I might have learned enough to train horses anyway, but I am convinced that one of the luckiest things I ever did in my horse career was to get a black Labrador. Labs have always been a sharp reminder of what it feels like to have an animal in my care—and to know I don’t know enough to deal with that animal correctly. People remark to me that I seem unusually sensitive and patient while dealing with riders struggling to climb the learning curve. That is because I know exactly how they feel as they try to understand and communicate with their horses.

Although I was already a fair horseman by 1966 when I brought home my first puppy, the fact that it was a new and different type of animal convinced me I needed help. So I did what had worked for me with horses: I read books about it. It worked. My first Labrador was a lifelong friend, and I have been at it ever since, reading books on training Labradors and applying what I have learned along the way.

Since I am always trying to find—and pass along—new and different ways of learning how to train horses, I thought that as a mental exercise we would talk this month about training Labs. If you don’t quite get the points I am making, just substitute the word “horses” in your mind every time I say “dogs” or “Labs.”

Job Determines Training
Once you decide how you want your animal to earn his living, a lot of decisions fall into place. My Labs, for example, are purchased with a specific goal in mind: I want them to be good hunting dogs. This means they spend a fair amount of time around humans carrying loaded guns, so they cannot jump up on humans—ever. I start training my puppies about this right away.

My puppies usually tell me just before they are going to jump up, and I make sure they run into the flat of my hand with their noses. They seem to get the idea quickly that jumping up on humans in not acceptable. I hope the analogy with horses is clear to you. Your horse outweighs you by a factor of 10:1. Make sure you teach him ground manners. An unruly horse is a danger to himself and to you. Decide how you want your animal to behave and be consistent about applying your rules.

I firmly believe that most animals want to please us, but we have to show them how to do that. Praise or punishment alone does not accomplish what you want. You need a judicious balance of these two techniques to produce a friend for life. Of course, justice should always be tempered by mercy; we will talk more about punishment and discipline in a minute.

Something was clearly wrong with Feelin’ My Oats. The 5-year-old Connemara/Welsh pony, called “Oats,” usually expressed a cheerful interest in everything, especially eating. But on the morning of September 21, 2010, the 13-hand buckskin gelding failed to come in for his grain.

“He was just standing there, real lethargic,” says his owner, Candi Hylton. Her husband, Bernard, put a halter on the pony and walked him in to the barn. Oats’ depressed demeanor suggested that he might be colicking, but he didn’t appear to be in significant pain. A quick check of his temperature revealed it was slightly elevated at 102 degrees. At first Hylton was only a little concerned about the pony, but she became alarmed when Oats stretched out to urinate---and produced a stream of dark, almost coffee-colored, urine.

Thinking quickly, she grabbed a bucket to take a sample. Then she phoned Appalachian Veterinary Services in Christiansburg, Virginia, where she also happened to have worked in the front office years earlier. The on-call veterinarian headed out right away.

Hylton and her husband had been scheduled to deliver Oats and a few other horses from their boarding and training farm to a show at the county fairgrounds that morning. Leaving the sick pony under the watchful eye of the morning barn help, she and Bernard left to deliver the other horses. She would wait anxiously for a call to her cell phone with an update.

The veterinarian who arrived, a recent graduate, immediately knew Oats was in serious trouble. Dark brown or black urine is a sign that the body is excreting debris from damaged cells. Something inside Oats’ body was breaking down and had been for some time. The veterinarian called the office and consulted with the practice owner, Kent Adams, DVM.

“I could tell it was serious from the sound of that first call,” Adams says. The veterinary team still wasn’t sure exactly what they were dealing with: In addition to the dark urine and fever, Oats was lethargic, his heart and respiratory rates were elevated, and his gums were a slightly “muddy” color, indicating that his cells might not be getting enough oxygen.

The veterinarian gave Oats a dose of Banamine to help control any pain he might be experiencing and “tubed” him because of his decreased gut sounds, scant feces on rectal palpation and loss of appetite. The hope was to address any gastrointestinal problems while he considered the diagnostic possibilities for the unusual set of clinical signs. To gather more clues, he pulled a blood sample and headed back to the office to analyze it.

The results of the blood test shocked everyone: Oats had a hematocrit (HCT) of only 14 percent. HCT is a measure of the percentage of red blood cells in the blood; the normal value is 31 to 53. A level of 14 percent is very serious and potentially life-threatening. The pony had so few red blood cells circulating in his bloodstream that his vital organs, and indeed all of his tissues, were slowly being starved of oxygen. The dark urine indicated that red blood cells, and possibly other tissues, were being destroyed inside his body. These signs, combined with Oats’ muddy gums and depressed behavior, plus a careful survey of his turnout paddock, all pointed toward one very serious diagnosis: red maple toxicosis.

Deadly leaves
Red maple toxicosis (poisoning) occurs when horses eat wilted leaves from Acer rubrum trees. Red maples, also called swamp maples or soft maples, are medium-sized trees with distinctly shaped three- to five-lobed green leaves with jagged edges, V-shaped notches between the lobes, bright red stems and silver-white undersides. The trees are native to the eastern United States, but they are planted all over the country. The leaves contain several toxins, most notably gallic acid, that can lead to the destruction of red blood cells (hemolysis). A horse who nibbles on a few fresh green leaves, which are mostly water, isn’t likely to get a toxic dose. But one to three pounds can be a fatal dose for an average adult horse, and half a pound can kill a small pony. As the moisture content of the leaves decreases, the levels of the toxic principle increases: It is generally thought that lush spring growth is less toxic than later summer or early fall leaves.

