Lesson in Manners
When my daughter was a junior in high school, she and I got into the horse breaking business. We would take in horses which people weren’t able to ride. A horse might buck when a person tried to ride it, or it might try to bite the rider when they were around it. Another common problem was running away with its rider when the rider would try to stop the horse. Some horses were simply hard to catch. Other horses would refuse to have a bit put in their mouth or wouldn’t stand for a saddle to be put on it. We would retrain the horses by teaching them new habits and eliminating the old ones.
I worked at a regular job that required me to be gone from home each week so I would spend time with the horses and my daughter on the weekends. I would set up a series of training exercises for my daughter to use on each horse and she would work with the horses every day after school putting them through their exercises. She would spend a minimum of one hour a day with each horse.
I returned home one Friday afternoon after being gone for five days on business and saw my daughter and her girlfriend Sheila, who lives across the road, with a new horse that had been delivered that afternoon.
The owner of this particular horse had bought it for his 12 year old daughter to learn to barrel race on. From the beginning the horse had been hard for the girl to mount. It would not stand still for her when she tried to get on. She rode every weekend and usually at least one evening during the week.
About two months after the owner bought the horse he noticed that she wasn’t riding as often and ask her why. The girl said that the horse kept trying to bite her and kick at her when she tried to saddle him. It wasn’t long after that the horse had bucked her off when she tried to run the barrels.
The owner had heard about the work that my daughter and I had done with horses through a friend of his who we had done some work for. The owner called me and I agreed to come and look at the horse and watch his daughter work with it.
After meeting with the owner and his daughter and watching her interact with the horse I explained to the owner that the horse had learned that if he bullied the rider that the rider would be hesitate to make the horse do anything it didn’t want to for fear of the horse retaliating by kicking or bucking.
The owner agreed to have the horse delivered to our farm where my daughter and I would work with the horse for 30 days at which time his daughter would come out and work with the horse with us supervising for another 30 days.
That afternoon when I arrived home I noticed there was a strange car in the driveway with two high school boys in letterman’s jackets leaning against it watching my daughter and her girl friend try to work with the horse. They were offering bits of encouragement to the girls every time the horse would attack them.
The horse was tied to the fence with a lead rope. Every time my daughter tried to walk up to it, the horse would rear up on its hind legs, biting at my daughter while striking at her with both front feet. It would also spin around and kick out with it hind feet every time my daughter or Sheila tried to get next to the horse.
I walked over to the fence and asked my daughter, “What’s going on?”
“This horse is crazy. It won’t let me get close to it. It’s been fighting with us every since the owner dropped it off. I can’t even untie the rope because he comes after me if I get too close. He bit Sheila on the arm when she got too close.”
I asked Sheila if she was ok. She showed me where the teeth had scraped the skin.
I told my daughter that the horse had to learn who was in charge and that this type of behavior wouldn’t be tolerated. The first thing we need to do is establish that we are in charge not the horse.
I climbed through the fence into the corral and ask my daughter to hand me a long rope that was lying next to the fence. I threw a length of rope over the horse’s neck. I had Sheila get the end of the rope and throw it back to me in front of the horse. I then tied a loop in the end of the rope and threaded the other end of the rope through the loop and pulled it tight so I had a slip knot around the horse’s neck.
I had my daughter distract the horse so I could slip up beside it and make another loop with the rope and slide it over its nose. Once I had the loop over the horse’s nose I pulled it tight and told my daughter “Untie the horse and let me have it.”
“Dad what are you going to do?” she asked.
“The horse has to learn that we are in charge so I am going to take control by making him do what I want him to do. I am going to get him down on the ground and sit on his neck and talk to him until he realizes that I am in charge. Just step back and let me have the horse and stay out of the way.”
“But Dad your suit,” my daughter exclaimed.
I had forgotten that I was still in my work cloths which consisted of a suit and tie. At that point I couldn’t stop what I was doing, so I told her “Untie the horse and let’s get on with it. I’ll worry about my clothes later.”
Sheila untied the lead rope from the fence as I held the horse’s head away from her. The instant the lead rope went slack the horse jumped and tried to run. The rope was around my hip and I anchored down pulling the horse to a stop.
When the horse hit the end of the rope he began to fight, rearing up and pulling backward trying to get away from the rope on his nose.
