Northern Horse

I've been hanging around horses for around twenty years and the one thing which has always struck me is the way the women outnumber the men. Overall, it must be at least five to one, and in the english disciplines it seems to be even higher. Cattle penning seems to be one of the few areas that are as popular with men as with women.

Trail riding is another northern horse activity that seems to be equally popular with both sexes.

Still, for some reason many women seem to have better relationships with their horses than they do with the people in their lives. I've often wondered what our lives would be like if we treated each other with the same patience and consideration we apply to our four-legged friends.

Men seem to do it backwards and treat their horses the way they do their women, and you know they get about the same results. Obviously, some men are gifted with empathy and achieve miracles with their horses. Most, however, try to get their way with macho and muscle. A great example of this is the word we use for basic horse training. Safe to say it wasn't a woman who came up with the term breaking to describe the process.

The thing I like most about natural horsemanship and other schools of natural horse training is that brute force has been replaced with subtlety and sensitivity to the horse. Of course, if you want totally non-coercive training then clicker training is the way to go. Most people can't wrap their minds around it, though.

The truth is that a horse is not a machine. Whatever you accomplish with a horse is a result of communication and co-operation. The rider needs to be trained just as much as the horse does. The rider has to become sensitive enough to ask gently for whatever result they are trying for in a way that the horse will respond to willingly. When that is achieved the result can be the poetry in motion of the Lipizan stallions. They are just one example of the ultimate goal every horseman is trying to achieve.