“It’s a common misconception that [red maple poisoning] happens most frequently in the mid- to late autumn, when leaves turn colors and fall from the trees,” says Adams. “But in reality, in late summer when pastures are short, downed branches are much more of a threat because of both the quantity and appeal of the green leaves. In fact, the majority of cases I see are in late summer following a thunderstorm, when a branch falls and the pastures are sparse. Horses go looking for something to chew on and find those leaves.”

The exact source of the toxicity in red maple leaves has not yet been pinned down, but the effects within the body are well documented: “The toxin attaches to hemoglobin in the red blood cells, rendering them incapable of transporting oxygen,” explains Adams. “Some of the cells rupture, releasing hemoglobin into the bloodstream. That stresses the kidneys by clogging up the blood-filtration system. Meanwhile, the liver and spleen are identifying nonfunctioning cells with damaged hemoglobin and removing them from circulation faster than they can be replaced by the bone marrow. The end result is a horse who is essentially suffocating, with extensive damage to vessel-rich organs that depend on oxygen, like the heart, lungs, brain and kidneys.”

Starved of oxygen, the organs begin to shut down, usually about 72 hours after the horse eats as little as a handful of leaves. Severe colic and laminitis from circulatory dysfunction are common complications. “The spleen can release its stores of red blood cells, but that’s only about 10 percent of the total volume, and those cells will quickly die or be destroyed just like the others,” says Adams.

There is no specific antidote or effective treatment for red maple poisoning, but supportive care, including intravenous fluids and possibly blood transfusions, may help a horse survive. Infusions of vitamin C may also help, if the problem is caught in its earliest stages. “So it comes down to, ‘Can the horse live long enough---can his kidneys and other organs remain functioning long enough---for the toxin to be used up and new blood to not be affected,’” says Adams. “Most of the time, the answer is ‘No, he can’t.’” About 70 percent of horses with red maple toxicity do not survive.

Adams relayed the grim diagnosis to Hylton, who immediately headed home from the fairgrounds, hoping Oats would still be alive when she got there. He was.

Although Oats displayed all of the classic signs of advanced red maple poisoning---and his HCT indicated that he’d eaten at least a couple of pounds of the leaves a day or more before his problem was discovered---his case was distinctly unusual in one way: “In the early stages, even before we see red urine from the hemolysis, the gut slows down, experiences marked irritation and colic sets in. It’s usually a fairly painful process,” says Adams. “So, by the time we identify what’s going on through blood work, the horse is usually in significant pain or refusing to stand.”

Oats was by no means perky, but he was still standing, drinking some and even eating small amounts of hay. Also, his gums were only slightly off in

color, not the deep brownish hue that can be more typical of the condition. Taken together, these signs suggested that he was in the early stages of toxicity or he had gotten only a relatively small dose of the toxin, contrary to his blood work.

“What was remarkable is that he wasn’t panicking and severely stressed,” says Adams. “He was clearly in some discomfort and in distress, but he was staying on his feet. He would start breathing heavily if he moved much, but if you let him stand there, he seemed to be coping very well.” This stoic nature was serving Oats well---when a horse with red maple toxicosis gets agitated and thrashes, he uses up his limited oxygen supplies that much faster and can make the situation worse.

Tough decisions
The Hyltons’ first course of action that day was to find the source of the red maple leaves Oats had eaten to protect the rest of their horses. Although the pony had been in a large pasture that morning, he’d spent the previous day in a sparse “diet” turnout area. “The maple tree was over the diet pen,” says Hylton. “And we’d had a rainstorm. Bernard found a small limb that had fallen off, and you could see where leaves were gone off of it. When Oats is in the diet pen he will literally eat anything that has a leaf.” Bernard removed the limb and searched the property for any others that may have come down.

Meanwhile, Hylton had a long discussion with Adams about treatment options. “The first thing you think of is transporting the horse to a clinic where you can do a blood transfusion,” says Adams. “But given how low his oxygen levels were, the stress of such a trip could very well have killed him.”

Adams also had doubts about the benefits a transfusion might ultimately have for the pony: “Blood transfusions in horses have limited utility because they have so many blood types---you can’t get an exact match. Plus, in cases of red maple poisoning, any blood you do put in is going to be destroyed by the same processes as long as the toxin is circulating. So you get maybe 24 hours of benefit.”

All in all, it seemed better to leave Oats where he was and keep stress to an absolute minimum. His blood results had shown that his kidneys, liver and other vital organs were still functioning, and if he didn’t move around much his respiratory rate was nearly normal. “He was a very sick horse---no doubt about it---but his body seemed to be handling the situation remarkably well at that point,” says Adams. “He seemed to be holding his own.”

The veterinarian was also reluctant to try giving Oats intravenous fluids for fear it could upset the pony’s fragile physiological balance. “You can expand their blood volume with intravenous fluid, which will lower the total [HCT] levels even further,” says Adams. “There’s always the urge to do something, but sometimes you need to step back and make sure what you do doesn’t create a bigger problem.”

After discussing all of these factors, Adams and Hylton arrived at what may seem like a startling treatment plan: They would try to control Oat’s pain and discomfort and not much else---at least for the moment. “This wasn’t a case of ‘Oh, it’s just a pony, let’s wait and see what happens,’” says Adams. “And it wasn’t a case of an owner deciding things weren’t bad enough yet to call a veterinarian. Far from it. There was intense discussion to understand all the nuances and risks before making some very difficult decisions.” Confident that Oats was comfortable and as stable as possible, Hylton remained close by to monitor the pony’s condition.

Hanging on, day by day
Oats’ condition was unchanged the next day. He remained lethargic and slightly feverish with brown urine, all indications that his blood was still under assault from the toxin. And yet he remained on his feet, eating and drinking normally. Hylton watched him nearly continuously for signs of colic or laminitis, but the pony seemed to be holding his own.

