I read an article the other day in Western Horseman magazine about the training philosophy of a professional trainer and cowboy, Chris Littlefield, in which he stressed the importance of versatility.
"Versatility," he says, "is the cornerstone of my programme. I like to train horses that aren't specialised for one event, but instead are able to perform in a variety of competitions.
"A cowboy once told me, a real cowboy should be able to do it all – ride, rope, shoe horses, train horses, work cattle and fix fences. I feel the same way about a good horse; he should have well-developed foundation skills, no matter what the task at hand."
Littlefield then goes on to describe his training approach, emphasising that it is important for a horse's mind, that the horse gets out of his stall and out of the arena: "Along with exposing them, I can't stress enough how important it is to give your horse as many jobs as possible. By doing a job, a horse gets a sense of accomplishment and begins to understand the reason you taught him to go left, right, stop and go."
This convinced me to try out some of the exercises he recommends in the article. I attached a rope to a cavaletti pole in our arena and, after introducing them to the rope and pole from the ground, started pulling the pole around from both my horses, Nina and De la Rey. Their reaction to this was quite different, but, for me, equally telling. Nina, old hand that she is, just took a look at the pole and went on her usual, workmanlike way. "Been there, done that" was her attitude.
De la Rey, on the other hand, is young. He needed to take a good sniff at both the rope and the pole that has suddenly become "alive". After dragging the pole around for a while, I dropped the rope on the ground and praised him. I know this is an anthropomorphism, but what the hell; he behaved as if we had conquered this thing. He even took the rope, where it was bound around the pole, in his mouth and picked it up.
With both horses, it was as if they had a renewed interest in what we are doing for the rest of their training sessions.
Giving a horse a purpose, making him see the point, so to speak, seems to be a recurring theme with quite a few trainers of working horses. Former champion reiner, Al Dunning, says for example, that riding out into the desert is an integral part of his training programme for young and experienced horses: "... I'll circle around bushes, drag a log, ride over a few obstacles and through ditches. Anything new to keep a horse interested."
In Afrikaans the expression for a horse that has seen it all, is balanced and comfortable with carrying his rider in any situation, is "deurgery". I think especially us city folk need to pay more attention to this aspect of our horses' education.
