much more prevalent than the gaited breeds, especially out here in the west.

Another problem with the gaited breeds is that just because a horse is bred and registered as a gaited horse, does not mean that he gaits well or gaits naturally. What many buyers of gaited horses are disappointed to discover is that a lot of gaited horses require the assistance of the rider to maintain their gait properly. Well, if you’re buying a gaited horse because you’re a beginner and you want it to be easy, this presents a problem. If the rider has the skill to assist the horse in its gaits, she’d probably be just fine riding a regularly gaited horse.

Finally I’ve found a cute little double registered TN Walker/Mountain Horse that meets my criteria for training and temperament. He is a 14 y/o black and white gelding, cute as a button, shown extensively and successfully by a young girl and trail ridden heavily over the past five years. He’s a been-there-done-that broke horse that anyone can ride and he’ll go over, under or through anything you point him at. He’s a great size too, at 14 hands. As I’ve said before, the older I get, the smaller I want my horses to be and this is a perfect size for a trail horse. I am eager to get him here, but it’ll be a few weeks before I can get him on a van.

What’s your take on gaited horses?

Enjoy the ride,

Julie

Bitting Experiment, Part 2

2009-06-16T11:51:00.001-06:00

Recently someone sent me an email asking about their horse’s training issues and she said, “I’ve had has teeth floated and his mouth checked by a vet, we even changed his bit but he’s still throwing his head. I think it’s just that he likes to throw his head.” Sure, that’s it—he likes doing that. I hear people say stuff like this all the time as if a horse’s anxious behavior can be explained by something as simple as, he just likes doing that.

If a horse is throwing his head, rooting the reins, star-gazing, opening his mouth or sticking his tongue out, there is a pretty simple explanation but it has nothing to do with him liking to do that. Once you have ruled out a physical/medical problem (which is always the first question) then you have to look at what is making the horse uncomfortable in his mouth—is it the rider or the bit or, more likely, both.

When horses are uncomfortable with the bit, it is usually a result of too much pressure on their tongues and in all of the behaviors listed above, the horse is simply trying to relieve the pressure from his tongue. Often, people think they are doing their horse a favor by putting the horse in a mild bit, like a basic snaffle, when in fact, they are putting maximum pressure on the tongue.

For our bitting experiment, our two subjects are Cari and Lakota. Cari is an experienced rider and Lakota is well trained but through the years of being used as a school horse and a therapeutic riding horse, he has become hollowed out and travels with his neck stiff and his head up too high. If you saw the first installment, you saw the before footage and the dramatic improvement he made when we switched him to the Myler Combination bit. This particular bit uses nose, chin, and poll pressure and minimizes the pressure on the tongue. Lakota was instantly better. This bit is somewhat of a miracle-maker and helps all sorts of horses relax and get comfortable and helps riders develop a better feel.

The next step in this bitting experiment is to use the Goodnight bitting system to recondition Lakota in a rounded frame, teaching him to relax his neck, drop his head and use his back and hindquarters more from a specific signal from the bit. For this, we put Lakota in my favorite bit, the Myler 33 mouthpiece on an egg-butt. This is the bit I use on my horse (both in the egg-butt if I want to ride 2-handed and with shanks if I am riding one-handed or working cattle) and it gives the maximum amount of tongue relief with the shape of the mouthpiece. You can see it briefly in the video.

Cari told me she was a little intimidated by using a new bitting system (she was on her own—I wasn’t there to help her) but was pleasantly surprised that it was not too complicated. The beauty of this system is that it teaches the horse to search for the release, which comes the instant he breaks at the poll and rounds his back. He learns self-carriage—meaning he holds himself in the frame, not leaning on the bit; so in this system he learns lightness too, while he conditions and strengthens his top line. The best feature of all about this bitting system is that the rider can mimic the feeling the horse gets from the bitting device once she is riding.