A veterinarian from the practice returned to check on Oats that morning, and on the third day, Adams himself came back out to the farm to draw another blood sample to check the gelding’s HCT level. An increase in the number would be a sign that he had turned a corner and that his blood was no longer being destroyed by the toxin or removed by the liver and spleen.

Using a portable unit to run the blood test on site, Adams had results in minutes---and they were shocking. Oats’ HCT had dropped even further, to an astonishing 9 percent. According to the textbooks, a horse with an HCT that low should be in severe distress---or dead. Yet, there stood Oats, very much alive.

Hylton and Adams had another long conversation. The risks associated with transport, transfusions or intravenous fluids were still present, perhaps even greater. And although Oats was undoubtedly getting sicker, he still didn’t seem to “need” the supportive treatments. He showed no outward signs that his condition had worsened. In fact, his urine appeared lighter in color that day, a sign that the destruction of his blood cells was diminishing.

“We decided to let things be,” Hylton says. Oats remained in his stall, kept as quiet as possible while his owner monitored his care: “I was taking his temperature and listening to his gut and heart and giving [the veterinarians] a call several times a day to let them know how he was.”

Receiving these regular reports helped support Adams’ decision to not intervene medically: “Candi is an incredibly knowledgeable and diligent horsewoman. I knew she’d notice any changes and report it immediately.”

But the day after his astonishingly low HCT, Oats began to perk up. He moved around in his stall, and his temperature and heart rate started to come down. After another day, Hylton took him for a short hand-walk outside his stall. He pulled her toward the grass and ate voraciously.

Seven days after the initial veterinary visit, Oats was rechecked and a third blood test performed. This time, the pony’s HCT was 31 percent, edging into the normal range. His liver and kidney functions were normal, and he showed no clinical signs of colic or laminitis. Oats’ body, it seemed, had powered through the worst of red maple toxicity and was well on the road to recovery.

“It’s really a remarkable case,” says Adams. “I wouldn’t have believed the recovery in light of the dramatic lab findings if I hadn’t seen it myself.”

A few weeks later Oats was turned out with the herd again, and several months later Hylton began riding him cautiously. Finally, one year after the day he was found in the field so lethargic and weak, the pony made the trip to the county fair. He has never shown any adverse effects from his ordeal.

Adams uses Oats’ story as a teaching tool in continuing-education seminars for veterinarians. “This case really highlights the complex issues you face when treating red maple poisoning and how understanding the pathology is crucial so you don’t inadvertently make the situation worse; in some cases intravenous fluids or whole blood transfusion might make things worse,” he says. “Plus, it’s nice to be able to present a case with such a good outcome. He really is a remarkable pony.”

This article first appeared in EQUUS issue #425.

You can haul your horse all year long, even in the dead of winter, as long as you do so safely. Here, I’ll first tell you how to ready your rig for winter hauling. Then I’ll go over how to help keep your equine friend comfortable when you haul him in winter conditions. Finally, I’ll give you six ways to ease trailer-loading in snow and ice.

(For my on-the-road hauling guidelines, see “Safe Travels,” The Trail Rider, January/February 2013).

Note: You may wish to sign up for USRider Equestrian Motor Plan, which covers both your towing vehicle and your trailer, and will help you find a safe place for your horse, in an emergency. (USRider is a sister company of The Trail Rider and EquiSearch.com.)

Ready Your Rig

Before you set out with your horse in tow, you need to ready your rig for winter conditions. Here’s how.

Apply reflective decals. Apply extra reflective decals on the back and sides of your trailer, so that other drivers can see your rig in poor conditions. One good source for trailer decals is Caution Horses Safety Products.

Invest in good tires. Invest in quality tires for your entire rig. Check tire pressure before every trip; comply with the manufacturer’s recommendations.

Check all lights. Recruit an assistant to help you check all lights on your towing vehicle and trailer. Replace any nonfunctioning lights.

Carry chains. Keep quality chains handy if snow and ice are significant enough to use them. Check your state’s chain requirements. Generally, if you have to chain up the drive axle of your towing vehicle, you should have chains on the trailer as well.

Top off the fuel tank. And don’t let your fuel tank get below a half-tank. If you’ll be driving in remote areas, carry extra fuel.

Top off the windshield-wiper fluid. And make sure the windshield wipers are working. Place a long-handled windshield scraper in your vehicle.

Comply with local brake laws. Every state has its own laws related to trailer brakes. To find out the laws in your state, consult AAA’s website.

Turn off the Jake brake. Engine brakes are wonderful for towing vehicles — they do a fantastic job slowing the rig to minimize brake wear under dry conditions. But a diesel engine’s compression-release engine brake (also referred to by the brand name Jacob’s brake, or Jake brake) can lead to a jackknife if used in slick road conditions, since they slow your towing vehicle first.

Sync the brakes. Make sure the trailer brakes complement the brakes of your towing vehicle. When you’re on a steep downhill in slick conditions, you might need to slow the trailer with brakes greater than your vehicle’s brakes.

Consult the manufacturer’s instructions. Generally, brakes are best set on dry, flat ground at a slow speed and need to be adjusted for the load. Position the electronic brake so you can manually engage it via the thumb control.

Turn off cruise control. If you get into a slide, the precious second or two that it takes to turn off the cruise control may doom your chances of maintaining control.

Weight your towing vehicle. If you’ll be towing an empty trailer, note that it’ll jackknife more easily than a loaded one. For better control, place concrete blocks or bags of sand into the back of your truck to add weight over the rear axle.

Pack cold-weather gear. For the horses, pack extra hay and at least 10 gallons of water (nonfrozen). For you, carry a cell phone with charger, emergency blankets, jackets, high-energy snack foods, and a thermos of hot drink, in case your towing vehicle or trailer breaks down and you need to wait roadside for help.