The harder he pulled against the rope the tighter it closed down on his nose shutting the air off to his lungs.
He kept fighting pulling backward dragging me across the corral but I couldn’t let go of the rope. I was holding one end of the rope in my left hand and then it was wrapped around my hip and then wrapped around my right arm and it was pulled so tight I wouldn’t have been able to let loose of it even if I had wanted to.
The horse had two options; either quit fighting or run out of air. It seemed like we had been fighting for a half hour but I knew it had only been a few of minutes. I was beginning to think that my 165 lbs. was not enough to take down a 1200 lb. horse. I knew it would only take one mistake on my part and the horse would win the tug of war between us. If the horse decided to run toward the rope instead of pulling away I would be run over because I was too tired move out of the way
All of a sudden the horse reared up and went over backward landing on his back with all four feet pawing the air. As he started going over I ran toward him and wrapped the rope around his front legs pulling him over on his side. Once the horse was on his side I dropped the rope and jumped astraddle the horse’s neck right behind his head. As I sat down on his neck and held his head to the ground I began to loosen the loops that are around his nose and neck.
Once he had air he proceeded to start kicking and thrashing, trying to get up but with my weight on his neck he wasn’t able to raise his head so he couldn’t get his legs under him to stand up.
I began talking to the horse in a quiet voice. I told him that we didn’t tolerate bad manners and he was going to have to change his attitude.
The horse didn’t understand what I was saying of course but it was the manner in which I said it. The quiet voice and calm attitude finally got him to stop kicking and thrashing about.
I sat on his neck for 10 minutes just talking nonsense to him while he lay there quietly shaking.
Once he had calmed down I got to my feet and stepped away from him. The horse just lay there on the ground not sure what he was supposed to do. I picked up the rope and flicked it to get him to his feet.
He stood there trembling as I reached up and rubbed my hands alongside his face and around his ears still talking to him softly saying sweet nothings. He stood quietly and let me rub around his mouth. Then I open his mouth and checked his teeth. I then stepped back about 10 feet and tugged on the rope. The horse walked quietly up and stood and let me rub his face again.
I explained to my daughter, “What I did was teach the horse we were in charge and we wouldn’t tolerate him misbehaving. I took his ability to control the situation away by forcing him to do what I wanted to do. Normally I wouldn’t use such extreme measures but in this horse’s case it was the only way to get through to him that we were in charge before he hurt someone. At some time in this horse’s life he found he could act up and scare people and they would leave him alone. Now we have to change his way of thinking.”
I told her, “Working with him is like working with a child. Every time you ask him to do something no matter how small you are to make sure he follows through with it. He will test you, but you are the one in charge. When he does what you want be sure to tell him how good he is doing. Horses like praise just the same as people and they respond to it. Before long you will find that he will do anything you ask just to please you. Horses, just like people have to know what is expected of them so they can function on a day to day basis.”
I then handed her the rope and told her “Take the horse to the barn and put a saddle on him. Then work him on a lunge line for an hour. Work him both directions and watch his leads.”
I turned and was walking to the house when the two boys came up to me and introduced themselves.
They said “We’ve never seen anyone beat up a horse like that before. That was impressive!”
I just looked at them for a minute and then said, “Just remember what you saw today if you ever plan on taking my daughter out on a date.”
I never saw either one of those young men again.
The End
I really like the ending. I don't have any daughters, but my niece's husband confessed that when he first dated my niece when she was about 15 he feared my brother. Instead, my brother greeted him warmly and took him out in the garage to show him his cars. She married another man after college, divorced, and then remarried this lucky guy, her high school sweetheart. With her two daughters from her first marriage and their daughter, he tells me he has his hands full when guys come dating.
The story would be much better if you stated that you had experience prior to your seemingly spontaneous treatment of the horse. Somehow, you learn how to control a horse that way. It would be nice if you are experimenting to see if your idea would work rather than acting like you knew what you are doing and just showing off for the kids.
The story could also use some editing because of the way it is written changes in the middle. This could easily be done. Perhaps your daughter could edit the tale and improve it?
A wicked Cajun Fairy named Robes Pierre entered the impenetrable Magical doll land of Sha Bebe. Queen Faustina, the ruler of the doll land, thought she had destroyed him, but he's back! Will the doll land survive his evil ways?