In this video, Lakota is in the bitting system for the first time and you can see him searching for where the release is. Watch for the moment when you see him totally round up and get very fluid in his body, using his hind end well and moving with a strong cadence—it’s beautiful! It’ll probably take a few more works before Lakota holds this type of frame for the whole session. I’d like to see Cari work Lakota 2-3 times a weeks in the bitting system for a few weeks and then give us another peak at his progress.

BTW- this process is thoroughly explained in my newest video, Bit Basics. In this video I work with a young filly that’s never had a bit in her mouth as well as an older rope horse who’s had his head tied down and is terribly confused about how to respond to bit pressure. Both horses make excellent progress and you can see the benefit of using this type of bitting system.

Until next time,

Julie

Training Priorities

2009-06-15T12:09:00.000-06:00

Horses are not good multi-taskers. They can really only focus on one thing at a time. That’s why you can’t pull on a cow horse all the time and expect him to hook onto the cow. If you’re pulling on his mouth, he’s thinking about that and he cannot possibly be thinking about the cow and what it’s doing and how he should move with him. Do you know what I am talking about? I see this kind of confusion in horses all the time, with or without cows in the picture.

Actually, as I age (and therefore get smarter), I have discovered that multi-tasking is not such a great thing for me either. When I had my office in my house, I was the queen of multi-tasking. Every time I was talking on the phone, I’d wander around my house starting projects. By the end of the day, I’d have about a dozen started and unfinished projects ranging from reorganizing cabinets to weeding the flower beds—and my house would be a wreck.

A few years ago, I moved my office out of the house to its own location nearby. At first I was at a loss not being able to check my email in the middle of the night, or work on the computer while Rich watched football or start working at dawn in my PJs. But it wasn’t long before I realized that the quality and quantity of my work was greatly improved when I went to the office and focused just on the task at hand, without all the distractions my home offered. And the quality of my home life improved too! Just ask Rich. Does multi-tasking work for you?

For horses, multi-tasking is pretty much an impossibility. Sometimes even a singular focus is difficult for them. One thing that I always talk about in clinics is that you can only train one thing at a time to a horse, so you have to know what your priorities are at that moment. For instance, if I am working on a prompt canter departure from the walk and my horse gives me a very good departure but takes the wrong lead, I cannot really correct him for taking the wrong lead without taking a chance that he thinks the correction is about the departure—maybe he shouldn’t have done that. Plus I have to take some responsibility for not setting him up well for the correct lead.

Here’s another example that always arises in clinics, during the ground work. We’ll be working on teaching the horse to walk beside you and behind you in a very specific place, so that he matches you step for step as you go and stop. We’ll correct the horses each time they step in front of the imaginary line that we have dictated and pretty soon, the horse starts watching you and thinking about where his proper place is and is no longer reliant on your holding him there. Then we’ll progress to the trot and at this point, lots of people will have trouble getting the horse to trot. Finally, the horse breaks into a trot, but the handler isn’t moving fast enough so that the horse ends up in front of the person; then the person turns around and shanks the horse for getting in front. That’s training two things at once (the trot departure and not getting in front) and the horse doesn’t know how to deal with that. Chances are, he learned that he was not supposed to trot at all. Have you ever made this kind of mistake in your training?

Horses learn by making associations. In other words, he makes an association between his actions and the release, reward or correction. It is only possible for him to make an association if the release/reward/correction comes within three seconds of the action—and the sooner in that three seconds, the more likely he is to make an association. The optimal time for the release or correction, according to research, is one half of one second. Wow. That’s good timing.

Horses make incorrect associations all the time, like the ones mentioned above, and they make associations on their own that we never intended them to make, like if they pin their ears and bare their teeth at feed time, you will feed them. Or if they throw their head up, they get a momentary release of pressure from their mouths. Or if they buck when you ask them to canter, you’ll stop them.

The timing of the release is the essence of good training and whatever your horse is doing at the moment you release the pressure is what you are training him to do. Unfortunately, if you have to think about what the release or correction is or whether or not your horse did the right or wrong thing, you’ve already missed the optimal time for the release or correction and you risk the horse making the wrong association.