In-Trailer Equine Comfort

Here’s how to help keep your horse comfortable while hauling him in the winter.

Invest in quality tires for your entire rig. Check tire pressure before every trip; comply with the manufacturer’s recommendations.

Provide good-quality hay. Even in really cold weather, horses create more heat than you think they do. The best way to keep your horse warm in the trailer is to provide good-quality hay.

Watch over-blanketing. It’s easy to over-blanket your horse. Most trailers are poorly ventilated, so they tend to get very warm with body heat, even in below-freezing temperatures. A light sheet or blanket is sufficient for most horses.

Apply leg protection. Apply leg protection, such as polo wraps or shipping boots. In winter, it’s especially important to protect your horse’s precious lower legs from slips and kicks.

Increase ventilation. Humidity and condensation buildup from your horse’s breath can cause respiratory illness. Improve the indirect ventilation in your trailer to counteract this risk.

Avoid drafts. That said, make sure that there are no direct drafts hitting your horse, especially on his face and eyes. Freezing-cold temperatures with wind can result in damaged corneas from frostbite.

Monitor your horse. On the road, check your horse frequently. If there’s sweat under the blanket, he’s cooking inside. If he’s clipped and lacks natural insulation, carefully monitor him for sweat or shivering.

Trailer-Loading Tips

Here are six ways to ease trailer-loading in snow and ice.

Train your horse. Prior preparation and good training are important to make sure your horse is a good loader; if he rushes in or out, he can easily slip.

Wear good boots. Slipping, falling or breaking a limb is really a downer on your planned trip. Find good-quality boots that will keep your feet warm, protect your feet, and provide good traction.

Lay in supplies. Keep sand/shavings/salt and a broom/shovel in the trailer so that if you must load in icy conditions, you can minimize the chance of injury.

Find traction. Park so that the trailer’s ramp is positioned on the best traction you can find. Dirt is preferred, but snow is better than ice or asphalt.

Check the trailer stalls. Check the inside of the trailer. Frozen urine and manure are slippery. A fall inside the trailer can lead to serious injury and even death.

Create an inviting environment. Put fresh hay in the bags and a little grain in the manger. Open the doors and windows, so there’s plenty of light. The more inviting you make the trailer’s interior, the more likely your horse will feel confident enough to step in.

Simply put, ponying means to lead a horse alongside the horse you’re riding. On the trail, ponying comes in handy when training a new horse. As the ponied horse’s herd instinct kicks in, he’ll likely follow his leader through terrain that might otherwise seem intimidating, such as crossing water. And he’ll experience spook-inducing, wide-open country without risking a rider’s fall.

You might also wish to pony a horse carrying supplies to a campsite, a horse a child is riding for greater control, an injured horse that needs exercise to heal, or a horse whose owner has experienced an accident or injury.

In each case, you’ll need to know how to pony a horse safely — how to keep you, your horse, and the ponied horse safe. It’s a complex task to carefully ride your own horse and pay attention to another, all while holding the reins in one hand and a lead rope in the other.

But horses don’t mind the proximity, because it’s natural for them to travel at speed while close to one another. Once you know how to handle the ropes, ponying can become a natural, easy way to travel.

Here, top clinician/trainer Julie Goodnight will teach you how to pony a horse safely while avoiding common pitfalls.

(For Goodnight’s regular Q&A column, see “Ask Julie Goodnight,” The Trail Rider, January/February 2013)

Exercise Prep
Before you begin, make sure your pony horse — the saddle horse you’ll ride — is comfortable with other horses riding nearby. Your pony horse should also be easily controlled with one hand on the reins so you’ll have an extra hand to hold onto the ponied horse’s lead rope. He should be a safe, reliable mount that doesn’t spook.

Your pony horse should also calmly allow ropes to touch his legs and tail, and should drag logs without spooking.

Your ponied horse should be halter broke and lead well from the ground. To be safe, both horses must have good ground manners and know not to interact with other horses when a human is present.

What you’ll do: You’ll learn to how to handle the ponied horse’s rope, how to cue the ponied horse to move forward, how to teach the ponied horse to stay in position, and how to approach new obstacles while ponying.

What you’ll need: A saddle with a rigid tree (a flexible tree may apply pressure unevenly across your horse’s back if the ponied horse pulls) and a bridle for the horse you’ll ride; a rope halter and 12-foot lead rope for the horse you’ll pony. Wear gloves to protect your hands from rope burns if the ponied horse pulls.

Step #1. Learn the Ropes
Outfit the horses in the tack listed earlier. Position the ponied horse on the right side of your pony horse. Holding the lead rope and reins in your left hand, move to your pony horse’s left side, and mount up. As soon as you’re in the saddle, keep the reins in your left hand, but transfer the ponied horse’s lead rope to your right hand.

Note: Always hold the pony horse’s rope in a way that you can easily drop it if one horse slips or spooks — never tie or knot the two horses together.

Double the lead rope so you can easily lengthen and shorten it. When the lead rope is safely doubled, you’ll see a loop in front of your knee as your hand rests on your leg. Never wrap the lead rope around your hand; if the ponied horse pulls or bolts, you’ll likely become injured.

Note the doubled rope in Goodnight’s left hand. The rope nearest to her pinky finger is attached to the horse and lies next to the rope’s end. The rope extending from her thumb and forefinger is doubled. She’s in position, relaxed, and ready to cue her pony horse by neck reining.

Avoid holding the rope too far behind you. With this hold and without a doubled rope, too much slack allows your ponied horse to fall far behind your pony horse —precisely in kicking position. The loose rope can also tangle in your pony horse’s legs or slip under his tail, potentially causing a wreck.

