Horse Information - Aussie Horsemen

A couple of years back, Shane and I were out trail-riding a couple of coltsthat we’d just freshly started, giving them trail time and generally enjoying the scenery.We love to get the youngsters out and about as soon as possible, usually on their 3rd or 4thride, to explore the greater environment, move some cows around and generally expand theirconfidence and acceptance of their new rider.

It had been a particularly nice ride on a typical Queensland afternoon and as we topped thehill behind the house and began coming down the other side, we stopped to take in theglorious golden afternoon. Being a nice clear afternoon, we could see and hear all along thevalley. As we started down the hill once more, we heard the sound of hoof beats racing upthe road. Looking down the valley road we noticed sure enough, a little red colt (and bythat I mean a youngster) boring hell for leather up the road with a lead rope flappingbehind him like a long scarf. Not far behind him was a guy on a motorbike and bringing upthe rear was a car we recognized as belonging to one of our neighbors.

As we rode down the hill, we watched with some interest as the trio sped past our gate andon down the road a little way and out of sight. By this time we were back at the arena againand comparing notes about how well the colts went on the ride and thinking of other things.Our neighbors antics slipped from our minds until about 30 mins later when we heard thesound of an approaching vehicle. Shane and I both looked out of the stables to see ourneighbor racing up the drive in a cloud of dust.

“Okay…what’s happened now?” I wondered, as he got closer. We often get asked by theneighbors for help with horses, so this was pretty much what I was expecting.

The car crunched to a stop right in front of us, the car window was wound down and ourneighbor stuck his head abruptly out the window.

“You go and catch him will ya.” he told us. “We’ve got him in a paddock across the road. Wecan’t do a thing with him. I’ll come back and get him later.” And with that he was off downthe drive again.

Shane and I looked at each other, shrugged and Shane went off to grab a halter.

As we walked down the track we could see the little horse in the paddock across the road,still with the halter on and lead rope dragging. He was pretty still now and everyone hadleft so it was just him and us. He was only about 18 months old, a Thoroughbred destined fora racing career (our neighbor breeds and trains race horses). He looked pretty shaken up bythe whole experience and we took a few moments to let him settle and get used to us. As hewas, there was no way he was letting anyone near him.

As soon as we were able to get near enough to him, we could see that he’d had the halter onfor some time. Probably most of his life by the looks of it. It was well worn into itselfand had rubbed into the colt's nose to the point that as his head grew and the halter didn’tgive, it had worn a mark across his nose.

Now, Shane and I have a few horsemanship skills up our sleeve and some experience, but evenso, it took us nearly two hours to actually catch him in that 5 acre paddock. We didn’t wantto just catch him physically, so there was no cornering him, or grabbing him by the halteretc … we knew that if we were to truly help this little guy, we wanted to get it right fromthe start. He had a huge personal space so it took a while to even be able to get near himand our approach was critical to gaining his acceptance. We made sure we could rub him andhave him accept us a little in our approach before we went near his head. He was too clueyfor that anyway. Any attempts to grab the halter would have resulted in him spooking andtaking off again and any rapport we had built would have been gone in an instant.

When we finally did catch him and he was just barely okay with it (it was going to take sometime for him to be happy to be caught) Shane got our halter on him and gave him a nice rubto strengthen the connection. He wasn’t able to undo the old halter though as it was so worninto place. So, he had to take it over the colt’s ears, which went down well, but he managedit without too much ado.

Little did we know that the fun was just beginning. We were directly across the road fromhome, so literally metres from our place, however we wanted to get him up to the yards wherewe could secure him and spend some time with him. To do so we had to get him about 400metres … that’s all!

It was pretty clear from catching him that the colt hadn’t had a lot of handling. Wesuspected that he may not lead too well either. However we soon found that he didn’t lead atall. Given the time and the right tools (a round yard or smaller safe area would have beennice) we would have spent some time on this, however we really needed to get him home. Ifanyone had tried to lead him traditionally (by pulling on the lead rope) this little guywould have felt the pressure on the death spot, pull backed, or worse reared up and flippedover. As it was, even a slight amount pressure would have him running backward at full speedtrying to get away from the halter that was grabbing his head. This little guy was seriousand about as wild as they come.