When I was a kid and got in trouble, my mother would send me to my room to wait until my father got home, so that he could dole out the punishment. The wait was agonizingly more painful than the spanking I would get when he finally arrived—I didn’t have any trouble at all making the association between my bad actions and my father’s punishment that came hours later. But horses aren’t like that.

You should always know what your training priority is as you are teaching your horse something new or working on improving an existing skill and focus on that. Don’t change priorities in the middle of an exercise. The only thing that trumps your training priority is obedience. When a horse becomes disobedient, you should immediately change your priority and work on that—you cannot teach something new to him anyway, if he is disobeying you or not listening.

Even if you are a good multi-tasker, remember that your horse isn’t. Try to focus on one thing at a time in your training sessions, starting with the most simple thing and moving toward the complex. Keep it simple. Little by little, you’ll get there.

Enjoy the ride,

Julie

Five Pound Challenge Update

2009-06-10T08:41:00.001-06:00

It’s been a little over a month since we started the five pound challenge and I have been pleased with all the people who have joined in and/or made comments! Some of you still have a week or two to go on your personal challenge, but I look forward to hearing how you’ve done. Make sure to comment below!

I am pleased to say that I met my first five pound goal and am one pound into the second five-pound challenge. Let me know if you're up for another challenge! Keep going with us. It’s been a lot easier to have friends involved and to help cheer each other on. Even my husband has signed onto the challenge, so that has made it a little easier when faced with temptations at home.

Rich and I are on our way to a spa resort in Boulder for the next few days and I intend to collect my reward for the first five pounds while there. I also plan to do two-fers in my workout routine while at the spa. Rich has business meetings all day while we are there, so that will leave me free to workout and get some rest. After a grueling eight weeks on the road, I need a little break.

I’ve noticed that the loss of weight becomes a reward and a motivation in and of itself. With five pounds gone, I see a difference when I look in the mirror after stepping out of the shower. And my jeans are a little more comfortable. It becomes an investment that I want to protect and I want the number to grow—not stay flat. I know there will be the inevitable back-slide, but it seems like it’s easier to lose the weight again.

Thank you also for all your support with Honolulu police horses. We are continuing to increase the awareness of the plight of these horses and are very hopeful that the city of Honolulu will make the right decision and let these horses go to the retirement home that they deserve. Click here to read that blog entry>>

I look forward to reading your comments on the five pound challenge and hearing how you’ve done—for better or for worse!

Julie

Police Horses Face an Uncertain Future

2009-06-08T17:23:00.008-06:00

I’ve had the great privilege in my career to work, on several occasions, with police officers from the Honolulu Mounted Police Department. I have helped to train their officers to ride better and also to train their horses to be more responsive so that they can both do their jobs to the best of their ability. It was always an unusual experience for me, but highly enjoyable, and quite different from any other training I’ve ever done.

The officers had a level of dedication and determination unlike any other riders I’ve trained. Of course they did—they were not in the clinic for fun or personal fulfillment, in fact that was the last thing on their minds. They were very serious and focused on improving their riding and their horse’s training so that they could do their very important job better. And at the back of each officer’s mind is always the fact that their lives may be dependent on how well they ride and how well their horse responds to their requests.

For most of us, owning and riding horses is about fun; but not so with police officers. They take their job very seriously and they constantly train and drill to get better and better. The horses and police officers do crowd control—breaking up drunken brawls in parking lots after football games, keeping unruly protesters in line at demonstrations, patrolling the beaches, intervening in gang wars and the drug trade. In addition to this serious and dangerous work, the mounted unit also does ceremonial work—presiding over the funerals of slain officers, and community service—bringing the horses into the elementary schools with their anti-drug program. The officers and especially their horses are highly respected and loved by the community.