Goodnight will hold this rope and rein position as long as she’s working with a young horse. By holding the rope — instead of fully dallying the rope around the saddle horn — she can cue her pony horse to move forward or back. She also ensures that the horses won’t be connected if the new pony horse spooks.

When Goodnight knows her pony horse is obeying and compliant, she’ll often half-loop the lead rope around the saddle horn. This allows her to relax her grip and hold only one piece of the rope. The rope isn’t knotted and can quickly be released from the horn.

Step #2. Go Forward

Ask your pony horse to walk on with your usual rein and leg aids. Include a voice command so that your ponied horse also hears the cue. As your pony horse moves forward, your ponied horse will feel the rope’s gentle pull. He should understand these go-forward voice and pressure cues, because he’s halter broke.

Keep the ponied horse close in at your pony horse’s hip so the horses can’t step in different directions around a trail obstacle. Photo by Heidi Nyland Melocco

If your ponied horse doesn’t follow along, don’t try to pull him forward; you don’t have enough strength, and the attempt could wrench your back or pull you off your pony horse.

Instead, stop your pony horse, and take a half-wrap on the saddle horn, holding both ends of the rope in your right hand, down against your leg. Then cue your pony horse forward, and let his body weight pull your ponied horse forward. It’s pretty easy for the ponied horse to pull against you, but he won’t pull long against the pony horse’s weight.

Caveat: To successfully pony a horse, you’ll need to have the skill and concentration to deal with two horses at once, such as asking your pony horse to slow down while asking your ponied horse to come forward. Not all riders are ready for this kind of challenge. You might forget to stop your pony horse. Or, you might get pulled off your pony horse by a spooky ponied horse. If you plan to pony a young or unseasoned horse, first practice these initial steps with calm, easygoing horses.

Keep the ponied horse close in at your pony horse’s hip so the horses can’t step in different directions around a small tree or other obstacle.

Practice walking while maintaining these lead rope and rein holds. First, walk straight ahead, then gradually add turns to the right. Turn only to the right until you’re comfortable handling the rope and you can trust your ponied horse to follow. When you turn to the right, you turn toward your ponied horse, enabling the rope to stay in position easily.

Turns to the left are tricky if the ponied horse isn’t keeping up. Before you turn, make sure your ponied horse is in the correct position; if he falls behind, the lead rope can droop, touch your pony horse’s tail, and even slide up under it.

If the lead rope droops, turn your pony horse back to the right to prevent the rope from wrapping around you; drop the rope, if necessary.

Step #3. Correct Poor Positions
If your pony horse falls behind, simply gather your fingers along the doubled rope to shorten the line, and pull him forward with a bumping action. Your ponied horse should respect this correction, because he knows how to lead on the ground,

Don’t allow your ponied horse to move forward so much that he’s in front of your knee. You won’t have enough leverage to control him, and he can start to lead “the herd” instead of naturally following your pony horse.

If your ponied horse moves too fast and is too forward, pick up your rope-holding hand and jerk it back, pointing the rope in the direction you’d like your ponied horse to be. A quick bump from the rope halter’s knot will correct your ponied horse just as it does during ground-work sessions.

Step #4. Move Out
When your ponied horse learns to follow along in formation, moving with your pony horse without needing constant corrections, begin asking both horses for gait changes. Put your horses to work as they transition from walk to trot.

Each time you cue your pony horse, use your verbal cue or a bump of the rope to spur on your ponied horse. Soon, your ponied horse will keep pace, move in step, and easily stay in position.

Julie Goodnight (www.juliegoodnight.com) lives in central Colorado, home to miles of scenic trails. She trains horses and coaches horse owners to be ready for any event, on the trail or in the performance arena. She shares her easy-to-understand lessons on her weekly RFD-TV show, Horse Master, and through appearances at clinics and horse expos held throughout the United States. She’s also the international spokesperson for the Certified Horsemanship Association (www.cha-ahse.org).

Heidi Melocco (www.wholepicture.org) is a lifelong horsewoman, equine journalist, and photographer based in Mead, Colorado.

Ever wonder what’s going on inside your horse’s head? What makes him act—and react—the way he does?

Temple Grandin has a better idea than most. She’s the celebrated animal scientist whose autism enables her to see things the way animals probably do. Her bestselling book, Animals In Translation (Scribner, 2005) teems with unique insights; the book’s subtitle is “Using the mysteries of autism to decode animal behavior.” Because of her autism, Grandin doesn’t think in words, as most of us do. She thinks in pictures. Animals, who are wordless, likely visualize their thoughts in a similar fashion. This puts Grandin in a unique position to speculate on how animals think and feel.

For this special report, we pored through Animals In Translation to discover Grandin’s most compelling observations about horses. We also spoke at length with the Colorado State University professor, herself a horse fancier who rode as a teen. We’ll share her explanations of such phenomena as why a horse’s fear is “faster” than ours; what a horse sees that we probably don’t; and why rough handling of a horse can create lifelong phobias.

We’ll also suggest how you can make the best use of Grandin’s insights in riding and handling your own horse.

Scary Pictures
We all know that, as a prey species, horses have certain hardwired behaviors designed to help keep them safe from predators. As Grandin explains it, they use emotions to “predict” the future and thereby make wise decisions.

“A healthy animal makes sound, emotion-based decisions all the time,” she observes.“He has to; otherwise he’d be dead.” For example, fear of the scent of a predator causes a prey species to run away and escape being caught.

That makes fear a basic, predominant emotion for horses. We tend to refer to a horse’s excitability or his spookiness or his level of agitation, but what it all boils down to, says Grandin, is fear, which horses and all animals experience far more vividly than we do.

