Tying a horse for a long time

[DressageGeek "Ribbon Ho"]

Fiona - I agree! More formally stated:

Aunt Esther, when tieing your horse to the trailer, is it more appropriate to be carrying your Louis Vitton handbag to the port a potty? And when you leave your horse standing tied for hours in the stall aisles, should you be sporting the Hermes bag when gossiping in the tack room? Thanking you in advance.

[Trakehners2000]

Just FYI...Piaffe at liberty is not hard to teach, and is actually usually more correct than undersaddle.....
Before he was ridden, I ground drove my horse, always had some treats in my pocket.... One day when asking for something else...he offered piaffe.... so I was quick to reward him, and it became a cue...at a very young age....I agree with Kyra K. if they offer it...reward it, you might need it someday... so that is what I did....Turns out he is a natural with piaffe.

So, for some time, we would do a few steps in hand, and reward with treats...this went on for a long time...proably two years. It was just a fun thing we asked him to do and he enjoyed and got free carrots/mints/cookies...whatever...

Then came the day it transfered to under saddle, same thing, asked for a few steps here and there and gave rewards...

One day, about two years ago, we were having a bitterly cold winter, so all the work we were doing was at liberty....just to see if he'd do it, I played with the piaffe cue with just a halter/lead on him while he walked in a circle around me....Wow, he did, so I rewarded him, we repeated this several times, as he was really having fun with it and so was I.....he was very keyed onto me, so I pulled the halter and lead off and asked again...and for sure...he offered it....that is also the winter he learned about passage...same way...halter and lead on a cold day and I asked for trot / piaffe / trot / piaffe, and wahla...passage and a bunch of treats for him....he loves passage, so much so that we are leaving it alone for awhile!!!!!! Everytime I'd half halt I was getting passage....so it is in there.....we just don't ask for it much right now...he is only six.....so I'm just happy to know it is in the tool bag for later....
Teaching some of these things is simply teaching your horse that there is a right answer...and a reward for it.....once they know there is a way to please you, and a right answer....there is a great path of communication open...the greatest things 'trick' training gave to me & my horse were 1. open communication lines faster 2. gave us a lot to work on while he was growing and 3. he learned to learn.

God Bless~
~*~Choose thy Love, Love thy Choice~*~

[egontoast]

Aunt Esther, when tieing your horse to the trailer, is it more appropriate to be carrying your Louis Vitton handbag to the port a potty? And when you leave your horse standing tied for hours in the stall aisles, should you be sporting the Hermes bag when gossiping in the tack room? Thanking you in advance.

oooo, good question!.

ps the website is interesting. I am going to order a beanbag chair and a lava lamp for each stall.

[NoDQhere]

take a gander here!

http://www.imagineahorse.com/ImagineSubPortal/CircensicDressage.htm

GRRRR!! What makes me mad is that these knuckleheads always have to call what they are doing, DRESSAGE. Pleease, do what you want, but come up with your own "name" and stop hanging on the coattails of real dressage!!

Oh, we do teach all our horses to tie. It's a good thing for a horse to know.

[PoliticallyIncorrect]

I know I came off as rather mean spirited, it was too prove a point to people who bully others for having a different viewpoint. I had quite a few people Email and PM me with a thank you too, so its not just me that feels the same few always gang up on anyone who doesn’t see it the way they do.

Point two began after point one, when I was challenged on my claims of my horses being able to handle surroundings almost unthinkable for the ones I was arguing with, and I was accused of endangered recklessness for being able to ride my horses to Burger King. I hate Burger King by the way…

I believe the video clips made it more than clear, just how socialized my horses are. My horses can do what I say they can do…And I owe it all to great trainers who shared their life’s work with me.

For the record, its ok to disagree. Its OK if you dont feel comfortable doing certain things with your horses. If you have fear your horse will have fear… It is not OK to force your viewpoint on others.

Some people will tell you things in good faith, because that is what they believe or all they know. . Others just want you to agree with whatever they believe or they not being able to do something, feel no one else can either.

Learn all you can, and do the best you can for your horses. They didnt choose to be in your barn. No different than children it is our responsibility to make sure they are prepared for the world….

That being said I leave this thread with these words.

Dressage is not what you think it is, or what I think it is.

According the Masters it is an Art Form.

Two people can never create the exact same Art…Even if they are both abstract artists, or minimalists or whatever....

What one person considers art or Dressage you may not, but don’t forget Competition Dressage is relatively new.

After the Court Schools fell out of favor the CIRCUS was the only place one could see Dressage. There were no competitons. Dressage as we know it today owes much to the Circus and has its roots deeply planted in Circensic Equitation. Never forget those One Tempes as well as other things you wish to train your horse to do were at one time exclusively Circus Movements.

Times change, people change but horses remain the same. They are reflections of ourselves and their kindness and nobility is not too be taken for granted.

You please the judge, exhibition riders please the crowd. Doesn’t make either of you right or wrong-AS LONG AS THE HORSES BEST INTEREST ARE IN YOUR HEART….


As long as he is Emotionally, Mentally and Physically ready to do what you require and you have the tact to communicate what you are requesting of him...THEN EVEN A RANCH/TRAIL horse is a Dressage horse. He has been prepared and is confident in doing what it is you request of him.

To me that is what Dressage is…Again its perfectly OK with me if you disagree, or you like Competing….