So you can imagine how stunned I was to discover that the current police chief had decided to disband the mounted unit. After years of hard work and dedication, this mounted unit had developed highly trained officers and horses and had made a significant impact on the community. I suppose that is the prerogative of the chief and I am sure he has found a way to justify it with budget cuts, but what I found most appalling was their initial intention to auction off the horses that have served the city and county of Honolulu for the last decade. This move was fuled by the city's finance department, which has tried to make the horses fit into their regulations for liquidating unwanted equipment and since no other department in the city wanted the horses, the regulations called for public auction.

Most of these horses are in the 18-19 year old range and have slaved hard each and every day to do the bidding of the HPD for the past nine years. Legally, in many jurisdictions, animals used in law enforcement are considered law enforcement officers—if you assault one, you’ll be charged with assault on a police officer. In Hawaii, it seems that these horses are considered property. Still, they've served their communities and had full careers.

Police horses are incredibly courageous and trusting—willing to walk into a 200 person drunken brawl—strictly on the assurance from his rider that it will be okay. They have been taught to trust their rider and walk into certain danger when asked. They have been hit, screamed at, had objects thrown at them by unruly citizens and have walked blindly and willingly into dangerous situations on the command of their officers. And now, if the HPS finance people have their way, these horses will wind up in uncertain homes with an undetermined future where, in their twilight years, after years of dedicated service and hard work, they’ll have to start all over in a new career and be left to an undetermined fate.

From what I've been told by my inside sources at the police department, many parties lust after these horses. The ropers want them because of their size and training, a trail ride operation wants them to carry tourists down the beach day after day, a therapeutic riding program—yet to be started-- thinks they can build a program with these horses, a group wants them to play polo on. These are not therapy, polo, roping or pleasure horses—they’re police horses; and there’s a big difference. They are finely trained and responsive and programmed for a totally different job. While anyone of these groups may be able to make these horses work for their goals, the main question is, don't these horses deserve a comfortable retirement and the security of knowing they’ll be taken good care of the rest of their days?

Believe it or not, a philanthropic citizen, with an impressive history of doing good deeds, has offered to take these horses to the Big Island of Hawaii and turn them out together on green pasture and take good care of them for the rest of their lives. She has an incredible track record of philanthropic work for humans and animals in the poorest countries. http://cdhinternational.org/ This will cost the HPD absolutely nothing; the HPD hasn't taken this offer, in spite of the numerous pleas from the police officers and the community. Apparently, the community outrage at the thought of auctioning these horses did make an impact so they agreed not to put them up for public auction but to take applications from people that want the horses instead. Perhaps that will mean there is a little accountability.

But almost all of the applications are from people that want these horses to advance their own personal agendas and in almost every case—except the philanthropist from the Big Island, the horse’s futures would be uncertain—they could end up anywhere with extended careers. And for what? A few thousand dollars maybe? Why not give these horses the dignified and secure retirement they deserve? Doesn’t the police department have an obligation to these horses?

My brother is a police officer, so I understand and highly respect the difficult and dangerous job that they do and I understand the political forces that can affect their abilities to do their jobs. I also understand how devastated these HPD officers are at the disbanding of the program they worked so hard to build and the ultimate insult that the HPD would turn its back on the four-footed partners who gave so much.

I’ve also had the pleasure of working with Disney World in their horse programs and discovered that the WDW company actually funds the retirement of its trail horses after only 5-7 years of packing guests around on trial rides. If a for-profit company can have this kind of sense of responsibility for horses used in recreation, why can’t the HPD? Should we expect less of a police department? It’s not like we’re talking about hundreds of thousands of dollars here—and their retirement would be totally funded by a kind and generous donor. Is there something I’m missing?

It is my sincere hope that the HPD will recognize the value of these animals and the risk they face if their futures are not secured. I know the officers from the disbanded unit are working hard toward this goal and are losing sleep every night with their concern for these regal horses. I hope you will join me in supporting the safe retirement of these horses with your thoughts and prayers and if you want to make a comment on my blog, I’ll make sure all the comments are received by the HPD. I’ll keep you posted on the outcome. Check out the news video, too: http://it.truveo.com/HPD-Disbanding-Horse-Patrol-Unit/id/1302796689

Julie