“Fear is so bad for animals, I think it’s worse than pain. I always get surprised looks when I say this. If you gave most people a choice between intense pain and intense fear, they’d probably pick fear. I think that’s because humans have a lot more power to control fear than animals do.”

And that’s because, she explains, we can use our analytical faculties—courtesy of our prefrontal cortex—to understand and rationalize our fears, whereas animals cannot. All your horse knows is, “This is scary, which means I’m in danger of being killed, which means I need to get outta here.”

Another thing that “awfulizes” fear for horses is the visual nature of their thinking. Consider, if you will, how much scarier a picture of Freddy Krueger is than a verbal description of him. The image has much more impact, right?

By the same token, “a visual memory of a scary thing is more frightening than a verbal memory,” says Grandin. “When it comes to managing their fear, animals and autistic people are at a big disadvantage because they have to rely on pictures.”

Though social in their own way, horses are less controlled by social stimuli than dogs are, thus less likely to do something purely to please you.

Fast Fear, Slow Fear
Another way horses and other animals differ from us is that they tend to experience fear “faster” than we do. There are two ways fear is experienced in the brain, depending on whether it takes what Grandin calls the “high road” or the “low road.” The high road gives you “slow fear” because its physical path through the brain is longer than the low road.

“On the high road,” explains the scientist, “a scary stimulus, such as the sight of a snake in your path, comes in through the senses and goes to the thalamus, located deep inside the brain. The thalamus directs it up to the cortex, at the top of the brain, for analysis. When it gets there the cortex decides that what you’re looking at is a snake, then sends this information—it’s a snake!—back down to the amygdala, and you feel afraid. The whole process takes 24 milliseconds.”

By contrast, the low road, or fast-fear system, takes half the time. You see a snake in your path, and the sensory data goes straight from your thalamus over to your amygdala, avoiding the cortex. The whole process takes 12 milliseconds. Nature gave us both systems because you can’t get hyper speed and accuracy in the same system.

“The fast road is quick and dirty,” says Grandin. “You see something long, thin, and dark in your path, and your amygdala screams, ‘It’s a snake!’ Twelve milliseconds later your cortex has the second opinion: either, ‘It’s definitely a snake!’ or, ‘It’s just a stick.’ The reason fast fear can be so fast is that accuracy is sacrificed for speed.”

High road fear is also conscious (you know what you’re afraid of); low road fear is not—“you’re running away before you know what you’re running away from,” says Grandin.

Your horse, as you might have guessed, depends primarily on low-road, fast fear, so he’s going to respond to something scary much more quickly than you would. That’s often what catches you off guard.

Grandin says the inborn temperament of animals also plays a role, as some species and breeds are even more sensitive to fear than others. She calls these more fear- prone animals, which tend to be finer boned than less sensitive types, “fear monsters.” Arabian horses in general fall into this category; as a result, they tend to have a low tolerance for rough handling.

“Some trainers swear rough handling is effective. But what’s interesting about these trainers is that if you check out their horses, they’re all big-boned, low-fear horses who habituate fast to treatment that would crush a high-strung animal”—such as an Arabian. (For you Arabian lovers, note that Grandin also observes that high fear and high sensitivity tend to correlate with intelligence; the greater “awareness” of such horses makes them highly trainable—by the right methods.)

Gear up
You will need a rope, cotton or leather gloves, and a roping dummy. The dummy can be as simple a set of horns in a bale of hay or as elaborate as a mechanical dummy that’s pulled behind a horse or ATV. Some mechanical dummies have adjustable heights and sets of interchangeable horns. Use gloves to protect your hands from rope burns. (They allow you to pull the rope tight and quickly adjust slack.) Choosing a rope is a matter of personal preference, though. Most heading ropes are 30 feet long and made of nylon or a nylon/poly blend.

Set the scenario
Dummy roping allows you to practice several scenarios in a short amount of time, such as varying distances and angles. Always approach the dummy from the left side, and always use your right arm to swing the rope (even if you are left-handed). You never want to throw across your body. Start with a distance of 10 or 12 feet and then vary it throughout the practice.

Get in the loop
Take your rope in your left hand and build a set of three coils; make a loop from the remaining rope. As a general rule, Sartain recommends making the loop twice as large as the horns, and make sure the slack between your loop and coils is sufficient. There should be enough to hold the coils in your left hand and freely extend you right arm and loop away from your body.

Take a swing
Tuck the loop under your right arm, and get into position. As you move toward the dummy, untuck the looped rope and grip it one to two feet back from the eye splice (the hondo). Using your entire right arm, swing the rope counter-clockwise just above your head.

Follow through
Release the rope toward the right horn and follow through with your right hand in a downward motion, across the horns from right to left. Legal head catches include roping around the horns, around the neck, or around the neck and either horn (half head). As soon as the rope catches, pull your slack. Remove the rope by hand, and go again! Sartain notes that the biggest mistake novices make is releasing too early, which causes the rope to go to the right. If it goes to the left, you’re hanging on too long.

Photos © Stacey Nedrow-Wigmore for Practical Horseman.

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January 5, 2013—Each year there's one day where the 12 riders in George's clinic spend the session working without stirrups on the flat. Today was that day. And while the riders probably don't look forward to it, the spectators certainly do because George will inevitably get on at least one horse and show everyone how it's done. He proved that he's still "got it" but riding not just one but TWO horses for about half an hour each with no stirrups and very few breaks. And he still makes it look easy.

George spent the session reinforcing his previous lessons about the need to make a horse calm, forward and above all, straight. He utilized the same lateral exercises and transitions to increase the horses' lateral and longitudinal suppleness. And he emphasized the connection from the rider's inside leg to her outside hand. Without stirrups, the riders were able to "rivet" their seat bones to their horses' backs, requiring that the horses accept the aids and allowing them to come round, working from behind and elevated in front.