.There is nothing about teaching your horse to do fun stuff that will keep him from being a Grand Prix Horse. It might even be fun for them to do something different. If you choose another form of ground work that’s fine, don’t begrudge someone else the joy they find in whatever they choose.

Take what is good from each method and leave the rest on the plate. I certainly hope there are horses in Heaven. Because all the great masters agreed on ONE THING for sure.

That one lifetime is not enough to learn all there is to learn about horses.

Do not follow in their footsteps, seek what they sought. How sad those men would be to know we are doing or trying to do exactly what they did then. Why do you think they wrote it all down. Certainly not wealth and fame is useless to dead people. I think they were trying to give us a head start they didn’t have.

I do believe if the Classical Masters were alive today, they would train very differently. From Baucher to Oliveira to Fillis to whoever. Their ideas and beliefs changed through their life. Horsemanship, much like reality is not static.

With each horse and each experience we grow, its those bad days and tough horses that make us better trainers/communicators.

“Herbermann points out that "it takes an enormous amount of adequate experience, often requiring years of study, in order to even begin to recognize the details which differentiate right from wrong or better aspects from less good ones. " What I think he means by this is that one lifetime is not enough time to discover the "right" way to train a horse. Rather as he suggests we must "build our work on the hard-fought ground won by past generations of dedicated riders."—Cathy Morelli


If you do choose to listen to someone exclusively, please find a GRAND PRIX trainer to follow.

To those of you bullies out there…beware or I might come back out of lurk-dom!

Do carry on…

Now I going back to lurking and learning…

Sincerely,

PI

[fiona]

I know I came off as rather mean spirited, it was too prove a point to people who bully others for having a different viewpoint.
Which is a pity because you are probably interesting as oppose to what you showed us. You didn't have to be mean spirited to make your point it would have been more effective, and a darn sight easier to read if you'd taken a different approach.

I hate Burger King by the way…
Thank Goodness for that! It really worried me that you thought that the drive thro' was a legitimate place go eat.

[egontoast]

I'm not buying the- I was meanspirited to make a point with bullies.- Sabine is not a bully she just disagreed with people who are not used to having people challenge them. You , on the other hand are a bully, telling people to'shut up' and that they 'need a man ' or are mentally ill and so on because they disagree with you....Can't be too good for business.

[slc2]

No, Politically Correct, I'm not buying it either. It's an excuse for acting like an a**hole.

Moderators, why is it OK for Politically Incorrect to insult people, call them names, say they're mentally ill, etc?

[egontoast]

I don't think it's an issue for the moderators. I think it's good that the moderators rarely get involved with this stuff. We have"Ignore", if necessary.

That said, if you have a complaint , you should send it to the moderators rather than posting it here. It's not like they are actually reading this stuff, poor things.

[siegi b.]

I have this vision of PI sitting astride her steed with a milkshake in one hand and a large order of fries in the other as the horse lowers itself onto a huge beanbag chair. Ahh, the visual is so powerful!

Once PI has stuffed her face, the steed gets up and performs 200 perfect piaffe steps, follwed by an immediate canter pirouette around the dog's water dish, all without spilling a drop of the milkshake!! The raw power of this brings on completely new emotions.... This is round-pen performance at its finest! The spectators have gathered around waving their lava lamps in silent awe....

But the piece de resistance comes when PI takes a huge swallow from her shake, slides of her steed, and commands him to lie down and roll over. AAAAHHHHHHH... the crowd is mesmerized. But wait, what is she doing now? No, it can't be! The spectators go crazy, some faint from all the excitement... PI and her mighty steed who is still on his back, are playing PATTY CAKES!!!! The lava lamps are swinging like mad and the crowd is howling in appreciation of this incredible performance. Patty Cakes - a FIRST in dressage!

[MyReality]

I actually think some of what PI's last post has some value. And I say the following not to be disagreeable or be offensive, but just an opinion. Not that I'm a great educator by the way... I'm a nobody in the grand scheme of things, and I say many of the things I do in defence of my friends and mentors, who are indeed professionals working their asses off.

I just want to say the circus dressage, I HAVE seen a person try it at my barn... because it looks so, you know fricking impressive. My point is, this is not real dressage, and you're hindering the real development of a horse and a rider if dressage is actually what you intend to do. BUT... if you think, hey let's do some tricks for fun! Or like PI say, I want my horses to be very very well socialised, and work off the ground perfectly, my horses work at movie sets etc., totally different story.

That certain individual at my barn who teaches her horse how to piaffe and spanish walk, she doesn't even ride him on the aids ever even in working gaits. When to a dressage clinic, being shred to pieces and boy was she furious. This is not dressage, this is up side down dressage, that is my point. High school movements are demonstration of progressive atheletic development and continuous elevation of the forehand. So if you claim your horse can do levade, you better be able to *ride* him in all collected gaits and all movements that comes before levade, if not, sorry, that's not levade that you've done. It is important to make that distinction, because you want to see the vision, the essence of this exercise.

I'm worried to see, see I can make my horse rear and trot in the same spot, oh I am doing dressage and let me show you how it's done. I hope that's not the case.

And to give the circus dressage people some credit, there are plenty of current dressage competitors commit the same crime of doing up side down dressage. This is a heated debate and very relevant to the development of this sport, welfare of horses and even breeding. but let's not discuss it here.

I shall shut up now.