[Heavenly Jumper]

So today we went to the next step in Tiff's hobble training. She readily gives each foot when it is looped in the rope, she leads by each hoof calmly and if she's got one foot tied with a tail dragging...she doesn't wig out if she steps on the rope with the other foot.

I took a cotton lead rope with no snap (darn thing busted!) and I doubled it over leaving me with a 'U' in one hand and two free ends in the other. I put the middle of that on her far leg, twisted the rope 4 or 5 times and stuck the free ends through the 'U' that had become a loop.

The first 5 minutes were completely uneventful. Shuffle, graze, shuffle, graze, shuffle, graze. (I kept thinking, "aren't you going to care?") The first step she took was so cute...she felt the tension and held her foot up as though I wanted to clean it. haha.

Then, she decided that this walk & shuffle business was just too danged hard. First, she went every so gently to her knees and then plopped down like a beached whale to continue on grazing like that. Whatever works I guess. She didn't look upset, just unimpressed.

Oh to the next step then, real hobbles! Yay Tiffany!

[idlewild]

She actually laid down to graze?? LOL, silly girl!!

Isn't it so nice when they just accept it without a fight and figure it out right away? Hehe, when I first put hobbles on my horse he couldn't figure out how to go forward, he just kept backing up slowly to get to new grazing, lol. Took a few days for him to figure out how to do the shuffle walk.

[ridetolive]

why are you hobbling her? (for my ignorant knowledge haha)

[luckydragon]

Originally Posted by idlewild

She actually laid down to graze?? LOL, silly girl!!

Isn't it so nice when they just accept it without a fight and figure it out right away? Hehe, when I first put hobbles on my horse he couldn't figure out how to go forward, he just kept backing up slowly to get to new grazing, lol. Took a few days for him to figure out how to do the shuffle walk.

That was really funny!

Both my horses figured it out pretty quickly. Vicktory even figured out how to jump. Dragon just shuffled around except when he wanted to cross the ditch! He could travel a long way though...

[endurgirl]

She's just using hobbles as a step in her training. It is beneficial for a horse not to f.reak out when they realize that they can't move their legs like normal.

[Heavenly Jumper]

Originally Posted by ridetolive

why are you hobbling her? (for my ignorant knowledge haha)

Well, the reason I am teaching her now is:

- I am only able to do ground training things with her at the moment. The more I can do to get her ready to ride, the better. My husband is away and I live in a place that if I got hurt, no one would find me. Too dangerous.

- I like to turn the horses out in the 'yard grass' daily when I am outside and hobble training will allow me to do that with her much more easily. She's a hussy and will take off to visit the stallion down the street.

- I appreciate hobble training in general for lots of reasons. The main one is that a hobble trained horse does not thrash when tangled up. Panic is what causes the majority of 'tangle' injuries. It is a useful skill for any horse to have. For instance, when out trail riding we once had to stop to help another horse and rider. I had to dismount and we had no safe place to tie the horses. I was on a hobble tied horse, so I took the hobbles off my saddle and put them on right there. No worries about the horse taking off and we were able to help the down rider...

This same horse had an incident where her legs were caught up in a hose that was in the pasture (to fill troughs) and she just laid there hog tied...knocking on the trough to make noise so someone would come get her. A horse that was not hobble trained would much more likely have panicked and gotten hurt. Glad I looked outside of the barn to see what that darn knocking noise was. It was her big head bonking the trough like a gong. haha!

[Tymacs Girl]

Congrats Heather!! Glad that you're one step closer to your ultimate goal!!! So happy for you!

[hermonine]

Too cute! If she can't figure out how to move and eat might as well lay down and do it lol.

Originally Posted by Heavenly Jumper

Well, the reason I am teaching her now is:

- I am only able to do ground training things with her at the moment. The more I can do to get her ready to ride, the better. My husband is away and I live in a place that if I got hurt, no one would find me. Too dangerous.

- I like to turn the horses out in the 'yard grass' daily when I am outside and hobble training will allow me to do that with her much more easily. She's a hussy and will take off to visit the stallion down the street.

- I appreciate hobble training in general for lots of reasons. The main one is that a hobble trained horse does not thrash when tangled up. Panic is what causes the majority of 'tangle' injuries. It is a useful skill for any horse to have. For instance, when out trail riding we once had to stop to help another horse and rider. I had to dismount and we had no safe place to tie the horses. I was on a hobble tied horse, so I took the hobbles off my saddle and put them on right there. No worries about the horse taking off and we were able to help the down rider...

This same horse had an incident where her legs were caught up in a hose that was in the pasture (to fill troughs) and she just laid there hog tied...knocking on the trough to make noise so someone would come get her. A horse that was not hobble trained would much more likely have panicked and gotten hurt. Glad I looked outside of the barn to see what that darn knocking noise was. It was her big head bonking the trough like a gong. haha!

I have been wanting to learn hobble training due to that too. Do you know any good books or videos that can teach me? It seems like it could be dangerous if you don't learn the right way.

[Heavenly Jumper]

Originally Posted by hermonine

I have been wanting to learn hobble training due to that too. Do you know any good books or videos that can teach me? It seems like it could be dangerous if you don't learn the right way.

Here are a couple good websites

(my fave)

http://www.rwedie.com/hobbles.html

Another one -

http://www.gaitedhorses.net/Articles/Hobble/hobble.html

video and gear kit -

http://www.huckleberryslineshack.com/video4.htm

[Nixxy373]

Lmao! I'm glad it was uneventful but I wish you'd gotten some "beached whale" pictures! I can only image what that looked like. Good like with the real hobbles