While the sessions today weren't as long as those on previous days, there were lots of training gems and useful nuggets of insight that George shared. Here are some of my favorites:

• Keep your horse's tempo the same in turns as it is on the straightaway.
• The shoulder-in helps you get your horse in front of your leg. From there, just let him go forward into a lengthening. Don't push.
• The horse doesn't determine the rein length. YOU determine the rein length.
• When you work without stirrups your horse must accept your seat and show submission.
• A horse doesn't work properly if he escapes in the neck.
• A horse is put on the bit from leg to hand—not pulling, sawing or with draw reins. Ride from back to front, and feel the horse's hind legs "dance"!
• Alternating 10 strides or so of shoulder-in with 10 strides of haunches in will bring the horse's hind legs under and encourages him to start to collect.
• The lateral work you ask of your horse doesn't have to be perfect for a dressage class. It just needs to gymnasticize the horse.
• Too much neck bend is a habit in our country. Keep the head and neck straight and bend the horse in his middle using your inside leg.
• With jumpers, I don't do a lot of transitions from canter to trot. I do canter–walk because if I'm jumping, I don't want to ask them to shorten and instead have them break into a trot.
• Don't do the same exercise too long even if it's not perfect. Drilling isn't the answer.
• I never start with flying changes--I want the horse to first listen to my leg in counter-canter.
• The hand can't "hang" on the horse's mouth. I don't care how hard you have to half-halt. You have to release.
• These are show horses. We need fresh, competitive horses. I don't want them perfect. But they need to accept the contact.
• When collecting, you want to ask the horse to go slower without losing the activity. Watch with your legs that the horse's tempo stays the same.
• With a horse who is built downhill, the simplest way to transfer the weight to his hind end is by elevating his poll. The second way is to engage the hind leg, and the third way is to do both together.
• Riding without stirrups allows you to better feel your horse's balance.
• When doing downward transitions, think of "stretching your spine." A stretched spine "rivets" the seat to the horse's back.
• Lengthening allows a stretching of the horse's topline.
• Let the horse "roll" around the bit. Don't pull him down.
• A half-pass is just haunches-in on a diagonal.
• Your inside rein is the flexing, suppling rein. Your outside hand needs to be steady.
• What you teach your horse, he may try to use against you. For example, he may use shoulder-in to try to evade the contact or throw in a flying change just before a jump.
• The contact should be straight from elbow to bit, supple and definite. If that's not happening, I take with my hand and close my leg.
• It's tempting to roughen the hand when a horse stiffens. What's important is the give.
• In half-halt, your hands should move backward and upward toward your stomach, not toward the pommel of the saddle.
• Temper is always wrong because temper is too strong.
• A horse chewing the bit and foaming at the mouth is a sign of suppleness and relaxation.
• Impulsion is the mother of equitation. Without impulsion, you can do nothing with the horse.
• Relaxation on a horse is not slack. You're still watching and listening to your horse.
• Your first aid is the inside leg, just behind the girth. It is more dominant than the outside leg aid.
• Your outside hand regulates impulsion and straightness and is your dominant rein. The inside rein gets the horse's jaw to relax. Don't think outside rein without inside leg.
• Successive reverse turns (turning into the wall) gets horses supple and turning.
• Only the horse's head is flexed in the direction of travel. Not the neck.
• If a horse breaks into a canter instead of extending the trot, it's a backward resistance.
• Short reins and soft arm, not long reins and stiff arm.
• Don't make the shoulder-in at the canter for too long. It's very taxing on the horse. Maybe ask for only 10 strides at a time.
• What's interesting about give and take is the give. Good riders give when the horse gives; great riders give just before.
• Working in counter-canter teaches collection.
• Turning a horse's head displaces his haunches. Leg-yield is the first stage. There is no bend in leg-yield.
• If a horse stiffens in the transitions, repeat until he gives.
• Save the sharper bit for jumping. Use a plain snaffle for flatwork.

And my favorite:

• Schooling a horse is playing. It's play with boundaries.

This wraps up our coverage of the clinic for this year. I leave you to watch the Sunday riding sessions, featuring course work, on www.usefnetwork.com as I had to get home. You can be sure, though, that despite the temperatures hovering around freezing here in Maryland, I'll be working my horse (and myself) on a lot of the exercises George introduced to these talented riders and horses. I hope you have been inspired as well.

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January 4, 2013—George Morris often says that he's forgotten more than most of us know about riding. He's probably right, so it's no wonder that an all-star lineup of top trainers, riders, owners and Olympians have been gathering to watch George teach this week: Katie and Henri Prudent, Melanie Smith Taylor, Debbie Stephens, Karen Healey, Tori Colvin and Dr. Betsee Parker to name a few. It is a reminder of what a fantastic learning opportunity this annual clinic is, and spectators are finally catching on. There have been at least a hundred audience members each day—more than have attended in the past. It's good to see.

Today's riding sessions echoed the lessons from the past two days with George reinforcing the importance of the horse accepting the contact and the riders keeping their hands elevated to elevate the poll and let the horses come round. The exercises George set up, from cavalletti to bending lines of jumps, set up the horses to be suppled both laterally and longitudinally through changes of bend and long and short striding between fences.