Shane worked on getting him going forward by driving him so he could stay behind the driveline and get the colt moving forward without pulling. This took a bit of doing and when hedid go forward he was so claustrophobic about Shane being along side that he shot forwardand ran into the end of the lead rope … which meant he felt pressure on his head again andflipped out. Even our long rope was too short for this little guy. He was so scared ofsomeone in his space that his personal space area was huge. It took all of Shane’s timing,feel and release to work the rope and the horse’s body position so that he didn’t keeprunning into pressure like a pin-ball and panicking.

It soon became clear that leading him home wasn’t going to be possible and there was no wayShane was going to manhandle him and make him more scared. He was flat out keeping him onthe end of the rope and did not want to be using strength on the little horse which wouldhave only reinforced his bad thoughts of humans.

So … Shane set out to get him home as softly and with as little fear and reaction aspossible. Desensitizing and confidence building time would come later … once we got him homesafe.

With a series of fantastic moves and incredible timing, Shane got the colt going in theright direction, showing him the open door as much as possible and going with what ever thelittle horse gave him … sometimes forward but most often backwards and sideways with a lotof rearing and flipping thrown in. This little guy was serious. Being on the lead rope wasjust too claustrophobic for him and he truly felt the need to flee. Shane worked hard togive him release as long as he was heading in the general direction of home. If you’ve everseen Shane’s Halter Training DVD you’ll know this was not how he would have liked thesituation to be.

As we approached the 12’ gateway it became clear that this was not going to be anywhere neara big enough space to get him through safely unless he was headed positively in onedirection. I went ahead and opened the gate (we didn’t want to stop him once we got himmoving), ran across the road and also opened our gate and got out of the way for Shane andthe colt to pass through.

Going pretty quickly backward now but at least in a straight line, the colt and then Shanemade it through the gate and onto the road. Shane still had to negotiate a deep ditch, adrain and a Telstra manhole with a metal fence around it…all of which had seemedinsignificant until we had to get this little horse safely past them … before he got throughour gate, which he managed to do.

I got the gates closed as Shane and the colt made their way up the hill toward home, withfrequent episodes that looked like those Marlin fishing shows you see on TV plus a few otherantics that put Shane’s incredible rope skills to the test. He managed it though and I wenton ahead and opened the rest of the gates so they had a clear passage.

By now the girls at home (our resident working students and team) had all come out to seewhat was going on and found quite a spectacle to see. As we watched them make their waycloser to home I wondered how Shane was going to get the colt through the narrow gates andlanes around the stables and yards to get the colt safely tucked away.

Manage it he did, although I suspect that at the end he felt like he’d gone 10 rounds withMike Tyson. With one last rush, the colt was through the last gate, into his yard and as lslid the bar across Shane rubbed him down and indicated to me that he’d like a cool drink.He’d stay and spend some time hanging out with the colt, letting him cool down and relaxbefore he took the halter off.

What a trip that’d been! All up we’d been gone for 2 ½ hours … just getting the colt acrossthe road and into his yard had taken 45 mins! But … he was unharmed, unscratched andhopefully not too scared. He’d had his first lesson in Release Focus Training and going tocomfort. Maybe humans weren’t so bad after all.

We later found out about the events leading up to Carrot, as we called him, coming to us.Apparently he’d not been handled very much, however with the farrier coming to shoe someother horses, the decision was made to get his feet done too. He’d never been tied up beforeor had his feet done, so when both happened to him he panicked, jumped the fence and took ofdown the road.

The little colt spent a couple of weeks with us, getting to know humans and trusting them.Building his confidence and rapport with us. Shane taught him to lead and tie up and in theend his personality started to show as his curiosity evolved and his fear diminished. Heseemed to enjoy spending time with Shane … he was totally relaxed and happy. He became adifferent horse. Later on he came back to us along with a few other stable mates, for Shaneto start under saddle. After a bit of a shaky start he was now on track and with a greatstart to his future career.

I reckon you’re doing well in the horse industry when horses start finding their way to youall by themselves!

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