Training Tip: Horses for Courses

Just like people, horses’ attitudes and abilities vary from one individual to the other. Some horses are more naturally talented at a certain task than others. Sometimes the hardest thing for people to realize is that not every horse suits every course. For example, I breed reining and cow horses, but not every horse I breed wants to be a reining or cow horse. Some of them want to be barrel racers and others want to do team penning and still others want to be trail mounts. Just because a horse is bred to do a certain job doesn’t mean that individual wants to do that job. Your task is to find a course that fits the horse.

Horses are a million times happier in their partnership with you and performing their jobs if they like what they’re doing. A horse that loves the challenge of working cattle on a ranch probably wouldn’t be well-suited at performing a dressage test. A horse that dreams of jumping fences isn’t going to be happy doing a reining pattern. People are the same way. If you like crunching numbers and analyzing problems, you probably wouldn’t be happy teaching an art class.