You can watch the video on demand at www.usefnetwork.com in order to see the various exercises, but here are a couple of important points George made during the sessions:

• There isn't just one correct way to ask a horse to do something.
• Running martingales must not bee too tight. The running martingale is a safety device for the rider and should not be adjusted so short that it puts pressure on the bars of the horse's mouth. The rings should come up nearly to the withers when held perpendicular to the ground.
• Ask the horse to go forward out of the corner when jumping a line or combination, even if the striding is short. Going forward allows you to shorten as necessary.
• If something is difficult it's good. If it's easy it won't teach you much.
• When the going gets tough, the rider needs to get tough but not abusive or rough. (Or, When adversity strikes, stay cool, calm and determined with no emotion.)
• It's not always comfortable. If it is, something is wrong.
• Riders must carry their hands, particularly on low-headed horses to elevate the poll and get him round. Carrying your hands also affects your position.
• If you horse poops while you are jumping, you need to go forward.
• You're always schooling or unschooling a horse.
• If you want a certain striding between fences, you need to do it in the air, not in the last stride.
• When teaching a horse to jump water, get in a defensive position, keep the contact and attack. Be ready to go to the stick if needed. Get your horse in front of your leg, but do not run.
• If in doubt, override to water.
• Doing canter–walk and walk–canter transitions with a set number of strides (e.g., every eight strides)  gives discipline to the canter.
• Think of a half-halt as picking up a heavy rock with both hands.
• Don't always walk your horse and immediately drop the reins. He'll learn to use it against you. Instead, kee the contact for a few strides and then let it out if you want to give your horse a break.
• Avoid drilling. Don't get obsessive about something. That's how you break a horse physically and mentally.
• LET the horse learn. Trust that he'll learn and sort it out.
• If a horse drifts to or between fences he avoids having to collect or shorten.
• Start simple and get progressively more complex.
• Weight in the rider's heel helps hold the stirrup in place.
• The distance to a fence doesn't matter as much as what you do with it.

Birdies & Threads: Deep Straightening
After lunch, the riders had another session with Dr. Deb Bennett, this one on "deep straightening." This was more of a metaphysical discussion than practical, and Dr. Deb was up front that some have thought her philosophy—based on the teachings of classical equitation and legendary "horse whisperers" such as Bill Dorrance and Buck Brannaman—was considered to be "out there," but she thought it was important to discuss. She began by explaining that metaphors are a teaching tool that helps students see things that are real but invisible. The metaphors in this case were the birdie and the thread.

The birdie is the leading edge of your horse's attention--his desires. It is also the deepest feeling. The "Law of Birdie" is that if the horse's body and his "birdie" (what he desires) are separated, the horse will exhibit signs of distress and dangerous behaviors. A horse can only be 100 percent OK on the inside when he has his birdie with him. He is then centered within himself. When the rider's birdie and the horse's birdie are flying together, there is harmony. Resistance is turmoil/disharmony. In other words, the more you try to muscle the horse, the more guilty you are of tearing your horse from his birdie. You are not the boss at any time: You are the teacher, the master, but you don't have more power than he does.

Dr. Deb went on to explain that birdie-body separation puts your horse in fear that they are going to die. If you are responsible for that separation, your horse thinks YOU are trying to kill him. And animals are hardwired to try to survive.

This is where the thread comes in. The thread is a stream of energy that can be shaped, pulled or projected. For example, you take your horse out of the barn, tack him up and walk him down the road for a ride. He gets only so far before you hear his breathing and he begins to balk. His birdie is back in the stall, which is where he would prefer to be. The thread is the distance between where your horse's birdie is located and where he balked. You have two options: get the birdie to come to you or go back to the birdie. To work through this balkyness, you envision a fall line where your horse has become "not OK," circle your horse and face the direction you want to go and ask your horse to stand. Do not let him look back to the barn--or to his birdie. If he looks around, refocus his attention. Once his birdie has been called up, his feet will come loose and he will move forward toward the goal. A smack with a whip will force the birdie up, but Dr. Deb prefers to have the rider deflect the issue instead.

The same principle works when you're in an arena and your horse decides there are ghosts in an area of the ring. Ride parallel to the "fall line," the farthest point in which he's comfortable and circle in both directions to allow your horse to see into the "ghost area" of the ring with each eye. Cross the fall line a little and then leave. Go in farther and then leave. Allowing your horse to cross back across your fall line after venturing into the scary part of the arena is his reward. Challenge him but don't make him think that it will go on forever.

While this concept is a bit difficult to process, the bottom line is that you want to get your relationship with your horse to where he would rather be with you than anyone else. If you'd like to learn more about this, visit Dr. Deb Bennett's website at www.equinestudies.org.

No Hoof, No Horse
Finally, the riders met with farrier Dean Pearson who taught the riders a little bit about the anatomy of the hoof capsule, what is normal and what needs further investigation. On the practical front, he taught the riders how to remove a loose shoe if necessary. Claudia Billups was the only rider who was brave enough to volunteer herself and her horse Armageddon to try this. She donned farrier chaps and learned how to support her horse's front foot between her knees to free up her hands to use tools. She started with the rasp to release the clinches where the nails come out of the wall. Trying to remove a shoe or nails without releasing the clinches will cause damage to the horse's hoof wall. She then used a crease nail puller to remove each nail individually. The crease nail puller is also gentle, not putting torque on the hoof capsule as pressure is applied. If she was unable to remove a nail with the crease nail puller, a pull off would be used to put tension on the hoof capsule to loosen nails.

If the shoe was pulled off cleanly, it's possible for the rider to nail it back to the hoof using the existing nail tracks. Your farrier can show you how to properly do this in a pinch if you need to get the shoe back on but cannot get your farrier there immediately. A basic essential farrier tool kit includes a rasp, pull-offs, crease nail pullers and a hammer.

Tune in at www.usefnetwork.com tomorrow beginning around 8 a.m. for flatwork without stirrups. After lunch, Dr. Deb will give her final presentation, True Collection: Loin Coiling and Raising the Base of the Neck.

The 2013 George Morris Horsemastership Training Session is presented by the U.S. Hunter Jumper Association and Adequan and supported by Practical Horseman magazine, SmartPak and Equestrian Sport Productions.